Found!

At the end of last summer (not this past one, the one before), after Yefim (president of our community) had said all his lies to many community members, I went through all my papers and collected proof of his lies. this included;

- From our first meeting, a paper in which we both listed our 1, 3 and 5 year plans and how we'll get there together, which he claimed I had never done with him and therefore was trying to say I wanted to work alone...

- All our signed contracts up until then - important because I had the originals and his signature on all of them.

- The 3 lists of children that we had worked out deserved to receive aid after the Pesach disaster in which he was only handing out aid from Moscow to his friends (some of whom weren't even Jewish). 1 list was from Moscow with the list of names he had sent them (that included some children who weren't receiving), another was from Anya Davidova who represented the poor women who weren't getting any aid anymore, and the third was from when I sat down with him and told him to give me 30 names 'poorest to richest' of who he thinks deserves the aid. I even included his reasons on that third list...

- A community list that I had only procured from Natasha of the Sachnut after like 8 months.

- A letter from two businessmen in Stavropol who wanted me to help them find some investors in America.

- A copy of the history of Stavropol's Jews, taken from a very fancy book put out by Stavropol city and given to only a couple of hundred families.

- Some Divrei torah I had prepared for Shabbos and the like.

- My bank transfer information.

- A list of all the finances Yefim received from Moscow, and a list (in his handwriting) of what he claimed to receive from Moscow and in which he requested they send him more money (for example, he claimed that he only received 200 rubles a month for food for Shabbos, when in reality they gave him 2640 rubles). Also on the finances he received were included an entire program he was getting funding for that didn't exist, and conditions on the programs that he had never kept (such as that everything must always be kosher)...

I had also had something I loved looking at and showing people - a map of Russia and a map of Stavropol Krai.

I brought these home with me last summer and lost them. Every time I had returned I had looked for them. I had also at one point turned over my apartment in Russia looking for them.

Yesterday my mother asked me to take some of my stuff that had been sitting in her basement. I didn't even know anything was down there. Turns out she had made a small box of stuff that I had left there before i had moved to Russia, and added into it stuff i had left in their house on our visits from Russia (which we had to leave every 3 months).

you guessed it. I found my papers and my maps. I am happy now.

Ulyanovsk does it again!

Yossi and Suri, amazing shluchim of Ulyanovsk, Russia have just finished renovating their shul building.

For more pictures read their blog and comment. You have no idea how much support you give them by just telling them to keep it up.

Their blog is at marozov.blogspot.com

Cultural day in Stavropol

When I was back in Russia, I used to chat on the phone all the time with Yossi Marozov, the incredible (and American) Shliach in Ulyanovsk. I loved our talks, since we bounced ideas off one another very good. He's also a doer, and has accomplished an incredible amount in the 3 years he's been out there.

He dreamed about making a personal calendar for the Jews of Ulyanovsk, with their classes and birthdays listed in there, pictures from the community... something people would proudly display in their homes... He imagined being able to publicly honor donors in the calendar, and not having to go to the back of the calendar to find local Shabbos times.

Well, he accomplished it, and even better and more impressive than I could have thought. Please go visit his blog (linked on the left) and tell him what an awesome job he did and is doing. Check out the calendar, it is spectacular.

This is a page from the calendar. I think it is beautiful. He also has complete pages devoted to: Sunday school, Mommy and me, Mezuza campaign, a chuppah he arranged, youth clubs, his overnight camp, his kosher store, his classes titled 'Judaism in the 21'st century', women's club, and their shul.
I recently received an email from a member of our community with some pictures from a recent Stavropol cultural festival. The community rallied together (avoiding Yefim's people) and put on something beautiful. Here is some public Klezmer...
The Jewish table at the fair. Aaaaaaaah, I miss them all!
A picture of just the kids...
And this is their Rosh Hashana experience, with cameras, and if you look closely on the left of the picture, apparently television too. Looks like they rented somewhere nice. they could use some guidance on what Rosh Hashana is all about.
And leading the services (at least without a mike) is Hillel Davidov with 13 year old Gavriel Zizov. Two people who were my friends and whom I greatly miss.

:(

I love frum Jews

When I was about 10 years old I witnessed something really cute. My brother Benny broke a glass in the kitchen. A couple of minutes later my mother came into the kitchen and saw the mess.

"Who did this?" She shouted.

"Me!" Benny admitted.

My mother, who was in a bad mood, gave Benny a 'frask' as they say in Kitah Gimmel.

Benny started howling and bawling. Between sobs, he squeaked out his complaint. "But... sniff sniff... in the Marvelous Midos Machine... sniff sniff... it says that if you say the truth then your mommy will be PROUD of you!"



What brought this memory to the surface of my brain?

Comment #7 of this article: http://collive.com/show_news.rtx?id=5478

For those of you too lazy to read the entire article, it discusses PETA coming to Crown Heights to protest Kapporos.

This guy launches into a full page tirade. To quote: "An animal must be treated kindly and with respect according to the Torah. The same Torah has told us to use parchment for Tefillin and Mezuzos and meat of animals for Korbonois."

Beautifully written, in my opinion.

But here is how he finishes his comment and I quote:

"Remember that Country Yossi (I think) song:"...I swing a chicken over my head....'cuz I'm a Jew, 'cuz I'm a Jew I do that too...AND I'VE GOT NOTHING TO APOLOGIZE TO YOU!!!!!...."

So Peta get out of town and learn some manners."




My favorite part is how the 'I've got nothing to apologize to you' part is in big letters.

:)

Still a Shliach

Erev Rosh Hashana I had school (and a sample screenplay storyline due).

I debated whether to go or not, and then, my yetzer Hara winning, went.

At the end of the class, a woman sitting behind me leaned over and says, "excuse me, but can I ask you a personal question?"

"Sure."

"I'm Jewish and i know a holiday is coming up. When is it?"

I told her all about Rosh Hashana, and yom kippur for good effect, and she promised to go to Shul. I invited her to a meal, but she'll be at her children...

Another Stavropol connection

This past Shabbos after the meal, we went downstairs to the Samama's to play some board games and let the kids beat each other up.

After the games, we sat on the front porch of our duplex, chatting. We noticed that garbage which had been strewn along our front walk by our mean downstairs neighbor (everyone has one of these) had been picked up nicely and put in a large black bag on the side of the stairs.

Apparently we also have a nice neighbor.

As we discussed this, the Samama's told us that in fact, we did. There was a Jewish woman living across the street on Vezina who is married to an Armenian. She has in past picked up garbage the garbage men missed on Friday.

As we spoke about her, she showed up. In a car. She rolled down the window and started chatting with Zalmy Samama, who invited her and her family for Rosh Hashana.

Listening to her speak, I noticed she had a strong Russian accent. I approached her and asked her in Russian where she's from.

"Yerevan, Armenia. But my native tongue is Russian." was her reply.

"Oh cool. My family lived in Stavropol, Russia for over a year where I served as Rabbi of the province!" I told her in Russian.

Her eyes widened. "Stavropol? I was raised and spent most my life in Pyatigorsk! (2 hours from Stavropol, in the province).

I don't know why I keep meeting these Stavropolian Jews. I invited her also for a Rosh Hashana meal. Maybe we can have a Stavropol ex-pats Rosh Hashana meal in Montreal...

Bar Mitzvah call

yesterday was Sasha Filatov's bar mitzvah. I called him to wish him Mazel Tov and remind him to put on tefillin (there are 2 pairs in Stavropol, once of them thanks to the Tefillin bank of the Shluchim office, who provided them to Igr Lerner after he promised to put them on daily).

Boy were the Filatovs happy to hear our voices. Chayale chatted with his mother, Anya, who is a wonderful woman full of life and character, and a fellow Mom. They spoke for awhile. Chayale told her that we remember her every time we see this Stavropol 'plate' which hangs on our wall that she gave Chayale before she left.

Then I told her to have a meal and eat apples with honey and pray a little on Rosh Hashana. Her husband, by the way, isn't Jewish, but he is a very good man.

Then we asked what they are planning for Rosh Hashana, and she said, 'this year we have no Rabbi to guide us, so we're going to the park and dancing to live music.'

I don't even know what to do about that. That's as far from Rosh Hashana as it gets. But what can I do? it's already been planned and all...

They so need a Rabbi, and I wish someone would move out there.

Finality

I don't have much time, so I'll be brief.

The news:

- Our stuff arrived from Stavropol! Finally! This past Friday the container arrived from stavropol with all our stuff in it. It took two days to organize getting it to our apartment, and another few days to unpack it (still not done). We also had a guy rebuild our furniture quickly, and he was great. So now we are completely out of Stavropol.

The guy who did the shipping job was so professional and reliable, which was very surprising. Sending our stuff to Russia from Montreal was a pain... our stuff took 6 months to arrive and we weren't updated on what was going on at all. We also barely had help and it was mostly an unprofessional job.

But Alexander Aksenov from Rostov was amazing! Not only did our stuff arrive within 3 months, but he also constantly was in contact with us, updating us about our stuff and being very professional.

What a mentsch.

2 - I started school in concordia today. chayale got me a school bag and school supplies, which is a first for me, since in the past my father always gave me some old pens and cheap paper. Or I'd find some notebooks in the basement to use. But this was a schoolbag FULL OF STUFF!

The professor was a Jewish guy, and it's good to be learning for a change. Business administration here I come!

3 - I played ice hockey tonight! Preseason began, and this season I'll be playing full time (once a week for about 30 weeks) in the MJHL (Montreal Jewish Hockey League). I had a better game than last time. No goals or assists, but I was somewhat up to speed, and played sound defence. I blocked 4 shots and stopped 2 shots with my stick that had dribbled through the goalie's legs. In other words, a good defensive game, without even taking a shot on goal. I am exhausted though.

4 - Lots of opportunities have arisen, and we'll see what happens. Hashem closes one door and opens another. One of them involves being a Chazzan for Rosh Hashana and Yom kippur in a local Shul for good pay, another is a good writing job, another is a fantastic shlichus'dik part time job, and lastly - I started tutoring two cute little kids who think I am the greatest since their favorite video is 'Maccabees', a video that honestly embarrasses me in its unprofessionalism.

My beef with it is that it should have been done HASC-video style (and I said this from the beginning when they were filming). Like a 'this is what you missed and you should have been there' sorta film, with lots of shots of audience reactions and participation.

Instead, there are entire scenes without an audience... I could go on and on, but the lesson I learned is to run the films myself. Now i got to keep writing and go to sleep.

Another stamp story

I'm uploading more stamps, and I find this other one, above.

Basically, unbeknown to most, Russia has tons of little 'republics' inside of it. I'm sure most of you heard of Tatarstan and Chechnya, but have you ever heard of Mordovia, Mari El, Ingushetia, Chuvashia, Evenkia, Bashkoristan and many others?

Russia is huge, and there are many nationalities in there.... many republics. In the 1920s (or maybe the 30s), Stalin planned to make a Jewish republic. He set it up in an area of Russia that's beyond Siberia, in a city called Birobidzhan. It's above Mongolia, and there is nothing there except lots of snow.

He sent around 50000 Jews there before he gave up on the plan. Still, early on there was a huge Yiddish theatre and Shul.

Anyway, for some reason they never stopped calling it the 'Yevreiski Avtonomy Okrug' or the 'Jewish Republic' and this is a stamp I found from there. Actually a mini sheet set.

Cool, huh?

Closure

I wrote about him before, but I'll write again.

Back when I was in Stavropol, I got a message from an 'Eduard Croitoru'. He wrote (in Russian) that he is from Moldova, his father is Jewish but mother isn't. He wants to become a Jew. An orthodox Jew. He continued by saying that he's writing to me because I'm the only Rabbi on odnoklassniki (Russian version of facebook, where I got the message). He finished by saying that he had just mvoed to Montreal, and didn't know what to do (he had no idea I was from Montreal).

we started a correspondence and I got him connected with Rabbi Sirota of the Russian Jewish Community Center of Montreal. I met him once during a visit from Stavropol and he told me he was studying with some Rabbis in order to convert.

This past Shabbos I went to the Russian Shul, and bumped into him there. I didn't get to speak to him until after Davening. After chatting a bit, I asked him how much longer until he joins our nation.

"I was circumcised this past Monday, Rabbi." was his ecstatic reply. "I am a Jew!"

A day at Tremblant

Last week the Hershcovich family all got into our cars and drove 2 hours north to Mount Tremblant. My sister Malky captured this great photo of my sister Esty, and i had to post it.

While in Tremblant, we watched some singer perform in French, groups of jugglers, musicians and stiltwalkers, and we went mountain sliding. It was a very fun day.

Workless week

At the end of last week, I walked into the office one morning to find the electricity off and my boss missing. As I tried to work with the lights off (reorganzing the stamps...) the guy from the office next door dropped in to tell me that the building had new owners and they were throwing all of the tenants out.

So now we had to move the office. I called my boss, and he confirmed the news. He would spend the next week setting up an office in his home (the third floor of a triplex).

For a full day I packed up the office, and then spent the next few days waiting for him to finish his office. Every day he'd tell me to come tomorrow or there was work for half an hour... I wound up at home more than at work. It was very frustrating.

Finally yesterday he rented a van and i spent 3 gruelling hours moving stuff. He even took advantage of the extra help and had me move two massive bookcases (which barely fit down the stairs) into storage. He couldn't do much work since he has a bad back, so I was pretty much alone. I schlepped like crazy.

Today there's no work, since he now needs to organize the stuff in his home. He told me to come Monday morning for a full day of work.

I hope things will be ready by then.

We bought a van

And our camera died hy"d. It just clunked out in middle of shooting a video of Miriam davening.

We paid the full price for our van outright, and are quite happy with it. It's a 2004 Pontiac Montana.

Stavropol personalities - Gennady Khasminsky

The past few Shabbosim I've been davening Friday nights at home, or quietly on the side in Shul.

And every week I get nostalgic and remember Gennady Khasminsky, who I wish I had been able to spend more time with.

It's the Lecha Dodi tune (to ki hinei kachomer from Yom Kippur davening) that brings up the memories, and I'll try to explain who he is.

I saw Gennady at several community events (like Chanukah and Purim), and was told that he is one of the great prides of the Jewish community. I never got to speak to him more than a cursory 'hello', until a few weeks before Pesach when Natasha Kuligina, head of the Sakhnut called me and asked if I would sponsor some boxes of Matza to give to the poor and disabled Jews of Stavropol.

I discussed it with Chayale and we decided to donate a bunch of boxes. I called to confirm and Natasha said, 'great! I'll see you tomorrow at 10!"

Next day she arrived, but instead of taking the boxes and leaving, she asked if she can 'borrow my driver' (this was back when I had a driver). I agreed, and when the driver showed up, Natasha told me that I had to go with her so the Jews see that I'm there for them.

So I joined her in her rounds (I may have posted this back when it happened). One of the stops was at Gennady Khasminsky, and unlike most of the people we delivered Matza to, he was overjoyed and extremely grateful for the gift. He was also very excited to finally meet me.

He lived in a tiny apartment on the bottom floor of a dilapidated building on a side street. It was very difficult to find the entrance, since the street addresses aren't written anywhere. He had several cats, and books were scattered all over his apartment.

His wife was seated on the couch, and that was the only time I met her. I think she has serious health problems, which is a shame since she was such a sweet woman.

One of the first things he did, was get one of his books (he has authored three) and write a personal note for me. He gave me the book and then took out an album to show me.

He was a very popular actor in the Stavropol theatre. He also was a very proficient writer of plays, and had a regular program on the radio for the entire South Russia. He was very proud of these facts, and also of his Jewishness.

He had many questions about Yiddishkeit, and I answered them all to the best of my ability.

After that our relationship blossomed. I called him several times, and met him at more events. He once told me that I must change my surname from 'Khershcovich' (in Russian) to 'Gershkovich'. The reason, he explained, is that 'Kher' is a bad word. I told him I had no choice since I go with what was written on my visa.

When I started my Friday night Minyan he was one of the first participants, and he came weekly. At first he had a tough time with the tunes, but soon he started catching on. His favorite tune was the Lecha Dodi. He sang with a deep voice, very melodious, and I always think of his smile as he'd sing 'Likras Ka-a-ala'.

He was... rather IS a colorful guy and I miss him.

Unfortunately Chayale gave away all our Russian books to the community before she left, and his autographed and personalized copy to me was among them. I doubt I'll see it again.

By the way, that's him in the photo at the top.

Update: we are being robbed in Russia

The coolest hockey logo I have ever seen. Look again, it looks like a skate. Even has laces.



When Chayale packed up our apartment in Stavropol, she decided to leave the major appliances there, which we had bought brand new (and spent quite a bit of money on).

This includes the fridge, washing machine, and dryer - all top quality.

The plugs wouldnt work in America, and we figured we'd have an easier time selling them at a discounted price then getting them into Canada.

We just sold the fridge - for half of what we bought it... but our former landlord in Russia is pretending she knows nothing about it.

Maybe we should sue her...

Good Shabbos from Morristown

We're here. We're safe. And my buddy Vince is engaged!!!

The original plan was to come in to see him. But that didn't work out, so we'll be at his wedding in Florida instead. If anyone is in Motown for Shabbos, stop by and say hi (hint hint TRS. Would be good to finally meet).

Happy birthday to me

Yesterday was my birthday, and it was amazing.

First, the night before I had my first exercise in over a month. I played ice hockey in the last game of the MJHL (Montreal Jewish Hockey League). I was the worst player on the ice by far (some of these guys played Semi-pro), but had a blast.

We won 15-7, and I had a goal, 2 assists, and 3 blocked shots. My bones still ache.

Yesterday I went to work as usual, and was picked up by Chayale and brought to the park where lots and lots of friends came for a nice barbeque.

After eating and chatting we even had a small game of roller hockey. We lost 2-1 but I had an assist and played well.

I was also officially accepted into Concordia as a mature student. I will be taking courses this fall in linguistics, creative writing, and administration. I'll see which one suits me the most and take it from there. I also applied to beginners french for the winter. If I'm going to live in Montreal, I'm going to need it.

This season I'll be joining the MJHL hockey league full time iyh. It's 420 bucks for like 30 games and starts after Succos. I was told by some of the guys that after 3 months of play, you will improve physically and gamewise and be able to keep up with the others in the game.

My next post will be from Morristown iyh, where we are going for Shabbos. We'll be arriving there tonight.

And this is why they didn't let us have a Shul

See here

And if we can have a Shul, the Muslims will 'supposedly' claim that they ought to get a mosque of their own!

I feel bad

I had an opportunity this past Sunday to do a wonderfulk thing, and I let it slip through my fingers.

Chaim Danzinger, shliach of Rostov, was in Toronto to celebrate the Upshernish of his son and invited us. We didn't organize it in time, and spent a Sunday wishing we could be there.

Then things got messy (without details), and we had no time to call them to at least wish them Mazel Tov.

Chaim, I know you read this. I'm truly sorry and wish we could have been there...

On the bright side of things, today I was accepted into Concordia College for the upcoming year. Now I have to wait and see if the government will pay for the tuition and grant me a loan...

A picture from Esty

Apparently it's Chaim Shimshon... an old picture from his first photoshoot.