Corey Gradin has new lungs — and with them, a chance for a future. She received her lungs in late May in an operation that took place at Barnes-Jewish Hospital in St. Louis. Who they belonged to, and how the family members decided to donate his or her organs to a dying 16-and-a-half year old, […]
Early in the summer, Rev. Weldon McWilliams IV along with 25 others, walked into Rockland Kosher Supermarket, tucked behind the intersection of Routes 59 and 306, and bought groceries. Not very remarkable. It is a grocery store, after all. But it’s a niche grocery store, a very large one that contains only kosher certified products. […]
The world is a really queer place. How else can you explain the idea that is gaining traction that Israel is using its favorable record on gay rights to mask abuses of occupation? But that is the argument of those who are touting pinkwashing. Promoted primarily by Sarah Schulman, a professor at the College of Staten […]
So much fuss over a matzah ball, nu? Well, not a matzah ball, but a knaidel. Or is it kneydl? Or knaydl? Or kneidel? Because when Arvind Mahankali, a 13-year-old from Queens, correctly spelled the word for a doughy dumpling that even the most unengaged of Jews have consumed, he unleashed an unabahsed frenzy of […]
The first time I davened at the Kotel, I was 16 and with a group of girls from my teen tour. Our leaders brought us to the last vestige of the Temple, the remaining western wall. The boys and men funneled down the path to the men’s side to do their thing and we were […]
This is my latest piece. As head of the marketing and PR committee for the Jewish Community Campus capital campaign, Ensuring Our Future, I have worked with Jill Ofer and the JCC’s graphic designer, Karen Babat, to create this piece. Unfortunately, the way I can post it here on the website doesn’t begin to do […]
I always imagined that I would get to say goodbye in print. At least that’s how I pictured it if I bothered to think that I might one day no longer be editing the local Jewish newspaper in Rockland County. There were times I thought I could go on doing that job forever. Certainly for […]
I was half listening to the announcements at the end of the Saturday morning service when something the rabbi was saying broke through the noise in my head. I was pretty sure I heard him announce that we could sell our chametz online. Immediately, I pictured a sort of eBay marketplace, where I could auction […]
The secular education of a chasidic pop star Most students at Rockland Community College have not had successful singing careers before they decide to get their associate degree. But Lipa Schmeltzer is definitely not most students. A bona fide superstar in the niche world of chasidic singers, Schmeltzer came to RCC as a bit of […]
I purchased a pair of boots from Zappos.com, the online retailer, but they just weren’t right. I wanted to return them, but I also wanted to check out another pair of boots. Complicating what could have been a straightforward exchange was that I had initially paid through Paypal, which charged my American Express card, and […]
