Week 8: Why is This Year Different…

Hello!

In case you don’t remember from last week’s post, it’s Passover! If you don’t know what Passover is, it’s an 8-day long Jewish holiday that celebrates the Israelites’ escape from slavery in Egypt. I’d recommend Googling it if you want to know more (or ask a Jewish person).

I’m in New Zealand right now on vacation, but I’m not going to write about that at all until next week. I want to write about being away from home for the holiday.

My mom sent me an article about a girl studying in London who got invited to a Seder (a traditional Passover meal held on the first 2 nights). She posted about it in a rather lovely series of tweets. Honestly, I don’t think I can do a better job than she did of talking about my experience of celebrating a holiday without my family, but I’m going to try anyway.

First of all, I’d never attended a Seder without my family before. I took a gap year before starting college and they came to visit me for Passover. My school at home aligns spring break with the holiday, so I get to be home. But this year, I’m too far away for my parents to visit and I had school, so I couldn’t go anywhere.

I wound up at two very different Seders. The first night, I went to a local synagogue. There were probably about 80 people there, including a good number of students from abroad. Seders are super formulaic, so on the surface it was the same. The same words as every year sung to many of the same tunes. The order of events (The Hebrew word seder literally translates to “order”) was the same.

But the people around me were mostly strangers and our only link was our Judaism. But Judaism is a strong connection, so I felt right at home in this new community, as if these strangers were long-lost friends.

On the second night, I went to a friend-of-a-friend’s family. I’d only met her once before, but again the Jewish connection made me feel comfortable. Her family and their friends laughed and joked around the table and I was fully included. Again, it felt so familiar to me that I almost forgot that I was 10,000 miles from home.

I went back to that synagogue for Friday night dinner (which is part of the Shabbat celebration), where I had some delicious food and great company. In classic Jewish fashion, I met someone who knows my mom. But I also found a community where I can find the comfort of familiarity, even in a place so far away.