Q&A host Tony Jones

The  following is an abridged version of an interview recently screened on the ABC’s Q&A program.

Tony Jones:         Good evening ladies and gentlemen, and welcome to a very special Purim edition of “Q&A”. I’m your host, Tony Jones. We had, tonight, hoped to be able to reinvite our guests from last year’s Purim edition, deposed President of Egypt, Hosni Mubarak, along with the now former President of Libya, Colonel Muammar Gaddafi. As it happens, Muammar Gaddafi was not able to attend, having suffered a fate not dissimilar to that of Haman, while Mr Mubarak is otherwise indisposed.

Instead, we have been fortunate enough to have join us tonight, a man who has recently been appointed the Prime Minister’s special emissary to the business community and her special emissary to the Jewish community.

Ladies and Gentleman, please make welcome, Mr Bruce Wolpe.

Bruce Wolpe: Shalom my fellow Americans… I mean g’day my fellow Australians.

Tony: Mr Wolpe,You’ve recently been appointed both the Prime Minister’s special emissary to the business community AND her special emissary to the Jewish community. How do you find the time to take on two such diverse portfolios, and do you find it difficult to balance priorities between those two roles.

Bruce: Well frankly, Tony, the two roles really aren’t that diverse from each other. If truth be known, I feel a little guilty about it.

Tony: Guilty about, for example, spending too much time on one portfolio and not enough on the other?

Bruce: No, guilty as in…sometimes I feel like I’m getting paid two salaries for what is essentially the one job. But hey, you don’t look a gift horse in the throat, or whatever it is that you Aussies say down here.

Tony: A lot of our audience sitting at home will be wondering why Julia Gillard even needs to have a special emissary to the Jewish community. After all, when Kevin Rudd was Prime Minister, your role did not exist.

Bruce: Well Tony, you need to understand that Ms Gillard and Mr Rudd were and are very different from each other with regard to their feelings toward the Jewish community, as well as what should be Australia’s relationship with the State of Israel.

Tony: Are you saying Kevin Rudd was somewhat hostile to the Jewish community or at least to Israel?

Bruce: Well Tony, let me ask you and our audience something: Can anyone here imagine an Israeli Diplomat being expelled from Australia under Julia Gillard’s watch? The fact that one was expelled under Mr Rudd’s watch suggests that he was not exactly simpatico with the Jewish People.

Tony: Ok, well we’ve just received a Twitter response from a KRUDD, and he says this:

@KRUDD: I resent Mr Wolpe’s insinuation. I didn’t expel the Israeli diplomat because of my hostility to Israel. I expelled the diplomat because we were lagging in the polls, and also to distract everyone from what was our growing budget deficit at the time.

Tony: And a few more tweets coming in on the same matter. This one from a JRUDD.

@JRUDD: I’m effing proud of your last tweet, dad!

@ThereseRein: I concur, and am also proud of you, KRudd

Tony: And now we’ve also received a tweet from the CSG

@CSG: If someone is the owner of a white 1985 Subaru Sportswagon parked right outside the front doors, please move your car within the next 3 minutes or it will be subject to a controlled detonation. Your cooperation is appreciated.

Well, let’s move on, shall we.

Mr Wolpe, could you give our audience an idea of the kinds of tasks a Prime Minister’s Special Emissary to the Jewish community does. For example, what would be one of the most challenging things you’ve done in this role?

Bruce: Certainly Tony. Let me give an example from only last week. It was a Sunday morning, and Julia and Tim were planning on having some close friends and family around for lunch at their home in Altona, and thus they needed fresh bagels and mon kichel, which as you can imagine, are not that easy to acquire in Altona. Well, I got a call about 9am on the Sunday morning, from the Prime Minister, and she said she’s had a rough night reading Kevin Rudd’s twitter feed, and she just couldn’t face up to queuing in either Glick’s of Haymishe.

Tony: Well, what about Lichtenstein’s? I’ve heard reports that the service is friendlier, and the product is less oily than Glicks, and altogether of a higher quality.

Bruce: Could you not interrupt me Tony?!

Tony: Sorry, but..

Bruce: Please, just let me finish.

Tony: Ok, I’m sorry, please continue

Bruce: Anyway, I had to get in my car and drive several blocks, somehow find parking on Carlisle St, take a number at Glicks for bagels, then shoot across to Haymishe for mon kichel…umm that’s Poppy Seed cake, then wait an eternity for an old lady to give my change, while meanwhile I lost my number at Glicks.

Tony: Yes, well I think we all get the idea.  We’ve got another comment off the Twitter from a Professor Ghil’ad Zuckermann of the University of Adelaide, and I’ll simplify the comment for the audience. He says something to the effect that he’s concerned that Ms Gillard cannot hope to have the same level of understanding of foreign policy matters as Mr Rudd, because she doesn’t have the same level of understanding of linguistics compared to Mr Rudd.

Bruce: I think we actually need to be asking what Ghilad’s comment says about Ghilad.

Tony: What that says about Gillard?

Bruce: Yes, what it says about Ghilad!

Tony: Gillard?

Bruce: Yes, Ghilad!

Tony: Sorry, are we talking about Gillard or Ghil’ad?

Bruce: I’ve lost track.

Tony: So have I.

Well finally, we’ve had several people ask what is the Prime Minister going to do about the situation with the Melbourne Beit Din.

Bruce: Well, as you know, Julia has a lot of experience with combating infighting, lack of transparency, abuses of power, egotism, and general intransigence. At the moment, she’s more focussed on dealing with these same problems in the Labor Caucus, but once things have settled down there, I expect that she will announce a special inquest into the Beit Din, possibly to be chaired by Minister Peter Garrett.

Tony: Well there you have it, another startling revelation on Q&A. And I’m afraid that’s all we have time for tonight. Please join us again next, when we broadcast live from the carpark of Rishon kosher food store, where we discuss the growing influence of the Kitniyot Liberation Front. The KLF – a genuine liberation movement fighting for our freedom to consume legumes on pesach? – or a dangerous terrorist group threatening the continuity of Jewish life as we know it? For that, join us next week on Q&A.

Lou Gehrig, who had a disease so apparently rare that they had to name it after him

By Anthony Frosh
I recently attended a panel session that was part of the Melbourne Jewish Book Festival. The session was on the topic of “What is a Jewish book?” After listening to the panel and participating in the audience discussion, I decided that a Jewish book is any book disproportionately read by Jews, irrespective of the author or content.

For example in the early 20th century, psychology and psychiatry were considered Jewish sciences. Not only were most of the major texts written by Jews, they were largely studied and read by Jews. This is particularly true for the Psychodynamic theorists and arguably even more so for the Gestalt theorists. A physics professor I know tells me the same thing also applied to his discipline.

The corollary is also valid. There’s a world’s bestseller written by Jews and whose content is all about Jews, and yet I wouldn’t call it a Jewish book. Can you guess the book I’m referring too? That’s right, The New Testament.

So on that note, I decided to review some upcoming or recently released books that certainly ought to be classified as Jewish books.

A Patient’s Guide to the Best Doctors in Melbourne (Sydney, Perth, and Gold Coast editions also available). This book is an indispensable resource that lists and ranks all the best doctors in your capital city. The book is arranged by medical speciality, and it not only ranks the doctors, but has estimated waiting times to see those doctors, both with and without a connection. For every single practitioner, it also provides a list of individuals who, if you happen to have their contact details, could hook you up in order to bypass the standard waiting lists.

Self Diagnosis of Rare Diseases and Illnesses. Sometimes, even when you have good connections, you don’t have time to wait to see a doctor. That’s where this book comes in. It doesn’t matter if you have the Epstein Barr Virus or Lou Gehrig’s disease, this self-help guide will put your mind a rest. As recommended by Leonard “Lenny” Goldberg of The Reluctant Infidel fame.

How to Write a Complaint Letter to Your Child’s Day School. For anyone with a child enrolled at any of the major Jewish Day Schools, this could be a handy edition to the book shelf. It contains over 100 model examples of complaint letters. There’s quite literally a sample complaint letter for every occasion. Not enough tefilah? Too much tefilah? Not enough sport? Too much sport? Your kindergarten child missed out on an extra piece of apple at morning tea? You’re disappointed your six year old child cannot yet fluently read and comprehend a complex text in Aramaic? You name it, whatever your dilemma, this book’s got you covered.

Medicine, Law, or Something Else not as Good? How to Guide Your Child to Choosing the Right Career Path. No matter what your child’s academic strengths and weaknesses are, this book will prove invaluable in helping you decide for your child the most suitable career for the rest of their life. This book includes a comprehensive personality survey and aptitude test to be completed by the parent and the child respectively, as well as an easy to follow guide for interpreting the results. Most importantly, the book has a very open-minded approach and does not position either medicine or law as superior to one another.

And while you’re thinking about what books to buy, here’s a word on behalf of our sponsor.

Dear Izzy,

I gave up my intention to write about this, but then the site of a stretched pink hummer outside Caulfield shul on a Sunday afternoon some weeks ago (nothing says kiddushin like a stretched pink hummer), and then a more recent sighting of a similar vehicle spurred me to write. A couple of months ago I was walking down Balaclava Rd when I saw one of the more offensive vehicles on the road. I speak of course of the Hummer super stretched limousine.  I thought to myself, we must have some self-styled ‘gangster-rapper’ visiting Melbourne who was hit by a sudden craving for bagels.  However, as I continued my walk, I discovered that the vehicle was part of the Lag b’Omer parade put on by Chabad, with its focal point at Yeshiva College.

I found this both objectionable and disappointing.  There is probably no other vehicle on the road today that more greatly symbolises excessive and unnecessary consumption of oil than the Hummer super stretched limo.

Firstly, in this period of environmental awareness, it is an embarrassment to the community that the Lag b’Omer parade uses the most fuel thirsty car on the road.  Excessive and unnecessary use of oil is all the more shameful when we consider where most of the oil comes from, and what it is used to fund. If we want to help the security of Israel, then we ought to be striving to reduce demand for oil.

Apart from excessive oil consumption, the stretched Hummer is also strongly associated with lavish and conspicuous spending, as well as the rather non-tznius lifestyles of the gangster-rappers.

Tznius/Tzniut (modesty) is also a concept that needs to applied to more than just the way we dress.

What kind of message does this send to our children when our religious leaders embrace products with this type of obvious symbolism?

As you are one of our community elders, I’d like to hear your opinion on the matter.

Concerned Jew,

East St Kilda.

Izzy

Izzy: One thing’s for sure, I would never buy another American car. Many years ago, I owned a Dodge.  What a load of rubbish that was. At the time, I thought I was getting quite a good deal, but it ended up costing me a fortune in servicing and repairs. Eventually, my wife persuaded me to get rid of it. I bought a Ford to replace it. Let me tell you, when you drive a Ford, you feel like a king!  Well, I hope that has answered your question about vehicle choice.

As for being tznius, far vos, what for? I gave that away when I came to Australia. When I was younger, I liked nothing more than taking my shirt off on a sunny day at the beach, so that all the women could admire my physique.

“They want you to give a talk at something called Limmud-Oz”, said my publisher, a woman of enormous capability and an undistilled admiration for the organising capacity of the late Mr Ceausescu. “They are of your people and it can be a good chance to talk about the forthcoming book, which needs PR. That’s what Marketing thinks and you know how we need to keep them happy”.

My People? How does she know that I am a double Cohen? “Limited Aus? What’s that, Julia Gillard’s election mandate?” I whined, “Can’t I just send a video?”

“Don’t be silly”, she responded. “If you don’t wan’t to mix with the public, then go back to writing books about the Middle Stone Age in Gondwanaland, and see how far that gets you.”

Feeling, as usual, like a mere inkblot in the great printing press of life, I walked off to prepare for my fate. The invitation, it appeared, had arisen in response to my first book, a tasty little tome about my day job colleagues who turned their hand to murder (as opposed to the licenced butchery that they engaged in their daily working lives). To my surprise, the book was a modest success for a first-off author of no great skill, even worse reputation and an ingrained ability to split infinitives way beyond anything ever envisaged by Einstein for the atom. It was then picked up by no less than the French and the Brazilians. I had always been keen on the beach culture of the Brazilian folk and I was prepared to forgive the French their longstanding calumny from the time of Dreyfus for this act of kindness. That it was to take at least 18 months to get the book even translated into French and Portuguese did not mitigate my pathetic gratitude.

Inspired by my first venture into authorship and dreaming, as all authors have ever done, of a chance to give up the day job, I then came up with an idea for a book called Medical Charismatics and Their Discontents. My plagiarism of the title from Karl Popper notwithstanding, it was to be a witty, smart and riveting account of the danger done by charismatic individuals who take to medicine, as opposed the pulpit or parliament, to mislead or mangle their hapless patients. It still is. Trust me on this.

I walked into the She Publisher’s office, known for some reason to many of her authors as the Torquemada Room, and waved the draft outline under her nose. She made a noise like a fish swallowing a baby frog, her hand cutting through the air like one of those Japanese Samurai swords. “Nah, I want the brain. We can’t sell enough books on the brain. Biggest thing in the book business now. You are to write a book on the brain.” Keen readers will note the change in conversational tone to that more usually employed by those in military command.

“The brain?, I whimpered in shock, “I know of the brain what a fish knows from riding a bicycle.”

“Silly boy. You’ve done crime, save it for another day; there is no shortage of criminals in your profession. A book on the brain you can easily manage. Look how Oliver Sacks and Norman Doidge do it, easy-peasy. Here is the contract. Sign it.”

In less than five minutes, with a glazed look in my eyes, I staggered out, some of the staff averting their gaze knowingly.

The next eight months are not a period in my life on which I wish to reflect. It was the sort of thing Kafka or Dostoyevsky could write about, but I prefer amnesia. It was an experience akin to the man who thoughtlessly pays for a bondage and domination session at a house of ill repute, realising once it commences that he is in above his head, but feeling he has no choice but to finish, as having laid out his money.

After three months of trying to explain to the reading public the intricacies of such activities like sleep, pain and thinking, I realised that I did not have the faintest interest in reading, let alone writing, such drek, and nor would any sensate or non-lobotomised human being. Like Marx inverting Hegel, I changed course dramatically. I settled instead for writing about notable characters from history, providing a little discourse on how changes in their brain had affected their success, failure, art or crime. I started with characters such as Leonardo and Vincent van Gogh, progressing to Woody Guthrie, Jack Ruby, Howard Hughes and Adolf Hitler. When I ran out, I threw in two nameless individuals, one from 78,000 years ago (a sneaky way of getting in something about the Middle Stone Age. Hah) and a San rock art painter from 1800. And as a coda, the prophet who wrote the Book of Ezekiel, otherwise known as The Man Ezekiel or TME.

The manuscript of the work I wishfully called Being Human and Other Such Follies was handed over to the She Publisher. She laughed heartily at the putative title, saying there was as much chance of Marketing accepting this as there was of the shul schnorrer making a donation to the Sydney Peace Prize. The usual fight then ensured over my writing style. All jokes mentioning Woody Allen, my old Uncle Chaim and the wit of the late Dr Verwoerd were promptly excised, as was my tendency to slip in bad Yiddish phrases when I couldn’t think of anything else.  As a sole concession to stop me throwing myself out the window of the publishing house, I was allowed to keep one nebbish (for Jack Ruby, who else?).

The title, I learned with excitement was to be The Exceptional Brain and How It Changed History. Marketing, the She Publisher said, in a tone used by the current pontiff when discussing Opus Dei, was very pleased with their efforts. Just how I felt about Marketing was mostly indescribable and, in any event, anatomically impossible. No wonder so many writers are not just depressed but positively suicidal. That, if nothing else, would explain such cheery works as Wuthering Heights, The Bell Jar or anything by J M Coetzee.

It was on this note that I received the über-command to give the talk to publicise the book. “And don’t go on about those wretched criminals, James Joyce or that ghastly Stone Age stuff.”

“The book, give it a good go,” was added for good measure.

And, finally, “No bad jokes, I’m still dealing with the flak from your last public appearance on our behalf. If you keep going at your present rate it will result the first legal book burning since Munich 1934.”

With these instructions in mind, I submitted a list of topics to the Limmud Oz committee, foolishly including the topic Freud’s Jewish roots that I had given so many times I couldn’t stand to talk about it any more. The second topic, South African Jews and the Litvak Heritage I knew would invariably grate with an audience of mittel-Europa extraction, so the odds favoured the first topic or the last, on The Man Ezekiel. Needless to say, the committee chose Freud, I said he had done his dash, and it was TME or nothing. To my surprise, they immediately assented, which I can only assume they had mistaken him for Resnick, the mohel of Minsk, notorious for taking the concept of the filter tip to an extreme, rather than the distinguished biblical sage.

This left the problem of what to talk about. I had been interested in TME since I worked with the South African historian Charles van Onselen on the Jewish criminal Joseph Lis, a credible candidate for Jack the Ripper who was clearly influenced by TME’s work, if the systemic mutilation of his wretched victims is any guide. TME had described exactly the same fate for the whores Oholibah and Olibah. There was the historical Ezekiel, the theological Ezekiel, the literary Ezekiel, the priestly Ezekiel and so on. But what was going on inside the man’s head?

Actually, that proved the easy part. Ezekiel, once he got started, simply could not stop himself. Whether writing, preaching, prophesying, lamenting or threatening, he just went on and on – and then some. That he did this in some of the most beguiling prose and poetry of the Tanach is besides the point; he could, when least expected, switch over to the most brutal and extreme punishments (mostly to women), to say nothing of descriptions of sex that indicated the most alarming predilections. And he wrote, how he wrote; the Book of Ezekiel is the fourth-longest book in the Tanach, longer than Leviticus that by any reckoning, covered a much longer time in history, if not far more events.

This is not to say that rest of TME’s behaviour was conventional. He has ninety three visions, far more than Moses, he travels through time and space at ease, can slide through the walls of the besieged city of Jerusalem, lies on one side for 400 days, and is convinced that everyone is talking about him, if not plotting to get him.

TME had the Geschwind syndrome, a constellation of behaviours, mostly religious and creative, that resulted from temporal lobe epilepsy. To write a chapter on this at leisure is one thing; to talk to an audience well informed on the subject and ready to leap on any mistake, let alone suggestions of personal frailty, is entirely another matter.

When the day of the talk loomed, I was pleased to see that it was positively Noachic weather with winds blowing off the top of the Beaufort scale, rain streaming down and fears of mass evacuation. Things were looking up. I envisaged that the audience would consist of three: myself (who had no choice but to be there), my girlfriend Marita (who is devoted and loyal and does these things for me), and Boris the dachshund of no great intelligence, looking for somewhere to get out of the rain and have a nice sleep (Actually, Boris when not eating, spends most of his day looking for somewhere to sleep). The talk was booked for 5.45pm, certainly not a time for any sensible person to attend such an event.

I checked in at the Scientia Building, convincing the woman at the desk that I was not seeking the local outpatient clinic and learned that I had been given the smallest and most distant lecture room in the complex. This was expected and entirely consistent with my reputation. An audience of three, including the ever-somnolent Boris was now certain. I knew all would be well.

Like most of my prognostications, this could not have been more incorrect. I bumped into my friend Rachael Kohn, floating airily though the foyer, who breezily assured me that her session had been a piece of (Montreal) cheesecake. Thanks to the deluge, Marita was running late and I strolled into the room, expecting to hear only the echo of my voice off the empty walls. To my dismay, the first three rows were already full and more people came streaming in. None of them, I noted, looked as if they were fleeing the rain in search of warmth and sleep and more than a few were yarmulke-schleppers, men steeped in Talmudic argument, not a good omen for someone hoping to convince an audience that he was the only one who knew anything about the topic. By the time I started, there were over fifty present with the overflow, to my amazement, sitting in the aisles. I was beginning to wonder whether I had not been set up and this was a theological hit squad from the local Lubavitcher cell.

I had barely got into my swing when a keen-eyed beared young schlepper waved an excited hand, demanding to know how I could say that TME was the only priest who became a prophet. Was I not, he asked with his payot bouncing in unison, aware that Isaiah was also a priest. The implication was unmistakable. I could put forward my apostate and presumably ill-informed views, but I was in the presence of those who knew better and retribution was looming for any further slips.

“Actually, TME as I said was the only priest operating as a prophet outside the Holy Land. The keen look on the schlepper’s face faded. He glared at me and reluctantly sat down. With a gulp, I continued talking.

Before long, another hand waved, followed by another schlepper who asked how I could say that TME made heretical statements about his mission. “Are you seriously implying that a revered prophet could entertain such notions?”

“Ummm, I didn’t write the book, when a man talks about eating bread made from human dung or seeing a chariot drawn by four-faced beasts with beryl wheels, I think its unlikely to be listed in the Talmud.” He too sat down, but the glare directed at me did not bode well.

It was barely a minute later before the last character, an unshaven fellow who looks like an IT geek who had strayed into Talmud school bobbed up. “With your particular interpretation of the work, would you agree that you are putting forward the idea that TME’s concept of the Holy One was anthropomorphic?”

This question nearly floored me and I saw doom ahead unless I came up with something fast. In my desperation, the old lecturer’s trick came back to me. “I am many things, but not a specialist on theodicy. But I can see I am in good company to get an answer and would be happy to throw the question to the audience, many of whom seem knowledgeable in these matters.” I looked directly at my interlocutors. So did the rest of the audience. None of them, showed any inclination to take up the cudgels and starred down at the floor.

After a suitable pause, I announced with a broad smile that I intended to continue in the safer and more certain world of neuropsychiatry and epileptology.

And so I did. My interlocutors remained mute, even reproachful, but made no further intrusion. Two of the interlocutors were either sleeping or, from the psychoanalytic viewpoint, were expressing their feelings about my talk with passive-aggression. The talk proceeded without interruption. At the end, the questions were light, if not friendly and I received a good handful of applause, not just from Marita and the now-awake Boris who always likes to throw in the occasional yowl to join in the general zeitgeist.

TME, as I perceived the Man, had now been unveiled to the world and I had neither been burned at the stake nor reported to the Bnei Brith. That was one chapter down; only another fourteen left to explain. On Monday I intended to call the She Publisher and engage in a brief episode of authorial one-upmanship. We have so few of them. In the meantime, I seek a picture of TME to hang above my desk. The man is a positive inspiration.

Dr Robert M Kaplan actually has a day job; that is, until the authorities find out. His book, The Exceptional Brain and How It Changed History, is to be published by Allen and Unwin in September. He has been threatening to write his autobiography Memoirs of a Marginal Medical Student for years, but has been prevented from doing so by the intercession of his diminishing circle of friends, anxious to save him from further humiliation, if not disgrace. Why bother?

Al-Qaeda, a highly complicated organisation, as demonstrated by this org. chart

By Anthony Frosh

An Australian has been named as one of the potential replacements for the recently deceased al-Qaeda chairperson, Osama bin Laden.  Fiona Byrne, current mayor of Marrickville, is apparently on the short list to be nominated as the board’s preferred candidate for the job.

While none of the board members were willing to go on record, unnamed sources close to some senior al-Qaeda board members have said that Byrne is held in high regard.

Not only is the board highly impressed with her values, as demonstrated by her support for a boycott against Israel, but her experience managing Marrickville city council, as well her dabbling in foreign policy, is seen by some to make her an excellent fit for the next chairperson of the world’s leading international terrorist organization.

Counting against Byrne is that she is a woman.  Experts are not sure if al-Qaeda is ready to have a woman chairperson, but for a candidate of Byrne’s quality, they may be willing to make a precedent.

The story comes as more Australians are being appointed to run leading global organizations than ever before. In the past decade, Australians have headed the World Bank Group (Sir James Wolfensohn), the International Crisis Group (Gareth Evans), and McDonalds Corporation (Charlie Bell).

Byrne has refused to comment at this stage, other than to say that she is “one hundred percent focussed on running Marrickville city council, but if the opportunity came along to run an organization with the global reach of al-Qaeda [she’d] be mad not to consider it.”

Incredibly enough, it was hinted at prior to bin Laden’s demise, as early as August last year, in the Australian Jewish News that an Australian Greens politician could be selected for this prestigious role.

Sadly, the perpetrators of the hoax did not foresee some of the negative consequences.  Several members of Galus’ Facebook fan site disaffiliated (or in Facebook terms, “unliked”) from the group in disgust.  Several others expressed tremendous disappointment and vowed not to return to the website they now believed to be under new management.  Even some regular contributors contacted the editors expressing dismay at the sale to the AJN, and stating that they would need to reconsider any future involvement they might have with the publication.

A number of readers also left comments displaying their concern or dissatisfaction with the apparent takeover. “Don’t change a thing or I won’t be coming back!” wrote one reader.  Another reader wrote “We are here because it is NOT the Jewish News…Please respectfully keep that in mind Mr Magid.”

While the editors were able to reassure regular contributors that the story was only a purim hoax, unfortunately, the damage cannot be so easily undone as far as other readers and Facebook followers are concerned.

As predicted by the editors, David Werdiger, businessman  as well as regular contributor on Galus, was the first to publicly expose the story as a hoax.

The editors would like to apologise for any distress caused, and they hope disgruntled former readers will come back and rejoin the Facebook group.

Purim Sameach!

Lee Harvey Oswald – Allegedly he shot Kennedy from the Book Depository.

Galus Australis is a not-for-profit online magazine that aims to both highlight Jewish life in the Great Southern Land, and be an online manifestation of the idiom that where there are two Jews, there are at least three opinions.

It takes a not insignificant amount of money (not to mention time!) to run Galus Australis.  Not only are there the typical costs such as webhosting, but there are many other financial costs that readers might not be aware of. For example, legal bills. You’d never guess, but it turns out some Jews can be rather litigious people (just kidding!). Then there’s the catering bills. Who would have thought that the young ladies and gentlemen who have served their time as sub-editors could drink that much expensive hard liquor? Anyway, you get our drift.

Don’t worry, we’re not about to ask you to put your hand in your pocket. We know you’ve got much better things to do with your disposable income.  Of course, if you are part of the BRW or Forbes rich list, then feel free to get in contact with us.  As Mr Cooper from Stirling Cooper once explained to Don Draper, “Philanthropy is the gateway to power.”

But seriously, we’re certainly not looking for handouts from our regular readers.  Far from it.  In fact, if you keep reading, you’ll probably save money! Galus Australis is now an affiliate of the Book Depository. What’s the Book Depository you might ask? Well, it’s basically the same as Amazon, except that it tends to be far less expensive, since delivery is free worldwide.

All we ask is that if you are intending to purchase any books online anyway, please click through to the Book Depository via our advert at the top right of the page. Whenever people click through to the Book Depository from our site and purchase a book (or books), a small percentage of the purchase price will be donated back toward the upkeep of the Galus Australis website.

Thank you, and happy reading.

Dear Parents,

As we enter into a new Jewish year, and as we approach the end of another school one, it is important for us to re-evaluate our values as a community. As a college dedicated to upholding the ethos of Torah Ve’avodah, a decision has been made that addresses what has become a burning issue in our community.

In this week’s parasha, Sarai after many barren years gives her maidservant Hagar to Avraham so that he may have a child. Sarai becomes jealous of Hagar and proceeds to deal harshly with her, ultimately ending in Hagar’s exile from Avraham’s household. Sarai has not learnt the significance of Derech Eretz and the importance of treating all people with the respect they deserve.

Kashrut is a cornerstone of Modern-Orthodox life, but so too is Derech Eretz. Often in our striving for Halachic integrity, we lose sight of what Judaism is really about. Therefore, as a college, a decision has been made to endorse kosher establishments that are not currently under Kosher Australia supervision. Community politics have blurred the issue and to avoid any more confusion we have decided to take a stand.

As of 2011, the college will endorse the “Kosher V’Yosher” hechsher, by featuring sushi from Soho Sushi in our tuckshop, on the days it is kosher, and will permit students to bring other such products onto the campus. The senior management hopes this initiative will help to make Kashrut more accessible to those in our community.

Kol tuv,

Roy Steinman
College Principal

The above letter was sent out to Yavneh parents with the principal’s letter head and signature. Nevertheless, it is a clever hoax from the Year 12 students.

This time of year, California surely has better sukkah weather than southern Australia

By Anthony Frosh

For my wife and I, like many Australian Jews, the first Sunday after Yom Kippur is Sukkah building day.

Sukkah building used to require some knowledge of carpentry and ideally, some reliable contacts within the construction industry.  However, in recent times, with the proliferation of sukkah kits, one can thankfully get by with a mere bachelor’s degree in outdoor leisure (i.e. putting up tents).

The confined spaces of our first floor flat do not permit us to have a sukkah, but we share in the building and use of a sukkah at my makhatonim’s nearby residence.  Ours is a kit sukkah. For those who don’t know what I mean by a kit sukkah, imagine if IKEA sold sukkot – only without the exotic Scandinavian names  – “I can’t decide whether to buy the sukkahfloggen and the klutzige.”

The sukkah kit also departs from IKEA standards when it comes to the thoroughness of the instructions. While IKEA instructions frequently get a bad rap, I personally think they are masterful documents that cover all aspects of assembly, and can be understood regardless of one’s language. Not so with the instructions that came with our sukkah kit.  It favours a less prescriptive approach, where in the tradition of Jewish texts, assembly method is more open to interpretation.

On the upside, our family-size sukkah kit has just survived its third assembly with the only problem being some wearing to the roll out schach. This is two more assemblies than the average piece of IKEA furniture is built to withstand.

In any case, while your sukkah kit may not come with the easiest to follow instructions, SukkahMart, the main sukkah kit retailer in Australia, offers a 24-hour hotline, at least according to one of its advertising flyers. Isn’t 24-hours a little bit overkill? If anyone is really assembling their sukkah at 3am, they need to be consulting with a sleep therapist, and not the guys from SukkahMart.

I must confess that I have not tried to call the hotline, not even during business hours.  However, I imagine a lengthy wait to speak to a human, as you go through all the automated prompts.  “…dial 2 if you require an emergency Etrog…”