Diaspora in Israel.

My objective for today, being the 9th of Av, a dreaded fast day, was to get the kids out in the middle of the day for a couple hours, come home in time for Bailey's nap time and then count down the minutes until break the fast. The outing also had to be something that was indoors, air conditioned and largely something the kids could do with out much guidance from me. Once again I gave Dovie the option to stay back, so we took Shayna along.
The Diaspora Museum in Tel Aviv is a museum that focuses on Jewish people outside of Israel. I remember it to be a typical museum with exhibits of replica synagogues from Europe that were nearly all destroyed. I didn't think that this would be a hit with my kids but I came across something else that they offered. Their newest exhibit was called A, B, SEE, DO (in English). It is a hands on Hebrew language lab for children. It looks like you stepped into a box of "Pictureka"

http://www.bh.org.il/The%20Family%20Gallery.aspx Like most of Israeli attractions for some reason you MUST pre-order tickets for this exhibit.  They give you a reduced rate if you buy 5 tickets. It is geared for 3-10 year olds. Each area has English signage, but the games and activities are exclusively in Hebrew. I figured that although the target audience was on the young side of my group, given their level of Hebrew we should be able to enjoy most of section. I think I guessed correctly. And we brought my Hebrew speaking niece along for insurance.

Similar to most children's museums world wide, kids spend very little time reading and absorbing the lessons of what they are doing and just jump in and figure it out as they go, or not. There were many very cute hands on Hebrew language activities and mixed in were all sorts of climbing and sliding structures.
At the opening there was a "step on the Aleph Bet Letter" game, further in there was a pictorial texting activity, there as a "Martha Speaks" rock climbing wall (where you feed her a letter disc and she says a Hebrew word with that letter), the kids stood in a green room and signed according to a Hebrew story that was projected on the wall, a tower of Babel building area and more. We tried out everything including a Hebrew Braille wall and a conveyor belt of letters for word puzzles. We spent about two hours there. We were able to walk around part of the museum on our way out. We wandered into a world wide Family Tree competition display which was very cute.  We saw one mock up shul before heading out. The kids ate their lunch on a grassy hill before rolling down a few times. We made our way out to the car and headed back as planned.
Break the Fast was hosted by my brother's-in-law family in Mevaseret-Yerushalaim. They hosted a lovely meal in the Yeshiva Dining hall complete with a variety of their grandchildren finishing Mishayos or Gemara for a siyum. A real shame Moshiach didn't come while we were here in Israel over Tisha B'Av, that would have really been the ultimate!