Let the Pesach celebrations begin.

Let the Pesach celebrations begin.

Well. Here it is. Sometimes the religious festivals seem to come around far too quickly. In fact there are times when Rosh Hashanah( the Jewish New Year) seems to overlap with Chanukah(the mass doughnut binge where the entire Jewish population gorges itself ecstatically on sweetness and high cholesterol with the emphasis firmly on sweetness and, in some cases, huge pangs of guilt.

But here we are again at Pesach(the Jewish Passover), normally the cue for eating those ravishingly moreish and addictive matzas. How we love to crunch and bite away ravenously at those marvellous matzas, those large square shaped pieces of unleavened bread that frequently remind us of large Cream Crackers with lashings of butter, cheese or any available filling that comes to hand.

 This is Pesach, the season of spring, re-birth, new chapters in our busy lives, of regeneration and a large manifestation of hope, belief, faith in human nature and a mouth watering slice of spring fulfilment where the sun always shines and families take themselves off to varying points of the global compass. It is a season that means a great deal to me personally because childhood memories of Pesach are often coloured by the most vibrant shades of light and happiness.

On one wonderful evening during the late 1970s my lovely dad brought a unique dimension to the meaning of Pesach. In those days my parents, brother and I would alternate between my grandparents and our home for the Seder service. In fact the whole experience of Pesach was both heightened and illuminated by both the banquet of food on offer and the flowing No. 11 Palwin wine which everybody seemed to take great delight in drinking both freely and happily.

But one evening my dad, in all innocence and very little in the way of warning or prompting, did something that even the greatest of circus clowns couldn't have equalled. In the middle of one of the Haggadah prayers my dad's trousers fell down almost theatrically. At this point there was the most stunned silence before most of us just about fell about laughing  more or less convinced that nothing would ever better that moment in that time, that decade or that era. It was just incredibly funny and although my dad is sadly no longer with us I know that tonight he'll be the first one to indulge in the heartiest of chuckling. Truly brilliant.

Then there were the occasions when my parents, brother and I would make our way around to my grandparents home in Gants Hill for what was invariably the first night of Pesach. Now let me tell you straight away that my grandfather was one of the most learned Hebrew scholars ever to conduct a Seder Pesach service. And yet for those who like to enjoy and savour the finer nuances of the Haggadah and its stories this wouldn't have been your ideal evening. But, my mum continues to assure me that my grandpa knew exactly what he was saying and singing.

Needless to say my grandparents Seder service at Pesach had to be both the shortest and quickest Seder service in the history of Pesach services. In fact if I'd possessed a stopwatch I'd have probably timed it at roughly half an hour and in some cases quarter of an hour. No sooner had my grandpa started chanting the prayers before the meal then it was all over in seemingly five minutes.

Here was a man steeped in the lore and history of Judaism delivering the most impeccable Hebrew but without any of the clarity or coherence we might have been hoping for. In fact it was just a glorious jumble of muttering and mumbling that was barely audible to my young ears. And yet I was just captivated by my grandfather because his eyes were glittering and sparkling, his whole undiluted enjoyment of Pesach clearly evident. Passover had resonated with him in a way that he must have thought an impossibility at the height of the Holocaust horrors during the War.

I can still see those wine stained Haggadah prayer books splashed liberally with red wine, Hebrew writing blending seamlessly with dark red Jewish alcohol. Then at the end of the meal my grandfather would launch into the most gripping rendition of Jewish songs inspiring me by example and urging me lovingly into joint harmonies. Pesach is the Jewish celebration of Spring in all her colour and beauty but without the Easter eggs.

So here we are again at another Passover or Pesach and another chance to listen to that remarkable Jewish story of freedom, the liberation from enslavement, the chance to engage and communicate humorously with family and friends, an opportunity to be among our loved ones exchanging lively banter and bubbly bonhomie. Oh yes Pesach. It's time to sample the simple pleasures of the palate, a drop of life's finest wines and the warmest of company. Those matzas are just irresistible. Now what happened to that Afikomman? Let me guess. Grandpa hid it behind the sofa again. Wow what a festival.