Kosher Easter

Easter is around the corner, and even though I'd love to write something about it, what can possibly be said about Easter from someone who has never celebrated it?

As an Israeli, moving to Iceland didn’t only mean leaving the sun and beach behind and adapting to a different weather, it also meant leaving my culture and traditions and trying to adapt to completely different ones.

Even with a secular Jewish mind like mine, I knew from the moment I arrived here that Iceland never meant to be kosher.

Here's an example, the first thing I was given to eat after I arrived here, was a small piece of fermented (read: rotten) shark meat, known as hákarl. Experience like that can be a defining moment and those who have tried it know what I'm talking about.

After living in Iceland for awhile, I had no choice but to renounce my kosher eating habits and just go with flow. Generally speaking, when it comes to food, Iceland isn’t exactly the promised land and I’m not talking here as a Jew.

A few weeks ago I decided to start my quest for my first Passover in Iceland. Passover and Easter, which are celebrated around the same time of the year, have a lot in common.

It is not by chance that páskar (the Icelandic word for Easter) and Pesach (the Hebrew word for Passover) sound alike. The word páskar is taken from the Hebrew word "Pesach" which means "to pass over" as it told in the Bible book of Exodus.

Both Passover and Easter are considered to be the most important religious events of the year, one for Jews and the other for Christians. Passover Eve is also the time when Jesus was crucified, which explains the name resemblance.

Like Easter, Passover is traditionally celebrated among family and friends, which for someone who wants to have his first Passover in Iceland can be a problem.

Being a Jew in Iceland means for the most part being alone. The problem Jews face in Iceland is that there are hardly any of us around. Community is the center of Jewish life everywhere they are, especially in the diasporas. Sticking together is what kept us around for so long.

When I first heard that Iceland's first lady is a Jew I thought it was a good sign that I would find more Jews here. But soon I realized that it's basically only me around. Only after I wrote a letter to IR few months ago, discussing the war in Gaza from my Israeli point of view, I made my first contact with a Jewish person from Reykjavík.

I learned that there are only a few of us here in Iceland, maybe not enough to start a football team, but enough for a proper Passover meal. Well, I never was a big fan of football anyway.

It takes a special character for someone who wasn't born here to live here and call this place home. To me Iceland never seemed like the ideal place to live, but once I got here, there was something about this land that made me see things differently.

There is special quality in the air that is known only by the ones who live on this icy rock, maybe it’s the combination of the people, the unique nature and the ultimate peace that makes this place so warm for your soul.

It seems like Iceland is blessed with its own "milk and honey" and Icelanders are the ones who were chosen to inherit it. With all its faults, it is something that even the kreppa (crisis) can’t take away.

I was thinking, maybe here is the authentic garden of Eden, which is described in the Bible, where there are no wars and no trees (maybe this one is not such a good example)...

This time of year is going to be a time that will make the connection between my past and my future. I will have my Passover tradition celebrated in a new land with new friends and start a new tradition of celebrating Easter with my Icelandic family and friends as well.

How exactly, I don't know yet, but as long as it involves Icelandic lamb and a few chocolate eggs, it really doesn’t matter. Happy Holidays!

Published in Iceland Review April 8, 2009.