Our son, Nissim Shalom, recently became a bar mitzvah, and it is a living reminder for us of our family’s remarkable and ancient history. According to Jewish law, a Jewish boy reaching the age of 13 becomes a bar mitzvah…
I might have been a Jewish Martha Stewart if fate had been kinder to me. I used to watch with envy as she placed her rose-scented candles on the needlepoint tablecloth in the centre of which were the exquisite paper…
In my North American Ashkenazi house growing up, my mother always cooked arbis at Purim time. The dish is associated with Queen Esther, for whom this was supposedly a mainstay. Why? Because, some Jewish sources say, Queen Esther kept kosher…
Purim is coming the evening of Feb. 28, and if your schedule doesn’t allow time for making hamantashen, try poppy seed cookies. The Yiddish word for poppy seed is mohn, which some say sounds like Haman. Another story says Esther…
The Vancouver Jewish Community Centre doing a children’s baking program, Jan. 18, 1974. (photo from JWB fonds, JMABC L.11635) If you know someone in this photo, please help the JI fill the gaps of its predecessor’s (the Jewish Western Bulletin’s)…
(photo from pixabay.com) Tu b’Shevat, the 15th of the Hebrew month of Shevat, begins at sunset Jan. 30. The Tu comes from the Hebrew letters tet and vav, which add up to 15, and the festival is also called the…
Left to right are Jason Murray, Pacific Region LPC, CIJA; Carmel Tanaka, CIJA-Pacific Region; Nico Slobinksy, CIJA-PR; Alexandra Moses, CIJA-PR; Shelley Rivkin, Jewish Federation of Greater Vancouver; Ezra Shanken, JFGV; and Kara Mintzberg, CJPAC, B.C. (photo from CIJA and CPJAC)…
Left to right are Rabbi Falik Schtroks, Jason Aginsky, Jessie Miller, Emily Miller and Rebbetzin Simie Schtroks. (photo by Naomi Nelson) When Adina Ragetli, age 9, opened the annual public menorah lighting event on Dec. 17 at the Semiahmoo Shopping…
(photo from teenlife.com/summer-program/urj-camp-kalsman) Going to camp was a rite of passage when I was growing up. Everybody went to camp. In my day, it was the B’nai B’rith camp that all Jewish kids went to, in Sandy Hook, past Winnipeg…
On Dec. 13, after the lighting of the menorah and a Chanukah party at the Centre for Judaism (C4J) in Surrey, participants in the Iron Chef Chanukah Competition filled the C4J kitchen. The excitement was palpable as the chefs and…
