Jewish Weekend
This is an exerpt from a letter to a friend, and i had been meaning to write about this a bit, so this can at least give you a taste. It's all good times, and I'd be better at explaining it on the phone or soemthing if you're more curious. I actually did my next film project on this, but unfortunatly I don't think it's going to come out very well. I hope I hope.
What’s up with me… well this week is hella chill because we have break next week. My LCD teacher understands a break should be a break, and it is BEAUTIFUL. My drawing teacher, however, does not understand this simple idea, and gave me probably the most massive assignment I’ll have all semester other than my final project. It’s terrifying, actually. It’ll probably take me a full two days, if I do it all at once. Lame for my break, cause I’ll be home. But he wasn’t here today, so instead we had an assignment to go to the Met, and I went with my friend Taryn who is awesome and we had a lot of fun. We were supposed to do sketches, but instead we just took pictures of the pieces and we’re gunna do them later, and spent 5 hours wandering around the museum. It was awesome.
Other than that, last Friday I FINALLY made it to Shabbat dinner at the Rabbi’s house, and it was tons of fun! I knew it would be, but either Michele was gone, the Rabbi was gone, or I was gone every Friday for two months, so last week was the first week it worked out so I could go. We of course, went to the Synagogue first, and that was really interesting. It’s very orthodox, so the men and women are separated, which of course, is the source of some controversy for onlookers, but at the same time, Michele explained to me that the idea is that women are already holy, they’re already close to God simply because they are women, they just get it, whereas everything written is directed towards men, telling them what they need to do because they just don’t know, so the men and women are separated so that the men wont get distracted, because they are easily distracted. And that’s the same idea on the dress restrictions for women- always a skirt below the knees and a shirt covering the elbows, so men don’t get distracted. And Hasidic Jews don’t touch women other than their wives. Ever. It’s all really really interesting because without knowing what it’s all about, it seems like it’s bad for women, but when you find out the meaning behind things, it’s actually a pretty cool ideology.
So at Rabbi Simcha’s house, I met some cool new people and they were very confused that I was not Jewish. But I get that all the time, what, considering I’m in JSU and go to all the Jewish things and what not but I’m not even Jewish. Anywhere. Not a trace. So I just have to explain myself quite often. But yea, so Ariela, Simcha’s wife, made so much good food! And their older kid, Mendel, is a little rascal, going through that screaming stage. But they’re both such loving parents, it’s awesome to watch. And Simcha is mostly just ridiculous. No. He IS ridiculous. He, I think majored in film, and he’s from Manchester so he has a silly accent and basically, he had an epiphany and that’s why he became a Rabbi. But he is one of the silliest people I’ve ever met, oh my goodness. Definitely not what you’d expect from a Rabbi! But there isn’t a thing wrong with it. So Simcha likes to drink, haha, and he likes to offer other people drinks and make them say “Lachime” which I don’t know how to spell properly, which is just something like “to life” and take a shot. Oh he’s so silly. And they had amazing wine, it was so tasty. But that is not nearly the most important thing about him, just part of his silliness. He knows so much and is just very uplifting.. I mean, he could cheer you up any time anywhere out of any funk without even trying or knowing or anything. He just has that kind of awesome happy presence in a room. So silly, so silly!
And this weekend was Purim, which I wont delve into beyond that it’s like Halloween, and I went to two parties and randomly began to learn sign language and discovered that my friend plays in an awesome band with an awesome CD which me and Michele made sure to pick up, and I hung out with some really cool new friends of mine this weekend and all around I’m having a good time. I mean, I could keep talking forever as always, but I think that should satisfy you for now. It seems that right now, Judism is really interesting me and is a happy part of my life, thanks to Michele and the fact that you’ll learn about it from her whether you want to or not. I think I’m going to try to learn some Hebrew, what a beautiful language.
What’s up with me… well this week is hella chill because we have break next week. My LCD teacher understands a break should be a break, and it is BEAUTIFUL. My drawing teacher, however, does not understand this simple idea, and gave me probably the most massive assignment I’ll have all semester other than my final project. It’s terrifying, actually. It’ll probably take me a full two days, if I do it all at once. Lame for my break, cause I’ll be home. But he wasn’t here today, so instead we had an assignment to go to the Met, and I went with my friend Taryn who is awesome and we had a lot of fun. We were supposed to do sketches, but instead we just took pictures of the pieces and we’re gunna do them later, and spent 5 hours wandering around the museum. It was awesome.
Other than that, last Friday I FINALLY made it to Shabbat dinner at the Rabbi’s house, and it was tons of fun! I knew it would be, but either Michele was gone, the Rabbi was gone, or I was gone every Friday for two months, so last week was the first week it worked out so I could go. We of course, went to the Synagogue first, and that was really interesting. It’s very orthodox, so the men and women are separated, which of course, is the source of some controversy for onlookers, but at the same time, Michele explained to me that the idea is that women are already holy, they’re already close to God simply because they are women, they just get it, whereas everything written is directed towards men, telling them what they need to do because they just don’t know, so the men and women are separated so that the men wont get distracted, because they are easily distracted. And that’s the same idea on the dress restrictions for women- always a skirt below the knees and a shirt covering the elbows, so men don’t get distracted. And Hasidic Jews don’t touch women other than their wives. Ever. It’s all really really interesting because without knowing what it’s all about, it seems like it’s bad for women, but when you find out the meaning behind things, it’s actually a pretty cool ideology.
So at Rabbi Simcha’s house, I met some cool new people and they were very confused that I was not Jewish. But I get that all the time, what, considering I’m in JSU and go to all the Jewish things and what not but I’m not even Jewish. Anywhere. Not a trace. So I just have to explain myself quite often. But yea, so Ariela, Simcha’s wife, made so much good food! And their older kid, Mendel, is a little rascal, going through that screaming stage. But they’re both such loving parents, it’s awesome to watch. And Simcha is mostly just ridiculous. No. He IS ridiculous. He, I think majored in film, and he’s from Manchester so he has a silly accent and basically, he had an epiphany and that’s why he became a Rabbi. But he is one of the silliest people I’ve ever met, oh my goodness. Definitely not what you’d expect from a Rabbi! But there isn’t a thing wrong with it. So Simcha likes to drink, haha, and he likes to offer other people drinks and make them say “Lachime” which I don’t know how to spell properly, which is just something like “to life” and take a shot. Oh he’s so silly. And they had amazing wine, it was so tasty. But that is not nearly the most important thing about him, just part of his silliness. He knows so much and is just very uplifting.. I mean, he could cheer you up any time anywhere out of any funk without even trying or knowing or anything. He just has that kind of awesome happy presence in a room. So silly, so silly!
And this weekend was Purim, which I wont delve into beyond that it’s like Halloween, and I went to two parties and randomly began to learn sign language and discovered that my friend plays in an awesome band with an awesome CD which me and Michele made sure to pick up, and I hung out with some really cool new friends of mine this weekend and all around I’m having a good time. I mean, I could keep talking forever as always, but I think that should satisfy you for now. It seems that right now, Judism is really interesting me and is a happy part of my life, thanks to Michele and the fact that you’ll learn about it from her whether you want to or not. I think I’m going to try to learn some Hebrew, what a beautiful language.
posted by Bonnie at 11:59 PM
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