Jewish Quarter

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Today was, thankfully, the last day of intensive Czech. After class, we went to the Jewish Quarter and ate at the community center. I guess Kim didn’t know I was a vegetarian, so she ordered the meat meal for me. I could have made a big deal about it and gotten the vegetarian meal of pancakes with disgustingly sweet apple sauce, but I decided to stick with the goulash. I mean, when else am I going to have the opportunity to eat kosher goulash? It was pretty good, but I wouldn’t be sad if I never ate it again.

After eating, the guys were enlisted to help make the minyan* for mincha.** It may not seem like a big deal, but it bothered me that my presence was not valued at their prayer service. There are a bunch of good things about orthodoxy, but the thing I hate most is its rigid gender roles. I just can’t believe that God told some human beings to always wear skirts. What a silly rule. Anyway, after mincha, we started our tour of the Jewish Quarter with Zita, who is dating David Kraus (whose father is a big deal in the Prague Jewish community). Zita was an amazing tour guide. You could tell she was very knowledgeable. We saw a bunch of synagogues that comprise the Jewish Museum. It was really cool. Seeing the collections of ritual objects (like yad’s*** for reading Torah, prayer books, and chumashim****) just filled me with wonder. It’s so amazing that these ritual items and texts can connect me to people from the 15th century. There’s no visible difference between what they used back then and what we use now. How trippy is that? We also went through the Jewish cemetery (except for Jake, because he’s a Cohen*****). I don’t know how to describe that cemetery. The graves are so close together, literally on top of each other because anti-Jewish ordinances kept the Jews from expanding their quarter. You’ll have to see the pictures to know what I mean.

Anyway, after the tour I went to Tesco with Deena and some other folks. I bought more paper and some shampoo. I wanted to get conditioner also, but I forgot to bring my money. All I had on me was the money I had intended to spend on dinner. After Tesco, Deena and I also went to Albert. We finally figured out where it is. Yay! It was a pretty good grocery store, with cheaper prices than the corner market.


Glossary
*minyan = group of 10 adults (sometimes only 10 adult MEN) needed to say certain prayers

**mincha = the afternoon prayer service

***yad = hand-shaper pointer, used so that you don’t smear the special ink with your finger oils

****chumashim = books with just the first 5 books of the bible (Genesis, Exodus, Leviticus, Numbers, and Deuteronomy)

*****cohen = descendent of Moses’ brother, Aaron, a member of the priestly class, which is not supposed to come into contact with ritually impure things like the dead

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