Day 3 - Jewish Bombay - Part 2

---

Many of the synagogues in Bombay were built by and/or supported by a family of Bagdadi Jews named the Sasoons. He not only gave freely to Jewish causes but also to children and health care. One of the most beautiful synagogues was one called the Kenneseth Eliyahoo which had beautiful interiors. We also say the oldest synagogue in Mubai, the Shaar Harahamim (Gates of Mercy Synagogue which was built in 1796 by I can't remember his name but he was a Bene Israeli. This was a group of people who lived in India who had strange practices such as Bris Milah, kosher food, shabbos... but were not part of the world Jewish world. More recently the rabbis in Israel now consider them full Jews. Interestingly while living in India for about two thousand years they experienced no anti semitism and were allowed to practice their customs freely. Another synsague was the Magen David Synagogue (maybe named after me).... it is a tall building and very well maintained and also has the Sassoon Children's school, a mikvah and a matzo baking building on the same property.

During the day we also saw the Victoria Terminas which is one of the largest train stations in the world. It was truly a beautiful building. India has an amazing train system which has developed over hundreds of years. During the day Daniel also took us to a vegetarian restaurant in Bombay. There are no formally Kosher restaurants here, but the rabbis from israel has said that Jews are permitted to eat in the purely vegetarian restaurants. Most of the people of the Maharrashta state normall have a vegetarian diet in any case. I had the super deluxe thali for lunch which is essentailly a big dish that has a number of different things in it. There was brown stuff, red stuff, yellow stuff and something made with soft cheese. All of the food was delicious. Mom had a red thing made with potatoes, and a venetarian rice biryani. we also had nan and some crunchy bread.

In the afternoon we also got to visit the Dobi Ghat, which apparently is a unique feature of Bombay. The dhobi is a traditional laundry man who collects peoples dirty linen, washes it and returns it to you. The launries are called ghats... row upon row of concret wash pens each fitted with its own flogging stone. The place we saw had almost two hundred dhobis and their families working together.

The final thing to note about today is the amazing amount of poverty we saw as we drove through this city of 18 million people. Some families were living in what looked at large crates with young children running around outside with lots of goats and dogs. Interestingly the looked pretty happy... though that is hard to imagine.... I don't think that I would be happy there.

After getting back to the hotel... we were exhausted and both took a nap before going to cocktail hour and a light dinner.

will tell you more tomorrow..... later dudes

---