Protest popping up everywhere

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Before we leave the on-going blog topic of the Oct. 17 open house/open sukkah at the Presidential Residence, I want to show you these pretty Ethiopian girls waiting to go on stage and do their dance.
They were one of several folk dance troupes.

President Shimon Peres (in the upper left) was enjoying some of the entertainment before giving a nice speech.
His speech was interrupted by four protesters who suddenly stood up shouting and unfurling small cloth banners demanding affordable housing for the people of Israel.
I was happy that our President listened and relied to them that the government is working on the problem; and he asked the security men to be gentle when escorting the protesters out.
I got a picture of that moment but I don't feel like publishing it, somehow.

The Israeli Andalusian Orchestra, founded in 1994 and based in Ashdod, played.
Wiki says the 50 musicians and lyricists are of Russian or Moroccan origin.
They combine the oud and drum with European classical instruments.
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A few weeks ago , Wiki says, the orchestra bowed to pressure from religious subscribers and removed a concert from its subscription series featuring female singer Francoise Atlan. According to Haaretz, some concertgoers threatened to cancel their subscriptions if the concert was not removed from the series.
Strange, the Haaretz article is no longer to be found where it was footnoted.

However, you can go to Huffington Post to read about the curious halacha "kol isha" that says men should not listen to the voice of a singing woman.
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O is for oud

(For newcomers to the blog, I should explain that for the week of Passover vacation I joined a dozen other Jewish Israelis at a special summer school program in the Arab village of Darajat in the Negev desert. We studied Arabic and enjoyed home hospitality of the gracious host families.)

Our group of Arabic learners was invited to Darajat's community center (what in former years would have been a big welcome tent made from goat hair [hence a tent's name, "hair house"]).
This oud player explained about his instrument and the songs and told about his family and their history. Together with his son on the drum, they made the real Middle Eastern oud music.

Notice the beautiful dress embroidered in the village and the traditional strong black coffee serving set. For sale were more dresses and homemade olive oil and jars of labineh.
Off to the side these girls broke into dance to the inviting music of the oud. When they noticed we were watching, they giggled and did the shy thing, running off.

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