Yonathan in Berlin - July 2025

I've just met Kübra Dalkiliç of the educational department of House of One Berlin. As I wrote earlier, one of the main purposes of my stay in Berlin is to meet Kübra, her Christian and Jewish colleagues, and other HoO staff members. Now that we have had a chance to get to know each other, and they have received a copy of The Man in the Clouds,  the actual work of writing the learning units based on the book will be much easier and more efficient. Kübra and I will meet again tomorrow, at the monthly prayer for peace, organized by House of One.

This project will be the main focus during my stay in Berlin. It started in 2016 as an idea for a workshop in Stuttgart for Palestinian and Israeli teachers: to have Israeli, Palestinian and German students translate a Dutch children's book into Arabic, Hebrew and German, get a trilingual, fully illustrated edition of the book published, and use that book in Israeli, Palestinian and German elementary schools. The book was written by Koos Meinderts and Annette Fienieg, whose permission to use the text and illustrations I asked and received before I started working on the project. The book is  The Man in the Clouds (De man in de wolken) , and it deals with the importance of giving, sharing, accepting the other, and the dangers of greed and materialism. Its main themes are universal, which together with the beautiful illustrations makes the book a great tool for intercultural and interreligious dialogue and education. I teach English at the Leo Baeck Education Center in Haifa, and fou...