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gardens NISAN/IYYAR 5773 | APRIL 2013

Spreading peace & joy: Allentown woman shares African violets By Aaron Berger Special to HAKOL Susan Shmookler has an African violet in nearly every room of her home. On June 2, she will give a talk about them as part of the adult education program for Temple Shirat Shalom, of which she is a member. Shmookler’s friend, Bev Volk, is directly responsible for getting her started growing African violets. Shmookler loved to needlepoint, but had to stop due to arthritis. Volk, who has always had a green thumb, introduced her to violets. “I was wowed by them; their great colors and great blooms. Each one had its own personality. Bev became my planting mentor,” Shmookler said. Her own violet collection grew to a point where her husband said it was either him or the plants; fortunately, he’ still there. African violets are hybrids and can be found all over the world. They are dropdead gorgeous with magnificent tones and a new violet can be grown using the leaf of an already existing one. Place the leaf in a little water; it will grow roots and eventually become a new plant. “It is unknown what the new plant will look like,” Shmookler said. “It will not necessarily have the same colors as the parent. This is unusual among houseplants that it can grow new ‘babies.’ At any given time I have a variety of [these] babies in my home.” Some of the various colors include

blood red violets with white lines on the edges, tri-colored violets with medium pink and raspberry edges, and evergreen forest violets, which have been known to be used in space shuttle missions. “I try to get to know my violets and other plants … their growth habits and blooming periods,” Shmookler said. “The violets lift my spirits, which is why I have so many in my home. I also never sell them; I give them as gifts, which is why many of my friends have violets in their homes now. I used to give them to nursing home residents, too, when I [also] did therapy with greyhounds. I think giving people the violets helps spread peace and joy into the world because they know I planted them myself.” African violets are not challenging to maintain. “They are comfortable where you are comfortable,” Shmookler said. “Indirect lighting is fine, and it does not necessarily have to be sunlight. They should be watered once a week, and puddles in the saucers [or] pots should be avoided. During the day, their surrounding temperature should be 70 degrees, and 60 degrees at night.” Space will be limited for Shmookler’s June talk because her home is so full of plants. Those who attend may even get a peek at her “eldest” violet, which is between 15 and 20 years old. Watch the TSS website, www. templeshiratshalom.org, for further details.

Coming soon... SENIOR LIFE SPECIAL SECTION July/August 2013 HAKOL Contact DIANE McKEE 610-515-1391 hakolads@jflv.org to advertise

2 APRIL 2013 | HAKOL LEHIGH VALLEY | HOMES & GARDENS

Gardening:

weather or not

By Judith Rodwin Special to HAKOL Spring must be right around the corner. I know that because just like last year, it is the middle of March, that time between Purim and Passover and the migratory ducks have stopped by. This year there are four iridescent green-winged teal (or common teal) gliding around on the pond. Also, once again, it is snowing while earlier this week it was warm enough to work outside in just a sweatshirt. I do love the contrasts this time of year provides, especially the sight of crocuses in the snow. This rapidly changing weather reminds me of one of the most important lessons of gardening. As Bert Large, the quirky, rotund entrepreneur of the British TV show “Doc Martin” says in his Cornwall accent, “ya gotta go with the flow.” Our ancestors, agrarian souls that they were, acknowledged the significance of weather to our very existence. They tied it inextricably to the love of G-d and obedience to the commandments. The seminal daily prayer, the k’riat sh’ma taken from Deuteronomy 11: 1321 says “… then I will favor your land with rain at the proper season -- rain in the autumn and rain in the spring -and you will have an ample harvest of grain and wine and oil …” In this, Judaism is not unique. A charming little book, “Gardens of the Spirit” by Roni Jay describes the spiritual motivation behind the physical design of gardens of various cultures. The development of the Taoists of China (140 B.C.E.) who brought us feng shui, inspired the Japanese Zen gardens. Persian gardens (700 C.E.) spread east and west and always incorporated precious water “… with the aim of re-creating the garden of Paradise described in the Koran.” Medieval European gardens were designed not to mimic Paradise but to provide sacred and safe respite

from a tumultuous and unpredictable world. Their walled spaces, found in monasteries and church yards, were orderly, structured by strong geometric designs created by paths and planted with medicinal herbs and fruit bearing trees. Charlemagne, emperor of the Holy Roman Empire, in the early ninth century decreed it so. We still seek sustenance from our gardens, both physical and spiritual. Yet, more prosaically, we cannot beat the weather. I have several pages of plans for this year’s garden but the incontrovertible reality of our weather has caused me to alter and re-prioritize. This past season’s weather included Hurricane Sandy which blew over five large trees right into my perennial garden. What had been a semi-shade plan is no longer relevant. “Going with the flow,” I am revising the plan to a full sun plan, thanks to the weather. The garden offers new possibilities. Roses, I can grow roses now and other sun-loving plants. I love English gardens and our Lehigh Valley weather is very similar to Cotswold’s, so this is my opportunity. I briefly toyed with something Downton Abbey-ish but, since I do not have a staff of gardeners, decided to opt for something more manageable. The September 2001 edition of “The English Garden,” the British counterpart of our “Fine Gardening” magazine features an article on “How to design a True Cottage Garden.” Just as in the gardens of the past, an English garden has its traditional components. Views, paths, tumbles of roses around gates or doors, straight path from gate to front door, beans climbing cane “wigwams” intermingled with flowers such as sweet peas and more roses, swathes of lavender, spires of delphiniums and lupines all come into play. Some of this is just a dream. The deer love to eat delphiniums. I have no place for “a straight path” from gate to front door. I do have plenty of “canes” from

my bamboo. Yes, bamboo grows here. It is an extremely effective screen between properties. It is evergreen, extremely hardy even in our Zone 6 winters, impervious to insects, rustles appealingly when the wind blows and provides a sheltering home for birds. If you surround it with a metal barrier driven at least 12 inches into the perimeter of the chosen area, you might be able to control its relentless desire to spread. Another approach to controlling bamboo is to plant it where you can mow the new growth. Horseradish has a similar vigorous habit. Some readers may recall that I made two mistakes with it in my vegetable garden. First, I planted it directly in the ground. It should be planted in a good strong pot. Second, I accidentally rototilled it which spread it throughout the garden. Six years into my attempts to clear it out, I am getting close to a horseradish free garden. We shall see what sprouts this spring. My gorgeous water lilies are a similar story. It is possible to have too much of a good thing. I spent many

hours removing tubers from the pond with only limited success. I have a plan for this year, though. I will hire a crew of young people - perhaps BBYO would be interested - to descend on the pond en masse. A day of pulling water lilies followed by a cookout and pay should do it. There is the sustenance physical and, perhaps, spiritual. Lessons learned from the past year? Go with the flow, but do plan. Watch the weather. Be aware of my plants’ habits and treat them accordingly. Results take effort, so be willing to invest in my gardening choices. Keep records. Save seeds. Try not to take on more than I can handle. Laugh, at myself, the antics of the birds and the cute, pesky chipmunks. Keep my tools sharp and clean. Put greater effort into learning and employing more organic gardening techniques. Employ insects, biologically compatible plants and clean water rather than paying for quick fix, short-term yielding chemicals. And, most of all, take time to appreciate what G-d hath wrought with a little help from my labor.

HOMES & GARDENS | HAKOL LEHIGH VALLEY | APRIL 2013 3

A writing habit

You should write

Writing prompts

By Jerry Waxler Special to HAKOL

THINGS YOU’LL NEED Write a few minutes every day. This will accomplish two important goals. First, the writing will add up over time. Second, the habit will create momentum, which makes it much easier to write. Ask yourself questions: Write a scene about a bad hair day, a great vacation, a day with a best friend. By developing a list of such questions you can stimulate all sorts of surprise gifts from your unconscious.

A curious supportive audience

To write with freedom and energy, find or imagine a warm, curious audience. Your first such audience might be at a local library where you join with others who help each other write stories.

Memoirs to read

By reading memoirs, you will appreciate the skill and patience with which other writers achieved the task. Every one you read provides an example from which you can draw lessons about how to write your own.

Books or classes about writing memoirs

There are an abundance of teachers, in classrooms and books, eager to help you get started. Greater Lehigh Valley Writers Group, www.glvwg.org Northampton Community College, www.ncc.edu National Association of Memoir Writers, www.namw.org.

a book about that

If you have ever wanted to shape your memories into stories, there has never been a better time. Thanks to the popularity of bestselling memoirs by ordinary people, many of us are wondering if we could record our past into a readable form. Before we start, though, two simple questions stand in the way: How do you do it? And why would anyone care? These two questions sound like insurmountable obstacles. Yet, when you make a sincere effort to find answers, you will be learning an invigorating craft and finding a new way to look at your own journey. If you are not an accomplished writer, don’t let that stop you. You weren’t a professional when you started other activities. Just learn the basics and then practice, practice, practice. The fundamental building block of all storytelling is the scene. To write about your experience, jump into the memory and report what you see, hear, feel and think. Dialogue is often used in memoirs, with the understanding that the words are only a best guess at what was said. Once you start writing, you will be amazed at how interesting your account will be to a curious, empathetic reader. Over time, you will build

a stockpile of anecdotes. These may seem fragmented, until you apply the simple organizing principle of chronological order. By placing your anecdotes in sequence, the form of a story will begin to emerge. How to make your story interesting You may not believe your life is worth writing if by “story” you imagine the kinds of tales my dad told every night after coming home from the drugstore. He would say something like, “The doctor next door came in late again today and his patients kept begging me for information.” Such dinner table stories vented some emotion or highlighted some powerful or humorous incident. We rolled our eyes or laughed, and that was the end of the story. However, when you read memoirs, you’ll notice many differences between crafted stories and the more casual ones like those told around the dinner table. Memoirs present characters who start out with some emotional challenge. The character then proceeds toward a goal, overcoming obstacles, experimenting, and learning from mistakes. By the end of a written story, the events make sense in a larger context and both the reader and the writer feel good about the whole thing

To express your life through story, you need to reveal more information about yourself than you might typically be inclined to do in conversation. Such disclosure may seem daunting at first. Many beginners assume their revelations will create divisions and tension. In many cases, I have found the opposite to be true. Opening yourself up allows people to see you as more accessible, and can actually increase intimacy with loved ones. Written stories also tend to explore mundane details of life far more than spoken stories do. The reason is that when you write a story, you are attempting to provide sensory information so readers can visualize who you are and where you’ve been. You can help them do so by letting them walk with you to school, or go on a first date. What kept you busy after school? Describe each room in your house, and write a scene that happened in each one. Describe your neighborhood, or the games you played with your friends. These details seem unimportant when you’re speaking, but they will help a reader feel connected to your experience. When writing your memories, put yourself in the mind of a reader. That is easy to do since you have been enjoying stories since your parents started reading them to you

as a child. By learning to convey your memories in this form, you provide readers with pleasure, provide yourself with the satisfaction of creating a written piece, and gain an insight into a craft that has entertained you throughout your life. Jerry Waxler is a speaker, therapist, teacher and author. His blog can be found at www. memorywritersnetwork.com.

Former Jewish neighbor of Hitler writes memoir Jewish Telegraphic Agency A former Jewish neighbor of Adolf Hitler in Munich has co-authored a book describing his childhood brushes with the dictator. Edgar Feuchtwanger, 88, wrote "My Neighbor Hitler: Memories of a Jewish Child" with the French journalist Bertil Scali. The book's jumping-off point is that Feuchtwanger and his family lived across the street from Prinzregentenplatz 16, Hitler's main residence from 1929 to 1933. Feuchtwanger, who lives now in Aveyron, France, describes his childhood under Nazi rule in which officially sanctioned anti-Semitism made life increasingly difficult. His family fled to England in 1939 after Feuchtwanger's father, Ludwig, was released from the Dachau concentration camp. According to the Jewish Virtual Library, more than 10,000 Jewish men were interned there for several weeks or months following the Kristallnacht pogrom of Nov. 9-10, 1938. Feuchtwanger's uncle, the playwright Lion Feuchtwanger, had fled the country earlier. According to the La Depeche online magazine, Scali interviewed Feuchtwanger for an article in 1995. They stayed in contact over the years, and Scali eventually convinced Feuchtwanger to write the book. Scali said his own father's family survived the war hidden by righteous gentiles in Graulhet, in southern France. Hitler's former apartment is now a police station, and the Feuchtwangers' former apartment houses a law firm, the report noted.

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4 APRIL 2013 | HAKOL LEHIGH VALLEY | HOMES & GARDENS

By Ella Taylor Jewish Ideas Daily, reprinted with permission Returning to Israel this past January for the first time in 20 years carried a deep emotional charge for me. After World War II my British-born parents, young Labor-Zionist idealists, helped found a kibbutz in the northern Galilee. I was born there, but we moved back to England when I was seven. I’ve visited and lived in Israel since then, but mostly I’ve been in London and the United States. By most measures, every city in which I’ve put down roots in is an easier place to live than just about anywhere in Israel. I’ve never felt so British as when I’ve struggled to hold my place in what passes in Israel for a queue. Yet I’ve also pined for the brash, aggressive country I had last seen in the mid-1970s, when public rudeness was a point of pride, when every stranger felt free to get into your business -- but would reflexively rescue you in a pinch. In the early 1970s, in a small town north of Tel Aviv, I once fainted from heat and woke up lying on a sidewalk surrounded by a circle of faces, their voices theorizing about why I’d passed out. An old lady who could barely walk insisted on taking me home on the bus, where she barraged me with advice about what she was certain was my pregnancy and broadcast my “joyous news” to the passengers around us. The noisy, busybody intrusiveness of Israeli public life could be a pain in the neck. But, having spent most of my life in two countries known for their surface good manners, I missed the directness and, sometimes, the rough charm. On a vacation in Tel Aviv in the early 1990s, the airline lost my

luggage. I complained to the company’s Israeli representative -- who spread his arms wide and answered genially, “Mah haba’aya?” What’s the problem? “Sometimes I don’t change my underwear for a week!” On my recent two weeks of running around Israel with my 15-year-old daughter, I rarely encountered this kind of brazen chutzpah. The land of pioneering socialism and proliferating red tape has caught on to the capitalist service ethic big time. At the El Al desk at Heathrow Airport, a preternaturally polite young security guy with a miniMohawk apologized profusely for having to ask “a lot of questions.” No apologies were necessary: we were a walking red flag. I speak fluent Hebrew but do not carry an Israeli passport. Neither does my daughter -- who is Chinese. We get stopped, frisked, grilled, just about fried in every airport we pass through. With courtly politesse, the young man questioned me for 15 minutes -- then asked my daughter what her favorite Jewish holiday was. Flustered, she blurted, “Passover!” He said he’d never met a kid whose favorite holiday was Pesach. She shrugged and said she loved matzah ball soup. That did the trick. One more apology, and we were on our way. And so it went from the moment we landed at Ben Gurion airport, now bustling with souped-up boutiques and fancy eateries. Everywhere -- from the posh, scrubbed and renovated Jaffa quarter of Tel Aviv, to a now-privatized Galilee kibbutz whose members own their own homes, to the small town of Rosh Pina, once known as the “armpit of the Middle East” but now a gentrified home to artists,

hipsters and nouvelle cuisine restaurateurs -- it was please, thank you, can I help you and, to my horror, have a nice day. When I marveled about this, Israeli friends laughed and said that if I wanted to see the old churlishness, I just had to stick around a while. And it’s true that if you know where to look, you’ll still find the old belligerence in abundance, notably in government offices and on public transportation. After we stood in line for nearly two hours at the Jerusalem bus station to reserve our place for a trip to the north, a couple of latecomers elbowed my daughter out of the way and breezed onto the bus without so much as a by-your-leave. Once, in the early 1970s, when I was a graduate student commuting home from Tel Aviv University, I had to duck when two men in coveralls started throwing punches around my head over political differences. It’s not recommended behavior, but I loved that sense of engagement with public life. Israelis may still be great political brawlers, but they don’t seem to talk politics as much as they used to. Politically, our Israeli hosts were all over the map: friends living across the green line in suburban Jerusalem, a woman working for Palestinian rights, Golan kibbutzniks anxious about the Syrian civil war. Yet even with Hamas rocket attacks fresh in memory and

national elections imminent, few Israelis seemed interested in political debate beyond laughing their heads off at “Eretz Nehederet,” “Wonderful Land,” the satirical TV program that skewers corrupt posturing by local politicians and the ridiculous proliferation of tiny political parties on the electoral landscape. True, as the headlines scream, Israel is polarized these days; and perhaps Israelis are as weary of politics as I am of being the schizoid Israeli-abroad who sounds like Jabotinsky when defending Israel to the hard Left and fiercely criticizes the occupation when debating the hard Right. Neither of these shrieking groups understands that Israelis, in their daily lives, know how to improvise a precarious harmony. For all the stormy rhetoric, Israel is in some ways more open than ever before. The reflexive homophobia I remember is virtually gone in Tel Aviv, now one of the world’s gay-friendly cities. Jerusalem remains tense, with secular and Orthodox, Jew and Arab viewing each another with suspicion. We stayed in a beautiful guest house run by Christian Arabs; a stone’s throw away, an Old City Arab vendor, ironing a Coca-Cola logo onto a sweatshirt for my daughter, pressed his electric bill into my hand and complained about the high, Israeli-imposed costs of doing business. My friend in

the Jerusalem suburb beyond the green line pointed past the electronic security gate to a lone Arab house near a Jewish settlement. Its owner sent his son to the Jewish pre-school. The teachers, worried that the child might suffer because of his name, Mahmood, called him Hamoody. It means “Sweetie.” On our last night in Tel Aviv, we went to a large Arab-owned seafood restaurant in Jaffa, which has a mixed Jewish-Arab population. Outside, there was a lightning storm; inside, it was warm and festive, with different families sitting together at long tables. I over-eagerly admired the beautiful blackeyed baby of the Arab family next to us. There wasn’t much serious mixing, but there was a willingness to sit courteously side by side, engaging in small talk. Every few minutes a drum roll announced a customer’s birthday. When it did, everyone—everyone—clapped. It’s not much, but it happens every day, opening a tiny space for light and hope while politicians scream their mutual intransigence. I realized how much I had missed this nervous vitality and rabid self-invention. So, it’s not goodbye but au revoir, Israel. If I ever manage to retire, I’ll come home for good. Ella Taylor is a freelance arts writer whose film reviews appear regularly at NPR.org and who has contributed to the New York Times and the Los Angeles Times.

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Small gardens can Return on investment.

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Master gardener Cathy Leiber said the goal with small gardens is to have the most produce possible in any given space.

Leiber recommends freezing excess cherry tomatoes and using them in soups throughout the winter.

A s c

By Jennifer Lader Editor, HAKOL

I interplant lettuce and onions, or you might have fast and slow-growing plants together, or deep rooted plants like carrots planted with radishes. Companion planting was practiced by the Native Americans. They planted corn in a circle, put beans at the base which used the corn for support and then planted squash, which grew like a ground cover suppressing weeds. Gardeners today know that when you plant compatible plants you can improve the health or flavor of another plant. For example, I plant amaranth, which is attractive to cucumber beetles, near where I sow my squash, melon and cucumber seeds. Herbs that produce small flowers are also great companions in the garden because they attract beneficial insects. Vertical gardening is another technique for growing more in less space. When you add trellises, or tee-pees, you use far less garden space, can have improved harvests and increased yields. Any vegetable that produces a vine or rambling stem can be grown vertically including tomatoes, cucumbers, peas, and all melons. Finally, we have relay and succession planting. With relay planting, think about runners, who hand the baton to the next person in a running race. It’s the same with vegetables. Relay planting is the successive planting of one type of crop where the new planting is made before the old one is harvested. I do this with cilantro, lettuces, and beets. Succession planting is similar to relay planting, except you plant the second crop only after the first crop has been harvested. I’m a huge garlic gardener and plant it in October and harvest around the fourth of July. Then, after I replenish the soil with compost, I put in lettuce, peas,

Q. What’s possible with a small garden or patio space? The goal is to have the most produce possible in any given space. This can be done with crop rotation techniques, such as planting cold crops like lettuce early and keep rotating the crops within it’s own soil.

Q. How do we figure out what to plant? A home gardener can enjoy growing compact varieties of almost any vegetable in a small garden or containers on a patio. There are wonderful carrots, tomatoes, lettuces and virtually all herbs to enjoy in a small space garden.

Q. What then? [With some foods,] like cherry tomatoes, we can’t eat them all when they’re in season. We freeze a lot of them and then I have my own fabulous cherry tomatoes in the winter. The freezing changes them, but we can eat them in soups.

Q. Tell us about space-saving techniques for gardening. There are five techniques for gardening in small spaces that allow the home gardener to enjoy the greatest harvest possible. Inter-planting utilizes the space between the plants of one variety to grow the plants of another variety. For example,

6 APRIL 2013 | HAKOL LEHIGH VALLEY | HOMES & GARDENS

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Any vegetable that produces a vine or rambling stem can be grown vertically including tomatoes, cucumbers, peas, and all melons.

PHOTOS COURTESY OF JENNIFER LADER

A Q-AND-A WITH CATHY LEIBER

Leiber said having a garden and working in it in turn encourages people to grow more, but that “it’s important to know what your family likes.” You may love kale, but your family can only eat so much of it!

broccoli and other cold crops.

Q. What about for those who have a screened porch or a window sill?

Herbs are easy, flavorful and everyone loves hem. I grow parsley, cilantro, rosemary, sage, oregano and thyme. We have a dehydrator and dry them, as well as garlic, carrots and fruit. I tore the dried herbs in jars and the chili peppers n Ziploc bags.

Q. You promote small gardens; how else do ou use your 5 ½ acres?

We have chickens and enjoy eating farm-fresh ggs, especially since we know exactly what the hickens eat! We also have sheep and, just now, five baby lambs. We have “destination” gardens all over the property: a 4,000 square foot ornamental grasses maze, and a large hosta garden.

Q. You moved here from New York; how did ou learn to garden?

thought I would like gardening and wanted o meet people, so I went for three months of raining by Penn State faculty and became a Penn State master gardener. I am certified for both Northampton and Lehigh Counties. In our first year we volunteer for 50 hours, thereafter 20 hours per year and I’m now up to over 800.

Q. I know you are a member of Temple Covenant of Peace. How do you relate your work as a gardener to Judaism?

It’s our absolute devotion to lifelong learning, to giving back. There are lots of ways in Judaism that we give back; learning every day, from nature, is one very interesting way. I also learned from the family of friends that some of the immigrants from Eastern Europe came here and established chicken farms. I’ve had Holocaust survivors in my home. Gardening is so special, you could not be closer to God than when you are outside, tending to the plants. If I make my 5 ½ acres beautiful, isn’t that giving back?

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HOMES & GARDENS | HAKOL LEHIGH VALLEY | APRIL 2013 7

AND THE HOLOCAUST IN FRANCE By Rafael Medoff Jewish News Service Little more than 70 years ago, 15-year-old Annie Kriegel was sitting in her Paris high school classroom, taking an exam, when her mother suddenly burst into the room and warned her not to come home -- the Nazis were preparing to round up and deport any Jews they could get their hands on. More than 3,000 miles away, the cartoonist known as Dr. Seuss was setting pen to paper to alert America about what was happening to the Jews in France. Annie found a place to stay that night. The next morning, as she later recalled, she was making her way towards the city’s Jewish quarter when, “at the crossing of the rue de Turenne and the rue de Bretagne, I heard screams rising to the heavens.” They were “not cries and squawks such as you hear in noisy and excited crowds, but screams like you used to hear in hospital delivery rooms. All the human pain that both life and death provide. A garage there was serving as a local assembly point, and they were separating the men and women.” Stunned, the teenager sat down on a nearby park bench. “It was on that bench that I left my childhood.” (Kriegel’s experience is recounted in Susan Zucotti’s 1993 book, “The Holocaust, the French and the Jews.”) Over the course of the next two days, more than 13,000 Jews were rounded up in Paris by the Germans, with the active collaboration of the Vichy French government headed by Nazi supporter Pierre Laval. The majority of those arrested were couples with children. They were held for five excruciating days in the Velodrome d’Hiver stadium, in the summer heat without food or water. Eyewitnesses

described it as “a scene from hell.” Then they were deported by train to the gas chambers of Auschwitz. The brutal details of the roundup process were amply reported in the American press. The New York Times described the “scenes of terror and despair” in the streets of Paris, including suicides, Jewish patients dragged violently from hospital beds, and children violently separated from their parents. Unfortunately, the article was relegated to page 16. Theodor Geisel, who drew editorial cartoons for PM under the pen name “Dr. Seuss,” was outraged by the news from France and decided to use his cartooning skills to help publicize the plight of the Jews. The future creator of such beloved classics as “The Cat in the Hat” employed stark and disturbing imagery in a July 20, 1942 cartoon. He drew a forest filled with corpses hanging from the trees, with a sign reading “Jew” pinned to each body. Adolf Hitler, with extra rope draped on his arm, and Vichy leader Pierre Laval were shown singing happily. The first words of the Hitler-Laval song, “Only God can make a tree,” were taken from “Trees,” a famous Alfred Joyce Kilmer poem about the unique and eternal beauty of trees. The killers’ second line, however, “To furnish sport for you and me,” was a lyric concocted by Hitler and Laval to celebrate their “sport” of mass murder. In one important respect, Seuss’s cartoon was prescient: unlike many of his contemporaries, he correctly perceived that France’s Jews were doomed to be killed. At the time of the roundups, the Germans claimed the Jews were being sent for “work in the East,” and the deportees’ true

destination was generally unknown abroad. One senior U.S. diplomat in France, S. Pinkney Tuck, urged the Roosevelt administration to take in 4,000 Jewish children who had been separated from their parents, on the grounds that they should be regarded as orphans since the Nazis would not let their parents survive. But State Department officials complained that Tuck was exceeding his authority, and Undersecretary of State Sumner Welles assured American Jewish Congress leader Rabbi Stephen S. Wise that the deportees were just being relocated for “war work.” Dr. Seuss drew many anti-Nazi cartoons during his years at PM, but for reasons that are unclear, he never returned to the subject of Hitler’s Jewish victims. The dangers of fascism seem to have haunted Seuss for many years to follow, however. Reworking a scene of a tower

of turtles from one of his 1942 cartoons, he used the framework of what was ostensibly a child’s fable to inveigh against totalitarianism in his 1958 best-seller, “Yertle the Turtle and Other Stories.” Yertle is the king of a turtle pond who exploits his fellow-turtles in order to increase his power and personal glory. Furious when he realizes the moon is higher than he is, Yertle commands his subjects to form themselves into a tower so that he can stand on them and reach the sky. Seuss said later that Yertle was meant to symbolize Hitler, and the story was a warning against fascism. Dr. Rafael Medoff is founding director of The David S. Wyman Institute for Holocaust Studies and coauthor, with comics historian Craig Yoe, of the forthcoming book “Cartoonists Against the Holocaust.”

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8 APRIL 2013 | HAKOL LEHIGH VALLEY | HOMES & GARDENS

to include jewelry maker Joan Horn By Sandy Newman Assistant Executive Director, JCC In her studio in Elkins Park, Pa., Joan Horn hand fabricates jewelry. She creates individual elements from sterling silver and 14 karat gold, using traditional and innovative hand tools. Her bench contains pliers, hammers, saws, stamps, mandrels and tubing jigs that are like old friends. Horn’s metal starts out as flat sheet, wire and tubing. She solders individual elements together using an acetelyne/oxygen torch and enhances pieces with fresh water pearls and semi-precious stones, making color combinations with garnet, amethyst, citrine and blue topaz. Horn’s jewelry pieces are studies in line, color and movement. Horn loves working in her studio; her hands feel most at home when they have a pliers in them. She visualizes everything in the world as if it were a piece of jewelry. Musical notes from choir could become a brooch pattern. Wrought iron gates in Barcelona can become a pendant. Her newest designs are variations on paisley patterns, studies in how they relate to nature. Horn graduated from Temple University Tyler school of art. Her brand, Joan Z. Horn Metalwork premiered in 1990. Her jewelry has been represented by galleries all over the U.S., including the Hirshhorn Museum of the Smithsonian. “It was a pleasure last year to exhibit at the first JCC of Allentown show,” Horn said. “I usually show my

artwork through galleries, and it was a great experience for me to meet and talk to the art-loving public of Allentown.” Horn never takes for granted the luck she has in life, especially the experience of having her own studio. “Thank you to the people who support art,” she said. “We artists could not do it without you.” Joan Horn’s work will be featured at the JCC Arts Festival on April 20-21. The Arts Festival is the Annual Scholarship Fundraising Event benefiting children’s scholarships at the Jewish Community Center of Allentown. On Saturday, April 20, there will be an Opening Dessert Reception from 7:30 p.m. to 10:30 p.m. The cost is $75 per person and includes $25 in Art Bucks to spend. Reservations are requested

France returns art stolen by Nazis Jewish Telegraphic Agency France’s Ministry of Culture returned seven valuable paintings looted by the Nazis during the Holocaust from two Jewish families. Six of the paintings were given to Boston-area resident Thomas Selldorff, 84, who came to Paris to collect the works during a ceremony at the ministry in Paris, according to Le Parisien. Another painting was returned the same day to a lawyer representing the relatives of Josef Weiner, a banker from Prague who was murdered by the Nazis in 1942. The paintings were part of various collections in France, including the Louvre in Paris and the museums of Tours, Saint-Etienne and Agen, but they belonged to Selldorff’s grandfather, Richard Neumann, an Austrian industrialist who escaped the extermination of Jews by fleeing to Cuba with his wife and daughter, Le Monde reported. Following a lengthy process, the French CIVS Holocaust restitution committee determined in December that Selldorff was the legal owner of the paintings. Another 2,000 artworks that may have been looted by the Nazis and are in the hands of the French state or various museums because their owners are classified as unknown, according to Le Figaro.

by April 10. On Sunday, April 21, from 10 a.m. to 5 p.m., the festival is open to the public. Entry is $10 and includes $5 in Art Bucks to spend with a minimum $25 purchase.

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HOMES & GARDENS | HAKOL LEHIGH VALLEY | APRIL 2013 9

On looking for a new house By Aaron Berger Special to HAKOL

The home searching process requires a lot of time and thought. Notice I said home searching, not home buying. Most of the resources I have found through the Internet discuss mortgages, closing costs, negotiating and offers. Those are helpful, but before applying them, I need to find a home that suits my family. For the past few months, we have been going to open houses for condominiums, town houses and single-family homes. The “we” consists of my wife and me, our 6-month-old daughter, and our two cats. In the process, we have discovered what it is we are not looking to buy. One of the town houses we visited had a long walk to the parking lot from the front door, which is not encouraging for the winter season. Nor did the neighborhood appear kid-friendly. A condominium we viewed had very narrow hallways and higherthan-expected fees. I actually enjoy mowing the lawn and helping my wife garden so those activities would have been limited, too. Many of the single-family homes we have seen are split-levels, need a lot of fixing up, do not have a easily accessible garage, or lack ample parking for guests should we should have family or friends visit. We should highlight the things we appreciated, too. Kitchens with already-installed appliances and space to cook are attractive, as is a good school district. Parks and recreation areas within a reasonable distance are nice since we appreciate the outdoors. Remaining close to the Jewish Community Center matters, too. That brings up a risk always on our mind: Things change. The JCC’s recent announcement of a possible sale got me thinking about “what ifs.” Applying what we have learned has helped reduce the amount of time we spend home shopping because we know what we hope to find. We also understand now that our eventual decision will be based upon something that has become increasingly familiar to us as new parents: compromise.

10 APRIL 2013 | HAKOL LEHIGH VALLEY | HOMES & GARDENS

In SodaStream boycott push, Palestinians may be the victims By Ben Sales Jewish Telegraphic Agency For proponents of the Boycott, Divestment, Sanctions movement, SodaStream would appear to be a straightforward target. The Israeli company, which sells a popular kitchen gadget that turns tap water into carbonated drinks, has a large factory in a West Bank settlement. But for hundreds of Palestinians, SodaStream isn’t a target; it’s their employer. On a recent afternoon, women wearing hijabs hurried to their shifts at the plant located in Ma’ale Adumin, a suburban settlement about 15 minutes west of Jerusalem. Some 500 West Bank Palestinians work at the site, in addition to 400 Arabs from eastern Jerusalem and a mix of 200 Israeli Jews and foreign workers, including refugees from Africa. The Maale Adumim factory has an on-site mosque and a synagogue, and Jewish and Arab employees share the same dining hall. SodaStream has two other facilities in Israel, in Ashkelon and the Galilee town of Mount Tabor. The Galilee factory employs several hundred Israeli Arabs. “Everyone works together: Palestinians, Russians, Jews,” a Palestinian employee named Rasim at the Maale Adumim site told JTA. SodaStream’s case, some say, is one example of how boycotting an Israeli company doing business in the West Bank can end up hurting the very goals that boycott proponents say they are trying to achieve: Palestinian rights and Israel-Palestinian peace.

YOSSI ZAMIR/FLASH90/JTA

New views, familiar haunts:

The SodaStream headquarters in Ma’ale Adumim, Israel. “The SodaStream situation is extremely complicated because it’s a clear case of where the owners are making real efforts to engage the Palestinian workers with fair wages and in management positions,” said Kenneth Bob, president of the liberal Zionist group Ameinu, which supports the establishment of a Palestinian state in the West Bank but still opposes boycotts of settlement products. “At the same time, it does on some level strengthen the occupation because it’s a factory over the Green Line,” the boundary between Israel and the West Bank. Advocates of BDS say supporting SodaStream amounts to supporting Israel’s occupation of the West Bank and that boycotting the company is an effective way to support Palestinian national aspirations. “In the absence of global and international political pressure

for Israel to abide by international law, BDS hopes to use nonviolent pressure to get Israel to stop the occupation,” said Kristin Szremski, a spokeswoman for the Interfaith Boycott Committee, a pro-BDS group. Szremski dismissed the argument that hurting SodaStream could hurt the livelihood of Palestinians, calling it “a way to obfuscate” the issue. “The point is not just to make SodaStream go out of business,” Szremski told JTA. “Were there no settlements to begin with, Palestinians could be working their own lands. The fact that a worker goes to work every day does not indicate that it is a good thing.” Another Palestinian worker at SodaStream’s West Bank site, who gave his name as Mmdoh, said politics don’t enter the workplace. “We don’t get into that,” said Mmdoh, 34. “I feel normal. I don’t have conversations about it.”

The makings of a good husband and father By Alice Level Special to HAKOL My friend, Monica, loved her mother-in-law with all her heart. She loved her from the day she met her until the day her mother-in-law died. When I expressed surprise at such strong feeling, she said: “You don’t understand. My mother-in-law (let’s call her Golda) was the most amazing woman I ever met, and maybe the reason I married my husband.” And then she told me Golda’s story. Monica is not my friend’s real name either, but she is very private and it was the only way she would talk to me about Golda. Golda was born to very traditional Jewish parents from Western Europe, and she grew up in a kosher home. She was a beautiful woman; she married young, and had four children. She was widowed at a young age and left to raise her children by herself, never once complaining or feeling sorry for herself. “Even when she got older, she was always happy, always seeing the good in things,” Monica said. “She was also a great cook, and she loved to cook for her family.” As the kids grew older, they left their mom’s home and went to live very far from one another. “It was hard getting

together because we all lived so far away, but as long as my mother-in-law was alive, we managed to all go to her house for the holidays,” Monica said. “She would prepare these great meals for all of us, and she made every one of us feel comfortable and appreciated. She made no difference between her daughters and her daughters-in-law, and in turn we all loved her equally. Even with the grandchildren, she had this special connection where she knew how to treat each kid differently and made them feel unique.” As I asked Monica what recipe made her think the most of her mother-in-law, she said: “[Although] everything she made for us was delicious, there was a raisin pie that she used to make, and I just loved it. When I told her how much I loved it, she made sure to prepare it for me each time I came to visit her. So if I had to choose one recipe, I’d choose this one because it is the one that is closest to my heart.” As she was talking, Monica’s eyes filled with tears. “When she was diagnosed with stage IV cancer,” Monica continued, “and although she knew she only had a few months to live, she never lost her spirit and joie de vivre. On the contrary, she said she was grateful for

the time she had to put her house in order. She shared her possessions equally between her daughters and daughters-in-law, and she prepared everybody for her death.” Then I remembered something else Monica had mentioned: “Why did you say that you married your husband because of Golda?” “When I met my future husband and we talked about our families, he kept telling me how great his mother was, and how much he enjoyed his family,” Monica said. “ I thought, ‘A man who loves his mother so much will be a good father and a good husband.’ And I was right.”

Spring Appetizers BY SANDI TEPLITZ

Sherree Listwa’s Mozzarella Rollups

Line a cookie sheet with fresh mozzarella cheese about 1/4“ thick. Place roasted red peppers on top. Slice into 3 x 1“ pieces. Put a fresh basil leaf on each piece and roll up. Serve with toothpicks.

Devilish Eggs

Hard boil a dozen jumbo eggs. Cool, then peel. Slice in half. Remove the yolks and place into a bowl with 1/2

t. ground mustard and mayonnaise to taste. Using a pastry bag, swirl the mixture into the egg whites decoratively. Top with asparagus tips.

Salmon Croquette Sliders

Drain all liquid from a large can of red salmon. Dry off thoroughly. Chop salmon finely; add 1 T. grated onion, 1/8 c. bread crumbs and one jumbo egg. Mix well. Form balls the size of a large walnut. Saute in corn oil on both sides. Place into a slider roll. Top with homemade Greek tzatziki sauce.

2 c. seeded muscatel raisins 1/2 c. sugar 1 1/2 c. boiling water 2 t. lemon juice grated rind of 1/2 a lemon 2 T. cornstarch juice of 1 orange grated rind of 1 orange 1/2 t. salt 1 unbaked pie crust plus enough crust for a lattice top Cook raisins in boiling water for 5 minutes. Mix sugar and cornstarch, add to raisins and cook until thick (about 5 minutes). Remove from heat and stir in remaining ingredients. Cool slightly. Pour into unbaked pie shell and cover with lattice. Bake in a 375°F oven for 30 to 35 minutes.

HOMES & GARDENS | HAKOL LEHIGH VALLEY | APRIL 2013 11

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