Frum N' Flipping

I almost missed the message. Then I noticed the little envelope in the corner of my cell phone's screen. "I'm engaged!!!" the SMS shrieks out at me. She asks me to give the news to her high school teacher, who happens to be a relative of mine. That night I make the call. It starts off pretty typically. "Guess what? Rachel is engaged!" "Mazal tov! That's so exciting!" I can hear the genuine pleasure in her voice. Rachel is one of her favorite students. "Tell me all about it? Who's the boy?" "Well, he's in the army." Silence. I take a deep breath, and plow on. "He's an officer. Something quite high up. I don't remember the initials, 'samech' something or other." "I see." "It's such a cute story how the Shidduch was made. See she didn't think it would work out, but she thought 'why not', and gave it a try, and voila!' Frozen replies from the other side of the...

Charedim are anti Zionist, right? I mean everyone knows that. So how come black hats have been spotted, near picnic tables and grilling meat?! This on Yom Ha'azmaut itself, no less. Perhaps they got the date mixed up with Lag Ba'omer? Let us be Dan LeKaf Zchus. Casual investigation amongst friends turns up the fact that the majority of us celebrated Y.A this Wednesday, with the traditional family BBQ. Me: "So, we had this party, well actually a BBQ, everyone's on vacation you see.." Her: "Oh, us too. We do every year. Just because of it being a vacation, of course.." This year we even invited the neighbors, him a black hatted Kollel Avreich and all. We were a trifle scared of ruining my Shidduch reputation, but decided to risk it. They were keen on the idea, and promised to still say I'm Charedi, the next time someone calls to "find out" about me. I wonder if this is going on in the heart of Bnai Brak too? It's certainly happening in ...