A Bit of Catching Up

I haven’t written anything for a while, and really still don’t have the time, but will try to write now anyway, and do some catching up.

I was already in New York for the Convention of Shluchos on Tu B’Shvat, so unfortunately I missed the celebration here. Before I left, I decorated the school, made goody bags for everyone, and prepared the Shabbos menu for the shul accordingly, so that everyone got to taste the Sheva Minim – the seven special types of produce associated with Eretz Yisroel. Everyone especially enjoyed the cookies baked with barley flakes, wheat flour, raisins, dates, olive oil, and colored chocolate chips.

Purim was celebrated with great joy, both in the shul and in the school, with a full day program at the school for the entire community. I can’t post too many pictures now, as I’m currently working on two half computers. My desktop is loaded with viruses, and until it’s fixed, is not connected to the internet. The majority of the pictures are in that computer. I’m working on my laptop, which isn’t accepting CDs, and the (new) USB port doesn’t work (nor does the sound, but that’s a separate issue.) So until we get the computer act together somehow, there are only a few pics that I already have in my gmail.

Anyway – we started by reading Megillas Esther in school, followed by the distribution of mishloach manos packages and an explanation of the mitzvos of Purim, which everyone then participated in. I would especially like to thank the generous people in America and in England who donated the candies, which we used for mishloach manos. Children and grown-ups alike were delighted with them. Every year it's a challenge to come up with a costume for my husband, which hides his beard, so he won't immediately be identified. This year, he was a great scarecrow, as you can see above. We invited the teenagers from Sochnut to participate in the Purim program, and they presented an interesting Purim shpiel. This was followed by the costume contest, and a carnival full of exciting games and contests, and topped off by a delicious Purim seudah, prepared by Baila and company.

From Purim, we rolled right into pre-Pesach preparations. Of course, just about anything could beat last year! Last year was the Pesach to beat all Pesachs! That’s when TWO fridges broke, TWO self-cleaning American ovens broke, TWO kitchen cabinets disintegrated (all after lengthy cleaning, of course,) and TWO helpers were each out sick for TWO days. In the middle of all this (I believe I was running out to find new kitchen cabinets,) Yoel called me from Borispol airport in Kiev to tell me that he was having problems in customs. Stupidly, I responded that this is the least of my problems. Hashem let me know! All of our Pesach supplies, packed up in 14 large U-Haul boxes, and with two large bottles of wine per box, were supposed to be divided up between four of my boys. Three were coming on Sunday, with Yoel following on Wednesday. When the first three arrived at the airport in New York, (and this had actually been pre-arranged for once,) Aerosvit’s computers were down, and they couldn’t find the arrangements. So they suggested that all 14 boxes should go with Yoel on Wednesday, at a discounted fare. When Yoel and his boxes arrived in Borispol, it was like someone waving a red kerchief in the faces of the customs officials. Hey! Here comes a live one! I won’t go into all the gory details, but the customs, police, and successors to the KGB all got involved, and we did not get any of our Pesach supplies! Nor did Yoel get his clothing, as once they start confiscating, everything is included in one package deal! He had to pick up everything on the way back to New York, pay customs for storing it(!!!) pay for it to go back, and then again to bring it back here again this year!!! Itchie brought the most essential supplies with him, in several boxes. Our shmurah matzah was almost all confiscated, so we had to order locally. They sent us three year old matzah from Eretz Yisroel that was actually green with mold, so we had almost no matzah to eat and had to ration whatever there was! During Chol HaMoed they expressed their astonishment, as they had ostensibly told the workers to send us new matzah and for the last days we got several kilos of good matzah. To top everything off, we had four people with special diets to accommodate. I generally don’t mind this at all, but this on top of everything was – not easy. Two baalei teshuvah had taken on very stringent minhagim; only on the last day of Pesach did they finally agree that since R’ Zalman Shimon Dworkin a”h had told me I could grind my own pepper before Pesach, they would use it. One guest ate only what his father had seen in the Rebbe’s house on Pesach – minus all the foods he didn’t like – which left almost nothing. His food was cooked in a separate pot, which was kept on a windowsill, and caused problems by being blown onto the floor, leaving him without a pot! (If you didn’t follow that one, please don’t try!) We also happily had with us my newly married son and his (in the beginning of her pregnancy and very nauseous) vegetarian kallah.

So, as I was saying, even this year’s events were easier (in a certain sense) than last year’s. Certainly once Pesach actually began. Except that there was no real Chol HaMoed, but that’s a problem we shared in common with everyone, everywhere.

Several months earlier, my husband’s doctor had suggested he have a stress test done. He was flying all over the world at the time, trying to raise funds, and the doctor then told him the next time he’d be in New York, he should have an angiogram, and he should set aside two days to be in the hospital. Itchie figured this was no problem, and prepared to travel the following day to raise the funds needed for Pesach and the school. I asked him if he was sure he could travel immediately, and proceeded to do a search for angiogram on the internet. And proceeded to make him lose sleep. I can’t stand not knowing what’s going to happen to me, but my spouse is the opposite. I felt terrible. And I couldn’t even go with him, because this was happening almost erev Pesach! Well, when they did the angiogram, they found that one of his arteries was 100% blocked, but miraculously, his heart had created it’s own bypass! They ended up putting in stents in several arteries, and Boruch Hashem he was able to be home for Pesach, but the fund raising was off indefinitely. In desperation, I sent out a letter to friends, asking for help, and Boruch Hashem several very nice donations came in, which at least took off a little of the pressure from us (though it’s back again now :-) )
Now to backtrack a bit. In the 1960's arsonists burnt down the Central Choralnaya Sinagoga of Simferopol, a large and majestic building that had once graced the center of the city with its presence, on a piece of land, which until today is considered prime property. Shortly afterwards, a new building was built on it’s site, housing businesses, thus effectively doing away with any chance that the Jewish community could hope to reclaim what was theirs by right. For forty years, the city of Simferopol would live with the shame of this reprehensible act. Its extent can be seen by the fact that Simferopol is the only major city in the entire CIS whose Jewish population did not get back a beautiful synagogue after Perestroika. Unbelievably, in 2007, the Jewish community still has no synagogue building to point to with pride and say "this is where we worship." Eight years ago, we bought a piece of property facing the river, in the center of town, with the vision of rebuilding an active central synagogue, with a facade similar to the previous Choralnaya Sinagoga, to breathe new life into the glorious legacy of a once vibrant Jewish community. When the land was bought, a number of city elders lauded this initiative, and some of them (including the then Minister of the Building Department,) were actually the ones who referred to this move as undoing the shame of the city! Then, even though we had checked that the building on the site was structurally sound, the Minister said that he had done his own investigation, and the building was not sound, and we would need to demolish it. Nobody informed us that this would effectively take away our ownership of the property! Now that things are growing in Simferopol, our land has become prime property, and various groups have been vying to get their hands on it. The city council had already voted several times to deny us the right to build the synagogue. We contacted numerous people to help us, but nothing seemed to be having an effect. At the previous vote, police physically barred my husband and the president of our kehillah from entering the municipal building! And then said that they voted against us because the Rabbi was not present!!! A final vote was scheduled for Adar – a fortuitous month for such things – and on the birthday of the Rebbetzin. At the last moment, we were told orally that the meeting was being postponed. But we also heard that it was not being postponed, and they were indeed meeting on that date. Since we had once been deceived like that regarding a hearing in the case of the skinheads who had attacked us, you can imagine we were a bit leery. Well, it turned out that while they did indeed meet, our matter was not on the itinerary for that day. The vote was put off till the 10th of Nisan, just hours before the Rebbe’s birthday. The day before, I suddenly felt an amazing surge of confidence. I was certain that this time we would win. I went around the house singing Didan Notzach (the victory is ours) while cleaning for Pesach, and made a celebratory meal that night. The following morning, we met a prominent balebus in court. He would be speaking in our favor at the meeting. We entered the hall where the vote would be held, and felt everyone’s eyes upon us. Mr. Finklestein got up to speak, and then the secret vote was held. The results were displayed immediately on an electronic screen: 48 for, 5 against – Didan Notzach! Just last week, we were speaking with Mr. Finklestein, and he said to me “you don’t know – you had a miracle.” I said “Yes, I know.” He said “No, you don’t know! On the morning of the vote, the deputies had already decided that they were unanimously against us. The mayor told me that I’d have to be very convincing, and it didn’t look possible to win. I didn’t know what to say. That fact that we won was truly a miracle!”
So we went into Pesach on a real high, Boruch Hashem, with two miracles! For Pesach, our son Dovid, who graduated culinary school in Yerushalayim last year, came home and helped out in the school with the seder. We also had with us our two youngest sons, Schneur Zalman and Shmuelie, two of our “adopted daughters,” Ruchama, who had been living with us for the past three years and is now learning in Machon Chana in New York, and Sarah Rivkah, who taught in the school for two years and is now learning in Machon Alta in Tzfat, and Shmuel, another “regular,” home from yeshivah in Kiev. Two very fine bochurim who are learning in Australia, Mendy Eber and Moshie Rothstein also came, helping tremendously in general and especially with running the sedarim. Boruch Hashem nearly 200 people participated in the sedarim, and many attended the Moshiach’s seudah on the last day of Pesach as well.
Now Pesach has come to an end, and almost everyone has left. I’m back to my usual schedule of teaching in the school, giving classes several times a week for senior citizens at Chesed, classes in shul, etc. Today after school I spoke to a group of elderly women. We spoke about sefirah and what it means, and I gave them charts to keep track of the days. They all wrote down the “prayer” to say, and said they’ll say it every day. After the class, one of the women called me over to speak to her. She had asked me last time to borrow a Chumash so she could read it, several passages per day. She proudly told me: “You know, when I was younger, I didn’t know any of this. But now that I’m older, I’m starting to learn. I want you to know that on Pesach I got together my friends, even the non-Jewish ones. I put matzah on the table for everyone to eat. And I told them: ‘Quiet! Listen! Shema Yisroel Hashem Elokeinu Hashem Echod!’ I wanted everyone to know there is only One G-d! Maybe we didn’t do the four cups right, but for the first time, I wanted to do this!” I’m sure that Hashem was certainly happy with her growth, and I felt a special warmth as we firmly embraced each other.