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Author: Jacob Samuel
Evidence for and against pot
Standing, from left to right, are panel facilitator Michael Levy, CFHU board member Stav Adler, Rabbi Andrew Rosenblatt, Prof. Raphael Mechoulam and Dr. Kathryn Selby. (photo by Michelle Dodek)
It may be a common occurrence in many parts of the city, but it is still a rare thing to pass through marijuana smoke while entering an Orthodox synagogue. But that was the case on June 24, when a panel discussion took place at Schara Tzedeck on the topic Should I Change My Mind About Weed? A small number of attendees, unsatisfied with a merely academic consideration of the topic, opted for a more psychoactive engagement.
The director of the local Canadian Friends of the Hebrew University, Dina Wachtel, was inspired to convene a panel on marijuana after watching Dr. Sanjay Gupta’s CNN documentary on the topic.
Prof. Raphael Mechoulam, a Hebrew University chemist and a leading expert on the subject, said that marijuana has been used in societies from India and China to the Middle East “forever.” Queen Victoria’s doctor, J. Russell Reynolds, used it to treat the queen’s migraines.
Mechoulam said that cannabidiol (CBD), a component in marijuana, may have medical uses “in almost all diseases affecting humans.” Unlike tetrahydrocannabinol (THC), the component that causes a high, CBD does not deliver a high and has no known side effects. However, there have been almost no clinical trials on humans, probably because pharmaceutical corporations would not be able to patent it and governments, for various reasons, have avoided the matter.
Cannabinoid receptors are abundant in multiple brain regions, he said, including those affecting movement control, learning and memory, stress, cognitive function and links between cerebral hemispheres. Marijuana can impact appetite, blood pressure, cerebral blood flow, the immune system and inflammation.
In tests on mammals, such as mice, marijuana reduced brain trauma and reduced or eliminated cancerous tumors. There was a clinical trial on its use around epilepsy and its effect on patients experiencing 10 to 30 seizures per day. Cannabinoids were tested on people for whom existing drugs do not work and resulted in positive outcomes in large numbers of adult patients. “This is the only clinical trial that has ever been reported – 35 years ago,” he said.
Infants undergoing cancer treatment that causes vomiting were given small amounts of THC. “We saw a complete stop of all vomiting and nausea,” with no side effects, he said.
In treatment of schizophrenia, current drugs have some extremely unpleasant side effects, he noted, while CBD has none. Even so, in most jurisdictions, marijuana is in the same legal category as heroin.
Dr. Kathryn Selby, a clinical professor in the University of British Columbia’s pediatrics department specializing in developmental neurosciences, spoke on marijuana’s effect on the adolescent brain. She spoke of the “enormous plasticity of the teen brain” and said that THC can alter the brain’s structure and function, and that the neurotoxic effects can be lifelong. Maturing of the human brain continues into the 20s, she explained, and the prefrontal cortex, which involves judgment and executive functions, develops last. There are two peaks in brain maturation and cerebral volume, happening in early childhood and then, for boys, at age 14-and-a-half and, for girls, at 11-and-a-half. Trauma, stress, substance abuse and sedentary habits can negatively affect development.
The effects of marijuana use in the short term can be loss of motivation, fatigue and, in about 10 percent of users, addiction. Neuroimaging indicates that the longer-term impact of marijuana use by adolescents is strongly associated with psychoses such as schizophrenia later in life. Selby said there is a 40 percent increase in prevalence of psychosis among users, with a 50 to 200 percent increase in psychoses among heavy users and, among those who use marijuana daily during high school, there is a 600 percent increase in depression and anxiety later in life. Correlations also include lowered IQ, intellectual and emotional issues.
The frontal lobe, which is not completely formed by adolescence, is also the most affected by alcohol and drugs and leaves users vulnerable to the “adverse developmental, cognitive, psychiatric and addictive effects of marijuana.” Selby recommended that, if marijuana is used at all, that it be “as late and as little as possible.”
Rabbi Andrew Rosenblatt, Schara Tzedeck Synagogue’s spiritual leader, also has a biochemistry degree. Although the Torah does not say anything specifically about marijuana, Rosenblatt made the comparison to what the Torah and Talmud say about other forms of altered states, particularly drunkenness. If there were any questions about the severity of potential outcomes from inebriation, Rosenblatt said, the drunkenness and castration of Noah is a cautionary tale.
Rosenblatt also mentioned the story of Lot, whose daughters got him drunk and seduced him, resulting in Amnon and Moab, who were both Lot’s sons and grandsons. Rosenblatt cited it as an indication that drunkenness and disinhibition is to be avoided.
The holiday of Purim is of particular interest in this discussion and Rosenblatt said there is a modern interpretation of the old dictum that Jews should become so drunk on Purim that they cannot tell the difference between the names of the villain Haman and the hero Mordechai. The modern view, the rabbi said, is to drink a little, get tired, fall asleep and, when asked who is Haman and who is Mordechai, to roll over and snore.
Rabbis in recent years have overwhelmingly concurred that use of, say, morphine for terminal patients is justified, but the use of untested alternative measures is not.
“Anecdotal evidence is anecdotal evidence,” said Rosenblatt. If studies indicate that marijuana were clinically proven to assist in recovery or treatment for various diseases, he said, it would almost certainly become acceptable.
The panel was moderated by Michael Levy, CKNW radio and Global TV personality. Stav Adler, president of CFHU Vancouver chapter, introduced the evening. Hodie Kahn, president of Schara Tzedeck, invited the audience to stay around for munchies after the event.
Were minds changed? After Mechoulam’s presentation, he received an enthusiastic standing ovation from about half the audience of 200 or so. After her presentation, Selby was greeted with polite applause, while one man jumped to his feet.
Pat Johnson is a Vancouver writer and principal in PRsuasiveMedia.com.
Through blues to happiness with Jill Newman
Jill Newman at Cottage Bistro May 9 singing from her new CD, Lovestruck Blues. (photo by John Endo Greenaway)
Happiness. Perhaps ironically, Jill Newman’s performance at the release party for her latest CD, Lovestruck Blues, exuded happiness. The May 9 show at Cottage Bistro featured bright vocals, skilful (and electric) electric-guitar playing, cheerful interactions with the audience and a playlist of well-written, original songs, many about finding love, but also about losing it – even these, though, exhibit optimism, finding the courage and strength to be on one’s own and true to one’s heart.
Newman’s talents as a songwriter and musician were obvious in her debut recording, Fragile Walls, in 2004. The review in the Independent (“A garden of musical delights,” April 22, 2005) ended with the comment, “It’s been a long road for Newman to reach this creative milestone. Hopefully, it’s the first of many.” A decade later, Lovestruck Blues is another welcome milestone – and there’s nothing fragile about it. It exhibits the confidence and contentment of someone who has, so to speak, come out the other side. As Newman writes in the CD booklet, “It is the story of my journey – of turning my world upside down, taking some risks and being blissfully happy for having done so.”
During the period between releases, Newman told the Independent, a lot changed for her personally and musically. “My first CD was the culmination of many years of dreaming of making my own recordings,” she explained. “I was going through a difficult time in my life, including a breakup, so the songs were really all about loss and heartbreak. I had a great producer who took care of almost everything for me, from arranging the songs to organizing and directing the entire recording process.
“Today, I’m in a much better place personally, having just gotten married a few years ago and feeling happy. That does present some challenges for writing the blues – as lately I’ve been writing happy blues songs. I produced Lovestruck Blues myself with support from my engineer, Marc L’Esperance. I made all the final decisions in terms of how I wanted the recording to sound and directed the recording sessions in Seattle and Vancouver. I was not going for a retro sound, but that’s really what comes out. I’ve played in everything from country, punk, blues and even an all-female Led Zeppelin tribute band, so I’m quite eclectic in my approach to music. I’m often told that my music should be in soundtracks for Quentin Tarantino’s films, the less happy songs, that is.
“I’m most at home in front of a live audience rather than in the studio, as I really enjoy the energy and the interaction between the audience and the band,” she added. “I’ve been doing lots of performances and my live shows are definitely stronger than they were 10 years ago. I’ve also been doing quite a bit of vocal work over the past few years. Songwriting is always a challenge, with lots of hours spent struggling with lyrics – I still tend to write the music first or jointly with the words and then fine tune the lyrics.”
Lovestruck Blues includes 10 original songs, one of which – “Too Hard to Handle” – was co-written with Vancouver actor, artist, director, playwright and songwriter Lynna Goldhar Smith.
“I’m originally from Wisconsin, but immigrated to Vancouver Island with my family as a teen. I spent about 25 years living in the Vancouver area, with some brief stints in Washington,” said Newman about her community connections. “I was raised in a secular Jewish household with no religious upbringing, but I identify culturally as Jewish. My most valued connection to the Jewish community was my past involvement with the Peretz Centre for Secular Jewish Culture. My daughter, Michelle, participated as a young teen in the b’nai mitzvah program, which was a great experience for both of us. I also enjoyed singing in the Jewish Folk Choir and participating in the Peretz programming.
“I’ve worked for Jewish Family Service Agency in Vancouver and in Seattle and participated in advocacy to address poverty in the Jewish community in Vancouver. I combine my work as a professional guitarist, singer and songwriter with my part-time work as a therapist with teens who are struggling with mental health issues. When I have spare time, I enjoy being in the outdoors kayaking or sailing.”
A woman with many abilities and interests, Newman’s musical path also started somewhere other than where it led.
“I started in music playing classical flute at age 9 and got involved in community symphony and jazz combos as I got older, with a stint studying jazz in college,” she told the Independent. “My first stringed instrument was the banjo, followed by the acoustic guitar and pedal steel [guitar], but when I first plugged in an electric guitar (Stratocaster copy) at age 15, I was totally hooked. I loved the sound and the power of the electric guitar, especially turned up loud with distortion. A friend who’d been in rock bands taught me how to bend the strings properly and I began specializing in playing lead guitar – something very few girls were doing when I was a teen.
“I played constantly and learned everything I could figure out by Heart, Aerosmith, Yes and Led Zeppelin, but I also started writing my own songs and performing in coffeehouses. By my early 20s, I was making a living as a full-time professional guitarist and, other than recovering from a hand injury, I’ve never stopped playing. I feel strongly that we need more female electric guitarist role models and I volunteered as a guitar instructor for Vancouver Girls Rock Camp in 2012.”
And what draws Newman to the blues? “It’s the raw emotion and the simplicity of the music that grabs me,” she said, reiterating, “I’ve had a longstanding love of the electric guitar and, when I first began listening to blues players like Freddie King and Eric Clapton, I was blown away by the expressiveness of their playing. In recent years, I’ve been focusing a lot on slide guitar, which has a range of expression that emulates the human voice and beyond. There’s nothing more soulful than Roy Rogers playing slide guitar on Elmore James’ song ‘The Sky is Crying,’ or almost anything by Ry Cooder or Derek Trucks.”
Part of the fun of the Cottage Bistro CD release party – in which she was accompanied on stage by Loren Etkin on drums and Brian Scott on bass – was the seemingly spontaneous invitation by
Newman for her daughter, Michelle Baynton, and Cecile Larochelle to join her in a couple of the songs they each performed with Newman on Lovestruck Blues.
“One of the things that was the most special about making this new CD,” Newman admitted, “was getting a chance to record with my daughter, Michelle. She’s just finishing her opera degree at UBC and, despite my doing a very different style of music, we get a lovely vocal blend together. Michelle sang background vocals on my songs, ‘Everything Will Change’ and ‘Without You.’”
Newman, along with Etkin and Cameron Hood (bass), will perform next on July 14, 9 p.m., at Guilt & Co., 1 Alexander St., in Vancouver. For other upcoming performances, keep an eye on jillnewman.net, sign up to receive email updates or like the Jill Newman Blues Facebook page.
With respect to assisted suicide, context is everything
I am an oncologist, and I am Jewish. Fortunately, at this moment, I am not terminally ill, nor do I bear an incurable disease. By virtue of my profession and my age, death, suffering and the indignity that can go with it are familiar to me.
That is my perspective. I lead with that declaration because, when it comes to the business of assisted suicide, context is everything.
The rationale for actively ending a life is always posited on the basis of ending suffering and, hence, preserving dignity. At face value, this appears both straightforward and without controversy. It is not. Whose suffering? What is dignity, and is it realistic to provide some idealized form of dignity in every instance, try as we may? Who is to judge? When to decide, and when to act? Who is to act, and on what authority?
Some years ago, at a palliative-care conference in Israel, I was riveted by a panel where Anglican, Catholic and Jewish physicians discussed suffering. The ordained Anglican, a highly respected surgeon, spoke of the purifying nature of suffering and its role in preparing people for the afterlife. For him, the total relief of pain was at cross-purposes with the spiritual transit of the end of life. For me, as a Jew, this was a striking perspective, certainly far from my understanding that pain of this sort had little redeeming value. Lesson No. 1: Cultural context is important.
More recently, I was asked to see a young man dying of cancer, whose pain seemed uncontrollable. He was desperate to go home. The complex logistics of pain management and support appeared to make this impossible. What to do? We talked, initially rather guardedly, then more openly. It turned out that, more than anything else, he wanted to see his dog. That was why he wanted to go home, for the absence tormented him. We arranged for the dog to make a hospital visit. The pain went away. My patient died quite comfortably in his hospital bed a few days later. Lesson No. 2: Understand the pain; you may be able to relieve it.
Almost 30 years ago, a small group of Winnipeg cancer physicians asked what was then a heretical question: Are we treating cancer, independent of the patient, or are we treating a patient who happens to have cancer? We created the “quality of life” concept, and objective measures of it. What happened to the tumor became less important than what happened to the person – physically, emotionally, socially and functionally. We broadened our understanding of our patients, and so were born the diverse range of interventions and supports we now routinely employ to more than keep people alive. We help our patients live lives. Lesson No. 3: It’s about the person, not the disease.
“Assisted suicide” is a euphemism for ending someone else’s life. Every civilized society holds life sacred. The idea of “Thou shalt not kill” echoes in every faith. The penalties for killing are severe, mitigated by an understanding of intent. Whenever we introduce a legal exception, we run into trouble. Similar arguments about relieving suffering were used by the Nazis to justify first exterminating the weakened and disabled, then the mentally ill, and then non-Aryans on the regime’s hell-bent descent into depravity. In order to execute the policy, a cohort of licensed killers was created. This, in a society once considered the world’s most sophisticated and cultured. Lesson No. 4: Assisted suicide is not a legal matter, it’s a moral one, and we can’t legislate morality.
So, where does this bring me in the consideration of assisted suicide? Full circle, to my ancient role as physician. Not as medical technician, nor as the master of prognostic statistics, derived from groups somehow extrapolated to an individual. I am a member of the one profession whose essential role invokes individual life and death decisions, and acts on risks that necessarily include adverse outcomes causing pain and suffering and death. I’m not doing my job unless I understand context, cause and possibility when it comes to suffering. That takes time, patience and experience. The responsibility is a great harbinger of humility.
Each dying patient has their own context and belief frame for their “suffering.” Each case has its own mix of causes, and things that make it worse or better. My contention is that when we fully understand what’s going on, it is rare that suffering can’t be greatly palliated. It then follows that the perceived need to end life to alleviate suffering is a very rare occurrence.
In this most intimate and delicate interaction between patient and physician, the physician also has context and values. I don’t think they can be legislated away.
For me, as a Jew and as a physician, I can give morphine to relieve pain, but not to end a life. I come down against legalizing assisted suicide as a product of my faith, culture, training and experience. Put as a dichotomy, I’m prepared that a few might suffer more than they can bear, rather than countenance in the name of some kind of generosity of spirit the active taking of a life. I know from history, and I have seen too much of the slippery slope of convenience, to find confidence in any permissive legislative process.
Harvey Schipper is a professor of medicine at the University of Toronto. This article originally appeared in the Globe and Mail.
The power of social media to terrorize
Others have observed that our generation is the first to carry a device in our pockets capable of accessing the entire depth and breadth of human knowledge, but mostly we use it to watch videos of kittens. This is not always the case, of course. Some of us use it to enrich our character, others less so.
During last week’s World Cup game between the United States and Germany, sports fans invoked Nazi imagery on Twitter 30,209 times. From referring to the players or referees as Nazis to otherwise throwing the term around, the word was tweeted an average of 3.4 times per second throughout the game. At one point, according to a blog that follows these statistics, references to Nazis came 20 times a second.
People say and do things on social media that they would never do without the anonymity it provides. It is not surprising that people looking for an obvious source of ridicule or debasement would focus on the darkest chapter in a country’s history, and one that is well known. Tweeting vicious names is not the worst that soccer fans have done. However, the phenomenal explosion of the use of “Nazi” during a sporting event is troubling in a few ways. From our perspective, accusations of Nazism should be limited to people who behave like Nazis – and that is a very, very small proportion of people in the world today, thankfully. To use this word with flippant nonchalance diminishes its meaning and the history that surrounds it. A worse thought is that people are using it without knowing its meaning and history.
More to the point, there is a certain amount of hypocrisy involved in non-Germans throwing this word at Germans. As a society, Germany has done a great deal to confront the meaning of its Nazi era, to an extent far greater than other countries that collaborated with the Third Reich, for example. The German government has over the decades been exemplary in trying to learn from that history and make a better society, as well as making restitution financially and, as much as such a thing is conceivable, morally to the Jewish people.
More bizarre is the apparent social media wizardry of the murderers that are killing Iraqis in the quest for a Sunni Muslim caliphate. The New York Times reported on Sunday that ISIS, the Islamic State in Iraq and Syria, “has hijacked World Cup hashtags, flooding unsuspecting soccer fans with its propaganda screeds. It has used Facebook as a death threat generator; the text sharing app JustPaste to upload book-length tirades; the app SoundCloud for jihadi music; and YouTube and Twitter for videos to terrify its enemies.” A particularly grisly example was a video of a policeman being beheaded accompanied by the message “This is our ball. It’s made of skin #WorldCup.”
The Times reported that, weeks before ISIS overran the city of Mosul, it had issued on Facebook death threats to every Iraqi journalist who worked there. Understandably, most of the journalists singled out for death fled the city, which the newspaper suggests may have accounted for why the successful launch of ISIS’s brutal campaign took time to filter out to wide global attention.
While most people on Twitter and Facebook are posting pictures of summer barbecues, kids and pets, ISIS is broadcasting a steady stream of decapitations and other executions of Iraqi soldiers, police and disobedient civilians. These extremists hope to impose a Stone Age social order in the Middle East and, presumably, beyond, but they have no qualms about using the most modern technologies to advance their cause.
Site owners like Google and YouTube are trying to confront their responsibilities, but it is technically difficult – as soon as one post/tweet/video is removed, for example, the content pops up elsewhere. As well, there is debate about the merits of blocking all access to the propaganda, and not just from free-speech advocates, but from intelligence agencies, who would prefer the content be left online because it aids them in tracking the extremists.
This is the power of social media. Death threats that have a tangible impact on war zones and which also carry the potential for intelligence gathering. It’s not just for cat videos anymore.
This week’s cartoon … July 4/14
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Stotland plays Carlebach – in Yiddish!
“Montreal Jewgrass” musician Adam Stotland channeled one of his musical gods since childhood – Rabbi Shlomo Carlebach – in his acting debut last month.
Stotland, who has Vancouver family connections, landed the title role in the musical Soul Doctor: The Journey of a Rock Star Rabbi, which made its world première in Yiddish at the Segal Centre for Performing Arts in Montreal, with a June 8-29 run.
Stotland, 37, is not a rabbi or exactly a rock star, but he is a cantor and singer-guitarist known for his brand of music that blends klezmer and other Jewish folk music with the sounds of bluegrass. He is a huge fan of Carlebach, the charismatic, yet controversial, voice of the Jewish revival movement of the 1950s through ’70s. But, as Stotland pointed out to the Segal team when they invited him to audition, he had never acted before – and didn’t know Yiddish.
He also wasn’t sure if he could find the time between his duties as cantor, for the past two years, at Shaare Zion Congregation and his busy performing schedule. He and his wife also have a young child and are expecting another.
Besides, as always, the actors and singers in Dora Wasserman Yiddish Theatre productions are highly talented, but unpaid.
But the Segal insisted he would be ideal.
Stotland headed a cast of 30, which included Mark Bassel, Aron Gonshor, Burney Lieberman and Sam Stein. Co-directors were Bryna Wasserman, artistic director of New York’s Folksbiene Theatre, who convinced the Segal they had to do this show, and Rachelle Glait.
Written by Daniel S. Wise with lyrics by David Shechter, Soul Doctor had its Broadway debut in English last summer. It was hailed by the New York Times as “a joyous, leaping roar” and “unabashedly celebratory show.” The Montreal show featured English and French supertitles.
More than 30 of Carlebach’s greatest hits over his 40-year career are featured, backed by a live band. “He had the ability to compose simple tunes that touched you,” Stotland said.
There is a storyline, and Stotland spent “hours and hours” learning the dialogue. His knowledge of Yiddish had been limited to a few affectionate and sometimes colorful phrases he knew from his bubbie. “Having a musical ear, however, has helped me get the meter, the lilting melody of the language,” he said.
Soul Doctor recounts Carlebach’s life from his childhood escape from Nazi Germany and his early rabbinical career, to his discovery of gospel and soul music after meeting acclaimed jazz singer Nina Simone in 1957. An unlikely collaboration and friendship blossomed from there.
He moved away from his strict Orthodox upbringing, but brought the Chassidic love of song to mainstream Jews. He developed a signature sound that combined folk, pop and soul with traditional Jewish music and liturgy, and his popularity grew well beyond Jewish fans. He performed with the likes of Bob Dylan, Jefferson Airplane and the Grateful Dead.
But stardom had its price and Carlebach, who died 20 years ago, struggled with personal demons that strained his family life and shook his faith.
“The music and journey of Rabbi Carlebach is one that will resonate strongly with our community,” said Wasserman prior to the opening, adding that the production “captures the spiritual essence of his songwriting.”
– For more national Jewish news, visit cjnews.com.
Melanie Fogell’s paintings inspire imagination
Melanie Fogell’s paintings inspired the story told here. (photo by Olga Livshin)
The solo show Illuminated Forests by Melanie Fogell is on display at the Sidney and Gertrude Zack Gallery until July 27. As I wandered through the gallery, surrounded by Fogell’s paintings, I felt as if I were in a varicolored forest, alive with stories. Stories grew between the majestic trees, flitted among the rustling leaves and dozed under the evergreens.
***
Tia guided her wheelchair into the park. The dappled leaves whispered above her head, green and pink and pretty, smelling of sunlight. She resented them. Nothing should be that beautiful, while she was stuck in this ugly chair. After a single brief glance around, she stared sullenly ahead, into the shimmering, fragrant air. She found it oppressive. An hour outside, as the doctor prescribed, and she would head back home, into her room, where no beautiful things waited.
A gasp to her left caused her finger to jerk on the control stick, and her chair lurched forward. No matter how she detested the forest’s loveliness, she didn’t want to run anyone down. When she stopped and looked for the source of the noise, she saw an old woman in a wheelchair. The woman’s silver hair surrounded a pale wrinkled face like snowy lace.
“Hi,” the woman said. “You startled me, dear. How romantic. Two wheelchairs meeting in a park. Almost a love story.” She smiled.
“Nothing romantic,” Tia blurted. “And nothing to smile about. Definitely not a love story.” Tears sprang up, despite her attempt to suppress them. “Stupid,” she muttered, her fingers tightening on the controller.
“Don’t go,” the woman said. “It’s lonely here. Would you tell me about yourself? Was it an accident? I’m Alice.”
“I’m Tia.” Tia nodded stiffly. Alice looked truly interested. Why not? She had to kill the next hour anyway. She started talking. She was in a car, with her friend driving, and a drunk driver rammed his van into them.
Both her friend and the drunken jerk ended up dead, leaving her alive to deal with mangled legs.
“They are broken in a gazillion places.” She kept a sob inside by sheer willpower. “I was a dancer. Now, I’m … a cripple. The doctor said I might walk again, eventually, after another surgery. I’ll probably always limp. No dancing for sure.” This time, a sob escaped.
“So, you got lucky,” Alice said calmly. “You survived.”
“Lucky, ha!” Tia swore loudly, daring Alice to disapprove. She would never have said anything so rude before her accident, but now, she didn’t care. Rudeness even made a perverted sense. It helped her not to cry.
Alice nodded. “Good idea.” Then, she too swore, very creatively. “The trees absorb our anger and hurts,” she said. “They heal us. With obscenities, we pour out our pain, bury it. It’s like verbal manure.”
Surprised, Tia laughed. “You think so?”
“Yes. Now, inhale the sweet air. Take in the goodness.” Alice looked expectant, waiting.
Tia shrugged. Inhaled. Alice was right, the forest smelled good. It smelled of living things, of dreams.
“Now swear again,” Alice said. “Repeat after me.” The following string of descriptive verbal abuse made Tia laugh aloud for the first time since the accident. She dutifully repeated the words, wincing only a little.
“Well, dear. Do you feel better? I have to go back now, so I’ll have to turn here, at this intersection, but we’ll meet again, right?” She reversed her chair and met Tia’s eyes. “I hope you’ll walk soon. Bye, Tia.” Alice brushed her thin fingers across Tia’s hand, and then rolled away into the gold and green mosaic of the foliage, vanishing behind a bend in the greenery. The lower branches swayed in her wake, a bird trilled overhead.
“Bye, Alice,” Tia said. She did feel better. Only later, after returning home, she realized that she didn’t even thank Alice.
She visited the park every day afterwards, watching the trees and the light change with the season, feeling her pain draining away. She never met Alice again. The next surgery went well, and she healed quickly. After a couple months of grueling physiotherapy, she started limping on her own feet. The doctor said the limp would fade in time. No dancing, of course, but walking felt good. She would find Alice and say thank you.
The autumn forest overflowed with color, reds and greens and yellows of every shade. The fallen leaves bounced under her shoes. Alice would love it, she thought. But when Tia entered the nursing home on the other side of the park, Alice wasn’t there.
“She died in the spring,” said the receptionist. “Are you Tia?”
“Yes,” Tia breathed.
“She left something for you. She was an artist.”
It was a small painting, a forest in spring: leaves and sunlight embracing each other in a quiet melody of green and amber and peach, singing of hope.
Olga Livshin is a Vancouver freelance writer. She can be reached at [email protected].
ISIS looking to Jordan
An Israeli border policeman patrols the area of the Judean desert, near the Jordan border. After swift victories in Iraq, the Islamic State in Iraq and Greater Syria (ISIS) terrorist group is setting its sights on Jordan, threatening to drag Israel into the global jihadist conflict. (photo by Nati Shohat/FLASH90)
Emerging from the chaos of the Syrian civil war, the Islamic State in Iraq and Syria (ISIS) terrorist group has gained the world’s attention for its brutal medieval-style justice and its swift victories in Iraq, threatening to overrun the weak U.S.-backed government there. But now ISIS is also setting its sights on Jordan, threatening to drag Israel into the global jihadist conflict.
“They are a vicious and brutal group, and have even done some things that al-Qaeda thought were unwise,” Elliot Abrams, who served as deputy national security advisor for former President George W. Bush and is currently a senior fellow at the Council on Foreign Relations, told this reporter. “More people, more money and more guns. They do constitute a real threat.”
The goals of ISIS are clear from its name. Alternatively translated as the Islamic State in Iraq and al-Sham (the Arabic name for the Levant region) or the Islamic State in Iraq and the Levant (ISIL), the group seeks to control the entire region, which, in addition to Iraq and Syria, includes Jordan, Lebanon, and even Israel and the Palestinian territories.
NCSY Vancouver celebrates organization’s 60 years
Graduates of NCSY’s Impact leadership program at the spring regional awards banquet in Harrison Hot Springs, with Rabbi Samuel Ross. (photo from Rabbi Samuel Ross)
In a Jewish community with one of the highest assimilation rates, the role of youth groups such as the Vancouver chapter of the National Conference of Synagogue Youth (NCSY) has become more important over the years. NCSY Vancouver’s parent organization was founded in 1954 and the local chapter, which emerged about a decade later, is helping celebrate the 60th anniversary milestone.
NCSY works to develop a connection with Jewish youth before they embark on their university and professional lives. Rabbi Samuel Ross, NCSY Vancouver director, spoke about the “unique, beautiful situation” in which the chapter works. He said they “cater to anyone and everyone, which is an ongoing challenge but it’s really reaping rewards.” Indeed, many of those who join or take part in NCSY activities develop lifelong connections to Judaism and Israel, which was Nicole Grubner’s experience.
Grubner grew up in West Vancouver and became involved with NCSY when she was in Grade 9. She started attending their Shabbatons, and loved the warm atmosphere and Jewish connection that she felt at these events. By the end of high school, she was on the NCSY student leadership board, began keeping Shabbat, and had signed up for a post-graduate year at a seminary in Israel.
“I think the goal of NCSY is for it to be a jumping off point for you, so I used it as that and continued my Jewish education after high school,” said Grubner, 25. “It brought a lot of meaning into my life and week and I enjoyed the sense of community that it brought.”
NCSY Vancouver hosts a mix of educational and social programs, everything from a mock casino night to sushi in the sukkah to Shabbatons, trips and leadership programs.
“The city is growing, the chapter is exploding, I wouldn’t want to be anywhere else. I’m actually bringing in someone else to come work for me next year,” said Ross, who has been leading NCSY Vancouver for the past three years. “We do the best we can to inspire them enough so that they’ll want to continue their Jewish growth once they get to university.”
In Grubner’s case, after her year in Israel, she studied at Stern College in New York, returning to Israel every year.
“I actually went back to NCSY and staffed summer programs in Israel for three years,” she said. “I had an amazing Israel experience and it was important for me to give that to someone else.”
Her love of Israel and connecting with the Jewish people didn’t dampen after university ended. In October 2012, she made aliyah.
“In Vancouver, we know that assimilation is a really huge problem, so NCSY is really important to the Jewish community in Vancouver because it’s a connection point, one that many kids don’t get the opportunity to be a part of.”
“It had a very big impact on my life, so much so that I made my best friends and closest connections in NCSY. I’m really grateful for the base it gave me, for the fact that I was able to get so involved and so connected in high school,” she said. “In Vancouver, we know that assimilation is a really huge problem, so NCSY is really important to the Jewish community in Vancouver because it’s a connection point, one that many kids don’t get the opportunity to be a part of. NCSY has really changed the face of Vancouver’s Jewish community,” she said.
NCSY is a globally recognized organization that connects Jewish youth through social, recreational, educational and spiritual programs.
“It’s about connecting kids to their roots and to their Jewish identity. Whether kids become religious or not, to me, that’s almost less important than kids thinking about their Judaism and it being something important to them in whatever way they choose to practise,” said Grubner. “It shouldn’t be a part of their identity that passes them by because of apathy or lack of knowledge.”
In Vancouver, the number of Jewish youth involved in NCSY programming has been growing. This year, they’re sending 16 youth to programs in Israel. Some of their programs draw 100 kids, and there are already 25 applicants this year for the NCSY Vancouver youth board.
“When I first came three years ago, we had to beg kids to be on that board,” said Ross. “Now, it’s really hard to get on. The kids have to write an essay why they like NCSY and what they can add, and it’s beautiful. You see how they write how Judaism has made such a difference in their lives and how passionate they are and how much they enjoy coming.”
Vicky Tobianah is a freelance writer and editor based in Toronto. Connect with her on Twitter, @vicktob, or at [email protected].