Einat Mizhar
I work with Kiah's 'Maarag - Kol Israel Haverim' program. As part of a staff day out, we went to see a performance of 'Frecha is a Nice Name'.
I didn't have great expectations of the play, and perhaps I even had a preconceived view stemming from resentment, anger and disappointment that, after 66 years of the Jewish State's existence, there's still separation between Ashkenazim and Mizrachim.
As an Ashkenazi, who was raised for years in Dimona and taught by a classroom educator from a Moroccan background (a teacher for life who influenced me to become an educator), I have always believed that there are Ashkenazi frechot and Mizrachi frechot and Ashkenazi arsim and Mizrachi arsim, just like there are cultured and educated Mizrachim and Ashkenazim. I blamed the lack of proper education on the creation of the behavior embodied in the slang word arsit or frechit, and I didn't blame it on the person's ethnic origin. I didn't evade the fact that there were more Mizrachi arsim and frechot, but I also blamed the economic situation and the lack of investment in the social periphery, and I hoped that if we worked in the right way, if we voted for social parties who work towards equality and if we dealt with education, then we'd help to change the situation.
After I saw the play, which from my perspective was a direct continuation of the film Gett: The Trial of Vivian Amsalem (which I wrote about in my last post), I understood the depth of a problem that – it becomes clear – I wasn't aware of at all.
This insight came from the wonderful show of Hanna Vazanna Grinvold which tells all the story through song. It was made up of 15 songs, most of them from Mizrachi poets, some by men, and gave them in the mouths of the three exceptional actresses. Sally Arkadash, who also wrote the show, Avital Meishar-Meir and Eden Uliel. These three actresses read/act out the poems, with the genius direction that causes you to feel that you know them personally. They are workers in a textiles factory where you visited, they are the cleaners at the school where you learned, in the mall where you shop, in the museum where you visit. Mizrachi poetry dramatized, wonderful, which tells a screaming and discouraging life story. The only music which is heard in the background is davka the music that we nickname "Israeli", but it's essentially only "Ashkenazi": Arik Einstein and Hanna Alberstein. It's impossible not to experience the dissonance and the insight of Jewish Mizrachim, Arabs and minorities, who live in the State of Israel, which is still a space where the mainstream belongs to others.
After the performance there was a discussion with the actresses and the director, with interesting questions and even more interesting answers.
One of the questions dealt with the influence of the game in a play like this on the offstage identity of Mizrachim: "Here you are celebrating your Mizrachiness, but I'm interested to know what happens offstage. Do you continue to celebrate it there?"
The actress Sally Arkadesh gave a chilling answer. She said that usually the answer is "yes". The show helped her to be authentic and to feel pride in her origins, and connected her to her roots, but, the morning she appeared before us, the cast flew from Eilat, where they had performed the previous day. The security person checking her ID couldn't understand her family name and her father's name (she is of Turkish origin) and they began to interrogate her regarding her origins and the nature of her relations with her family and friends in Turkey. Sally was shocked by the situation. When she was in the army, she had served at checkpoints and interrogated Palestinians about their intentions when they visited Israel and checked their ID cards. How could it be that she suddenly constituted a potential security threat only because she's of Turkish origin?!? She said that the situation had embarrassed and humiliated her.
'Kol Israel Haverim' CEO Yehuda Maimaran also asked to speak. He stood up and said that, beyond the cry that was heard in the play, it lacked the presentation of the alternative: the rich Mizrachi culture. The rich culture which flourished in the Jewish world isn't mentioned in the performance. The celebration of Mizrachiness can't just be the color of clothes, the happiness of life, and the movement of the hands. Mizrachiness is a rich culture which goes far beyond these symbols. I agreed with him. Maybe the play shouts out the problem but doesn't state the solution. Maybe that's still to come.
I feel, and this is what I said to Yehuda Maimaran at the end, that if the play is the body which is pointing at the problem, Kiah is the body which provides a sort of solution through education, which tries to unit all of Israel not by blurring the different cultures, but as a melting pot which invites each element to bring its own special aroma to the dish, while at the same time remaining secure in its own identity.
