The Lighter Side

Brace yourself as we could ‘allegedly’ be going to a restaurant or out for a drink in a few weeks.

After dining in my own kitchen and pouring my own G&Ts since 23 March, just the mention of a menu has got me thinking about locations and the libations I’ll order from that masked server at a socially-distanced table.  My only experience of this kind of dining – albeit without a visor – was at a simcha when I was so socially distanced from the top table, I might as well have been in the car park.

But as times – to paraphrase Bob Dylan – are constantly a-changin’, someone else’s cutlery is finally within reach. Just to be ‘out out’ will be a novelty, after the rollercoaster rigours of lockdown, which in my case have included my daughter’s virtual batmitzvah and the streamed funeral of my closest friend, which was both surreal and tragic. With no conventional way to celebrate or mourn, my husband has been the buffer and comfort provider for my joy and grief; so coupledom during this pandemic has proved a blessing.

Sadly not everyone will feel the same after months of enforced space sharing – and China, which has led the way a lot recently, currently has the most divorce petitions.

UK figures will emerge eventually, but if a split is on the cards, a new book, The 4 Foundations of Love, will help you make the right decision. Using her own experience of a painful break-up and the subsequent recovery, Mor Cohen, an Israeli author who is a neurolinguistics practitioner interviewed hundreds of couples to determine the uniqueness of their relationship and how they knew they’d found the ‘One’. Evidently they all shared the same ‘four foundations’ according to Mor and these are:

Rareness –  realising this is your destined partner; Unwritten agreement – to be on the same page; Sacred Bond – the divine connection between you and Future dimension – the promise of a mutual future

Baffling as it sounds, if you tick all the boxes, you were meant to be together. “And if you don’t, the book tells you how to not waste precious time,” says Cohen, who claims her method can reshape and elevate a relationship without overbearing conversations, games or waiting for your partner’s cooperation.

Cohen insists her guide is for anyone interested in relationships, especially the romantic kind, which randomly got me thinking about couples in movies who make it, such as beloved Harry and Sally and those who don’t like Sebastian and Mia in La La Land. We all seek  Noah and Allie’s forever love in The Notebook, but there’s also the lesser known Adam and Helene, who battle their way to love over a hot stove in Burnt.

Truth be told, it’s a flambé of a film starring Bradley Cooper, but it’s set in a restaurant, which will prepare you for what’s coming. Hopefully.

• The 4 Foundations of Love: Reshape Your Relationship and Make It Last Forever by Mor M Cohen is available now on amazon.co.uk, priced £14.97

• LISTEN to the JN Podcast with Stephen Bush and Ron Arad  

Aloni Again Naturally

While hiding out in Caesarea during lockdown with his pooch Bruce, Shtisel star Michael Aloni shared content from his first and only novel, Love in the Time of Flu. With a title derived from Love in the Time of Cholera by Gabriel Garcia Marquez, it was penned before Covid-19, but echoes the crisis. The extract was in Hebrew, so I sought out Aloni projects I could understand and hit on Antenna, which is available to rent (£2.99) at ukjewishfilm.org.

Aloni plays the son of a woman whose 84-year-old husband declares war on a neighbour for installing an antenna on their shared roof and this is the trailer.

https://ukjewishfilm.org/film/antenna

Now in demand owing to his popularity as artist Akiva, Aloni will also star in Unto the Son, a true tale about the disappearance of a gangster father and Plan A, which follows  a group of Holocaust survivors as they plan to poison the water system in Germany.

Then there’s Happy Times, a film about a Shabbat dinner in Hollywood that goes badly wrong – unlike Aloni’s career, as he is also in the teen US show Greenhouse Academy on Netflix. Seems there’s no way of locking down this man.

Movie Right along

Film Night In is the perfect title for a partnership with UK Jewish Film and JW3, which brings new films fortnightly to an expectant audience on Tuesday evenings. “There’s so much out there, it’s hard to keep up, but to be blunt it’s not all of equal quality,” says JW3 CEO Raymond Simonson.

“Hence our online film club, which offers high quality Jewish films, live introductions and cast Q&A’s.”

Next Tuesday, you can watch Diana Groo’s Regina, which is about the world’s first woman rabbi as voiced by Rachel Weisz – so get out the corn and pop to www.jw3.org.uk

Turn on the Tan

It’s tough to accept, but the tan you acquire this summer is more likely to come from a bottle than a Tel Aviv beach. So instead of being asked: “Where have you been?” they’ll be asking “What brand?” and I’ll be helping you find the best starting with Norvell Vivid Collection in ‘EFFECT’ (£29.99), which is a salon quality micro-fine mist that neutralises any Trump orange hue. www.norvelltanning.com

Daddy’s Home

Father’s Day, lest you forget, is next Sunday, so make it sizzle with a BBQ delivered to the door by a chef who should be on his next simcha, but is instead bringing salads, roasted salmon and strawberries to dads.

Visit BBQ Hamper on Facebook or call Kushan on 07981 992717