Memories of the Past, Driving the Future

I haven’t written a blog post in over 15 months.

Since the death of my friend, Dave, nothing seemed adequately meaningful that it deserved recording - my wedding of course being an exception but I was slightly too busy at the time to write about it!

A few weeks ago that changed.

I was in Israel and was lucky enough (?!?) to receive an invitation to Kiryat Ata’s official memorial ceremony for Yom Hazikaron - Israel’s Day of Remembrance for those killed and injured in wars and terrorist attacks. 

There I sat, with families of soldiers who had died, as a solemn, yet powerful and empowering ceremony took place - an honour guard, civilian officials and military officers making speeches and reading poems, wreaths laid and a 21 gun salute.

How saddened one feels by the deaths and the pain, knowing that so much of it could have been easily avoided if only Israel’s neighbours hadn’t been so belligerent. 

Yet, how empowered one feels when one realises the responsibility we have to those who are no longer with us, to continue what they were part of, such that their deaths weren’t for nought. 

The following night (yes, it’s peculiarly Israeli) was the celebration of Yom HaAtzma’ut - Israel’s Independence Day - and my first time celebrating it in Israel.

There we were, 15,000 people in a park celebrating Israel’s existence as a Jewish, democratic state (FYI, that’s a quarter of Kiryat Ata’s population, gathered in a single park!).

There we sat, as the broadcast of the counting of votes from UN Resolution 181 was replayed, and listening again to David Ben Gurion’s Declaration of the State a few months later, 1948.

There we stood (because that’s all there was room for!) as musicians - Subliminal, Sarit Hadad and Chaverim Shel Natasha - joined us in celebration.

Israel - both the People  and the State - is both history and present. Both solemn and celebratory. It is our past, yet also our present and our future. Am Yisrael Chai, the Nation of Israel lives!

Dave would have loved it.

In Memoriam

My post today, my first in a long while, is devoted to the loving memory of a good mate, Dave Burnett, 3/12/1985 - 22/1/2008.

When a good mate dies, especially so unexpectedly, there are no words to describe the number of thoughts and memories and feelings that come out of deep, hidden recesses.
Similarly, there are no words to describe Dave or the way that people in his life saw him. "Legend" doesn't cut it; nor does "top bloke". Dave may have approved of "champ" but that's definitely lacking.

One thing is for sure, whatever words one uses, and that is that Dave was an incredible guy and an inspiration to many.

He was one who was perpetually involved in the community and the world around him. Doing things and doing them well.

For a long time, Dave had been involved in various facets of Jewish life. His synagogue, Hineni, AUJS and many others. More recently, Dave found a passion in politics, getting heavily involved in the Labor Party and was last year elected to the board of the student union.
There is little doubt that, in Dave, we had someone who was truly going places and was going to lead the way with countless loyal devotees in tow.

But where he was heading is not the issue.
Dave was an incredible guy and an inspiration to hundreds and perhaps thousands of students, colleagues and chanichim. His attitude to life, to people, energised others and his contagious enthusiasm and effervescent personality made it impossible to not smile when he was around.
He brought light, laughter and love to those who knew him and will be sorely missed. The world is already a sadder place without him.

Dave leaves a legacy as an example to us all of how one can live in this world. To be active and effective, fun and friendly, innovative and honest.
None of us, I'm sure, can believe that Dave is gone; surely, somehow, he's looking down on us all. The greatest way we can honour him is to live as he did and strive to build the world that Dave would have wanted to see.

Dave, may your soul rest peacefully on High. We miss you terribly already and will continue to do, always.

Don't worry, be happy!

Tomorrow evening ushers in the Jewish festival of Sukkot (סוכות), painfully translated as "The Feast of the Tabernacles." You'll excuse me for referring to it by its Hebrew name henceforth.

It's a bit of a funny festival in that there are a bunch of rituals and traditions that lots of people don't understand. Not that they're by any means incomprehensible but they're just not as easy to interpret as apple and honey for a sweet New Year, or the contents of the seder plate whose explanations (on a basic level, at least) are reasonably apparent and commonsense.
Not so with Sukkot.

Nonetheless, Sukkot is a festival that continues the trend through the recent High Holydays of a growing sense of joy happiness, such that Sukkot is the festival for which we are told "ושמחת בחגיך והיית אך שמח" - be joyful on your festival and you will be only happy.

I very much intend to heed this command - with the arrival of my sweetheart tomorrow, I anticipate that I will indeed be happy and this festival will be particularly joyful.

May it be a great time for us all; may you have a chag sameach and a wonderful year.

Get out of the way - QUICK! - I'm a Skin Doctor!!

Doctors are a privileged bunch, having the knowledge, training and opportunity to help people at their most vulnerable, saving life and limb. It is for this reason that doctors - junior, senior and in every specialty - have pagers (that's "beepers" for the Yanks) so that when an emergency situation arises they can be instantly informed and do what's required to save the day.

As such it's quite common that lectures, tutorials and teaching sessions of any sort will be interrupted by the beeping and vibrating of pager and/or mobile phones, informing the doctor of a situation to be dealt with.
Often, doctors ignore these pleas for help (often they're mundane requests to complete paperwork, do simple procedures and the like)

One specialty, however, seems to be very diligent in their page-answering, obviously having to respond many calls for life-saving treatment.

It's not the surgeons, rushing to deal with the incoming multiple-trauma following a car accident.
It's not the cardiologists, hurrying to stent a coronary artery of someone verging on permanent heart cell death.
Nor is it the interventional radiologists, speeding to save someone's brain from the developing ischaemic stroke.
And not the obstetricians, off to the labour ward to perform an emergency twin caesarian.

It's those apparent kings of the medical emergency, the dermatologists, who answer their pages rapidly, diligently, unfaultingly.
So it lead me to wonder -- what exactly is a dermatologic emergency?

Precisely while I was wondering this, as if delivered from above, the answer appeared before me. There she was -- young and French, decked out in ridiculous-looking designer clothes and with her bag hanging in the crook of her elbow, rushing about the pharmacy telling staff that "someone need to look at this, I need this fixed immediately!" while pointing to a small spot on her face that had appeared since putting on makeup the previous evening.
My question had been answered but in doing so it left me with another: Why was this young woman at a pharmacy??
Perhaps her dermatologist wasn't carrying their pager....

Onward and Upward!

Another rotation finished and another trip to the airport..... I'm going to Israel!!! :-D

Lessons for the Living

Last week, as part of a trial innovation in our medical curriculum, I participated in a new session on breaking bad news, something that is part of the nature of any career in medical practice.
Little did I know that what remained of that week would bring bad news to me. Specifically, on Shabbat, the death of my grandfather Kurt Yehuda HaKohen Nothmann. It’s true what they say – no death is really expected, even when it’s known to be coming.

Poppy led a long life, ended in its 90th year, in which much was done and achieved, despite the adversity of being orphaned and losing most of his family at a young age, the loss of the rest of it (aside from one sister who had made it to the Promised Land) in the Holocaust and the personal and political limitations that are inherent in that. When he arrived in Australia, having left Germany on perhaps the last boat available to Jews, he has no money or belongings and was a citizen of nowhere, having been stripped of German nationality by the Nuremberg Laws. He was as his ancestors were when our family name was created. He was a man with nothing -- A Nothmann.

And yet from this nothing he built a life here, despite being a stranger in a strange land. He contributed to society and joined the Australian Defence Force – though of course as a German, even as one who’d been stripped of his citizenship, he wouldn’t be permitted to serve overseas. He married his beloved Dora, my Nanna, on the 25th of December, 1940 as Christmas was when the Army would release him for long enough for the wedding and the overseas honeymoon in Manly. Together they began a successful bakery business and, thankfully, a successful and happy family. My brother Joel has more about Poppy’s life at www.joelnothman.com/blog/

Instead, I’ll focus more on Poppy as a person.
Poppy was a wonderful man. Whatever was happening, at least until his decline over recent months, he always seemed to have something to smile about. Whatever was being discussed or whoever was arguing at the table he always had a knowing grin on his face; there was always a clever comment on its way. Bright and knowing, Poppy was great to be with. From taking us, and other kids, to the park to feed the ducks to Anzac Day marches and memorials with other active members of the National Association of Jewish Ex-Servicemen, Poppy was able to relate everyone around him.

As well as this, Poppy was probably the most patient person I’ve ever met. Also amongst the kindest and most generous. A gentler soul one has never met.
I’m sure that, if we were all just a little more like Poppy, the world would be a much better place. If we could all just be a bit more giving, a bit more accommodating; more patient and kinder. If we could see things in perspective and keep on striving – whatever we’ve been through isn’t really that bad, and there’s so much more that makes life wonderful. Poppy was like that and, through those attributes and attitudes, he helped make my childhood and upbringing as wonderful as it was.

May Poppy always be remembered this way, as I will surely remember him. May he serve as a role model, and may we do what we can to emulate him and improve the world around us. May his soul be blessed and move swiftly to the World to Come.

Poppy: we love you and miss you and will remember you for the rest of our lives. Thank you for being who you were, and making us who we’ve become.

Rollercoaster

The last day has been one of the most emotionally hectic of my life, if not the single most hectic such day.

The highs and lows came and just kept on coming.

The engagement party itself - wonderful, gorgeous, so much fun and so happy - was a high like nothing else I've experienced.
The Yom Hazikaron* ceremony afterwards - my first since firmly deciding that I will be making aliyah** - was amongst the deepest sorrows I've felt in a long time.
Back home and opening presents - reminders of the wonderful future that awaits us - my spirits were again buoyed.
And then packing her bags and seeing her off - my future is once again beyond my reach.

Highs and lows, it's been a tough day. An emotional rollercoaster.
But at least this rollercoaster is running on track and I can see where it stops next. A rough ride, perhaps, but well worth it! As I continue along my track, my future approaches... and I couldn't be happier, because a finer bride-to-be doesn't exist, anywhere.


* Yom Hazikaron is the memorial day for Israel's fallen and missing soldiers, as well as victims of terrorism.
** aliyah means going up and refers to migration to Israel because, of course, Israel is on a spiritually higher plane than the Diaspora.