Shana Tova

Events Review 2010

Poem by Alumnus

Club Notes

Shana Tova Message from the Club President

This year the Yale Club of Israel reached a new level as an organization -  a new level of excellence and of maturity.  More club members were involved in organizing and executing the year's programs; new members appeared at each different event.  The events and programming themselves reached new levels of breadth and richness. Alumni from around the country became involved and participated in everything from tasting etrog beer in Tel Aviv to painting an after school center in Beit Shemesh.    And 75 club members and their families participated in a unique family day of orienteering and ancient history.  75 people from our modest club with just under 300 members! That says that we are doing something right. 

 This year we hope to enrich the range and scope of activities and programs to interest even more of you.  In fact, our aim for the upcoming year is to see more members involved in thinking up new and appealing programs and helping organize them. We'd also like to expand the geographic locations where events take place. For example, when the Whiffs return next summer, we'd like to hold a concert in the South. To do so, we need a Yalie who lives there to work with us.

 If you are considering participating or would like to suggest ideas for events or programming, please be in touch with me or any one of the Club officers or coordinators listed at the end of this letter.   We'd love to hear from you.

  May 5771 be a year of interesting and entertaining shared experiences.

 Shana Tova, G'mar Hatima Tova!

 Carice Witte '83

President

Yale Club of Israel

 EVENTS REVIEW 2009-10

 November 2009

Alumni Travel Tour - November turned out to be our All Music Month. For the first time in almost 10 years the Yale Educational Travel Program brought Yale alumni to Israel thanks to Yale Prof. and composer Ezra Laderman who asked to hold a tour here. Hosted by AYA at the Sheraton Tel Aviv Hotel, visiting Yale alumni and Club members here were treated to an outstanding talk by Prof. Laderman on the subject of Jewish Composers Through the Ages. As a professor of Composition at the Yale School of Music, and composer-in-residence at Yale prior to becoming dean of the Yale School of Music from 1989 to 1995, professor Laderman's vast knowledge and personal history enlightened and delighted the captive audience.  We also had the chance to meet his wife, Aimlee, limnologist on the faculty of the Yale School of Forestry and Environmental Studies from 1990 to 2002, who continues her wetland forest restoration and biodiversity research in Woods Hole.

*Thanks to Miriam Hartman '80 for assisting in organizing this event.

Alumni Recitial - Also in November, Yale alumni were invited to attend a recital by Dmitri Novgorodsky,  Yale MM '92, MMA '99, DMA '03. By the age of 16 he had won the First Prize at the Kazakhstan National Piano Competition and later the Gold Medal of the National Festival of the Arts. After graduating from the studio of Professor Victor Merzhanov at Moscow Tchaikovsky Conservatory with high honors, Dmitri immigrated to Israel in 1991. In 1992, he was offered a full scholarship for graduate studies with Professor Boris Berman at Yale University School of Music. In fall 2009, he joined the piano faculty at the Jerusalem Academy of Music and Dance. The recital was attended by alumni in the Yale Travel Tour and Club members. We look forward to hear more from Dmitri.

Alumni Recital - Ashok Chandrasekhar '85 invited Yale Club of Israel alumni to a piano and violin recital performed by Ashok and his partner Desiree.  A number of alumni and friends were treated to a lovely evening of music, wine and cheese in the performers' Tel Aviv apartment.

DECEMBER 2009

 Beer Tasting - December began with our 6^th annual wine/beer tasting. This year it took place in Tel Aviv at the Dancing Camel Brewing Company.  After a tour of the brewery, David, owner and head brewer, conducted the beer tasting, pouring at least 6 different styles of beer while discussing a range of beer types and how beers are rated and pointing out the various aromas and flavors along the way.  A crowd of alumni were there. But I was to busy 'tasting' to write down their names.

*Thanks to Ari Zalkinder '80 for organizing this event.

Gala Dinner - At the other end of the spectrum, Yalies were invited to  the HBS Alumni Association of Israel & Penn Club of Israel to their 8^th annual Gala dinner with keynote speaker    Meir Brand, Country Director, Google Israel . And some of us actually attended. How was it?  It wasn't a Yale event.

Visiting Alumnus - December also saw what I like to call a 'master's tea'. I don't know when the tradition began but when I was at yale in the early 80's it had already become and entrenched tradition.  Hosted at the home of Phil Waldoks '73  and Amy Persky, Author and veteran writer for the Wall Street JournalTom Herman '68 offered a personal perspective on the evolution of the Wall Street Journal and its transformation in the face of changes caused by the on-line revolution.  He also shared some of his experiences teaching a Yale seminar class in Journalism.  Unsurprisingly he noted that Yale students are by far the best anywhere.

*Thanks to Phil and Amy for hosting.

January 2010

Concert – In January we were invited by Tami Kanazawa and Yuval Admony

First prize winners of 5 international piano duo competitions, to attend a benefit concert in Tel Aviv.  A number of alumni were treated to an outstanding evening of Shubert, Grieg, Rachmaninoff and Paul Dukas' the Sorcerer's New Apprentice.

Schubertiada - .  Raz Kohn M.Mus 88', professional cellist and producer of the annual Schubertiada, invited Yale Alumni to enjoy this festive musical marathon honoring Franz Schubert. Raz attended the Yale School of Music on an ITT Fellowship. While at the Yale School of Music, Raz was a student of the renown cellist Aldo Parisot.

APRIL

  Pesach Tiul - on Hol Hamoed 75 alumni and their families enjoyed a truly unique and fun family day of Orienteering, Ancient Historical Sites, and a Picnic in the Forest. We gathered in Old Usha at the Kiryat Ata Forest Site of the Sanhedrin in 135CE. Jim Parish-Plass '75, well experienced in orienteering, laid out an orienteering track in the woods, prepared topographical maps, provided compasses and taught young and old (3months to 76yrs) how to find those flags and live to tell the story. Families/children were able to either to go off to a point and directly return to "home base" for feedback, or to go in a clockwise direction in a large circle, gathering all points and then returning to base. Some of the orienteering points included Old Usha, only 300 meters from home base.  After a picnic, Jim treated us to a guided tour of Old Usha.  It was a truly outstanding day thanks to the effort and expertise of our favorite orienteering alum, Jim Parish - Plass.  But that's not where it ends . . .

 Few of us were aware that we had a published poet in our midst. Richard Sherwin, Yale PhD in English Lit and retired professor from Bar Ilan recorded his experience of our day in this poem he agreed to share with us all. 

 Usha,

 usha's empty

here a pile of stones

there a winepress cut into stone

a clump of poppies red remembrances

famous rabbis cutouts in tin

whitewashed and summarized 

in hebrew black

among the purple thistles

cactuses and dandelions

the dry cowpattied path

winds thru

still the sabbath boundary is marked

in greek on stone between another town

nothing else is left of

but then sanhedrin judges gathered here

on hilltops hadrian allowed unharried

burnt by nothing but the sun

escaped from burntout yavneh

and jerusalem

to scribe and pharisee eternal truth and

daily law the centuries to come

hadrian a curse and crumbling wall

that may have kept out picts

but failed to keep out time

the usha talmudists had crystallized

glittering dark matter 

no matter how we turned it

radiant 

no matter how we turn 

Gd's word

no matter stones piled up dug out

no matter metal cutouts standing in

and up for brilliant minds returned

to Gd and us forever

bonding jacob joseph david jonathan

soul bound up in soul

eternal

Published in Menorah Review, Issue 73, Summer/Fall 2010.

MAY

 Yale Service Day - The Yale Club of Israel's first foray into the world of YALE SERVICE DAY took us to Yemin Orde Youth Village www.yeminorde.co.il in northern Israel and Midreshet Beit Shemesh (http://www.mbsh.org.il/) just outside Jerusalem.