Our Yishuv has quite a few Chanukah events. The only one I felt BSM would really enjoy, however, is the Torchlit Parade. When I mentioned it to my manager (seriously, a torchlit parade: how cool!) she responded matter-of-factly that their neighborhood had their torchlit parade last week; I guess it's a normal Israeli thing.
Either way, I figured BSM likes Shabbos candles, so he'll probably get a kick out of walking around and seeing "torches", however those played out in real life. Husbinator agreed with me, so yesterday afternoon, the two of them headed out. When I got back from work and caught up with them at the tail-end of the parade, I immediately comprehended what had struck Husbinator as soon as the parade was being set up.
This was a torchlit parade. This wasn't an American torchlit parade, either, in which firefighters hold an Olympic torch or two and everyone watches. This is an Israeli torchlit parade, wherein people decide that it's a good ideas to give kiddies huge, wax-covered sparklers, and let them wander forth in the breeze as a close-packed group. Oh. My. Gosh.
Pro tip: if you offer a bunch of kiddies such devices, they will wave them around and point them in all sorts of directions and generally freak the patooties out of everyone. The kiddies will not decide that holding huge, wax-covered sparklers is above their pay grade, and opt for the glow sticks instead.
For the record, BSM loved his glow stick, no one got hurt, a few torches got confiscated by the security guard who also walked around in the parade, all torches were doused at the end, and everyone got a doughnut.
Oh my goodness. It was certainly an experience.
