Yom Kippur is not exactly a holiday. The Day of Atonement is the most solemn and important fasting day in the Jewish calendar. On this day, many come to pray in the synagogues, including those who do not attend synagogue on any other day of the year. They pray and fast, believing wholeheartedly that it will bring them atonement and forgiveness. They pray that their names be written in the Book of Life.
When I was a girl it was one of the most fun days of the year. At one o’clock in the afternoon before the fast began, our neighbor from the apartment building where we lived, Aliza Ohayon, would bring us a special pot of couscous for Yom Kippur. As I write this, my taste buds are starting to work. What would I not give right now to eat her couscous! The aroma of chicken soup wafted from every kitchen in the neighborhood, for the meal eaten just before sunset at the onset of the fast. We children were still too young to fast, but we would not miss this meal in any case.
At about four o’clock in the afternoon, ALL the cars stopped driving. People hurried back home. And the roads were transferred for 24 hours to be the territorial possession of the children. Bicycles on this day were a must-have in every home.
On this day, all our parents fasted. This left them powerless, and thus they left us children to ourselves. We were free and happy to do whatever we pleased. We spent the day in the streets. No mother shouted from the window to her son to come home. Most of the parents were either sleeping, or were in the synagogue. That’s how it was with everyone.
The favorite game among the children was, “Who can fast the longest?” We would really hold competitions. And how did we know who had broken their fast? Very simply. We checked the tongue of everyone who announced that they were still fasting. A fasting tongue is whitish and dry. I promise you that slowly and gradually, all the tongues became pink and “soaked” with food.
However, there was one Yom Kippur that was different from the usual, a day I remember in a completely different manner. We lived then in Jerusalem in the Bayit VaGan neighborhood. Secular and religious families lived together in the same apartment buildings. Our house was right next to the synagogue. That Yom Kippur at about 11 o’clock in the morning, from out of nowhere a car suddenly arrived and stopped near our house! It was very strange, because no one drove on Yom Kippur. It was considered a great desecration of this day. And therefore we children were immediately primed to shout at whoever drove on that day.
The man who got out of the car walked up the stairs to my apartment! You can imagine the awkward feeling that went through me… the very person desecrating the Day of Atonement was coming of all places, to my own home!
How embarrassing!
After a while the man left our house and continued on his way. About half an hour later my father also came down to the street from our apartment. We (me and my sister) who were down on ground level as was our custom, ran to him. He kissed us and asked us to be good children and obey our mother.
Now, my father in those days was a truck driver. Have you ever heard the sound of a truck starting up? Rest assured it was a deafening noise. Suddenly he climbed up onto his truck which was parked near the synagogue, and – horror of horrors – he started the engine and a horrible noise filled the whole neighborhood. People came out of the synagogue and started shouting at him: “Infidel, blasphemer!” Yes, there were some who cursed (Yes, on Yom Kippur). I didn’t understand what my father was doing; I felt ashamed.
Anat’s father, ready for action. Photo: Anat Schneider
Then at about two o’clock that afternoon, a war siren pierced the silence. Mothers shouted from the windows to their children to come home, in a panic.
The Yom Kippur War had begun.
My father had been summoned to active IDF reserve duty a few hours before the rest of the reserve soldiers, together with his truck because his emergency military role, like his civilian job, was as a truck driver.
People hurried home from the synagogues turning on their televisions and radios. An altogether different noise filled this Yom Kippur.
In the evening, a delegation of neighbors arrived at our house. They came to apologize for yelling at my father, and to offer help to my mother. We spent that night in the neighborhood bomb shelter.
I didn’t think the memories would flood back, but at certain moments while writing, my heart churned and my eyes filled with tears.
