Yom Kippur- Intro to the Jewish community of Bondi

I had a very nice Yom Kippur, not easy to say since fasting is never very nice, but I did.  My friend who was here before me put me in contact with the family she stayed with in Sydney, so I stayed with them.  They are amazing and incredibly welcoming, just as the family I stayed with in Melbourne was.  The parents, Lisa and Paul, are from South Africa.  They came to Sydney sixteen years ago, and most of their families live here, too.  They have three kids, two sons and a daughter.  It is an interesting dynamic to be around, having come from my family with just my sister and me, though I find it quite entertaining.  They also have a dog, so clearly I'm in heaven.  We filled up on chicken and brisket and potatoes to try to get through the fast, which were delicious.

They go to JLC, the Jewish Learning Center, in North Bondi.  There are TONS of shuls in the area.  The JLC is a very nice community, and thankfully there was a seat for me at each service.  The community is pretty young, with many little kids running around and young couples taking turns looking after their kids.  Something that struck me immediately was how quiet it is.  There is very little talking, and it seems to be a place for serious daveners (people who really like to pray).  Lisa told me that in fact, the Rabbi makes sure of that, as he stops the service if talking gets too overwhelming, and so the community is now used to it.  It was perfect for Yom Kippur.

I recognized a lot of the tunes, which helped me get into the spirit of things, and others were pretty repetitive and easy to catch on to.  Though there were some tunes I missed, overall I really enjoyed the experience there.  The sun also sets earlier here, so the fast ended at 6:30, making it a bit easier.  Not too shabby. I might come down here every year for fast days.

The only bad thing is that to get to the shul from their house you have to walk uphill then downhill, which means to get back you have to walk the same, uphill then downhill.  So there is always an uphill climb, which we walked I believe six times.  On the way to shul for Neila (the end service of Yom Kippur) we actually passed a guy pruning his palm tree, so Paul went over to ask him to leave the fronds there so that he could pick them up later and use them as the schach (roof) of his Sukkah.  That was pretty convenient.

For break fast it was just the family and me and we had macaroni and cheese and cinnamon babka.  It was perfect.  They then invited me to come back for Sukkot, so I'm really excited about that.  Shira, the 9 year old daughter, told me while I was going that she hopes I come back soon, so I promised I will (considering that Sukkot is on Sunday night I'll definitely be fulfilling that promise!)

Anyway it's finals week and I just missed two nights of class because of the holiday and all our papers are due Friday (finals day) so I should go get some work done. Shanna tova! (Happy new year!)