Chabad student center expands celebration

A mobile sukkah hut made of branches and greenery will travel around the University of Kansas and Lawrence for the next week. The traveling hut is part of the Chabad student center’s celebration of Sukkot.

The student center placed the hut atop a truck to travel around campus, to residence halls and the city of Lawrence.

The center will also build huts for the first time at the University. Huts will be in front of the student center and on Stauffer-Flint lawn.

Thursday marks the first day of Sukkot, a Jewish holiday that celebrates the outdoors and remembers the Jewish history of 40 years in the desert after the exodus from Egypt. Each year Jewish communities build temporary outdoor sukkah huts to eat their meals and celebrate in during the holiday. Some communities also sleep in their sukkahs,

Rabbi Zalman Tiechtol said the huts represent a cloud covering believed to have protected the Jewish people as they roamed the desert.

“The big goal is Jewish awareness,” Tiechtol said. “People should know more about our culture.”

Tiechtol said Chabad will host Israeli Dinner under the Stars at the Chabad student center Friday, and Pizza in the Hut on Stuaffer-Flint lawn Tuesday. Both meals will be kosher.

Daniel Goldshmidt, Minneapolis freshman, said he was looking forward to celebrating the holiday at the University.

“They are one of my only resources on campus to keep in touch and get the resources I need,” Goldshmidt said. “I’m really involved because it’s a good means to practice my religion.”

Megan Williams, program associate at Hillel, said she and her husband would build a sukkah hut in front of their apartment building. She said they would invite the graduate students and young professionals from Hillel for a shabbat dinner on Friday.

“It’s a holiday to remember a time in the past when Jews were wandering in the desert and building temporary homes,” Williams said. “It’s important for Jews in the United States who are doing well and have permanent homes to remember that and help us to think about those who don’t have permanent shelter and ways to help them.”