Rara Report – Stories from the Trail

Its Yossi Spigler and Sholom Rapaport (Atlantic City, NJ) here. We’re the next group of Roving Rabbis to hit the streets of Australia. We’re going to be out on the RARA trail for the next five weeks; our plans are to head up to Rockhampton, QLD, then chuck a U-ey and make our way back down the Coastal Highway till we hit Melbourne. We hope you enjoy just a few of the stories that have taken place over the past week.

A SHORT TRIP IN VICTORIA

We had planned to leave Melbourne on Sunday and start our long journey up. But G-d had other plans – our good friend Yossi Herbst was having his L’chaim in honour of his engagement on Tuesday night and we really couldn’t miss it. So instead of heading straight up to NSW like we originally had planned, we spent the next two days in Victoria.

One of the first ladies we visited is Shoshie. Shoshie lives in Castlemaine and had recently contacted RARA as she wanted a Mezuza put up in her house. We’re going to let the email that she sent us after our visit do the talking….

“Today two of the Rabbis came to see me in Castlemaine. I want to thank Chabad of Rara so much. The visit meant so much to me. It was wonderful to feel some connection with my faith, and have Yiddishkeit come into my home. The last twelve months have been the hardest of my life. I have Multiple Sclerosis and I have had two severe attacks of the illness in that time. I have felt scared and isolated, so having the visit was just perfect. I love Judaism so much. What I learnt most from the visit was that one does not have to be perfect, but as long as you are following the main mitzvot of Chesed and Tzedakah etc then that is a start. I am so excited that my Mezuzah was installed also. I feel safe now and that Hashem is protecting me. Thank you so much for thinking of me and caring. Happy Travels!”

Our next stop was Gisbourne. Shulamit is 88 years old and moved to Australia five years ago from Israel. She was born in Egypt, then moved to Israel where she completed an art degree. She then spent the next thirty years all over Africa as her husband was an Israeli diplomat. Her reason for moving all the way to Australia, and out to the little town of Gisbourne was solely to be near her daughter. However, shortly after her arrival, her daughter left her to take care of herself and she has been alone ever since. That is, until Chabad of RARA came along… This elderly woman hadn’t left her house in four years as her carers no longer take her out. So off we went for a walk down the street. She loved every minute of it! Shulamit preferred to speak in Hebrew and was just happy to have us there keeping her company.

We ended up spending three and a half hours with her talking about a range of topics including (surprisingly) the Internet. She actually asked us to go down the street and get her a book on how to use the Internet as she had just purchased a laptop for the first time. She’s excited to use the world of cyberspace to learn more about Yiddishkeit!

Shulamit is an extremely talented artist whose work is amazing! All her paintings are of Chassidic Jews.
We left with a very good feeling after we had put up a mezuzah and she promised to start lighting Shabbos candles every week.

OUR JOURNEY BEGINS…

The morning after the L’chaim, (I think it was morning) we began our treck to NSW. First stop…Wagga Wagga.

Wagga Wagga has an estimated population of 56,000. We had 8 listed contacts on our database. Our first contact led us to a large building with a massive Tzaylem on top. We were sure that we were in the wrong place. A Jew living here? After asking some questions and walking around a bit, we realised that there was a nursing home attached to the building. We walked in and met Adele, a 94 year old woman, who had taken on the role as Rebbetzin of the town. Her husband conducts all the Jewish ceremonies there; Bar Mitzvahs, funerals, Brisim etc. While chatting with her the topic of Jews remaining Jews even if they had converted to other faiths or denounced their Judaism, particularly intrigued her.

As Adele was sitting there sipping her cup of tea, she called for the nurse and asked if she had any Beer or Whiskey so she could have a L’chaim with the Rabbis. We weren’t surprised when the nurse responded; “No Adele. You know you are not allowed those drinks.” The nurse looked at us with a smirk (while we were cracking up). As soon as the coast was clear, Adele turned to us and asked us to go into her cupboard and look behind her coat. What a hiding place…. Believe it or not there was a bottle of 21 year old Royal Salute. Ah, our meeting now turned in to a full fledged, 2.5 hour Farbrengen. We managed to finish off the bottle with her and yes! she holds her drink very nicely! We realised it was time for us to leave when the cricket started and seeing that cricket is one of Adeles passions, we said farewell and headed on our way.

COOLAMON, NSW

Our next stop was a small town about 45 minutes out of Wagga Wagga by the name Coolamon. The Chabad of RARA database informed us that our contact there resided in the movie theatre complex. So off we went. Israeli born Anat and her two daughters, aged four and seven, had spent a couple of years working for Krinskys in Sydney. Anat really tries hard to bring Yiddishkeit into her home, even though she lives in a small town of 2000 people and not many other Jews. She was ecstatic to hear about the new INTERACTIVE ONLINE HEBREW SCHOOL that RARA is launching in 2009 and eagerly signed her kids up. She showed us pages she had downloaded for her kids and loved the idea of signing them up to the Chabad of RARA website and Tzivos Hashem pages and purchased letters in the Sefer Torah for them.

We spent close to four hours with them discussing anything they wanted to know about Yiddishkeit, playing with her kids and telling them stories.

After spending a beautiful Shabbos in Sydney, thanks to the hospitality of Mendy and Tova Moss (thanks for hosting us), we headed to Krinskys to restock our goods.

Then it was time to move on to the Music Capital of Australia, Tamworth NSW.

Off we went to meet Eddie and his sister Judy. Eddie and Judys mother was the first war bride to move to Australia after meeting her Australian solider husband in Israel. They moved to Colac where they were brought up as Christians, until the age of 17, after which his parents moved to Israel and his father under went an Orthodox conversion. We spoke about absolutely everything and after four hours Judy decided that she would begin lighting Shabbos candles and Eddie agree to entertain the idea of purchasing his own pair of Tefillin. By now it was getting dark and Eddie wanted to put on Tefillin while wearing his own Yarmulka. It was a very enjoyable get-together. Eddie and his family were extremely kind to us and when they wanted us to ‘have a glass of red’ with them, they were upset we couldn’t. As big pro-Israel supporters, they believe in protecting our Land and try and promote it as much as possible in Tamworth through lectures and seminars. The whole family was extremely helpful, giving us a couple of new contacts.

After saying goodbye and promising to keep in touch, we headed over to the local paper for the interview and photo shoot Eddie had set up for us. Make sure you buy a copy of the Tamworth local news!

Well, that’s it for this week. Hope you enjoyed some of our stories from the RARA trail!

-Yossi and Sholom.

A SPECIAL THANK YOU TO:
DOVID AND NAOMI KRINSKY OF KRINSKYS
(Sydney Kosher supermarket)