Gabi, one of our interns, showed me this video — a mock version of Disney’s animation strategies for its newest princess, the Jewish American Princess. What do you think?

New Look For 14th Street Y

Y members find a relaxing gathering space in their newly renovated lobby, where ceiling-to-floor windows splash the new tiles and fixtures with sunlight, and a welcoming staff answers questions.Photos by Michael Datikash

by Sharon Udasin
Staff Writer

Even before he was born, 6-year-old Shane Fleming spent lots of time in the 14th Street Y’s pool, a 20-year-old neighborhood oasis that is now home to some of his favorite weekly classes.

“Shane literally took every class he could possibly take since he was born” up to the present, said his mother, and longtime Y member, Jill Shely. “He totally feels like the Y is his home.”

The Y has especially become a home to him in recent months, Shely says, as the institution underwent a complete programmatic upgrade two years ago, followed by physical overhaul this past summer.

In what used to be a drab, unwelcoming lobby, huge windows now splash sunlight into a bright blue-tiled meeting space stocked with neon yellow lounge chairs and matching coffee tables. Babysitters patiently rock babies in strollers and wait for preschool-age siblings to finish up for the day, while college students and young professionals stride through to the brand-new fitness center.

Upstairs, a group of senior citizens rehearses for their upcoming staged reading of William Shakespeare’s “Twelfth Night,” and children play indoor soccer in the gymnasium.

“My hunch about what this place could be was correct,” said Stephen Hazan Arnoff, who began his work as executive director of the 14th Street Y two years ago. “The concept was to transform our infrastructure, accounting for the many, many talents of our staff and our interests in the community — it really is a diverse and vibrant community.”  Continue reading…

Israel, At First Blush

The author in Jerusalem, overlooking the Temple Mount. Talya Lev

by Sharon Udasin
Staff Writer

Waking up as the tour bus crawled to a stop on the shoulder of an otherwise empty Israeli highway, I opened my eyes to see eight strangers piling their luggage into the bottom of our bus and climbing up the steps. Clad in identical olive-shade uniforms differentiated only by their multi-colored berets, they walked down the aisles among the 40 wide-eyed Americans, taking the empty seats we had left for them.

I shifted over to the window seat, quickly adjusted my wrinkled University of Pennsylvania T-shirt and ran a brush through my hair — you know, just in case the male Israel Defense Forces soldiers lived up to their reputations. Felix, a 20-year-old and perfectly sculpted immigrant from Russia, sat down next to me, and within minutes we were somehow discussing Antoine de Saint Exupéry’s “The Little Prince” in broken English. Not that such a thing — a serious conversation about a literary classic — couldn’t happen with a guy from the States. But it was my first real sense that there was something different about Israelis.

It was midway through my Taglit Birthright Israel trip — June 1, 2007, to be exact — and the eight soldiers around our age had joined us as civilians for the remainder of our time in Israel. We were all reaping the benefits of the free 10-day journey available to all diaspora Jews under the age of 26, funded by private donors and the Israeli government.

Only two weeks before, I had walked through the wind tunnel of Franklin Field in Philadelphia arm in arm with the girls who had been my best friends for the past four years, following the plush red running track that would lead us to our college diplomas. Looking around me and waving up to applauding relatives, I remember being struck with fear. Not fear about graduation — I already had plans to attend journalism school — but fear that I might never make it to those plans because I had finally caved to peer pressure and agreed to go to Israel. Sure, I was an Ivy League grad and relatively proficient in Middle Eastern politics, but as my dad kindheartedly reminded me, “Don’t expect to come back from Israel alive.”

Despite having grown up in a largely Jewish community in New Jersey, all I seemed to know about Israel was war, terrorism and suicide bus bombings.

But I made it there in one piece, and on the first night, our bus pulled up next to the Zion Gate just before sundown, where we made kabbalat Shabbat near the 24-karat gold menorah that overlooks the Kotel. Outstretched in front of me was the Western Wall of my ancestors, a refuge of hope and prayer for thousands of Jews everyday, and I was stunned by the fact that I was actually there, in this place that I had been so afraid of for so many years.

Yet it wasn’t until the five male and three female soldiers joined our group that my understanding of Israel began to deepen, eventually turning to a passion for the small, embattled country.  Continue reading…

Going To The Mat Against Bigotry

Hundreds of Penn students gather Monday in front of Steinhardt Hall, the university Hillel, to counter Westboro Baptist Church protesters and celebrate diversity. Rabbi Joel Nickerson

by Sharon Udasin
Staff Writer

In its battle against members of the anti-gay and anti-Jewish Westboro Baptist Church, who were demonstrating this week on the heavily Jewish University of Pennsylvania campus, the school’s Hillel appealed for a little muscle.

Literally.

It so happens that Hillel’s next-door neighbor on frat row is the school’s wrestling team fraternity. When approached by the Jewish students, the grapplers were more than welcome to help throttle the protesters, so to speak. They lugged out the grill, threw on some burgers and helped organize an “Acceptance BBQ” in conjunction with Hillel to drown out the Westboro demonstrators.

“The idea is to have our event overshadow theirs in every way. We want to have so many people with such a positive energy that it completely drowns out the hate and negativity going on 30 feet to the North,” wrote fraternity Vice President Marty Borowsky on the event’s Facebook page. Borowsky said the barbecue drew about 800 Penn students for free burgers, veggie burgers and hot dogs.

Borowsky said he is one of three Jewish brothers in the predominantly Christian fraternity, Alpha Tau Omega, and that he worked with his friend Greg Barber, from the predominantly Jewish Tau Epsilon Pi fraternity, to organize the event.

“We barbecue all the time and we’re right next to [Hillel] so I figured, why not?” he told The Jewish Week.  Continue reading…

Soles With Soul

Well heeled: Designer couture and vintage shoes on display for auction at a benefit for TheJewishWoman.org. Sharon Udasin

by Sharon Udasin
Staff Writer

Sandwiched between the sparkly Christmas windows of Bergdorf Goodman and the high-end Under Armour sportswear store, 75 or so modestly, yet trendily, clad women sipped organic kosher wines, enjoyed cheese hors d’oeuvres and tested their luck with various Christian Louboutin wedges, Gucci boots and Marc Jacobs slingbacks.

Their elaborate headbands perfectly placed on impeccably styled sheitels, the women had gathered at Chabad of the Plaza District for a couture and vintage shoe auction, where proceeds would benefit TheJewishWoman.org, a new Jewish women’s educational offshoot of Chabad.org, the Orthodox outreach organization’s Web site. Spearheading the event was Shterni Seligson, 28, who has established a group called Rebeccah, which raises money for Jewish women’s causes in memory of Rivkah Holtzberg, the Chabad emissary killed in the terror attacks that gripped Mumbai, India, a year ago.

“I was brainstorming on how to get women involved,” Seligson said. “Every woman loves a great pair of shoes.”

“I got fabulous response,” she continued, crediting social media outlets like Facebook and Twitter for her sizeable turnout.

Not a professional businesswoman herself, Seligson is actually working part-time for Chabad.org while studying for her master’s degree in medical assistantship and volunteering at Mount Sinai Hospital. Yet by reaching out to friends, friends of friends and even perfect strangers, Seligson ended up collecting 60 pairs of like-new designer shoe donations, with brands ranging from Prada to Salvatore Ferragamo to Kate Spade.  Continue reading…

Adam Dickter interviews John Liu, in episode #2 of The Jewish Week’s new vlog, “MetroPolitics.” John Liu is the comptroller-elect of New York City, and is currently a city councilman for the Flushing district. He’s also an incredibly nice guy! Enjoy the video — I think I did a much better job this time.

Not Immune From Mumps

by Sharon Udasin
Staff Writer

Stemming from an initial mumps outbreak that wreaked havoc at a Jewish camp this summer, 247 New York City residents plus 131 other state residents have since contracted the disease, which remains mostly contained among fervently Orthodox adolescent boys in pockets of New York, New Jersey and Quebec, according to official reports from the New York City and State Departments of Health.

The trigger case occurred back in June, when an 11-year-old boy returned to his Sullivan County summer camp after traveling in the United Kingdom, where an ongoing outbreak has now reached about 4,000 cases, the Centers for Disease Control reported.

From there, the mumps spread to 24 other boys at the camp and continued to plague their local communities when they returned home, and the median age of patients remains around 14. But perhaps the most frustrating news to some parents is that most of the affected patients had received their proper two-dose vaccination as children — 83 percent, according to the CDC.

“This is a very confusing issue not only for ourselves but for providers and parents,” said Cindy Schulte, vaccine-preventable disease surveillance officer at the New York State Department of Health. “If you have a population that’s fairly well but unevenly vaccinated, by logic, you’re going to end up having some disease in the effective population.” The Measles, Mumps and Rubella (MMR) vaccine has an 85 to 91 percent efficacy rate among those who take the proper doses, she said.  Continue reading…

The East Village ‘Wailing Wall’

New beat in the Village: Rabbi Greg Wall has launched a new music series at the Sixth Street Community Synagogue.

by Sharon Udasin
Staff Writer

Surrounded by dustily stocked bookshelves, antique lamps and floral artistic screens, a jazz saxophonist jammed along with his ensemble for a small crowd that straggled in and out of a dimly lit East Village basement this past Monday night.

No, this wasn’t your ordinary subterranean jazz haunt.

Suddenly, the sax player paused his band between sets to relate the piece they had just finished to Vayishlach, the Torah portion of the week, where Jacob confronts Esau and speaks to him about his evil father-in-law Laban.

Rabbi Greg Wall, a noted saxophonist working at the intersection of jazz and Jewish music, was just installed as the new spiritual leader of the Sixth Street Community Synagogue, what he is now calling the “Wailing Wall of Sixth Street.” And the basement gig was the launch of his “Jazz Rabbi’s Monday Night Invitational,” part of his effort to transform the synagogue into an arts haven.

Rocking back and forth with his tenor and soprano saxophones as if he were davening, the rabbi joined pianist Shai Bachar, drummer Aaron Alexander and bassist Dave Richards as they played songs from John Zorn’s Tzadik label as well as new material from their upcoming CD. The new concert series is just one of many events in a wave of musical innovation that Rabbi Wall is bringing to the traditionally Orthodox synagogue that has always been steeped in arts and culture.

“I’m trying to come up with programming that will appeal to the East Village demographic,” said the rabbi, who is hoping to please older congregants while bringing in the neighborhood’s youth. “We have a full schedule coming up.”  Continue reading…