| On Wayfarers, Tabernacles And Tents |
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Each of our holidays has unique qualities - beyond food - that allows us to build special memories for our families and us. With the approach of chol hamoed Sukkot I am always on the lookout for tiyulim - outings. This year I would like to share a New York experience and include ones in São Paulo, Brazil and Israel too, to balance things out. _option_option_option
We were in New York this summer with our grandchildren. Where can one go, where there is something for every age and level of walking ability - from 10 months to grandparenthood - and, almost as important, not cost an arm and a leg? We had a great day. We went to see the New York City Waterfalls! Now if you think NYC doesn't have waterfalls and you have to go to the ones at Niagara, you're wrong. We started at 10:00 a.m. in Red Hook, Brooklyn. We discovered New York City's other "checkered cabs" - also yellow with black and white checks - water cabs which we found on the Internet: www.nywatertaxi.com. The New York Water Taxi now runs a FREE daily shuttle from Wall Street's Pier 11 in Manhattan to Brooklyn's new Ikea superstore and in the reverse direction too. On this free ride we were able to see the Water-falls under the Brooklyn Bridge, a view of the Verrazano-Narrows Bridge, the Statue of Liberty and many other views of Manhattan and Brooklyn, ending up at the South Street Sea Seaport. We later retraced our water trip, and found our car back at Ikea, which is a short distance from Borough Park with kosher eateries galore. What we didn't expect was a free parking place for the day! We went looking for the pier (we're foreigners so we used Mapquest and landed on the wrong pier first). We ran, attempting to catch the 'taxi,' twist, kippot flying, and one or two scraped knees, but just missed it. So we decided to slow down and wait for the next one. All of a sudden, our group who had not eaten in more than eight minutes (!) smelled fresh popcorn. Maybe there was a movie theatre around with a hashgachah for the popcorn? This didn't seem at all possible near the port, nor the unmarked factory buildings in the vicinity. There were no signs around. All of a sudden, a mirage appeared. Two men in black and white outfits, tzizit, large kippot and Bluetooth® earphones (all signs of frum businessmen!) were standing next to the opening of what we previously thought was a brick wall. They were not speaking English, one of my grandchildren said. He then went into Hebrew and asked him a "lands-man" question. It didn't seem like he understood this either. I then used my fractured German. He responded in Yiddish and asked if I could speak English and we were "connected." Is it possible that there is any-thing kosher in the vicinity? We told him our tale of woe concerning our tiyul and the missed water taxi. Within seconds, he nodded and winked to the man standing next to him. Shortly thereafter little hands were laden with bags of kosher, delicious-smelling popcorn. I offered to pay and he demurred. So I want to be makir b'tov v'chesed!! It seems we had met both Ike and a "relative" of Sam's (see www.ikeandsams.com and www.myspace.com/ikeandsams). According to lore, Ike is a Kettle and Sam is a kernel of popping corn and they joined to make a wonderful, flavorful product, not in the least we are sure, because they saw a need and filled it (and little hands and mouths too!!). Tell them you read about them in The Jewish Press by the harried grandmother! (They said they offer tours of the factory in-action, to schools and groups. Call 866-IKE-1-SAM.) In September, my husband and I were invited by Nefesh Brazil to give lectures to Jewish mental health professionals, rabbanim, teachers and parents on various topics in São Paulo (more on that in another article). Many of the people I met read The Jewish Press Online and recognized my name from there. So this is a recommendation for a tiyul over Sukkot for visitors from abroad and locals in São Paulo (where there are 70,000 Jews)! The community kept us happily busy with lectures and shiurim. We had the opportunity to see many Jewish institutions and were so impressed with the level of chesed and chinuch and especially kabalat orchim - this community truly embodies the lessons of our forefather Avraham, whose tent was open from every direction to wayfarers. The week was "chockablock" full of lectures, but we did get a visit to an inner-city "jungle," Parkue do Morumbi, a national monument to the natural São Paulo of thousands of years before it became the third largest major city in the world! On entering we said hello to one of the guards. It turned out he was the one in charge and, when he found out we were from Israel, he insisted on taking us around himself! He told us that among his ancestors are many of the indigenous Indian tribes. "And now," he said, "I have met descendents of the most important tribe of all, the tribe of Abraham." We were dumbfounded and that was before he parted with us saying: "Shalom and Shanah Tovah!" (It seems he moonlights as a guard for a Reform synagogue!) And now to Israel, which encompasses every fiber of our minds, nefashim and hearts but in reality is smaller than the smallest of Brazil's 26 states. Over chol hamoed, the magnificently reconstructed Roman antiquities of Caesarea (and they have just uncovered some of the ancient Jewish neighborhood) have wonderful activities for children of every age (grandparents are kids too!). Beyond the wonderful seascape, viaduct and artifacts are the interactive holographic conversation you can have with historical personalities and the riding academy's bi-annual (the other one is chol hamoed Pesach) presentation at the Hippodrome. There is also a kosher restaurant with a sukkah (I don't know under whose hashgachah). So wherever you put down your sukkah, or as tiyulers (wayfarers), you may not be obliged to eat in one at all (ask your rav!). May you "pitch" your permanent tent here, in Eretz HaKodesh. Chag sameach! Originally published in the Jewish Press on October15, 2008 |
