And a good Shabbos to you

I am basically all cooked.

All our chicken is in a commercial freezer, not accessible right now.

I have between 4 and 8 guests tonight. I am never sure until they actually show up.

And my women's program for Sunday is semi-prepared, but only about 10 people know about it.

Wishing you a great Shabbos!

A text message

I was looking through old text messages on my cell phone lately, and I found this one, which we received a few months ago:

I am transcribing exactly, so excuse the typos.

Shalom, reb Israel. Ani Leonid Rogozin (ahshav Ar'e ben Vevl), brit mila sheli haeta hsilhsom le Ierushalajm. Ani sameach ahshav. Ar'e

Free translation:
Hi, Rabbi Yisroel. This is Leonid Rogozin (now named Arye, the son of Velvel). My bris milah was three days ago in Jerusalem. I am happy now. Arye.

Zipping out

We tend work in 2 modes here. Relaxed and fast-forward. On the average day, we move along, taking care of errands, visiting people, having guests over, doing shopping and any other things that come up. Every so often, we suddenly start zipping around trying to cram days worth of work into just a few hours.

It turns out that I going with the kids to new York in another week and a half. Of course we knew this was coming up, but we were hoping to push it off and go a later. Unfortunately, Baila has to leave the country, since she has been here for 90 days. On Monday, I went with our secretary to the head of immigration to beg for an extension. Our secretary prepared the documents, letters from our organization, and pleaded the case. My job was to smile. I thought I did my job well, but unfortunately, we were not granted any extension.

If Baila was a threat to the national security at 2 months, you can imagine, that by now, at 5 months, she is really dangerous. Not only does she has to leave, but she has to stay out for 90 days. We hope to circumvent that by getting new visas for all us, but they won’t be ready until the end of August. So we are leaving on July 7, and returning at the way end of August.

In the next week and a half, I have to, among other things: prepare and run a women’s program on Sunday; teach the youth classes; organize a director, curriculum, and location for our Hebrew School next year; decide and plan what type of preschool program we will be having next year; fill the freezer with bread and some other basics for Yisroel to eat while we are away; pack and prepare for the way.

So I don’t mean to neglect this blog until I go, but if you find that postings are not all that regular, consider yourself warned.

Another sad post

In the past few days, I have sat down at the computer numerous times to write a post. Every time, I look at my previous post, and become to upset to write.

We really miss Meiron, the fellow who passed away. We was 80 years old, but so full of life.

He loved Judaism. He’s the one who asked us about the 19 year calender, and he taught in our STARS. He owned many Jewish books, and loved to learn. He was the gabbai of the synagogue, and ran the services whenever we were away. Unfortunately, his wife does not share his love of Judaism. She is Jewish, but was always resentful of the time he spent at the synagogue. So she doesn’t want anything Jewish at the funeral – not anyone who looks Jewish, not any Jewish prayers.

It’s a shame that Meiron, who was so involved in Judaism during his life, was deprived of a Jewish funeral.

We will however, be having a minyan in the synagogue, and saying kaddish for him there.

May his memory be blessed

An older member of the community just passed away. He was really involved in the synagogue, the community, and Judaism. He taught classes, learned a lot, came to pray.

Unfortunately, we do not have a Jewish cemetery here. There once was one, but the Communists paved a road over it.

We will miss him.

A good Shabbos to you

Wishing you a great Shabbos!

This is going to be a short one - I shouldn't really be on the computer right now. I am in the synagogue at the moment. Every Friday we have a 'kabbalat Shabbat' program for seniors. They learn about the Torah portion for an hour, make kiddush - okay, it's a bit early in the afternoon, but they enjoy it - and eat a 'Shabbat meal'. It's mostly elderly people, but there are always a few young people who enjoy the scene.

Attendance ranges from 15 people to 50 on an average week. Mendel is here with me today, and, obviously, he is the highlight of the event. As I type this, Yisroel is singing Lecho Dodi. I think Sholom Aleichem is next, and I should join, as I haven't made it for this event in a long time. I am usually at home preparing for Shabbos.

So have a great Shabbos, and check in after for a new post, hopefully.

Of meat and other eats

Keeping Kosher in Vladivostok is not quite the same thing as keeping kosher in, say, Brooklyn.

Most things can be made from scratch, and the from-scratch products – flour, sugar, oil, eggs – are, for the most part kosher. But meat has always been an issue. It has to be brought in from a big city. Moscow would be the most logical choice, but the cost is exorbitant to ship it by plane. The train takes a few weeks to get here, so even though we could theoretically send frozen meat in the winter, we are a bit nervous to do that. We could send it by refrigerated train, but they are also not cheap.

When we first moved to Vladivostok, we brought along 70 pounds of meat. The chicken for Shabbos, the meat was saved for holidays, and, just as we ran out, they did a slaughtering of kosher chicken in Siberia. We ordered something like 600 kg, which my computer tells me is 1,322.77 lbs. 600 kg is a lot of meat, and, even though we used a lot of chicken for our overnight camp last summer, it lasted, and lasted, and lasted.

Eventually, though, our Siberian chicken ran low. But then we were in New York, and again we shlepped 50 pounds of meat with us. But G-d takes care us, and before we ran out, we met a fellow here who sends a refrigerated container to Moscow every week or so. He is Jewish, and whenever his container is empty, he will send along some meat for us.

So now we have a freezer full of meat, ready for the eating whenever we choose. I have a beef in the fridge, pickling, as I write this. It should turn into corned beef in another two weeks. I will let you know.

The best part of having this meat is that we can now sell it to community members who are interested in eating kosher. In America, it is relatively easy to keep kosher. So many products have a kosher sign, and dairy and meat products are sold in supermarkets also. It is so much harder here, and there are some people who are really interested in kosher, but they have to be REALLY committed to keep kosher in Vladivostok.

Daniel is on his way over now, to pick up a load of kosher meat. Since we received our meat shipment, he has begun to eat only kosher meat, which he tells us, tastes even better than the non-kosher stuff.

Next we need to begin importing mayonnaise and chocolate chips.

Happy to kvetch

One Shabbos, a few weeks back, we had some Americans over for lunch. We spent a really nice meal. Some of my food worked out, some new recipes I tried didn’t quite, but no one starved. Yisroel told a story, spoke about that week’s Torah portion, and sang a song. And we talked. Well, we kvetched, mostly.

We kvetched about the ridiculous visa laws, and about the absurd prices of tickets to get just about anywhere. We kvetched about the broken up roads, and the huge potholes in middle of the street. We kvetched about the city’s 2 traffic lights, and the law enforcement officials enforcing stupid laws.

The truth is that we enjoyed all the kvetching. We are all American living in a Russian city, and we commiserated with each other.

At one point, Yisroel turned to one fellow, the chief kvetcher of us all. Why does he live here, Yisroel asked, if he hates it so much? It’s not that he hates it, our friend answered. He’s Jewish, and Jews kvetch. He would kvetch anywhere. In fact, he loves Vladivostok, and chose to live here just because he likes it so much.

Mendel likes to run around the house yelling ‘Happy!’ He often specifies just who is happy – himself, his mother, his father, the cleaning lady, his aunt with whom he just spoke, and most often, his baby sister.

And we are. We are happy. We love it here in Vladivostok. It is home, it’s pleasant, and we are doing what we love best – guiding Jews to reclaim their lost heritage

So if I kvetch a lot, bear in mind that, I am, after all, Jewish. My kvetches are not indicative of anything. I love it here.

Unexpected

Living out in Vladivostok, we expect people to know nothing about Judaism. And usually they don't. We are most people’s first introduction to Judaism ever. It’s exciting, really, meeting a Jew, and introducing them, for the first time ever, to Torah, to tefillin, to G-d, to Shabbos.

Sometimes, though, we meet people who already have some background knowledge – and every time it just throws me off and cracks me up.

About a month after we moved here, an older man came to the synagogue on Shabbos. He had a question. Which year would this be, within the 19 year Jewish calendar cycle? The question was just so far out, that it was really funny.

Anyway, on Shavuos a boy came to Synagogue. He speaks fluent English, and has been reading all about Judaism on chabad.org. He walked in, really dressed for the part. He wore a button-down shirt, suit, and. . . a black fedora.

The regular minyan-goers were shocked to see him. Someone asked if we brought him from America to help with the holiday.

We will never cease to be entertained.

Good Shabbos!

Shabbos starts this week at 9:35 PM, and ends at 10:46, so we have a long Friday to do things, and a long, long Shabbos afternoon. I, for the most part, am stuck in the apartment with the kids.

We have some guests, hopefully, and lots of food.

Wishing you a great Shabbos!

Ice Cream in a Bag

We made this ice cream in the synagogue with the kids. Actually, we made it last year too, and it is already a Shavuos tradition. The kids were thrilled to taste real, kosher ice cream.

It is perfect for a summer activity.

Ingredients:
1/2 C milk
1 Tbsp sugar
1/2 tsp vanilla
food coloring, if desired
4 C crushed ice, or ice cubes
4 Tbsp kosher salt
2 quart-size ziplock bags
1 large, gallon size, ziplock bag
gloves, or towel

Directions:
Mix the milk, vanilla and sugar together in one of the quart size bags. Put a drop of food coloring in for colored ice cream. Seal tightly, allowing as little air to remain in the bag as possible. Place this bag inside the other quart size bag, again leaving as little air inside as possible and sealing well. Put the two bags inside the gallon size bag and fill the bag with ice, then sprinkle salt on top. Again let all the air escape and seal the bag. Wrap the bag in the towel or put your gloves on, and shake and massage the bag, making sure the ice surrounds the cream mixture. Shake vigorously for 5 to 8 minutes, or until your hands fall off. If you do not shake enough, your ice cream will not freeze. Mendel called his ice cream 'juice' for obvious reasons.

Eat straight from the bag with a spoon.

Enjoy!

Water update

Our hot water has been turned back on.

It should stay on until August, when it will turned off again for repairs.

I thought you'd want to know.