The Art of Aging
Growing old gracefully is a far-cry from the octos squash league in Raanana. Writes David Bloch: "The players are all well past eighty, with two proudly into their nineties … They're still hitting, chasing, lunging and wheezing their way through rallies that would exhaust players half their age. If you want a precedent for longevity, here it is: ninety-year-olds setting the bar for octogenarians … players stride onto the court with total hip replacements and insist that the titanium has improved their backhand."
Sharon Bacher adds that it is not only by keeping our bodies and minds fit and healthy that we live longer and age gracefully but that we are social beings who need friends. Bezalel Katz, now 101, fought in the Red Army during World War II, was critically wounded, and moments before being declared dead in the morgue, came back to life. His entire family perished in the Holocaust, but he chose life. Since then, he has created thousands of artworks, including paintings he continues to produce today in the nursing home where he resides.
In the same positive spirit Jackie Beecham Kyram writes how Linda Glazer rather than celebrate her 80th birthday by opening a bottle of champagne or working through a calorific-heavy birthday cake, wanted to feel useful at 80, continuing her long tradition as someone who contributed to society. So she invited 25 family and friends to volunteer with her at Leket, the national food bank that provides meals for more than 300,000 people a week, who live below the poverty level.
The aftermath of two years of war in Israel, and three years of the Covid pandemic, has left a hunger for travel overseas. Ben Novis and his three daughters went on a bus with descendants of his grandfather's neighbors to Shaduva, Lithuania, returning to the shtetl his relatives had come from, 84 years after the town's last Jews were shot, to mark the opening of the Lost Shtetl Museum. Wrote Novis, "The trip was memorable and allowed us to learn about our roots in Lithuania and about the life of the Jews which ended so tragically, but which in a way continues today in Israel and in the diaspora".
Persecution of the Jews has haunted us for thousands of years causing us to wander all over the globe. Marc Chimowitz describes the anti-Semitism he encountered growing up in Gatooma, a small, remote town in Southern Rhodesia.
Shlomo Liberman went on a cruise through the Panama Canal visiting Caribbean cities. A few Crypto Jews who had converted to Christianity to avoid the Spanish Inquisition settled on the Panama isthmus in the 16th century. In the 19th and 20th centuries many Sephardic Jews immigrated to Panama City. Today there are 25,000 Jews, the majority of them Halabi (originally from Aleppo in Syria). The city now boasts 40 kosher establishments and 5 synagogues.
You too can relax totally on the seas - ESRA is offering a MANO cruise on a luxury boat to the Greek Islands.
David Broza hiked the East End viewing it "through the lens of Jewish history — a story written in stone, brick, sweat, song, and stubborn survival. Hidden inside the grounds of Queen Mary University of London, lies one of the most evocative places in Jewish London: the Nuevo Sephardi Cemetery … a 300-year-old resting place of London's Sephardi Jews. Grand slabs lie cracked and worn, Hebrew inscriptions fade into lichen ... Rabbis, traders, community leaders and children who fled Spain, Portugal and Holland rest here. To stand in a university campus surrounded by centuries of Jewish history is surreal."
There is also travel to Israel from abroad. For Joanna Glazer, the designer of ESRA Magazine who lives in South Africa, it was her first time in Israel. She felt like the whole country had taken a deep, collective breath and was exhaling after holding its breath for too long. It was three days after the hostages had been released, the air was charged — emotional, raw, and full of relief. In Afula she floated sky high in the hot air balloon; she swopped sky for water at Gan Hashlosha where she swam in the pools; in Jerusalem she explored the tunnels under the Old City, wandered through Machneh Yehuda Market, and watched the Sound and Light show at the Tower of David; next day she floated in the Dead Sea; visited Masada and was swept up by the 2,000 year-old-history of the mass suicide; spent three blissful days in Eilat snorkeling and swimming with the dolphins; a day in Tel Aviv lunching at Sarona; and a day volunteering at Leket celebrating her mother-in-law's 80th birthday.
Our war with Iran and Hamas left its mark on us. Israelis are now trying to breathe and different endeavors have sprung up to help us cope: Ya'ara is a social food forest, where ecological restoration and emotional rehabilitation go hand in hand. Rooted in sustainable agricultural principles, the forest is a living testament to the resilience of nature and the human spirit. A powerful tool, says Britt Sevitt, is our breath. "It is with us 24/7 and deeply connects us to our soul." She describes breathing exercises we can do; since October 7 she has worked with survivors of the Nova music festival, bereaved families, and soldiers on the battlefield. The Koby Mandell Foundation for bereaved mothers who lost children on October 7 and during the Iron Swords war, helps mothers find comfort, connection and renewed strength through shared experiences by visiting natural landscapes. Koach Eitan's Lifeline Program pairs survivors and caregivers with new families facing brain injury, offering guidance, emotional support, and family events. They support injured soldiers, stroke and brain injury survivors, and terror victims.
Relish Nitzan Krivine's Hannukah and Christmas recipes. Try renowned photographer David Silverman's wines that he imports, especially his favorite Chenin Blancs.
Legal articles, books to read, jokes to laugh at, poems to read, and plenty ESRA activities, outings and lectures you can enjoy. Also read about ESRA's impressive work in the educational field, and above all become an active volunteer in an ESRA project.