Many years ago, on the eve of Passover, we had just decided to renovate the kitchen and a mutual friend told me that Horowitz had just built a kitchen and Dina would probably agree to explain and help. It was unpleasant for me to interfere with her preparations for Passover, but in the end I contacted her.
Of course Dina invited me to her house to see and showed me the kitchen brightly. Since the kitchen I do not remember, but I was very impressed with how Dina looked, she wore an apron and was in the middle of work, she did not make any fuss towards the foreign guest.
I was very impressed with the way Dina, while talking to me, talked to little Nehama who came to consult what to do with a toy while cleaning for Passover. Dina spoke to her with understanding and grief about parting from the toy and helped her decide what was the right thing to do. I still have that impression.
After many years we met again as teachers in the studio and the connection tightened towards Nehama's wedding, we too were just about to marry our son and I discussed with Dina what and how to organize the wedding to be dignified but modest.
Dina's attitude and her willingness to share her thoughts and her life experience with a very, very big openness were very pleasant to me and very reassuring to anyone who is facing such a thing for the first time.
In her senior year we would travel together on Wednesdays to Jerusalem, Dina taught art teaching at the college. When I was waiting for her and my soul was already blossoming and I did not know how we would get to class at eight-thirty in the morning, Dina always arrived at the last second, but arrived.
During the trip we had a lot of nice conversations between us, in one of the conversations I told her about our dilemmas ahead of my mother-in-law's arrival. Dina told me about her background and her family. There are similar things and also very different things in the matter of how to host a family member who does not understand at all, not only the language but also the rules of the game here. We talked about debating how to host and take care of a friendly, pleasant, respectful atmosphere and how to do it so that it would not be an annoying and annoying experience.
On the Wednesday before Zvi's wedding, their son, Dina told me "Ruthie, today we can not talk"
I asked her, 'What happened? Are you on a speech fast? '
Dina replied "No, the Lebanese Rebbetzin sent me a tape about the relationship between in-laws and young couples"
Although she already has experience from two daughters she has already married, Dina was just like a student who studied the subject, it was very meaningful and important to her. She told me "looking girls is not like a son and getting a bride is not like getting a groom and they too will live relatively close" she said "you have to learn how to be hot".
Dina had to invest in it both the emotional preparation and also understand and absorb as much as possible the rules of the game.
In the second semester I no longer had to arrive at those hours in the morning, so I informed Dina that we would not be traveling together.
On Sundays Dina taught (music) in the studio and three weeks before the murder we met in a teachers' room at the end of the day, when we were both very, very tired and suddenly some kind of smile was very kind and Dina said to me "Ruthie, it's not the same thing"
I did not understand what she was talking about and asked her "what is not the same thing?"
"Traveling to Jerusalem is not the same when you are not there"
We got up and hugged and were left with the "not the same" with the hug and smile.
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