A Passover Journey

Of all the Jewish festivals, Passover is definitely my favourite. There’s a great story with plenty of audience participation, edible props, bonkers traditions and a lot of singing - what’s not to love? 

This year we decided to get hands-on with the story and talked about what we would take with us on the kind of journey the Israelites made into the desert. 

Food and water came up first, and cups for getting more water from streams. Daniel considered string would be pretty useful, while Adam fancied tools (he got a toolkit for his 3rd birthday recently). After some debate, we concluded that a Swiss Army knife would do as most other tools could be replaced by rocks of various kinds along the way. Matches would help with fire for warmth and cooking (some conversation about alternative methods such as flint and steel, or rubbing two sticks together), while a picnic blanket would provide something to sit on, sleep under and shelter in. Finally, a first aid kit seemed sensible. 

Then we made our own matzah, following the tradition of allowing no more than 18 minutes to elapse between the water hitting the flour and the dough going into the oven, to ensure that no leavening could take place. While it was in the oven, we read the story again, packed everything into our rucksacks, and put on our walking boots. Adam, who had grasped that the desert is hot, sensibly insisted on his sun hat too. 

As soon as the matzah was ready, off we went! 

Our trek took us up the road to the park, followed at one point by some rather noisy Alsations (we decided they were the Egyptian army), whom we escaped by crossing the road (or Red Sea, depending on how you wanted to look at it). There we settled down to a brief and slightly chilly picnic of matzah, hummus and charoset. 

The original plan was to continue to the Promised Land (cafe up the road) for the fabled milk and honey (hot chocolate) but we ran out of time so headed for home, talking about modern-day refugees on the way. 

I can see this activity growing with us and becoming a family Passover tradition, maybe a proper hike in years to come, and hopefully inspiring conversations about refugees that lead into positive action like our amazing friends here. 

The matzah wasn’t bad, either!