Forgiveness

About two years ago my friend did something so terrible that I could not forgive her for a very long time. What she did made me cry for a very long time. In fact, the occurrence made me question certain things and the decisions I have made towards them. I couldn't live with myself, or the decisions I had made prior to my knowledge of her actions.

Then Rosh Hoshanah came around- months (atleast 8) later- and it came time to ask for forgiveness in hopes of being inscribed in the "good" book. I knew I wouldn't be able to forgive her. I had no intention of discussing it with her nevermind the possibility of making myself feel guilty for something SHE did simply because I couldn't forgive her. I was terribly hurt and I wasn't about to forgive her just because it happened to be the season to forgive.

So I decided I'll just let things work themselves out. And this was a close friend who I happened to see all the time. So it wasn't so "far fetched" for me to think things would work themselves out.

Came Yom Kippur, and she still hasn't asked for forgiveness; Shmini Atzeret ended, and still no asking for forgiveness. So I just let it go. And I figured "screw it, I wasn't going to forgive her anyway"

And so I left it at that.

Then a few months later, I realized I let it go. I didn't care what she did, because I got over it. It was totally unrelated to my life and so while I didn't "forgive" her, I certainly lost interest, and had it been yom kippur, I probably would've forgiven her had she thought about asking. But at the time of yom kippur, only a few months earlier, I wasn't able to forgive her. So what happened?

Was I a cause of her possibly being judged towards the "bad" books side? Did Hashem know in advanced I wouldn't care in a few months, and so weighed it on the "good" book side? OR did it go towards the following years mechila?

What's the deal?

THE INSANITY! THE HORROR!

The office "lunch room" has a vending machine. Every few weeks the vending machine is filled with a whole new stack of goodies for me to choose from. Thanks to the heavy Jewish population, and the strong demand for kosher productions, I am able to eat most of the things that are available in the machine. Well...yesterday I was sitting and enjoying my nice lunch, when I decided to look up at the machine and realized it had been restocked. I walked over to it, and lo and behold, there was a potato chip bag that said Burger King on it...AND...AN OUd!!!!!!!!!!!


YUP! Can you believe this?? The frummies attack the crap out of Talias Steakhouse for putting PARVE cheese on their burger, because there may be some sort of stupidity involved with maaras ayin, but a bag of BURGER KING onion rings has a hechsher!

Well... I hope the Yated doesn't find out about this, or else the OU will be excommunicated and they will add yet another question to the shidduch resume "Do you eat BK packaged, OUd onion rings?"

The B"Y graduate theme song

Since I'm working alone now, I've been listening to the radio alot. Recently I heard Cascada's new song "faded" and it made me wonder if Cascada graduated a B'Y. lol. But really, this song should be adapted as the B"Y girl theme song.

The lyrics are as follows, and the music is here (youtube link)

Faded..Faded..Faded..
You never take
Take the time to really look
Look at the one
The one I really am
You try to fit
To fit me in a perfect box
You let me slip between the cracks


[CHORUS:]

Now I've faded
Into someone else
Made me someone
I don't wanna be
Yeah I'm faded
My true colour's gone
Like a picture nobody sees


I'll bet you don't
Don't even know my favourite song
You tell me how
How I should wear my hair

You wanna change
Everything I ever was
Try to erase me
Till I'm not there


[CHORUS:]

Now I've faded
Into someone else
Made me someone
I don't wanna be

Yeah I'm faded
My true colour's gone
Like a picture nobody sees

Now I've faded

Like I never was

Till I don't even know myself

Yeah I'm faded
Into what you want
But I'm not takin' it too well

I don't wanna be your little picture perfect pretty girl
Who's got nothing to say
I'm not gonna wait around
Let you run my whole life down
So you can watch me fade away


(Faded, Faded)

You try to fit
Fit me in your perfect box


(Faded, Faded)
You try to fit

Fit me in your perfect box

You try to fit
Fit me in a perfect box
You let me slip between the cracks


[CHORUS:]

Now I've faded
Into someone else
Made me someone
I don't wanna be

Yeah I'm faded
My true colour's gone
Like a picture nobody sees
Yeah I've faded
Like I never was
Till I don't even know myself

Now I'm faded
Into what you want
But I'm not takin' it too well

Now I'm faded

******

How perfect is this as a theme song?

Pre-Rosh Hoshanah stuff

Considering Rosh Hoshanah is a week away and the idea of setting goals for oneself are the central theme to every possible shuir or discussion going on in the Jewish world, it really got me thinking. So I made a few goals for myself. I have a few very personal goals I've made for myself that I'd prefer not to share, so the ones I will share are more of the "random, for-fun things I'd like to try eventually" type things. Like not REAL goals like "I wanna say the bracha with kavana" type thing.


TRAVEL-

One of the main things I would want to do more in life, generally, is travel. I undoubtedly would love to go to Israel again (been there twice), but this time I would like to make the travel focus more on the dead sea/ein gedi and Jerusalem.

I would also like to go to Finland. Yea, I know, totally random. But really, its not. While reading through an issue of Forbes Life, a beautiful picture of the glass-igloo hotel in Finland came up. Basically, you go way up north Finland, and you stay in a cabin, and for one (possibly two, don't remember) night you can sleep in either a real igloo (icy) or a glass one, and if you get bored or cold, you can always go back to your cabin.

I would also really love to go to Venice one day. And for something more local, I wouldn't mind visiting the Boston Liberty Hotel, which is a remodeled prison! Supposedly it is absolutely beautiful, with awesome architecture and interior design. Now that would be an awesome location for a shidduch date! lol. On a serious note, Boston has alot of interesting history and awesome site-seeing, so it would actually be an awesome trip, even though it would be a bit expensive if I stay at the hotel and not with relatives like I normally would (and then end up not seeing anything at all, just the car and a few random apartments).


READING-


Lately I haven't been much of a reader. Which is shocking because I LOVE to read. I'm the type to randomly just pick up anything, read it, and then discuss it. I do have my preferences, like historical fiction or something philosophical, but if it has a good story, I'd read anything.


Either way, I have a few specific goals for reading. I'd love to read all the books by Jane Austen. She is awesome. However, I'm not even sure how many books she's written. Plus, I would like to read some Ayn Rand. I even have both The Fountainhead AND Atlas Shrugged sitting in my house, just waiting to be read. But I just won't get around to doing anything about it!

There's also the book I just ordered on Education called Disrupting Class, which is totally right up my alley on bookreads. The idea of changing around today's educational system partially by using modern technology just excites me.

Anyway, there are alot of books I would love to eventually get to, so I'm going to just change the subject before this post gets to long.


Classes/Recreation-

I would love to take cooking/baking classes and learn some interesting ways to have interesting dinners without too much trouble (who wants to come home from work and cook?). On the subject of baking, I would also love to make challah on my own. I try to make it as much as possible, but that really is not often enough. Like 5 times a year, At most! And if I'm lucky it actually comes out tasting better than when we buy! So yea...need to make more time for challah!


Hmm...


well, there's the fact that I would love to go swimming more often. The pool my friend goes to, she says has huge roaches in the locker room!! EWWW!! I hate locker rooms to begin with, never mind if they have roaches! So fine, in the summer thats really not an issue. I can just wear the bathing suit home, even if damp, under my clothes, but in the winter, going out wet isn't the most brilliant thing you can do, so I'd opt out of that. So...well...I need to find a pool.

Then I would really love to take ballroom dancing and learn conversational hebrew. My hebrew is awful!!!

So yea...thats it for now. :-).

The Departed

Since it was motzei shabbos, my family (father excluded for this week due to slichos) naturally sat down to watch a movie.

My mom said that we will not be getting netflix until my sister finished Gone with the Wind, so because she hasn't finished it, and because we had a few movies which came with my laptop, we decided to just watch one of those movies, and it happened to be "The Departed" with Matt Damon (who was way better looking when he was younger), Leonardo DiCaprio (never liked him really, but was also better looking when younger) and Jack Nicholson, who well, is just stam old!

So anyway, the movie is rated R, and mostly because of the ridiculously high amount of cursing and goryness. All the blood and action was incredibly disturbing, especially in comparison with my typical chick-flick choice for a movie.

The general story is about this one mafia man who is being followed by the FBI, so they can get a case on him to arrest him and such. The guy has an agent on the squad working for him. Similarly the FBI has an undercover guy working for them. In the meantime everyone is shooting everyone, and nothing can get done, because both sides have "rats" leaking information to help/prevent them from getting caught. If you want to know what happens, you can watch the movie, but really you should be prepared for the gore. I was so disturbed I can't even describe it.

Well so anyway, I wanted to write a decent post, but I couldn't really concentrate on any of the topics I wanted to write about because of the movie, so I figured "Heck, I'll just write about the movie"

Education

My family and I were having an ongoing argument with my rabbi on education. I hadn't thought about writing about it until today, when "the babysitter" used an argument very much similar to what my rabbi would say when she commented on my previous post. She said:

1-Parents complain that their kids are having too much homework as it is, imagine if they would start learning all these difficult stuff at an early age. It takes the fun out of youth. Why do these kids need to be geniuses at such a young age? So that they can impress everyone with their knowledge? till they are old enough to apply the knowledge there's no need to bombard them with physics, algebra and other stuff. Their mind's might not even be able to grasp it at that age and they will get turned off from it young, instead of if the school waits till their older and ready then they will be more accepting of the knowledge and they will understand it better.

2- Why would you want the child to feel like a failure? Kids know on their own what they think a good grade is. For many they set the standards individually, everyone still wants an A even if the passing grade is a 65. There's still the same goal. Just for those that aren't capable of doing better they don't feel like failures so long as they pass 65. Sounds good to me.

Why do these kids need to be geniuses at such a young age? So that they can impress everyone with their knowledge

I'll argue her points in reverse order; Here it goes:

"Kids know on their own what they think a good grade is."
A good grade isn't a matter of opinion.
A is an excellent grade.
B is still good
C is average/OK, should really work harder
D is bad, you really need to work harder
F is STOP being lazy or get a damn tutor or else you'll get kicked out.
There is no room for opinion. Once you put opinion into what a good grade is, education sucks. They have things similar too the Flynn Effect to ensure that these remain the same no matter what.
1+1= 2. If your kid doesn't get it, their opinion doesn't matter. Look at the education system today they are so concerned with children's feelings that children are complete morons when they leave HS. Tell the kid how it is, 'cause in the real world, their bosses sure as hell won't be nice and gentle and care about their opinions. Kids need to grow up.

“Just for those that aren't capable of doing better they don't feel like failures so long as they pass 65.”

Terrible point. Those who aren't capable of doing better should be in a lower level class; just like those who get A's easily should be in a higher class level. Or else those who always fail will feel like failures and those who always get A's will be bored and actually begin to fail out of boredom (Albert Einstein).

“Parents complain that their kids are having too much homework as it is, imagine if they would start learning all these difficult stuff at an early age.”

Don't have to imagine. I've been there. Felt like I was actually doing things in life. It was a regular school (we had parties, dances) yet we were challenged academically every day.

My school had three gifted programs
a) Nova- passing was a 75, for math passing was 85.
b) Magnet- passing was 80 and for math 90.
c) CIG- I think the same passing as magnet, but they had different class structure. Was considered better.

In 6th grade there were 4 Nova classes, 8 magnet, and 4 CIG = 16 gifted classes
In 7th grade there were 3 Nova classes, 6 magnet, and 3 CIG = 12 gifted classes
In 8th grade there were 3 Nova classes, 5 magnet, and 2 CIG = 10 gifted classes

why the decline? Because the kids couldn't handle it and left. Had we been babied, the program wouldn't have been gifted (kind of like the point child ish made with not having to accept everyone).

“It takes the fun out of youth.”

I had a blast in JHS. The teachers gave us group activities and interesting research projects, after reading Flowers for Algernon our midterm was a blob of ink and we had to discuss what we saw, and incorporate a few book sources in our essay, and later we had an in-class assignment to write an essay in which everything was supposed to be misspelled. Which was fun, yet it showed us how hard it must have been for the author to misspell just about everything (read the book summary to know why).

I even once begged my parents not to schedule a ski trip on a school day because we were going to do something fun and I didn't want to miss it.

“Why do these kids need to be geniuses at such a young age? So that they can impress everyone with their knowledge?”

a- Kids need to develop their intellect. You can't say kids should just do average. A developing intellect causes things like creativity (which is the second level of pleasure according to the 5 Levels of Pleasure article on aish). Your kid isn't going to develop anything if you send him to a school with heterogeneous classes which are unlikely to properly challenge him. S/he will need to be appropriately challenged in order to develop anything.

b- Not everyone smart shows it off, many have intellectual pursuits and tend to associate with fellow geniuses, while others are in disguise as "average" people (whatever that can mean). Not everyone brilliant shows it off. Knowledge is power and it's a personal goal for many people. You start your kid young, they may end up the next Hillel (he was 18). I'm sure Hillel wasn't bored during his youth.

“ 'til they are old enough to apply the knowledge there's no need to bombard them with physics, algebra and other stuff. Their mind's might not even be able to grasp it at that age and they will get turned off from it young, instead of if the school waits till their older and ready then they will be more accepting of the knowledge and they will understand it better.”

a) Umm...the valedictorian and salutatorian completed the 8th grade with...
- Sequential 1,2,3 regents (that's math A and B in today's)
- Earth Science Regent
- Living Environment/Biology Regent
- 9th grade English
- A year of HS Spanish/French

Then there was one class (of about 30 kids) that finished the same but only up to Sequential 2.
Then there was my class and one other class that finished only up to Sequential one and didn't do the bio regent yet held onto John's Hopkins math, and the rest had teacher taught math. And Nova didn't take the Earth Science regent or have Johns Hopkins math.

b) I've been playing around on facebook, and seems to me that many of the students are now in top tier universities (Harvard, Cornell, Duke, Yale, BU), so I highly doubt any of them are any less accepting of knowledge, or are any less able to grasp it than those who got it at a later age.

c) basically I'm advocating levels. If their minds aren't able to grasp it, they wouldn't have been accepted into that class to begin with.

******

Generally on education:

One of the articles I linked to below mentioned how President Bush's No Child Left Behind Act failed the "geniuses" because the funds that were generally used towards gifted programs were taken to fund special programs, like tutoring for the "at risk" students. Which I found interesting, because the school I went to (Andries Hudde JHS/IS 240) currently does not hold the same reputation as it did during the years I was there (I graduated '01) as well as the reputations of the other schools that held such programs. Because while its nice to help the "at risk" kids, it shouldn't be at the cost of denying the smart kids of what they deserve, and they deserve good education.

In HS we had "modified" exams for the girls who weren't doing so well. I don't understand that. Why would you put the girls who cannot grasp the information in the same way as the girls who could into the same class?

I remember once in Yahadus class (I took that with the mainstreamed girls) I kept getting 1's and 2's out of 10, because I couldn't memorize chazals. Then when we were on the topic of Shabbos (always fascinated me) I got a 6 and the teacher wrote "tov" on top. I came home and was like "tov?!?" And I stopped bothering to do anything for that class. A 6 was in no way "tov" she could have written "great progress", no need for "tov". I even told my rabbi, "why bother, they think its good anyway"...and sure enough she passed me overall. My rabbi got into a whole argument 'you got to do this for yourself" blah blah myself. For myself I'd want the challenge of her telling me "great progress, I think you can do better" and then I'd try to do better. For myself I KNOW a 6 is not good; because of what the grade system represents. Once you tamper with grading because of the student as a person/individual (not just as a student) it loses its purpose, and there goes...crappy education. Again, you need class levels of the same type of "individual". In this type of class my "6" would've probably been a B+/A-. But in the mixed class I was in, a 6 was a D-, because it was comparitive.

In JHS we had some students who weren't able to handle Johns Hopkins math (which meant self-paced math) so they had teacher taught math. We had different class levels for each type of learning. And we didn't have a monolithic curriculum where we took a test and then moved on, we had a curriculum that was class paced (hence the levels) so we didn't take exams unless the class was ready and felt they knew the material. If we still failed, we'd have a retake, we wouldn't just move on and take tutoring on the side, because that wouldn't help, because who would have time to get a tutor if they're already learning something new? IF it were a few individuals that failed, they would have no choice but take tutoring, but generally, it wasn't a norm.

******

What do they say gohenim is? It's when Hashem shows you what you could have been, your potential. If you settle for "necessary" in anything, you'll never care to have anything more. How will you reach your potential?

******

I do not feel obliged to believe that the same God who has endowed us with sense, reason, and intellect has intended us to forgo their use.-- Galileo Galilei

Recommended Reads

"Teaching to the New Test"

"Assessing Education"

"Are we Failing our Genuises?"

Getting into HS

I became frum somewhere in the middle of eigth grade. I basically suspected that I'd be going to a private school. Mom knew that the yeshiva system was mostly full of crappy education schools, but we (well my Rabbi and ourselves) made it a mission to find a decent school for me to go to. If that weren't hard enough, I needed a school that would agree to making me a flexible schedule, because I finished 9th grade with all but one class.

None of the schools I applied to wanted to even give me an interview when my mom and/or Rabbi made the initial calls. Why would they want to accept a PS kid? One school gave me an interview rather quickly and they loved me, cuz I'm so frum looking :), and education wise it was fairly ok. They even said that they'd send me straight to 10th grade and just give me a tutor for hebrew and the one secular class I was missing.

Rabbi and Mom didnt really want me going to that school though. Education was not known to be very good; so since other schools didn't want to interview, Rabbi just told my mom to fax copy of my report card :-). Sure enough both schools that initially declined me the opportunity of an interview, decided "hey, why not?"

School #1 was wack. I wanted to get in so badly that I basically learned Rashi over one weekend. I went for the interview with mom. They sent me to take the entrance exams- one in english and one in math, in the noisy school library. When I was done, mom and I waited outside the principals office for about 30 minutes. Got an interview with the Hebrew principal first, where he tested the Chumash/Rashi. Was rather nervous, but if I remember correctly, I did pretty well. He asked me and mom a few questions and then sent me to the secular studies principal.

She was a rather interesting lady. She was very snobby and wore way too much make up. She asked me a few questions and implied that I did well on the exams. Then she told us (mom and me) to step out (prob to discuss with hebrew principal). They call us back into the office, and say that since my hebrew was not good they'd put me in a low hebrew class (as if I expected anything else), but, since the low hebrew class has low english, and the schedules cannot be played with, I'd have to take 9th grade hebrew classes and only one secular class (the one I didn't have credits for).

Mom and I were like "WTH?!" When dad heard later, he was like "there is no way i'm paying THAT much for her to sit around and not have a schedule full of classes.

so that was the end of school #1.


Then I went to school #2 for an interview. From the beginning it seemed obvious the Principal didn't like us- she was holding our deposit check to return to us. We were honest, told her our house wasn't kosher yet (duh, we had just become frum, we were getting used to avoiding treif, how were we supposed to separate dishes that quickly?). Then she tells us, the dumbest thing ever "Well, if you were to become a student at this school it would be inevitable that you make freinds. How would your friends visit your home if its not kosher?"


Mom was like "these are 14 year old girls, not little kids, they'll know not to eat anything from our pots and pans and to only eat take-out on disposable dishes, its not like we'll lie."


Principal was like "Can't have that in the school."


And rejected me. What a biotch!!!

So anyway, It came down to going to 10th grade in an "okay" education school or going to 9th at a good education school , but not actually doing anything in 9th grade.


Boy was my family miserable.


Sure enough a few weeks later (we had already left a deposit for 10th grade school at this point) and my Rabbi remembers about the program at a certain school that is catered to non-frum or becoming-frum girls. He got me an interview with the program's principal, and sure enough, I got accepted. Seemed all good 'cause they lied to me about their curriculum options (But thats for another post. :)). And so, I went to that school and we lost the deposit for the 10th grade starting one.


Eitherway, the point of the story, is how messed up it is to get into a frum school. Why are they such sticklers when it comes to accepting people from Public School if they're obviously on the path to becoming frum? I mean, seriously, I am like one of the most typical frum looking girls you will ever meet, I don't yell unless you already know me, and I follow rules, never had a bad record, none of that. Yet, they wouldn't accept me.


Stupid people. This is the reason for the downfall of the frum people. They're so damn stupid when it comes to acceptance. Its all about tablecloth colors and type of gefilte fish. They never ever see the forest for the trees.

Ohh..and the weirdest thing is that schools #1 and #2 were SUPER modern.

Blogger meet

Childish already put a post on this, but I had half a post written, so why have it go to waste? So read HIS first (if you haven't done so already).

Thanks to Moshe there was a blogger meet with me, childish behavior, frum punk and the babysitter and one of Moshe's friends (Alan) who reads all our blogs (or atleast we hope so).

After kiddush and homotzie Moshe's very nice wife served us fish, just like at any traditional shabbos lunch meal. However, unlike any traditional shabbos meal, his wife didn't serve gefilte fish and salmon, she served something way better fried fish (not sure the type) and vobla. The fried fish didn't get any cringes from the group, except for those who didn't particularly like fish, but the vobla was the topic of discussion.

Vobla is a dried up salty fish. It is delicious. But in order to eat it you have to skin it and take the guts out on your own. I honestly have never done it before (I always had my dad peel for me), so when Moshe gave me one to help myself with, I had no idea what i was doing. Punk called me "uncultured" to which I had the brilliant response of "I am NOT uncultured" and then started laughing, and said "this is my culture" or s/t like that. To which we got into an entire discussion on how russians don't really have a culture.

In the meantime, babysitter was not eating anything at all, and Moshe was hoping that she'd eat something when the meat came out. So finally the meat came out.

So Moshe's chulent was not at all "typical"; didn't have the beans, the barely, the potato type thing, rather had a whole mix of grains, sweet potatoes and lamb. I happened to really like it. Everyone else seemed more interested in the alcohol that Moshe was showing off. Boy does the guy have a love for alcohol. But so does my dad.

Anyway. We were at moshe's house for 5.5 hours!! We discussed many different things. And I realized that everyone was pretty much the way I expected them to be. And I had loads of fun, and I just want to thank everyone for going, and a special thank you to Moshe for hosting. :-)

Next time, I'll provide pickeled watermelon. Maybe I'll actually try it. lol.

Where I was on September 11

September 11, 2001 was a very sad and scary day for mankind. It was a day of sadness and sorrow and full of hatred towards the looney tune extremist Muslims who should all die a very slow and painful death.

Anyway...the week of September 11, 2001 was within the first week of my attending a Jewish school. It was, if I remember correctly my fourth day of school (9/11 was a Tuesday and school began the Thursday before). Considering I came from a totally different type of school and upbringing I had no idea what I had gotten myself into.

In 9th grade I took Chumash with the "mainstream" girls not with my kiruv program. The class was a "skills" class and was taught by the principal of the school.

On 9/11 school began regularly, with davening first followed by Chumash. My principal came in and asked us to open our chumashim to the parsha we were working on, and class began.

About 20 minutes into class my principal gets an income call from the secretary. She leaves class for a bit, and comes back all stressed out. She tells us what had happened "Planes flew into the WTC" and sends tells us that chumash is over for the day. A fellow kiruv-program girl from my chumash class and I went up to our kiruv program's classroom and told the class what had happened. We then (new friend and I) went down to the main office and began to pester them about our schedules.

We could not comprehend what had happened, but we felt we something was not right. And while we were in the main office we were trying not to cry. While we're kvetching about our schedules MY mom calls the office to ask to speak to me, and since I was there, I was given permission and my mom was like "Don't worry we're all safe."

And of course, since my mom called, it really hit me that something REALLLY bad must of happened. So I began to panic despite the "Don't worry, we're all safe" bit. I was like "OMG! What about cousin, aunt, uncle? Did mom include them? What about friend who attends Stuyvesant?"

And I had to literally keep myself from crying.


We got what we wanted out of schedules, and on the way up to class we began to discuss how worried we were about whoever we knew that lived/worked in the city. Her dad worked there.


We had arrived to our classroom when we hear an announcement for everyone to go to the auditorium. Us Kiruv girls didn't have davening seats, so we stood in the back. The school was told the news which was followed by a heck of alot of tehillim, to which friend and I started crying hysterically.


One of the teachers saw us crying and took us into the hall and was like "why are you crying?" So she took us two down to the office to call our parents at work. I was like "I don't need to call mom, she said everything was alright, just that she didn't say about my aunt, or my friend in Stuy!" She was like "Then why are you crying?"

I dunno...people in the middle of nowhere USA who had no relatives in NYC were crying, was I not allowed to cry?

The whole day went by so slowly. I was in complete panic because during lunch I tried to call each parent like 5 times on the pay phone but I couldn't get through. I tried office numbers, cell numbers, home. Nowhere. I even began to panic since I needed to pick my sister up from Hebrew school afterwards, I wasn't sure if it were still open or not. I literally could not function in school. All I could do was focus on the terrible smell of fire coming in through the windows and try my best to avoid tears.

My super frummy friend went to school with me, and since she went to my shul and at this point I knew her a little bit, her grandfather offered me a ride home. He dropped me off infront of my sisters hebrew school, which was locked. Which meant I had to walk home those few blocks...alone.

I was sooooo scared. It was ridiculous. The entire 3 blocks it took to get home, there were atleast 5 helicopters that flew over and there were tons of burned up papers that flew in from Manhattan. When I got home mom and sister were there. Mom was watching CNN, crying and hugging my sister. Dad apparently went out by car to pick me up from school, so he came home a few minutes afterwards.

Boy did we cry, and boy did I want to stay home the following day with my family.

Internet filter

Mom came back from my sisters schools parent orientation and says that the principal was trying to persued the parents into getting "kosher" cell phones for their daughters. She began discussing the "evils" of the internet and TV.

She said how the teachers have a special key that if the teacher gets distracted she can turn off all the moniters at the same time, so that the students wouldn't do anyting innappropriate without supervision.

When my mom said that my sister screamed "HAAAA!!! Thats just why last year I couldn't find a picture of Big Ben building the clock tower in England, but my classmates were able to watch Gossip Girl in class."

Then my sister started freaking out about how stupid the teachers are, and how not nice my mom was for not yelling at the principal for being an idiot.

Mom said many of the parents were nodding along to the "evil"ness of the internet.

Then the teacher started giving an entire history lesson and mentioned how Sputnik changed the entire educational system in America, and all the parents looked confused!!

No wonder these parents agree with the principal that internet is bad, its because they have no freakin idea about anything at all. Mom was like "its not that they didn't know what Sputnik was, its just that they all got completely confused when she tried to combine a few ideas into one."

I find human stupidity hilarious.

I can't figure out if these parents even speak to their daughters. How could they not know that students manage to watch all this stuff, and the administration is just full of it? Or how could they get confused when Sputnik comes into the picture?

Some people are just not very bright. And my sisters school is made up of mostly rich JAPpy people. One of the greatest frum schools out there as well. How are they be so dumb to not realize that filters are full of crap? And internet is not bad, its just that students should be taught things.

btw, I'm sure you've heard, but Rav Kaminetsky (if mom didn't confuse names) banned cell phones with internet.

I'm a heretic. lol. Just got me an awesome pink palm pilot. I read blogs during my lunch hour. :)

Set-ups

A newly engaged friend of mine was telling my family how she met her chosson.

She says "Family friends tried to set me up with him. I wasn't dating because I was planning on going to Israel and I generally didn't like anything I heard about him. So I said no. Then I hear that they are going to have a shabbaton with a few single girls and guys and even though I knew he would be there, I didn't think anything of it, and decided I should go. Then the host got us together, and while we didn't hit it off, I did agree to go on a date to try it out, and then 1.5 months later, we're engaged!"

I feel that having those small shabbaton meals at people's houses is a great idea. I know the idea was around for a very very long time, but it seems that no one is actually putting it into effect. Everytime I hear about a friend going somewhere its an all-girls meal or shabbos getaway and shadchanim are present. There is never any sort of mix-meal (that I hear of) unless its for older singles.

I asked my super frummy friend if she would go to a mix meal and she was like "depends on who is giving it and everything."

I said "me or a family friend"

And she said "I have to know the family friend"

Whatever. This is what the frum society is dealing with. This is why nothing practical can go into effect; they raise people to be so anti-social in terms of opposite gender interaction.

One of my friends said "why don't you make one in your house?"

I was like "Don't you think if I knew enough single guys I would've already set them up with my friends?"

These people cannot think. It's very frustrating.

Why frummies REALLY hate BT

Once again the comments on Frum Punks post have inspired a post of my own. On his post tooyoungtoteach declared that the reason frummies are anti-BT is because of the possibility that they are "ben-niddah"


Well, I think that reason is complete crap. Soley because then they wouldn't reject students from schools. Its not like the schools are mix gendered and may accidently fall in love with the person with the wrong birth status...


Anyway, I think the real reason is because BT are just more interesting. Who wants to sit around and listen to FFB's talk only about crazy crises when BT have awesome ORIGINAL stories?


Take my family for example. They're completely wacko.


1- My moms best friend (who is a Russian Jew) is married to a muslim guy and lives in Bangladesh. Before she moved there she was never concerned about her childrens' Jewish education, but now, that she's there, she informs them with as much as possible without risk that they'd get caught as Jews.


Wack, no?


2- My fathers cousin's wife died a month ago. We just found out. And we only found out because my grandma decided to tell us even though she promised not to.


The woman died and her husband didn't want anyone to know. To the extent that I shouldn't know that now (and its a month later!). When I heard I was told "JUST DONT TELL ANYONE"


Who am I going to tell that cares? Plus, I asked mom "Its not like you can ayin hara the dead, wth?"


She started cracking up.


3- Over presidents day weekend my family went to Boston to visit some of our family. One of our relatives was married about 1.5 years ago. So my mom asked his aunt "Oh, is Anna pregnant yet?" (Even though they not frum, the general culture of Jewish Russians is to have a baby right away then wait a few years for the second). The lady said "nea, why would she be pregnant, he just went back to school"


A week after we returned home, my grandmother calls my dad and SCREAMS at him "WHY DIDN'T YOU TELL ME ANNA WAS PREGNANT?"


Dad- What, she's pregnant?


Grandma- Yea, she just gave birth last night.


Dad- WHAT?!?! We asked Fira straight out!!! She didn't tell us!


Grandma- Liar!! (called back a few hours later, spoke to mom and she confirmed same story so grandma cooled off a bit)


Anyway, a few hours later my grandma was defending them saying "Thats right, don't want Ayin Hara" My mom was like "AYIN HARA ON THE NINTH MONTH? EVEN FRUMMIES DON'T DO THAT!!"


4-Earlier today my mom found out that her father and brother are involved in a new religion the "church of reincarnation" (I couldn't find it, so it probably has a different name, but the points the same). My mom was cracking up. What do these loonies do all day? Look for freaky religions to try? May as well be frum. They get the wackiness and still get to remain in the path of their ancestors.


Oy...my family is wack. Yet we're a very interesting bunch. We can tell stories for hours. What stories can frummies tell, the ones about gedolim?!


Frummies are lame-o. They don't know what life outside the "shtetl" of Brooklyn is like, so they discriminate against those that do. Then they come up with man-made terms like "ben-nidda' or "pagum" as excuses as to why they don't like the people who make them look dull.


:-)

Why do Kiruv?

While reading the comments to FrumPunks post When does BT status start? I came across the comment Moshe put in which one of the things he wrote was "Why do kiruv?"

Even pre-BT post comments I asked the same question. In fact I sarcastically asked my Rabbi that once. And I came up with a few answers as to why they do it.


One of the reasons is what Moshe himself said - To create for yourselves a caste of workers who’ll pay for the parasites who are sitting in kollel and pretending to learn?


This reason seems to make alot of sense. Think about it. A BT generally has more money. Not because frummies are all disgusting, dumb, and poor (like my grandmother says they are) but because BTs tend to come from smaller families as well as from better educated backgrounds (at least with this generation). An investment in Kiruv is like an investment in brand new-buildings and gorgeous new plaques for schools that can hardly afford to provide anymore scholarships. A few BT paying full tuition per school is some nice money.


The other reason is for shidduchim. I know this sounds completely out of the world considering this post is being based on a post about a girl that got rejected for being a BT, but I am NOT crazy, and I mean what I say.


When it comes to shidduchim, frummies go all out and crazy.


Take normal people looking for jobs. Normal person writes up a beautiful resume, calls up everyone he knows, gets headhunters, buys newspapers, begins to network in every possible way, all in hopes of making the write "connection" and finding the right job.


With frum people this is very similar. In shidduchim? Pretend you're job-hunting, and do some chesed so that you stand out from the other candidates.


What do I mean? I mean, that kiruv is done solely for the purpose of having something to add on the resume. All frum girls are the same. They all wear black on the first date, heels, straighten their hair, wear waaaaaaay too much make-up and have the same idiot posture and tone in their voices when they say "FOR SURE!!!!" If mommy and tatty do chesed, the resume is that much better and it heightens the chances of typical frum girl #37 of getting married.


Reason number three on why do kiruv at all, is so that one family can be all "holier-than-thou" about their lifestyles. EVERYONE can donate money to a chinese auction but "make" someone frum is exclusive to the people who think they did it.


Well so, I think I'm done with the reasons as to why do kiruv. If you have any to add, please feel free to comment. Otherwise, keep in mind I'm super anti-kiruv and think that alot of the money used towards "outreach" programs would be better spent towards providing already frum kids with decent education.


But what do I know? I'm a BT and Yeshiva education really sux in comparison to the PUBLIC SCHOOLS I've been to-which by the way were "free" and non of the girls I KIT were pregnant as teens or even now.