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Friday, August 7, 2009

The Yiddish Alphabet, as sung by Spider-Man

I have no idea what's going on here. But a secular Israeli in a Spider-Man outfit and a shtreimel -- who seems to be accompanied by a giant llama and the Village People -- singing the Yiddish alphabet...well, you can't not watch it.



As far as I can tell, Gimel stands for a fat goy. Vov is a vildechaya, which is one of my favorite books, and an English expression ("Wild Thing") that comes from the Yiddish slang for wild children. Zayin is a shotgun. One letter stands for getting punched in the face, but I can't tell which. And I'm pretty sure lox, bagels and beer made cameos.

One could try to deeply analyze this video for hidden messages and for subliminal attitudes of secular Israelis toward religious Israelis (or "dosim," which is what Dalet stood for.) But really, my instinct (as someone who isn't Israeli, but has spent a bunch of time there) is to chalk it up to a combination of making fun of the Orthodox, making fun of themselves, and a healthy amount of totally random imagery of hedonism and violence. What do you think?

4 comments:

בְּשֵם יְהוָֹה וְיֵשׁוּעַ וְרוחַ מִרְיָם said...

i think i should finally do my laundry, dump the spider-man t-shert that i've been wearing incessantly since tisha b'av on my way to purchase cigars & matches manufactured in india, beer manufactured in russia & ukraine, and kosha snacks in monsey, all the while donning a yarmulke, out of respect.

in other words, it's time for major subversive transformation - shake things up a tad - beginning with a custom-made kupi kippah inspired by the banner of efrayim combined with a reversal of ha'keshet, as well as clandestine movement{s}. what that will look like is a matter of imagination-interpretation {navigationally, regions don't always do what they appear to do}, strategy, wisdom, and good luck.

"Dreams are fulfilled according to their interpretation" (Berachot 55b).

i used to be terrified of chess. i think i'm more wary of the opposing players of chess.

chinese checkers, on the other hands......

matthue said...

I've been wanting to play Chinese Checkers ever since I saw it on Firefly.

You are so on, dude.

Yonah Lavery-Yisraeli said...

Eliyyahu, I love your comment, especially the first paragraph.

Bartholomew Loeb said...

This is the greatest thing I have ever seen.

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