Bearded men wearing wide-brimmed hats, white shirts and black suits are a rare sight in the noted Mexican resort.
“A lot of people stop us and ask where we're from. We say, 'New York.' They say, 'Oh, very nice,'” Druk said.
With their 8-month-old daughter Mushka in tow, the Druks left Crown Heights to open the Chabad Lubavitch Jewish Center of Cancun.
The transition has had its challenges, Rabbi Druk said in a telephone interview.
Despite hitches, Rabbi finds his place in Cancun
Cancun, Mexico — From the day they arrived in Cancun three weeks ago, Lubavitcher Rabbi Mendel Druk and his wife, Rachel, have stood out from the crowd.
Bearded men wearing wide-brimmed hats, white shirts and black suits are a rare sight in the noted Mexican resort.
“A lot of people stop us and ask where we’re from. We say, ‘New York.’ They say, ‘Oh, very nice,’” Druk said.
With their 8-month-old daughter Mushka in tow, the Druks left Crown Heights to open the Chabad Lubavitch Jewish Center of Cancun.
The transition has had its challenges, Rabbi Druk said in a telephone interview.
For example, finding kosher food is no easy feat.
“I’m not starving, but I’ve eaten a lot of fish. We have salads, and fruits for dessert,” Druk said.
There’s no kosher butcher in the area, but the Druks have turned up kosher lox, ketchup and flour at a local Costco.
With the flour, Rachel Druk makes challah, the braided loaves that are a staple on the Sabbath, and the rabbi passes them out on Thursdays and Fridays.
“People were asking, ‘Where’s the bakery?’” Druk said. “I say, ‘It’s right in my home.’”
The size of Cancun’s residential Jewish community is hard to estimate, Druk said. Some say it’s about 130 families.
“But I’ve met so many Jews who have no connections to other Jews – a lot of Americans, Canadians, Moroccans and Israelis,” Druk said, “and that’s not counting those with time-shares.”
For residents and visitors alike, the Druks are looking for a place to hold services and conduct classes.
Meanwhile, the rabbi is out and about. At shopping malls, he shows men how to put on tefillin, the leather boxes with straps worn during prayer. He offers to attach mezuzot, parchment in decorative cases, to merchants’ doorposts.
The Druks are among about 10,000 Lubavitcher emissaries in approximately 2,700 communities across the U.S. and the Americas, Europe, countries of the former Soviet Union, Australia, Africa and the Far East, said Rabbi Yehuda Krinsky, chairman of the Central Educational and Social Services Division of the Worldwide Lubavitch Movement.
The Druks will be quite busy, Krinsky predicted.
Through a Web site, www.jewishcancun.com, they already are hearing from people who want to join them in Mexico to celebrate the Jewish New Year.
classmate
HURRAY FOR RACHEL!!
your fam
you guys rock!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! keep it upp~~~~~~~~~
...
we are so proud of u guys!!!
asher
it’s about time we had a shliach in cancun
every time i go 2 cancun i go to the shul friday night. b/c thats the only time they have a minyan now i hope i could go shabbas day as well
well done
Drrrrrruk!!!
mendel v’rayuscha great job were soooo proud of you and hopefuly we’ll come visit soon.
Chicago dormies!!!!!!!!!!
Go Rochel!
Small Benji
To all readers,
please send money to the new shluchim. And geffilteh fish. Rabbi druk loves geffilteh fish.
thanks in advance.