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Goldene Medina comes here

photo - The Goldene Medina exhibit is designed to have the feel of a scrapbook album, to have come from any Jewish South African’s family memoir

The Goldene Medina exhibit is designed to have the feel of a scrapbook album, to have come from any Jewish South African’s family memoir. (photo from South African Jewish Museum) The Goldene Medina exhibit arrives in Vancouver July 29 for…

Timeless political satire

photo - Michael Scholar Jr. co-directs the political comedy Born Yesterday, which opens July 13 at the Jericho Arts Centre

Michael Scholar Jr. co-directs the political comedy Born Yesterday, which opens July 13 at the Jericho Arts Centre. (photo from ETC) Garson Kanin’s comedy Born Yesterday opened on Broadway on Feb. 4, 1946, and was a hit. It has been…

Happiness thoughts

Summertime and the living is easy! Of all the seasons, probably summer is most closely associated with happiness. Vacation, camping, family time, celebrations, picnics: these are activities that we associate with happiness. In Western culture, individual happiness is often considered…

Local woman inspires chesed

photo - Members of Vancouver Talmud Torah’s Grade 7 chesed club with Gia Tran, a local woman who raises money for cancer research by taking refundable containers to a bottle depot

Members of Vancouver Talmud Torah’s Grade 7 chesed club with Gia Tran, a local woman who raises money for cancer research by taking refundable containers to a bottle depot. (photo from VTT) Since 2014, Vancouver Talmud Torah has offered a…

Series finishes on high notes

photo - “Dueling pianists” Lester Soo and Marilyn Glazer entertain at the last Empowerment Series session of the season

“Dueling pianists” Lester Soo and Marilyn Glazer entertain at the last Empowerment Series session of the season. (photo from JSA) Co-sponsored by Jewish Seniors Alliance and the Kehila Society of Richmond, the fifth session of this season’s JSA Snider Foundation…

Growing mushrooms

photo - Mira Weigensberg and her husband, Oren Kessler, started Tekoa Farms in 1986

Mira Weigensberg and her husband, Oren Kessler, started Tekoa Farms in 1986. (photo by Barry A. Kaplan) When Mira Weigensberg, who was born and raised in Montreal, and her husband, Oren Kessler, from Brooklyn, moved to Israel in 1979, she…

Quinoa, bread and date bars

image Food You Want for the Life You Crave book cover

Food You Want for the Life You Crave by Nealy Fischer (Da Capo Lifelong Books, 2019) is a delight to read. Not only are there at least 128 gluten-free recipes in this kosher cookbook, but there are 107 full-colour photographs,…

Cucumber salads for summer

photo - cucumber

(photo by Nick Youngson/Alpha Stock Images) Whether you go to farmers markets or elsewhere to buy your summer produce, cucumbers are a must. In Jerusalem, we have all kinds of cucumbers year-round but my favourite in Machaneh Yehudah is one…

A little summer sangria

photo - Red wine sangria

(photo by theculinarygeek/flickr) When I entertain during the summer, my favourite drink is sangria, the Spanish wine punch whose name means blood. As I walk past the wine store on Agrippas Street in Jerusalem, just before entering the shuk, I…

Finding Ziklag

photo - Dozens of undamaged pottery vessels have been discovered so far at the site

Dozens of undamaged pottery vessels have been discovered so far at the site. (photos from Israel Antiquities Authority via Ashernet) In 2015, archeologists began an excavation in the Judean Foothills, between Kiryat Gat and Lachish. In research conducted in a…

רופא לפוריות ננזף

photo - Dr. Norman Barwin

ד”ר נורמן בארווין (CBC) רופא לפוריות באוטווה ננזף השבוע רשמית על כך שהפרה לפחות אחת עשרה נשים עם הזרע שלו, והפרה עוד עשרות ביציות של מטופלות עם זרעונים לא של האב המיועד בתחילת שנות השבעים. ד”ר נורמן בארווין (בן שמונים…

Music as a uniting force

photo - Clockwise from top left are Ayaan Ali Bangash, Amaan Ali Bangash, Sharon Isbin and Amjad Ali Khan

Clockwise from top left are Ayaan Ali Bangash, Amaan Ali Bangash, Sharon Isbin and Amjad Ali Khan. (photo © Suvo Das) On July 12, Strings for Peace will have its world première at the Indian Summer Festival, which is described…

Court’s segregation decision

photo - Halifax-based lawyer Hanna Garson

Halifax-based lawyer Hanna Garson. (photo from Hanna Garson) In 2015, the B.C. Civil Liberties Association and the John Howard Society launched a legal challenge to the federal government’s laws that allow administrative segregation – a form of solitary confinement –…

Colour bursts forth in Conjunction

photo - Ira Hoffecker’s current solo exhibit at the Zack Gallery, Conjunction, runs until July 21

Ira Hoffecker’s current solo exhibit at the Zack Gallery, Conjunction, runs until July 21. (photo by Olga Livshin) Conjunction, Ira Hoffecker’s current solo exhibit at the Zack Gallery, opened on June 13 and runs until July 21. German-born Hoffecker and…

Play’s Vancouver links

photo - Zayd Dohrn’s Reborning returns to the New York stage this summer

Zayd Dohrn’s Reborning returns to the New York stage this summer. (photo from Zayd Dohrn) The play Reborning, written by Zayd Dohrn, is being performed Off-Broadway at the Soho Playhouse in New York City from July 5 through Aug. 3,…

Intolerance is growing

A recent study indicates that Americans are increasingly tolerant of the idea that businesses should be able to refuse service to customers based on the customer’s identity. Of those polled, 19% said that a business should be able to refuse…

Maturation entails practice

photo - Burger King Whopper combo

There’s a funny story from when my husband and I were first married. We were in graduate school, but I had returned to grad school after teaching in Washington, D.C., inner-city high schools. I discovered that my husband and his…

The purple dyes of the Carmel Coast

photo - Ceramic vats from the first millennium BCE that still contain purple colouring

(photo from Haifa University via Ashernet) “Until now, there has not been any meaningful direct archeological evidence of workshops for the production of purple-coloured textiles from the Iron Age – the biblical period – not even in Tyre and Sidon…

החיזבאללה פועל בקנדה

photo - Ali Kourani

(LinkedIn) עלי קוראני ארגון הטרור השיעי החיזבאללה שקשור באיראן אסף מידע ביטחוני רגיש על שדה התעופה הבינלאומי “פירסון” שבטורונטו. כך מסרה רשות הביטחון בתחבורה האווירית של קנדה לפני מספר ימים. מתברר שסוכן רדום של החיזבאללה שגר בארצות הברית, עלי קוראני, ביקר…

TUTS season is set to begin

photo - Left to right: Sheryl Wheaton as Rosie, Lori Ashton Zondag as Tanya and Caitriona Murphy as Donna in Mamma Mia! with Adam Charles as Jack, Caleb Lagayan as Race and Graeme Kitagawa as Mush in Disney’s Newsies

Left to right: Sheryl Wheaton as Rosie, Lori Ashton Zondag as Tanya and Caitriona Murphy as Donna in Mamma Mia! with Adam Charles as Jack, Caleb Lagayan as Race and Graeme Kitagawa as Mush in Disney’s Newsies. (photo by Lindsay…

Refugees 40 years on

photo - Sui Khuu and her husband Dar, with their two children

Sui Khuu and her husband Dar, with their two children. (photo from Shirley Barnett) In the last couple of years, Jewish congregations and groups in Vancouver have sponsored refugees from Syria, acts of humanitarianism that are inspired in part from…

Exploring music, dance, self

photo - The cast of Tara Cheyenne Performance’s The Body Project

The cast of Tara Cheyenne Performance’s The Body Project. (photo by Wendy D. Photography) Among the more than 20 choreographers and companies from across Canada, Brazil and Korea that are participating in this year’s Dancing on the Edge Festival are…

Naming inhumanity

Concentration camps are in the news this week. The term, which was first used in the context of Jews in the Holocaust, is being invoked by opponents of the U.S. government’s detention of migrants from Latin America. Appallingly, those detained…

Inspired by a fellow activist

photo - Katie Delay, left, and Sunny Enkin Lewis are co-presidents of Grant Park High School’s Students for Social Justice

Katie Delay, left, and Sunny Enkin Lewis are co-presidents of Grant Park High School’s Students for Social Justice. (photo from Sunny Enkin Lewis) Earlier this year, Winnipeg Grade 12 student Sunny Enkin Lewis won first prize for her age group…

The search for a friend

image - Finding Fukue follows Jessica Stuart’s journey to Japan to find her childhood friend. (movie poster)

Finding Fukue follows Jessica Stuart’s journey to Japan to find her childhood friend. To what lengths would you go to find a childhood friend whose letters stopped coming decades ago? When online searches proved fruitless, Vancouver-born, Toronto-based musician Jessica Stuart…

Aiming for carbon neutrality

photo - Jeff Golfman’s Raw Office helps “businesses save money and be more eco-friendly in their supplies”

Jeff Golfman’s Raw Office helps “businesses save money and be more eco-friendly in their supplies.” (photo from Raw Office) Jeff Golfman has been working on ways to preserve nature since he was a boy. “I can trace it back to…

Meet Barry at Havana

image - In Jewish community member Ira Cooper’s Artisanal Intelligence, fellow community member Hannah Everett plays Jane, the entrepreneur and creative genius responsible for developing Barry, a fast-learning, curious and fashion-wise artificial intelligence customer service robot, played by Drew Carlson

Did you know without goats, the coffee bean may have never been discovered? Are you able to recognize if the vinyl you hear coming from your neighbor’s apartment is a 78, 45 or 33? Do you type your university essays…

Kehila celebrates 20th

photo - Left to right are Toby Rubin, Marie Doduck and Lynne Fader

Left to right are Toby Rubin, Marie Doduck and Lynne Fader. (photo by Lianne Cohen) On May 5, the Kehila Society of Richmond celebrated its 20th anniversary. The society honoured Marie and Sid (z”l) Doduck for the support and guidance…

Mystery photos … June 28/19

photo - People socializing at an unidentified event, possibly a University of British Columbia event in honour of Harry Adaskin, 1985

In the photo above and those below: People socializing at an unidentified event, possibly a University of British Columbia event in honour of Harry Adaskin, 1985. (The above photo is from JWB fonds, JMABC L.13764) If you know someone in…