We left for
Miami to make connections for Havana in the midst of Snowmageddon 2010.
Of our original group of 25 travelers, ultimately only 22 made it to
Havana due mostly to flight cancellations out of DC. Of the 22 who
eventually made it to Havana, 8 arrived a day later than planned. It was
only because of herculean efforts by Alex Vincente, Tessie Aral, and the
folks at ABC Charters that we were all reunited on Shabbat morning at
Centro Sephardi during Shacharit services. We bentsched Gomel and sang a
heartfelt Shehecheyanu after our late “DC 8” as they came to be known
arrived just before the Amidah.
Fourteen of our party arrived in Havana on
Friday and attended a lovely Kabbalat Shabbat at Sinagoga Beth Shalom.
We were charmed at the end of the service when the children came up for
blessings and then led the congregation in Adon Olam and a series of
Zemirot. It was a busy Shabbat weekend in Havana with five other Jewish
groups from the US all in town at once. The piles of humanitarian aid
and medicines we saw before services at our meeting with Adela Dworin
President, and David Prinstein Senorans Vice President, of El Patronato
and Beth Shalom, gave everyone a sense of satisfaction.
Saturday morning we attended Shacharit at
Sinagoga Centro Sephardi. Our old friends Mayra Levy and Alberto Behar
were there to greet us. Once again other Jewish groups were there for
services including a group of students from the US led by Dr. Ruth
Behar, from the University of Michigan, author of An Island Called Home
– Returning to Jewish Cuba. We would run into Ruth and her students
again in Sancti Spiritus and Santa Clara.
During services, ably led by Alberto,
Samuel, and Tatiana, I was invited up for an aliyah and asked to deliver
the haftarah for Parsha Mishpatim and a commentary. I was unprepared,
but “a regel echat” – on one foot, read and taught the deeper meaning of
the Haftarah, about the three times the Holy One of Blessing has feed us
from Slavery and how slavery can be a state of mind as well as a state
of being.
Rabbi Danny Price of Connecticut was also
with us and leyned the first aliyah of the parsha from the Torah.
After our joyful reunion with the rest of
our traveling party, we sat down to a lovely Shabbat lunch with members
of the synagogue. The exchange between the members of our communities
was lively and we had enough bilingual folks at the tables to insure
that everyone was part of the conversations. We made a presentation of a
battery / AC powered amplifier and microphone to the synagogue for “Albercito,”
who serves as the hazzan of Centro Sephardi and has been having some
throat problems of late. Now he can be heard again by everyone. He was
also very interested in the fact that I was an ordained hazzan, as well
as a rabbi, and asked that I teach him some niggunim and hazzanut. We
learned quickly a niggun (melody without words) by Reb. Shlomo Carlebach
and I promised to return in the not too distant future to spend a day or
two with him to teach hazzanut (more on that at the end of this report).
Sunday we arrived at 5:30 am at Jose Marti
Airport terminal #1 for the flight to Santiago.
It was a quick uneventful flight on an
aging Russian jet. We had time during the day to visit historic Santiago
before arriving in the late afternoon at Comunidad Hebrea Hatikvah.
Nearly 40 members of the Santiago Jewish community turned out to greet
us. We began our time together with introductions of everyone in
attendance before we had our evening study session on the hidden
meanings of Purim and we learned together songs for Purim. This was
followed by a wonderful performance by the Rikud group of Santiago in
full costume and a delightful dinner where we all got to know each other
better. In a quiet moment a few of us snuck off with synagogue president
Eugenia Levy to take a look at the congregation’s 300 year old Turkish
Torah. The Torah is housed in a new “tik,” the single round Torah case
commonly used by Sephardic congregations. I have seen many Torah scrolls
in my lifetime, and have learned a bit about the art of the sofer (Torah
scribe), but have never seen a Torah such as this. The hand of the sofer
was unique. The Zohar calls the writing of the Torah, “black fire on
white fire” and these letters were written in such a style so that they
danced on the pages like black flames. Truly remarkable! We also took
note of the Ner Tamid. Eugenia shared with us that because oil is in
short supply in Cuba, every family brings a little jar of oil
periodically to the synagogue to add to the Ner Tamid to keep it burning
always. This is truly the light of the spirit of the Jews of Santiago.
We also admired the sculpting talents of
Robert, a young member of the community who had a number of his works on
display at the synagogue. During the evening he presented us with a gift
of a wooden sculpture of a man with tallit and tefillin davening. It
will take up an honored place in our synagogue along with other gifts of
art we have received from Cuban Jewish artists.
We concluded the evening with joyful
singing and dancing of familiar songs and new songs before finally
sharing a few tears as we intoned Hatikvah.
Before leaving the synagogue for the night,
my wife Yaffah asked Eugenia if there were any graves in the Santiago
Jewish cemetery with the name Benbasset (her maternal ancestors).
Eugenia told us that there was the grave of a Shlomo Benbasset in the
cemetery and it was just off the road to Guantanamo. We resolved then
and there to make a brief stop the next day.
Monday we departed Santiago for Guantanamo,
stopping along the way at the Santiago Jewish Cemetery and indeed here
we located the grave of Shlomo Benbasset. We didn’t know yet how
significant this little “find” would be. The understanding would come
later.
We arrived in Guantanamo and checked in at
the Islazul Guantanmo Hotel. It seems that our arrival generated a good
deal of interest. The staff told us that they had never had such a large
group of “Norte Americanos” at the hotel before. The hotel was a bit
rough, especially compared to our accommodations in most other towns,
but this is the only option in Guantanamo. We also ran into our first
food shortages as the menu was very limited. No butter, no meat, no
potatoes.
That evening we met Rodolfo Mizrahi Tellez
and the Jewish community of Guantanamo. To our complete surprise he told
us that with 78 members in the community, this was the second largest
Jewish community in Cuba. When one considers that Guantanmo is a town of
200,000 people and is way “down east” in Oriente province, it is amazing
that so many Jews still live there. The community is quite isolated. We
were told that, except for a small delegation of Americans who attended
the community’s 80th anniversary celebration in the fall of
2009, we were the first group of American Jews to visit in over two
years.
We all crowded in to the second floor of
Rodolfo’s house which serves as the community synagogue with a lovely
Aron HaKodesh, Amud, Torah, and a small bookshelf for precious volumes
of Judaica. After introductions, exchanges of information, and
presentations, we all went out to the terrace where the young people of
the Rikkud group danced for us in a space only ten feet wide. And when
we all attempted to dance together – OY! But we again had a great
evening of teaching the meanings of Purim and songs. Rodolfo walked
around all evening with this huge smile, astounded at the ruach we were
generating together. Although it is far to Guantanamo, it is my hope
that we will visit there again someday.
Now came the hardest part of the trip -
long bus rides as we worked our way back across the island stopping at
each community for a day or two.
First a return to Camaguey, where we spent
two days teaching, and celebrating. Members of our group who were
musicians, dancers, teachers of Jewish chant, as well as the two rabbis
each had the opportunity to lead classes. We celebrated our last evening
together with a fiesta put on by the congregation with a three piece
traditional son band under the new roof of the synagogue. A roof
financed by donations from Bethesda Jewish Congregation when the main
truss of the old roof cracked just before Rosh Hashanah. This was our
third trip to Camaguey in as many years. It is a joy to be a part of the
community’s growth. Just stay away from the Hotel Colon at all costs.
The rooms are in poor condition and it was being fumigated while we were
still in the building – ugh! If you travel to Camaguey do your best to
stay at the Hotel Gran or at least the Plaza.
Friday morning we made our way to our
“sister” community of Sancti Spiritus. For eight years we have built a
close relationship with the families of this quiet city on the banks of
the Rio Yayabo. Each year we spend Shabbat at Casa Elisa, the home of
the Barlia family and the “synagogue” for the Jewish community. Kabbalat
Shabbat was a revelation. When we first came to Sancti Spiritus only the
Barlia family knew the prayers for Kabbalat Shabbat. Now, after eight
years of teaching and gentle encouragement, everyone knows the prayers.
I kvelled like a parent as different members of the community stood and
sang a solo verse of L’cha Dodi and we raised our voices in unison to
sing the familiar psalms and prayers. We were also delighted as Ivonne
and her brother Jose Jr (whom we hadn’t seen in two years while he was
studying engineering at Havana University), led the service. Then, over
a lovely Shabbat dinner that included Daisy Barlia’s amazing gefilte
fish, came the stunning announcement that 27 people in the central
provinces were beginning to study for conversion, 11 from Sancti
Spiritus!
The people studying for halachic conversion
have long been a part of the Jewish community, but they were either
children of a Jewish father and non-Jewish mother, or were married to
Jews but were not born into Jewish families. This display of commitment
and affirmation of identity is nothing short of remarkable in a country
where, until fifteen years ago, practice of religion was frowned upon.
It is gratifying to know that our work and teaching contributed in some
small way to this rebirth of Cuban Jewish life.
Saturday morning Shacharit, was a
continuation of the revelations of the previous evening. We were joined
again this year by the Langus - Rodriquez family from Cienfuegos and
David Tacher and Julito Rodriquez Eli from Santa Clara. David again
brought a Torah from Santa Clara and Rabbi Danny Price and I leyned from
it, giving an aliyah to each community. For the service we used a new
Tri-lingual prayer book printed in Costa Rica by the World Union of
Progressive Judaism. With simultaneous translations and transliterations
in Spanish, English, and Hebrew, this siddur makes it possible for
everyone to daven together regardless of native language or ability to
read Hebrew. The greatest surprise was when we began to sing the morning
prayers and everyone sang along. This was a surprise because the only
time Shabbat Shacharit is celebrated in Sancti Spiritus is on our annual
visits. It seems that last year someone recorded our Shabbat morning
service and the entire community went to great lengths to learn the
words and melodies in preparation for our visit this year.
Before the day ended there were two more
remarkable moments. The first was when 2 year old Elisa (our God
daughter) joined her older sister Claudia to sing Yerushalayim Shel
Zahav. Two years old and already singing Hebrew – Wow! Then the other
children joined in for a medley of Purim songs.
The other was a more personal moment. As I
mentioned earlier in this narrative, my wife, Yaffah, is of the family
Benbasset, originally from Turkey, then settled in the US and Cuba. I
had recalled just before this trip that Julito Rodriquez Eli had a
grandparent with the same name, as was related in Maritza Corrales book,
Chosen Island. In conversation with Julito, Yaffah learned that Julito’s
great grandfather Benbasset was a rabbi in Istanbul Turkey. So was
Yaffah’s great grandfather! They were distant cousins! But that wasn’t
the end. I have known Rebeca Langus Rodriguez of Cienfuegos for eight
years, but never knew that she and Julito were first cousins! So, Rebeca,
Julito, and my wife are all related. Amazing!
Our last stop before returning to Havana
was a day in Santa Clara, our other “home” community. I was the first
Jewish Clergy to intone the El Maleh Rachamim in the restored Jewish
cemetery and at the Holocaust Memorial. Our congregation has been deeply
engaged in fundraising to obtain and renovate the house that hopefully
this year will become the new synagogue. David Tacher and I consider
ourselves true brothers.
When we arrived at the cemetery along with
the entire Jewish community of Santa Clara, there was a white dove
sitting atop the center of the twenty foot tall main gate. The Santa
Clara folks were all quite surprised. No one could recall seeing a white
dove in Santa Clara before. David became very emotional, nearly overcome
by the moment. We would soon learn why. The community presented to me a
gift in honor of my recent ordination as rabbi (after 14 years as a
hazzan), and in gratitude for all of our work in Cuba. When unwrapped,
the reason for David’s reaction to the dove became evident. The gift was
a stained glass panel of Noah’s dove with a rainbow streaming from the
tail. A vivid reminder of the covenant and that there are no
coincidences when one is on the path with the Holy One of Blessing. We
also located more graves of members of the Benbasset family, and then
made a brief visit to the community “house” before departing for Havana.
On our last day in Havana we visited once
again the Adath Yisrael Synagogue, spoke with our good friends there,
and looked at pictures of the nearly complete renovation of the Kosher
butcher shop, before departing for the airport and our return to Miami.
So, what did we learn during our ten days
travelling across the island.
There is a real hunger for knowledge that
our current mission structure does not support. While our visits for an
evening or a day in each community serve a need for contact with Klal
Yisrael (the larger world Jewish community) and our Shabbat Shacharit
services are a unique annual event in Sancti Spiritus and the central
provinces, the people are hungry for more. In the provinces people want
lessons in Hebrew, liturgy, history, philosophy, and just plain
yiddishkeit. To this end I will be returning to Cuba sometime in early
summer with one or two other rabbis. We will spend two or three days in
as many communities as possible teaching Judaica intensives. Rabbi
Shmuel Szteinhendler of Chile was in Camaguey immediately after our
visit teaching the conversion class of the 27 people from the provinces.
I hope that our visit will deepen the knowledge of not only those
working towards conversion, but everyone, in a way that our larger
missions cannot.
All in all we delivered over 1000 pounds of
medicines, hospital supplies, and personal hygiene items, as well as
books, and instructional Hebrew and English language DVDs to the Jewish
communities of the island. We made contact with every Jewish community
in Cuba in a single eleven day trip. It was a grueling and difficult
trip logistically, but the rewards were great. We met new communities
and celebrated again with old friends. Every community received, and we
received, precious mementos to serve as physical reminders, precious
“ot” (symbols) of our friendship. We sang together, learned together,
prayed together, ate together, danced together, and celebrated as Jews.
We experienced together the singular Jewish unity that transcends all
barriers and embraces all differences of language and culture. We were
truly ‘echad.”
WATCH FOR FORMAL ANNOUNCEMENT OF BJC’s NEXT
CONGREGATIONAL MISSION TO CUBA
JANUARY 9-19, 2011 (tentative dates)