BS"D
Dear Family and Friends,
I am not the type of person that is just going to blog random thoughts just to keep an *updated* blog. I have recently been reminded by many of you that my blog is out of date, etc. etc. to which I respond simply that there honestly hasn't been much to share! Instead of boring you all with my internal thought processes and mental quagmires about who knows what, I would prefer to wait and give you all something substantial, something that wont waste your time.
So, b'kitzur ('yeshivish' for 'in short') I have been travelling through Eastern Europe since Sunday. I flew from Israel to Prague, Czech Republic where I was for four days. I saw the oldest continuously existing Jewish synagogues dating back to 1270 built in the Gothic style, called the Old/New Synagogue, Staronová Synagoga for those who speak Czech (who speaks Czech, anyway). It is one of the strangest sounding languages! So, I also took a day trip to the Terezin Jewish ghetto located in the garrison and fortress town of Terezin. Over 144,000 Jews were sent to Terezinstadt, the majority of whom were Czech Jews. The fortress-turned-concentration camp was erected in 1790 by order of Austrian Emperor Joseph II as a military fortress to house Prussian soldiers. During WWI the fortress was used as a prisoner of war camp. Gavilo Princip, the famous assasin of Archduke Franz Ferdinand and catalyst of WWI, was imprisoned in Terezin. The Gestapo eventually took over Terezin in June 1940 and took everything they could from it: work camp, crematoria, and even site of Nazi propaganda that tricked the world into believing Terezin was an ideal resettlement that Jews loved. In fact, when the Red Cross came to inspect Terezin in the 1940,s, it was awarded a reward for its humanitarianism. Of the total victims sent to Terezin, 33,000 died in the camp, 88,000 sent to Auschwitz, and 17,000 survivors by the time it was liberated in May 1945 by the Russians. Anway, today it is a huge historical site maintained by Czech government and Jewish organizations worldwide. The most appalling part of Terezin was the crematorium and the propaganda film showing the Red Cross presenting the award, depicting Jews frolicking about in the camp playground and saying very proudly in German how much they loved their new home. Even more, the Nazis' quarters were so elegant and included swimming pools and billiards rooms and theaters, all within feet from the ghetto where Jews were locked in dark detention cells so tightly they slept standing up. Sadly, I was told by the tour guide that one was lucky if he/she was sent to Terezin. Enough depressing stuff, though...
I took a river cruise and walked over the famous Charles bridge, drank lots and lots of Czech Beer (Pilsner Urquell, the national beer). I think the Czechs drink more beer than anyone else! I seriously think they invented it before the Germans! Everywhere you look people were drinking beer nonstop, day and night. The old town square was magnificent, absolutely breathtaking, picturesque! The weather was very comfortable as well, not more than 75 degrees any day I was there and very cool at night. The metro and tram system is very easy and one of the cleanest systems I had ever utilized and everything is on the honor system! It's great, there are no turnstyles or frustration like in the NYC subways: it's very smooth! Food: kosher restaurants are either hit or miss, in my opinion. Knowing beforehand there were four kosher restaurants in Prague, to me, that meant I would find one that was actually good and still in business! But to the contrary in Prague! I went to every kosher restaurant in Prague and every one of them was absolutely exceptional and very elegant! I'm talking 4 star Zagat-rated! They were like any of the other thousand boutique style, streetfront restaurants. I honestly do not think there is a restaurant in the US that can compare to the kosher places I ate at in Prague. My amazement was perhaps exaggerated a bit by that fact that I was invited to dinner both evenings with a very choshev Rav and his wife from New York who were visiting Prague on their return to the USA. For those who are curious, it was Rav Avrohom Halpern, Rosh Yeshiva from Sh'or Yoshuv yeshiva in Lawrence, and believe me this was quite a special opportunity to sit with such a learned man! Ok, time to move on or I just might have to go there right now and eat and that would be a tad bit of a drive considering I'm in Vienna, Austria right now!!! (how about that for a transition!) Yes, I'm in Österreich (Austria, in German!) as we speak. Quite a different place. I took a lovely coach train early afternnoon and four hours later I'm in Vienna! It's a little warmer here considering it's south of Czech and the atmosphere is completely different. I arrived a few hours ago around 19:00 Wednesday evening and got on the subway to my hotel and checked in. I went out to eat and find a minyan to daven with in the Judenplatz area of the central town square. The layout of the downtown area is quite typical, I'm guessing, of many European cities since it resembles in many ways the Prague city center: large open plazas, dozens of gigantic churches, millions of tourists, cobblestone streets, and a small confined Jewish quarter with a few restaurants, shops, synagogues, and Jewish cemeteries. So, in a matter of minutes after arriving in the Jewish quarter I met the leading members of the community and was warmly invited to stay with them for meals and Shabbat. I saw the yeshiva of Vienna and bumped into the chief rabbi of Austria as well as some Boyaner and Sanz Chassidim who were visiting from New York. It's amazing how one is immediately welcomed and embraced by the community the moment they meet you. Nothing more than a *Shalom aleichem!* and a *Where are you from?* and with that you're best friends, more like family for us! A great travel perk when you're an orthodox Jew, especially in a place like Austria (more of that story later!). So, it's not like being in Saudi Arabia here but it also isn't the safest city. There is definitely a very detectable atmosphere of antisemitism here for which I am not the least bit surprised but there is also a huge Orthodox Jewish presence in this city and every Jewish site has a police officer with a machine gun in front (to set the tone more than a reactionary gesture, I am told). This was the same for Prague, although the attitude toward Jews in Prague was much more favorable and less nefarious.
So, here I am, and there I was...From one city to the next. Friday I was offered to go with a tour to Bratislava, Slovakia where hundreds of great tzaddikim (holy rabbis) are buried such as the well-known Chasam Sofer zt''l among others. Tomorrow I will take a general walking tour of the old town center and visit some of the museums including the Freud museum and opera house and Jewish museum.
As always, pictures will follow when I return back to Israel on Monday although I will be literally getting back right in time to begin the new fall session at Yeshiva. For shabbat, I will either be in Vienna, where I've been invited to stay at the pension Lichtenstein (European term for B&B) which is operated by Vienna's Ohel Moshe Yeshiva and Bait Knesset or I will be going to Budapest, Hungary. This detail, however, has yet to be decided.
If you have any recommendations for things to do while I'm here please write soon before I leave!
I take the train back to Prague either Saturday night or Sunday morning and fly to Israel on Monday morning.
By the way: I just figured out what the signs ''WC'' mean here! WATER CLOSET!!! Who calls a bathroom a water closet??? And they call a cafeteria a ''CASINO''!!!
I am not the type of person that is just going to blog random thoughts just to keep an *updated* blog. I have recently been reminded by many of you that my blog is out of date, etc. etc. to which I respond simply that there honestly hasn't been much to share! Instead of boring you all with my internal thought processes and mental quagmires about who knows what, I would prefer to wait and give you all something substantial, something that wont waste your time.
So, b'kitzur ('yeshivish' for 'in short') I have been travelling through Eastern Europe since Sunday. I flew from Israel to Prague, Czech Republic where I was for four days. I saw the oldest continuously existing Jewish synagogues dating back to 1270 built in the Gothic style, called the Old/New Synagogue, Staronová Synagoga for those who speak Czech (who speaks Czech, anyway). It is one of the strangest sounding languages! So, I also took a day trip to the Terezin Jewish ghetto located in the garrison and fortress town of Terezin. Over 144,000 Jews were sent to Terezinstadt, the majority of whom were Czech Jews. The fortress-turned-concentration camp was erected in 1790 by order of Austrian Emperor Joseph II as a military fortress to house Prussian soldiers. During WWI the fortress was used as a prisoner of war camp. Gavilo Princip, the famous assasin of Archduke Franz Ferdinand and catalyst of WWI, was imprisoned in Terezin. The Gestapo eventually took over Terezin in June 1940 and took everything they could from it: work camp, crematoria, and even site of Nazi propaganda that tricked the world into believing Terezin was an ideal resettlement that Jews loved. In fact, when the Red Cross came to inspect Terezin in the 1940,s, it was awarded a reward for its humanitarianism. Of the total victims sent to Terezin, 33,000 died in the camp, 88,000 sent to Auschwitz, and 17,000 survivors by the time it was liberated in May 1945 by the Russians. Anway, today it is a huge historical site maintained by Czech government and Jewish organizations worldwide. The most appalling part of Terezin was the crematorium and the propaganda film showing the Red Cross presenting the award, depicting Jews frolicking about in the camp playground and saying very proudly in German how much they loved their new home. Even more, the Nazis' quarters were so elegant and included swimming pools and billiards rooms and theaters, all within feet from the ghetto where Jews were locked in dark detention cells so tightly they slept standing up. Sadly, I was told by the tour guide that one was lucky if he/she was sent to Terezin. Enough depressing stuff, though...
I took a river cruise and walked over the famous Charles bridge, drank lots and lots of Czech Beer (Pilsner Urquell, the national beer). I think the Czechs drink more beer than anyone else! I seriously think they invented it before the Germans! Everywhere you look people were drinking beer nonstop, day and night. The old town square was magnificent, absolutely breathtaking, picturesque! The weather was very comfortable as well, not more than 75 degrees any day I was there and very cool at night. The metro and tram system is very easy and one of the cleanest systems I had ever utilized and everything is on the honor system! It's great, there are no turnstyles or frustration like in the NYC subways: it's very smooth! Food: kosher restaurants are either hit or miss, in my opinion. Knowing beforehand there were four kosher restaurants in Prague, to me, that meant I would find one that was actually good and still in business! But to the contrary in Prague! I went to every kosher restaurant in Prague and every one of them was absolutely exceptional and very elegant! I'm talking 4 star Zagat-rated! They were like any of the other thousand boutique style, streetfront restaurants. I honestly do not think there is a restaurant in the US that can compare to the kosher places I ate at in Prague. My amazement was perhaps exaggerated a bit by that fact that I was invited to dinner both evenings with a very choshev Rav and his wife from New York who were visiting Prague on their return to the USA. For those who are curious, it was Rav Avrohom Halpern, Rosh Yeshiva from Sh'or Yoshuv yeshiva in Lawrence, and believe me this was quite a special opportunity to sit with such a learned man! Ok, time to move on or I just might have to go there right now and eat and that would be a tad bit of a drive considering I'm in Vienna, Austria right now!!! (how about that for a transition!) Yes, I'm in Österreich (Austria, in German!) as we speak. Quite a different place. I took a lovely coach train early afternnoon and four hours later I'm in Vienna! It's a little warmer here considering it's south of Czech and the atmosphere is completely different. I arrived a few hours ago around 19:00 Wednesday evening and got on the subway to my hotel and checked in. I went out to eat and find a minyan to daven with in the Judenplatz area of the central town square. The layout of the downtown area is quite typical, I'm guessing, of many European cities since it resembles in many ways the Prague city center: large open plazas, dozens of gigantic churches, millions of tourists, cobblestone streets, and a small confined Jewish quarter with a few restaurants, shops, synagogues, and Jewish cemeteries. So, in a matter of minutes after arriving in the Jewish quarter I met the leading members of the community and was warmly invited to stay with them for meals and Shabbat. I saw the yeshiva of Vienna and bumped into the chief rabbi of Austria as well as some Boyaner and Sanz Chassidim who were visiting from New York. It's amazing how one is immediately welcomed and embraced by the community the moment they meet you. Nothing more than a *Shalom aleichem!* and a *Where are you from?* and with that you're best friends, more like family for us! A great travel perk when you're an orthodox Jew, especially in a place like Austria (more of that story later!). So, it's not like being in Saudi Arabia here but it also isn't the safest city. There is definitely a very detectable atmosphere of antisemitism here for which I am not the least bit surprised but there is also a huge Orthodox Jewish presence in this city and every Jewish site has a police officer with a machine gun in front (to set the tone more than a reactionary gesture, I am told). This was the same for Prague, although the attitude toward Jews in Prague was much more favorable and less nefarious.
So, here I am, and there I was...From one city to the next. Friday I was offered to go with a tour to Bratislava, Slovakia where hundreds of great tzaddikim (holy rabbis) are buried such as the well-known Chasam Sofer zt''l among others. Tomorrow I will take a general walking tour of the old town center and visit some of the museums including the Freud museum and opera house and Jewish museum.
As always, pictures will follow when I return back to Israel on Monday although I will be literally getting back right in time to begin the new fall session at Yeshiva. For shabbat, I will either be in Vienna, where I've been invited to stay at the pension Lichtenstein (European term for B&B) which is operated by Vienna's Ohel Moshe Yeshiva and Bait Knesset or I will be going to Budapest, Hungary. This detail, however, has yet to be decided.
If you have any recommendations for things to do while I'm here please write soon before I leave!
I take the train back to Prague either Saturday night or Sunday morning and fly to Israel on Monday morning.
By the way: I just figured out what the signs ''WC'' mean here! WATER CLOSET!!! Who calls a bathroom a water closet??? And they call a cafeteria a ''CASINO''!!!
Zbohem / Seavas pfiati / Until next time, may it be Hashem's will that we all continue to hear of only good things!
Jordan :)
Overlooking the city center (Prague, Czech)
River cruise
Downtown traffic in the early evening. Parliament building in the background
Inside the Terezin ghetto, the train tracks that once led over 30,000 to their ultimate death in Auschwitz (representing only 3% of the total exterminated there). (Terezin, Czech)
...Off to Vienna (Wien)! Goodbye Prague!
