Erev Rosh Hashanah a.k.a. why I love Jews

This past week has been pretty low-key. I have class every morning from 9-11:30 with a fifteen minute coffee break during which we moosey on over to the coffee bar across the street for our .70 euro caffe. Italian class is going all right. We're moving at a relatively slow pace, which is good for someone like me who is terrible with languages, and are having our first quiz tomorrow. Today I finally feel like I'm starting to understand the teacher much better in class and no longer think twice about pronouncing "ch" like "k" and "ci" or "ce" like the english "ch." VERY CONFUSING at first.

Last night two other girls on the program and I went out to erev rosh hashanah services. It was really tricky finding a place because all the phone numbers I tried were either disconnected or had a message in Italian that I could not understand. Finally a number went through and a man answered with "Hello?" I got so excited that he was speaking english! He was the rabbi and when I asked him what time services were that night, he interrupted to ask me where I was staying and where I was eating. I told him in an apartment and I didn't know where I was eating, probably with my friends. "Alone?" he asked, "No, you come after services with me to my house. Many students will come." We didn't know what kind of service it would be, orthodox or conservative or reform. And we are all reform. We dressed as modest as our wardrobes had and hoped for the best. When we got there we had trouble finding the synagouge because it was in the basement of part of a residential complex. The doors weren't open when we got there and a nice lady sitting outside led us all around, with Maggie's little bit of Italian, to try and find the way to get in. She ended up walking us down a few blocks to a different synagouge where there were some American orthodox Jews who gave us the up and down and told us that the shul we were trying to get to would open soon. So then the nice lady walked us all the way back from where we started. I just kept thinking that I couldn't imagine anyone this nice to escort us to another synagouge and back in the U.S.

When the synagouge finally opened, we were led inside by a Hasidic man who spoke english. The english was the only thing that helped us feel not so out of place with our non-hasidic dress code. We slipped back into the boarded up woman's section and all my feminsit notions from middle school came rushing back in full force. The service was really hard to follow because it was all in hebrew and italian. My ear is so out of practice for understanding hebrew and it wasn't until later at the dinner that I was able to start understanding it better. The woman's section of the synagouge, including a little room where the kids jumped and talked, definately felt a bit like a social hour and less about prayer. Maggie, Briel, and I definately had trouble following the service. A lot of trouble. It was also a very, very short service...maybe 45 minutes? Definately not longer. However there were a lot of students there, not all hasidic or even orthodox. There were quite a few Israelis. So we started to feel a little bit more okay about how we were dressed.

After the service the rabbi led a large group of us back to his house for dinner. We were the only Americans. It was mostly Israelis although they weren't all traveling together. On the walk over we started talking to Israeli guys who were during a eurotrip. The had spent the past week in Rome, Florence, and Venice. It was their first day in Milan. We sat across from them at the meal. The dinner was in the living room/study and there were probably 30 or 40 people who had come over for dinner. It was packed. There were people of varying degrees of religious, reform to hasidic. There were people of all ages. The rabbi's little kids were there, one so young he probably wasn't even a year old. The woman on my right was probably in her sixties and was from Ethiopia. She and her husband live in Israel and come to Milan for one month every year for his business. She told me they also spend a lot of time in China. It was very interesting to chat with her about what is left of the Italian Jewish community, ethnic backgrounds, etc. We talked to the two Israeli guys sitting across from us as many women set dishes on the tables. The food was so beautiful and delicious but we weren't allowed to touch it for at least an hour. We just sat there starving, waiting anxiously for the blessings. We did the ceremonial hand washing, ate round challahs, apples, and honey. They even had fish heads on the table (that still had their eyes and teeth!!!!) to represent the head of the year. Very dramatic. When we finally did get to eat, the food was so delicious. Hummus, baba ganouj, potato egg salad, green salad, pomegrante seeds, rice, potatoes (and fish and chicken for the non vegetarians). The food kept coming and coming and coming. It was definately the most I had eaten at one time since I left my mother's kitchen. During the meal, a thunderstorm broke out. The lightening looked more like a lightening show than weather and it hailed. The Israelis ran to the window to catch some hail in their hands since Israel is a desert and, you know, no hail.

After the meal the rabbi started passing shots of vodka and amaretto. I love Jews. It was so funny. After he had a few, he got up to talk about the story of Chanah and Panina and Chanah praying for her son and I was so excited because I understood a lot of what he was saying!!! Then he started talking about some other things, about what was not his question but God's question or something, and I didn't understand as much. But I was really proud of understanding what I could. And it probably helped that I was already familiar with the haftorah in which I share the name with the main character.

We left around 11:30 because the metro system stops running at midnight and it had stopped raining (although the puddles were deep and dramatic). It was such a fabulous night. The rabbi invited us to services again today and to his house for dinner again tonight. There is a fashion thing tonight to preview fashion week which is at the end of this month and Milan, well you can imagine, big big deal. And I think I am going out to apertivo before hand, as well. Today I bought a pair of sandals for 7 euro that are very, very cute at a shop inside the metro station. I hope the weather stays good for sandals for awhile longer.

This weekend I am going to Florence, SO EXCITED. I cannot wait. But now it is time to use the notecards I FINALLY found (after much grief and searching) and study for the quiz tomorrow. So rather take a siesta...

Ciao!