Tuesday, December 28, 2010

Chassidisher Yid....

I chanced upon meeting a special person, and his stranded state was a blessing indeed (hashgacha pratis, or whatever your current hang up is:). We went out "to eat", but then ended up taking pictures. I saw this older Jewish man keeping his milk refrigerated in the snow, and talking yiddish on a cell phone.

Probably, he saved people during the war, but his family is definitely gezhee. What did he go through when he was looking to get hitched? I bet you his grandson would never date a non-gezehee. I am offended by this. After I took the picture I told him to his face, "I am the same as you!". He looked at me, smiled, and gave me the peace sign, "It's all about loooove" he exclaimed. OMG he asked me for my number, but because he is a big believer Keynesian economics, so I totally turned him down. Besides I'm not gezhee anyway....

Monday, December 20, 2010

This One Time at 770

This one time at 770...Everyone who knows me understands that much of my blog comes from social observations and personal experience...they are all made well aware that everything is bloggable unless it has been discuss that it is not bloggable. Most of the time everything is bloggable and even if it isn't, I have found ways to blog without blogging too much! With that said here it is...
I am really not the type to hang out at 770. In fact in the past six months I have only been their twice. Once on Yud Tes Kislev, because I promised a friends mother I would stop in for her and once to show a friend the inner workings of 770 the holy of holies. For this post we will discuss the latter.
It was a Tuesday evening and after finishing dinner with a Crown Heights outsider, she asked if I would take her to see 770. I thought to myself whats the harm I'll walk in she can oohh and ahhh and that will be that. I was sooo wrong!!! We walked in, she got her chance to oohh and ahhh...and then it happened we were spotted by a Crown Heights crazy. Yes Moshiach pin and all...she found us and we were in her sights. It was almost like a submarine bomber was about to hit us. As she walked over I prepared myself...ignore ignore ignore...and then it happened.
"Excuse me ladies are you Jewish." now my friend is not Jewish and I could already see that she was about to say no so I quickly stepped in. "Yes we are." "Oh is this your first time here." Quick on your feet Chava Leiba...don't let her get a word in..."No we are lubavitch." "Oh" says the crazy..."Well have you ever written to the Rebbe, show your friend its very easy." Ok now Im starting to get pissed shut the hell up lady and leave us alone is going through my head...and then it just came out of my mouth as she started to hand me a book of the Rebbes letters..."We go to the Ohel." I though her Moshiach pin was going to fly off...but she said gut nacht and walked away.
After all of this my friend said to me..."Why did you lie to her, I am not Jewish and you no longer consider yourself a member of Lubavitch." This was my answer...
You have to know who you are dealing with and in this case to tell the truth we start a scene in which neither of us would ever be able to get out of. My using my lubav card I was able to avoid what would have been and even more uncomfortable encounter.

I Don't Like What I See.

Those readers who know me personally, know what I look like on the outside. And no I am not going to go on about my self confidence issues or that when I look in the mirror I don't see the beauty that everyone else seems to. On the outside I am an ordinary person. I wear jeans, smoke cigarettes, and enjoy the finer things in life. Essentially I am not your normal Crown Heights factory prototype. And I often find that this scares people. They see me an automatically assume I know nothing of the frum world and they don't like what they see. However, it has come to my attention, that being frum is not about what is on the outside, but what is on the inside. One of my close friends told me not to long ago that I am the most chassidish person she knows. WHAT THE HELL ME CHASSIDISH!!! Not possible. But then she explained that although on the outside I am a normal secular girl. On the inside apparently I am Chasidish. This could be because I throw a few random yiddish words around every once in awhile, or because I can zug halacha better then most Gehzee girls.
Don't judge me from the outside...see the inside...see who I really am!

In the Land of Oz

I often refer to the Crown Heights bubble as bizzaro world. Everything is backwards in my mind. Now I will admit that I lived this bubble life for many years. And because of this it is very easy for me to criticize. I spend a lot of my time now observing the bubble and trying to see if the stereotypes I make up in my head truly exist. In many cases they do, however come in some rare cases they don't. For example I spend a lot of time talking about the Gehzees and in many cases the things I say are true, but their our those rare occurrences when I meet a Gehzee that doesn't fall into the bubble life style. Or so I think.
I have begun to realize that many of my Gehzee friends are very cool people. That is when the are not in the bubble. When we go out they are fun and hip and enjoy many of the same things I do. However once we return to the Shtetl they fall right back into the bubble as if what people think really matters. The point is be who you are, live as you want to live, cause in the long run living for others will only cause you to miss out on the life you want to live.

Sunday, December 19, 2010

My Fair Lady

As children we are taught very little about love. In fact most of what I know from love comes from Disney movies. Poor distraught girl meets handsome prince in an unlikely fashion, they fall in love and marry. Unlikely love. The kind of love that is only accepted in the fairy tale world. So what happens when this type of love occurs in the real world. It either ends in love or heartache. In this day in age, especially in the Chabad world more and more unlikely matches are happening. Many of my friends have married men they love rather then men their families picked for them because of the fact that they look good on paper. Many of my friends have married the men who look good on paper suggested by their family. Both of these situations have produced divorce and loving marriages. So it is not so much about the success rate. Charles and Diana were and unlikely match and it ended in heartache. William and Kate are an unlikely match and all sources say it will end in love. No one can predict the outcome of life or love. And no one can predetermine who they love or why they love them it just happens.
Many of my friends are scared and afraid of love. They are products of parents who were put together by a matchmaker and well not because of love. They looked good together on paper or both came from the same background. Yes that's right traditionally Gehzee married Gehzee and the rest were left to fend for themselves. Now for the first time in the history of the blog I am not going to criticize the need to marry in ones kind. I think it is a great idea to marry a first cousin and have children with 11 toes. In fact the more toes the better thats what I always say. This is crazy. Who the hell marries their own just to keep the blood all the same. Now I am going to be brutally honest and expose the fact that my great grandparents were indeed related before marriage...but they came from the shtetl. WE NO LONGER LIVE IN THE SHTETL. We no longer live in a place where love doesn't exist. We must teach our children to love. And love doesn't happen on paper and love isn't about who your parents are and love isn't about who died in Siberia and love is most certainly not about who someone else chooses for you.
In this day in age mixed marriages are happening left and right. Now let me make this clear that I am not talking about the same type of mixed marriages we see in the secular world. I am talking about the union between Gehzee and non Gehzee. IT IS HAPPENING!!! The Gehzees want new blood. Well their children want new blood and to have children without 11 toes, but the parents are still struggling. The result of these unions is often a Pygmalion. Where the less elite goes through training to be more elite. In the case of Chabad...the non Gehzee becomes Gehzee. They are trained how to be socially awkward, push bugaboo strollers, and steal babies. Its My Fair Lady, Chabad style.

Saturday, December 11, 2010

Duct Tape

Read the following article...respond..http://www.collive.com/show_news.rtx?id=12038&alias=rabbis-fight-hate-blogs