Traditions

[deird_lj]

We celebrated Passover last night.
(Yes, I said Passover. No, my family hasn't suddenly converted to Judaism. No, Passover isn't supposed to be for another month. Yes, we're very weird. Moving on...)

It's very different now that we've got the boys. For one thing, the order was kind of skewed. Sort of along the lines of "Caleb needs his nappy changed - can we do the Afikomen bit now?" and we all flip forward three pages, do that bit, and then flip back to where we're supposed to be up to...

And now that they can talk, I have officially resigned my post as the "youngest". (The youngest being responsible for asking a whole bunch of questions - and even though Alex was there last year, he couldn't ask questions, so I still did.) This year, Alex had been carefully practicing, so that whenever he was supposed to ask something, he'd say "Pa, why?" ...and we'd all interpret this, correctly, to be "why do we eat these bitter herbs..."

Caleb still can't grasp the idea of questions, but he had been taught how to say "hooray!" and wave his arms excitedly. So whenever we were doing "hallelujah"s, he'd chime in with another "hooray!"

Also, instead of reading the Passover story from Exodus, we read it from a picture book, and the whole thing became much more once-upon-a-time-y.

Overall? Much more chaotic - and I wouldn't change it for the world.

Comments

[a2zmom.livejournal.com]

Was the festive meal Pesadecka? (ie, no flour of any kind?)

And yeah, kind of weird. We just started buying our Passover supplies.

[deird1]

I'm not sure - do you put flour in Matzah? I'm pretty certain there wasn't any yeast or self-raising flour, though.

[a2zmom.livejournal.com]

You're allowed matzoh, but nothing else that contains wheat, barley, spelt, oats and rye. Traditionally Eastern European Jews also refuse to eat corn (including any corn products like corn syrup).

[deird1]

Well, in that case, I think so.

Our main meal was lamb (obviously), potatoes, vegies, and salad.

[a2zmom.livejournal.com]

Sounds delicious. I can't wait for our sedar.

[the-starshadow.livejournal.com]

Being Buddhist and part Thai, I have no idea about this whole Passover thing. Thais tend to celebrate feasts "whenever we can find a suitable excuse". Which is why a 98% Buddhist nation still celebrates Christmas... :P

[deird1]

Have you seen the appallingly dreadful Ten Commandments movie? You know: plagues of locusts, parting the sea, big slabs of rock with commandments all over it?

The whole getting-out-of-Egypt-by-using-lots-of-plagues-and-sea-parting thing is what Passover celebrates. Kinda.

[the-starshadow.livejournal.com]

Oh nono, I know why it's there..... I just dunno what it involves...

[deird1]

Well, you light candles, and eat lamb, and there's a whole bunch of stuff that you read out of a book, and you drink an enormous amount of wine, and it's... kind of complicated and hard to explain...