Day 22 - Culture Shock

For me, my parents' arrival signified a tremendous lightening of my load, and the total end of my social isolation that grew out of my peculiar situation.  For the kids, and the grandparents, their visit has different meanings than it does for me.

Culinary

Every time they come, one of the primary ways in which the kids bond with their grandparents is through food.  Of course, you might say, everyone fondly remembers their grandmother's cooking.  It's a big part of the link between generations, etc. etc.  Well, I'm talking about something else entirely.

In our house, under normal circumstances, animal products are a rarity.  Fish, beef, and poultry get consumed once or twice during the week, and once on Shabbat, on average.  We buy milk products about 2-3 times a year, since we're convinced that cow's milk was never intended for human consumption.  When my parents are here, they end up cooking very little, for a number of reasons that are irrelevant to issue at hand.  Instead, they end up eating a ton (by our standards) of animal products -- yogurt and cheese, prepared meats, smoked or canned fish.  For our kids, who consider these foods to be special treats, going to sup at Sabba and Savta's is always preferable to eating the regular whole foods served at home, and so they go there to eat as much as the hosts will allow them - almost every day.

Techno

Story time with Savta and Youtube

While I'm now working in software, and we have two computers and three more devices at home, we still heavily restrict the kids' screen time, hoping it will help them develop creativity, independence, etc.  Sabba and Savta come along, two smartphones, a laptop and a tablet in tow, and as typical grandparents, feel no need to discipline or restrict the children they came to dote upon.

And so, at the end of a typical day with them, I hear from one kid how he got so far playing Angry Birds, and from another how funny the Donald Duck cartoon was, and from a third how she took dozens of pictures and viewed them over and over again.  When I hear about and witness their digital over-exposure, I just roll my eyes.  That's just the way it has to be, I suppose.

Socioreligious

I grew up and placed myself in a radically different culturally setting from where I began.  My religious Israeli environment is different in language, mindset, social norms, and daily habits from the way I was raised.  And while my parents come often enough (2.5 times a year, on average) to Israel, and specifically to our neighborhood, there are still questions, hesitations, and awkward moments sprinkled in their interactions with the locals here.

My father, in addition to not being privy to all the cultural clues, doesn't even know what to do if things are spelled out for him - his Hebrew vocabulary is still in the double digits range.  So he oftentimes asked me what it meant that a particular person said something to him, or looked at him a certain way, or why someone dresses in a particular fashion.  In general, we have an ongoing dialog about cultural mores in the religious community, a dialog which we continue on from visit to visit.  My mother, whether because she has a better idea of what's acceptable and what's not, or whether she just assumes she can always rely on her Hebrew language skills (which are quite good) to get her through any kind of situation, rarely inquires about these kinds of things.  And sometimes it goes the other way.  The 'landlord' from whom we're renting the apartment asked me if my father knew the prayer times of the local synagogues so he'd know where to go in the morning, and I had to kindly inform him that my father is not a frequenter of synagogues.