JDC seeks local support for overseas programs

Jewish Federation fundraising campaigns all across the country, including Kansas City, have slumped in the face of the sour economy. As a result, funding for overseas programming has declined.

So Steven Schwager, executive vice president and CEO of the American Jewish Joint Distribution Committee, came to Kansas City last week in an effort to make local Jews understand why it’s important to support JDC’s programming around the world with their wallets.

Since its inception in 1914, JDC has helped millions of Jews in more than 70 countries. JDC acts on behalf of North America’s Jewish communities to rescue Jews in danger, provide relief to those in distress, revitalize overseas Jewish communities and help Israel overcome the social challenges of its most vulnerable citizens. JDC also provides non-sectarian emergency relief and long-term development assistance worldwide.

For the 2009-2010 budget year, the Kansas City Jewish community is sending a total of $1.07 million to the Jewish Federations of North America for overseas programming. Another $379,428 from here pays for elective, overseas programs in Israel and Eastern Europe, primarily Bulgaria and Romania. That brings the Federation’s total Israel and overseas allocations to $1.45 million in this fiscal year.

Percentage-wise, that is a year-over-year drop of 4 percent -- from 34 to 30 percent of the total budget. Todd Stettner, executive vice president and CEO of the local Jewish Federation, said the board decided to cut the overseas allocation in order to “maximize the dollars we can use here in Kansas City.”

JDC’s Schwager said other Jewish communities also keep about 70 percent of the funds raised by their campaigns for local programs. But that wasn’t always the case. When Schwager joined JDC in 1989, most federations split their funds 50-50 between local and overseas programs.

“So even though the system has raised more money today, there’s actually less money going overseas,” Schwager said.

The total amount of money going overseas from North American federations is about $140 million today, Schwager said. About 75 percent of that total goes to the Jewish Agency for Israel, with the remainder going to JDC. That’s a formula that has been in effect since about 1952, when Displaced Persons camps were closing in Europe and Israel was preparing to welcome many new immigrants.

“Now it’s 2010, and we’re dealing with welfare caseloads well over 200,000 people, and we think we need more money so those elderly Jews can live out their lives in dignity,” Schwager said.

Creating awareness
Schwager said without exception, members of every North American Jewish community he has visited have expressed concern for their brethren abroad.

In just a few hours last week, Schwager visited with about 125 local Federation leaders in an effort to create awareness about the agency’s mission. Patricia Werthan Uhlmann, a vice president of the local Federation and chair of the International Development Program Committee of  JDC, believes Schwager’s message was well received.

“I think there was a better understanding … of what is going on and what the situation is all across the world that the Joint is committed to taking care of,” Uhlmann said. “It’s very distressing to know that there are hungry, poor, isolated Jews out there that are not getting services because we are not raising enough money throughout the system to provide for them.”

While Uhlmann has personally witnessed the plight of these Eastern European Jews on many trips, Schwager realized on his visits to American Jewish communities that many federation leaders have no firsthand experience of JDC’s work.

“They have never experienced the walk up four or five flights of stairs to visit an elderly Jewish client. They have never had the opportunity to sit and talk, in person, with a woman who has not felt the sun on her face in years simply because she is unable physically to walk down and back up the stairs to her apartment,” Schwager said.

Stettner said federations want their next-generation leaders to learn about the dilemmas of Jews around the world. Therefore, a “next gen” service trip to Eastern Europe, chaired by Joe Loeffler and Jeremy Applebaum, is being planned for the fall.

Applebaum visited Ukraine in November 2008. He met with Ukrainians of all ages and is excited about the rebirth of Judaism he witnessed. He was surprised to find out when he came home that most of his peers had no idea that there are millions of Jews living outside Israel and North America.

“They are going to Hebrew day schools and going to summer camps and living Jewish lives,” Applebaum said. “Those people need our support. We need to learn from them, and they need to learn from us.”

He thinks next-gen familiarization trips will benefit both JDC and federations around the country.

“At the end of the day, the federations’ support is a large percentage of JDC’s budgetary makeup. If we get young people involved in seeing where their money goes, how it’s used and the wonderful things it does, then they will get interested in donating and being a part of the campaign instead of being turned off,” Applebaum said.

Beneficial relationships
With cooperation between JDC and Federation, Romania and Bulgaria have become Kansas City’s sister communities. Due to the current economic downturn, Schwager said, the Jewish people in both European nations ─ around 5,000 in Bulgaria and 12,000 in Romania ─ are suffering tremendously. He said many basic needs are going unmet.

Not all American federations have sister-community relationships with Eastern Europe like Kansas City. Schwager said the fact that Kansas City has adopted these communities is beneficial for all three communities. The Eastern European communities have a place to go to for advice and guidance, and Kansas City has profited from their ideas, as well.

In fact many of the senior-support programs now in place here were originated in Romania and Bulgaria, including Jewish Family Services’ Help@Home and Jet Express programs.

“We learn from each other. The nice thing that has happened is the young people in Eastern Europe and the former Soviet Union all speak English, so you can have a regular dialog with each other. English has become the language of the world,” Schwager said.

Helping Haiti
The JDC doesn’t concentrate only on Jews. As it has done after many national and world-wide disasters, JDC is helping the people of Haiti recover from the devastation caused by January’s earthquake.

“The Joint has done non-sectarian work for all of its 95 years,” Schwager explained. “We believe it’s a part of our Jewish responsibility to repair the world.”

With a national campaign and the help of local federations, JDC has raised $5.5 million for Haiti relief so far. Of that total, Kansas City has raised a little more than $46,000.

Typically not a first responder, Schwager explained that, after an emergency situation is under control, JDC usually comes in and tries to help rebuild infrastructure. It does such things as create jobs and rebuild schools.

“However in Haiti, because the job was so large, we’ve expended about a third of the money we’ve raised so far on basic needs,” he said.

The first thing JDC did was forge a partnership with the Israel Defense Forces, which brought a military hospital to Haiti. The hospital was designed to help adults, so funds were needed immediately to purchase supplies for children and infants.

“We bought two incubators and supplies for children and gave it to the hospital,” Schwager said.

JDC also partnered with Kansas City’s Heart to Heart International.

“We’ve paid for shipping in medical supplies and we’ve bought them several trucks to do distribution on the ground in Haiti. Equally important, we took the Heart to Heart people in Haiti to meet the doctors from the Israeli army hospital and they’ve created a partnership. So the next time there is a disaster someplace, Heart to Heart and the IDF will be able to work hand-in-hand again,” Schwager said.

Recession stings JVS, refugees it helps

If times are tough for native-born Americans in this Great Recession, think how hard they are for refugees from Africa and Asia who wind up being resettled in Kansas City, Mo.

Immigration has never been easy, and the ongoing recession has made the job of Jewish Vocational Service, the sole refugee-service agency in KCMO, that much harder this past year and a half.

That, in turn, has led to a series of stories in the local press about the difficulties faced by JVS clients, who have fled persecution in such nations as Somalia, Burundi and Myanmar (formerly Burma).

The failures revealed in a Kansas City Star story last year led to a series of internal changes — in both policy and personnel — that JVS Executive Director Joy Foster and board President Callan Cohen believe have improved the situation. They have some favorable outside reviews to back them up, as well.

This week the agency received a three-year accreditation from the Commission for the Accreditation of Rehabilitation Facilities.
And yet the changes didn’t prevent JVS from becoming the focus of another critical Star story this year as well as one in The Pitch Jan. 7.

JVS’s Foster admits that “Weaknesses surface during a time when you’re stretched.”

Back on track
And yet Foster hopes that things are getting back on track, both at JVS and in the larger economy. Last week, for instance, JVS helped nearly 50 people interview for and obtain jobs at the Triumph Foods pork-processing plant in St. Joseph.

There’s also hope that JVS can eliminate the structural budget deficit that leaves many refugee families in dire straits even before they arrive in Kansas City, Foster said. She explained that it almost always costs more to rent and outfit an apartment for a newly arrived refugee family than JVS receives from the federal government, which handles refugee placement nationwide.

Local donations make up some of that gap. (See below for details on how to help.) JVS got a one-time boost from the feds last year, as well as funds from the local United Way’s emergency campaign.

“The good news is,” Foster said, “that the U.S. Department of State informed us on Jan. 22 that money for reception and placement will double for the calendar year.”

Since it took over refugee resettlement in Kansas City, Mo., from the Don Bosco Center in 2003, JVS has received about $900 in federal funding for each person it resettles. JVS spends just over half of that on the refugee’s behalf (renting and outfitting a clean, safe, affordable home), with the remainder paying JVS’s administrative costs.

Meanwhile, the total number of refugees resettled by JVS has risen from 330 in 2004 to nearly 500 last year. Foster said JVS expects to resettle 450 refugees in 2010.

“Maybe we didn’t realize how much work would be involved” with refugee resettlement, said Cohen. “But it’s been very rewarding, and it goes along with the mission of JVS.” The agency was formed in 1949 to help Jewish Holocaust survivors assimilate into America.

Today, after their initial reception, JVS helps refugees to apply for identification, food stamps and other benefits, and to learn English and look for work. Some need medical attention, too, and to help make that happen, the Kansas City, Mo., Health Department has established a clinic at JVS’s downtown office.

But there is more than JVS workers alone can do, so Foster has appealed for volunteer mentors to help acclimate the refugees to the American lifestyle. (See below for details on how to help.)

And yet, for all the difficulties faced by the refugees and the anguish it causes those who try to help them, there are enough success stories to keep Foster and her staff going.

Foster says she knows immigrants who have been here just two years who “are buying houses with cash.”

Then there is former JVS refugee client Oumar Barry, now a steward/heavy duty cleaner at Ameristar Casino, who on Feb. 16 was named Team Member of the Year and awarded a $15,000 bonus. Barry, a Mauritanian refugee, has worked at Ameristar since September 2007.

“He possesses a deep compassion for others, which stems from the difficulties he has had to overcome in his own life.” says Barry’s manager, Jim Mulford. “His strong work ethic is an inspiration to every team member he encounters.”

How to help
JVS continually needs donations of good, used furniture, dishes, small appliances, etc., to outfit the homes of newly arrived refugees. A complete wish list is available at its Web site. Go to www.jvskc.org and click “Programs and Services,” then “Refugee Resettlement Services” and then “Center for New Americans.” Contact Housing Coordinator Deborah Fiene at (816) 471-2808, Ext. 1162, or This e-mail address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it to make an appointment for a JVS truck to pick up a donation.

JVS is also seeking volunteers to meet with newly arrived refugees to help them learn English and to mentor them in adjusting to an American lifestyle. For more information, or volunteer, contact Pete Cabell, volunteer coordinator, at (816) 471-2808, Ext. 1115, or This e-mail address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it .

Jewish Film Festival moves to Campus, single weekend

While the 13th annual Kansas City Jewish Film Film Festival has been reduced from a weeklong affair to a single weekend, Jewish Community Center Cultural Arts Director Tammy Ruder says it still has a lot going for it.

The four films over two days touch on the Holocaust, life in early Israel, conversion to Judaism and assimilation vs. tradition. (See below for details)

Ruder said it was tough for the film festival committee to narrow down all the films it reviewed to just four.

“Each film needed to be different than the other … and to really provide variety in a short amount of time,” Ruder said.

She offered the following comments on each film:

• “Saviors in the Night” is “such a great story, and told so well,” Ruder said. “It’s a feature film based on history. I always like to include a film that deals with the Holocaust and survivors. This is based on the memoirs of Marga Spiegel, and how she was rescued by Christian farmer. The family dynamics are interesting. The daughter is in a Nazi youth group and the son is going off to join the war, and it shows how they worked together.”

• “Circumcise Me” is “just a great, fun laugh; a great comedy,” Ruder said. “The star talks about growing up Catholic and how he converted to Judaism and went from Reform to Conservative to Orthodox, and everybody on the committee was laughing.”

• “Children of the Sun,” Ruder said, “opened up a huge dialogue” at the committee screening. It’s about how children were raised apart from their parents in an early Israeli kibbutzim. It includes historic footage of kibbutz life and interviews with the adults those children grew up to be. Film festival committee member Dr. Uri Alon, a native of Israel and former kibbutznik, will moderate a discussion featuring his son, Guy Alon, and fellow kibbutz veteran David Shik.

• “Max Minsky and Me” on Sunday night “is our teen film,” Ruder said, “about a young lady whose mom wants her to go through with her Bat Mitzvah, while she’s more interested in basketball and meeting a prince. … She finds out along the way what’s important.”

Making changes
In addition to the shortened schedule, the Film Festival moves for the first time from a commercial movie theater to the Lewis and Shirley White Theatre on the Jewish Community Campus.

That will save $4,000 in theater rental costs, Ruder said, and help make up for the annual subsidy the Jewish Federation had to withhold after a down fundraising year.

“We did not get funding this year from the Federation,” Ruder said. “We did not request it (because) we were asked to limit our requests.”

Even with a truncated festival moving to the Campus, “it is not a free program,” Ruder said. “It takes the support of the community to continue something important …and film is a great way to tell our story.”

In addition, the timing of opening night has changed this year. The festival has traditionally opened with an 8:45 p.m. film, followed by a dessert reception.

This year, the reception will follow the 7:30 p.m. film.

As a JCC-sponsored event, the festival has tried to avoid conflicting with the Sabbath. This year, with opening night coming before the advent of Daylight Savings Time, and Shabbat thus ending earlier, the earlier start time is possible.

Charge tickets now
Tickets to the 13th annual Kansas City Jewish Film Festival, presented by the Jewish Community Center in collaboration with The Kansas City Jewish Chronicle, are on sale now at the Center’s main office. A pass to all four films (including the opening-night reception) is $32. Individual show tickets are $8, except for the opening-night film and reception, which is $16 a person.

To charge tickets by phone, call the JCC, (913) 327-8000.

‘Team Koppie’ raises funds for charity in honor of Cohn child

Then-Kansas Citians Todd and Naomi Cohn learned a lot about Chai Lifeline last summer. In June, they were in Chicago on an overnight visit for a wedding when their 14-month-old son suddenly became seriously ill.

Little Koppie Cohn was diagnosed with a virus, which infected his spinal fluid. Within hours, his brain swelled to the point that it ceased to function. He lived for nine days in that state before dying.

Todd Cohn, former director of the KC chapter of the National Council of Synagogue Youth, had accepted a new position in Boca Raton, Fla. (See below for details.) Just a few days after the Chicago wedding, they were to have moved to their new home in Florida, but all of that had to be put on hold.

Chai Lifeline
Chai Lifeline is an organization based in Chicago that helps seriously ill children and their families live their lives as normally as possible under the circumstances. The organization provided clothes for the Cohns (they only had overnight bags), toys for their other children, therapy and anything else they needed while in Chicago.

The premise of Chai Lifeline, a Jewish non-profit organization, is the belief that seriously ill children (and their families) need and deserve to be as happy and normal as possible.

Amy Jacobson, Todd Cohn’s sister, said before last summer, her family had never heard of Chai Lifeline.

“They don’t have a chapter in Kansas City, but if anybody in Kansas City ever needed anything, they’d be on the next plane out,” Jacobson said.

Team Koppie
After receiving help from Chai Lifeline, the extended Cohn family wanted to do something in Koppie’s memory to give back to the group.

Another one of Todd’s sisters, Becca Wexler, learned that Chai Lifeline has a run/walk marathon fundraiser in Miami each January — one of two major, annual fundraisers.

“She approached the family and said ‘Who’s in?’, and we all jumped on board,” said Jacobson. “We had an overall team of 20 participants, just on Team Koppie” There were 200 additional contributors to Team Koppie.

Todd Cohn was unable to race because of an injured knee. But he and Naomi Cohn; his two sisters, Jacobson and Wexler; his parents, Les and Linda Cohn; and other family members and close friends formed “Team Koppie” and set out to raise $15,000. Jacobson said that, in the end, their team raised almost $17,000 (Jacobson’s 5-year-old son, Eitan, collected $1,000 in one week from supporters at his school, Hyman Brand Hebrew Academy). The total amount raised from all participants exceeded $64,000.

All members of Team Koppie completed the Chai Lifeline half-marathon, 13.1 miles. Naomi Cohn’s feet became sore by mile two, and she and her friend and walking partner, Naomi Rosenman, had to slow down. By mile seven, as Naomi Cohn later wrote on her blog, “The pain was so bad … I really didn’t think I’d be finishing.”

Yet she somehow persevered and she, Rosenman and her sister-in-law, Becca Wexler, crossed the finish line together — long after the course had reopened to traffic.

On her blog, Naomi Cohn said she was “touched at how hard everyone worked and what they accomplished, all because of little Koppie. I feel loved and cared about by all of you who came and showed your support.”

Jacobson said she hopes to talk her husband and friends into a marathon redux next year.

Going places
Todd Cohn originally accepted a position as associate regional director for NCSY’s south Florida and Southern U.S. region, with the focus on Boca Raton, which has about 200,000 Jews. After just six months, he has advanced to executive director of Southern U.S. NCSY, which covers eight states with about 1 million Jews. His job will be to set the vision and strategy for the region.

In addition, Cohn recently accepted two more opportunities: to manage the community high school, Hebrew High of Palm Beach County, run by the Palm Beach Federation, and to manage a section of the Jewish Education Commission, part of its informal, team educational program, under the South Palm Federation.

Christian’s mission has been to spread respect for Jews

About 30 years ago, Bob Bond began to feel a spiritual connection with the Jewish community. A voice from heaven, he says, told him to connect with and promote respect for Jewish people and their religion. For the past five years, he’s battled cancer, but he hasn’t given up on spreading his message.

A devout member of the Nazarene Christian church, Bond said that at first, he thought God “wanted me to preach in the name of Jesus, but he wanted me to preach with Yeshua.”

Using the Hebraic term for Jesus is important to Bond, as he believes it conveys his respect for Jewish people. His self-imposed mission has been to educate other Christians about wrongs committed by the church and its followers against the Jews in the name of religion. Bond founded Outreach Media to promote his cause, serving as its fundraiser and executive director until 2005.

Kansas Citians may be familiar with the work of Bond’s friend, Marilyn Griffin, who has organized “Call to Repentance” services at Kehilath Israel Synagogue twice in the past two years for the same basic reason. Griffin and Bond began praying together and found they had similar ideas many years ago.

“Bob is less visible and more on the vision side and the personal-growth side,” said Bob Gast, former executive director of the Jewish Federation. “Marilyn’s journey is the fulfillment of Bob Bond’s life; she’s the continuity to what he believes in.”

Gast has known Bond for about 13 years, since Bond, now 62, visited Gast at the Jewish Federation.

“There was something about him,” Gast said. “He talked about his vision of utilizing the media to promote the special relationship that God has with the Jewish people, and that ... in order to be a good Christian, one has to be respectful and honor the covenant God made with the Jewish people.”

Bond’s work has been a repudiation of “supersessionism” — the belief that Christianity has and should supersede, or replace, Judaism. Although he is not an ordained minister, several years ago, Bond traveled to every county in Kansas with a group of friends to spread his message.

“I want Christian people to have an understanding that they need to confess their superiority they have had toward the Jews (as wrong) ... I need Jews to understand that I’m not demanding that people embrace the name of Jesus,” Bond said. “My position on the Jews and how they relate to the Messiah is based on the fact that the have the Abrahamic covenant, and how the Lord deals with them is his own business.”

He understands that some in the Jewish community might be suspicious of his intentions, and he points to the support he’s received from people such as Gast and Jewish Family Services Director of Development Scott Fishman.

“I think he’s a really good soul, and ... I believe in his commitment to the Jewish people and his deep regret for what has happened in the past to the Jews,” Fishman said.

Gast said he’s been deeply impressed with Bond’s knowledge of Judaism, saying he knows more about our heritage than all but a handful of born Jews.

In light of Bond’s increasingly difficult battle with Stage Four malignant melanoma, Gast has made sure that Bond’s name is read during healing prayers at KI and has acted out a Jewish tradition to “fool the angel of death” by referring to Bond as John Robert Chayim Bond. For the past month, ill health has confined Bond to a hospital bed at his home, where his family is caring for him.

Bond continues to hope for a three-fold miracle from God that would entail banishing cancer from his body, changing attitudes about Jews in the church and distributing large amounts of money to those in need.

If such miracles don’t happen, though, that’s OK with him, too — he’ll be happy with whatever God decides, Bond says.

“The Hebrew word emet which is truth, is fundamental to him,” Gast said, “It’s not truth in the abstract; it’s truth based upon faith. The second (word) is emunah, faith. If you believe it, then it is real. That’s why he’s at peace with himself; he believes in the eternal soul. His faith enables him to continue to have hope.”

‘Ayeka’ stands for spiritual growth

Why would a rabbi leave a secure job at one of the world’s top institutions of Jewish learning — “a position people would kill for,” he noted in a phone interview this week — to start a program that’s neither explicitly religious nor educational?

Rabbi Aryeh Ben David, formerly of the Pardes Institute in Jerusalem, says he wanted to move from education to inspiration. It’s that mission that will bring him from Israel to the Kansas City area next month to pioneer the Ayeka (Hebrew for “Where are you?”) program here. (See below for details)

Ayeka is designed to promote personal, spiritual growth and uses bits of biblical text as a jumping-off point for a series of small-group and one-on-one discussions.

Rabbi Ben David, 55, explained that he’s always been something of a seeker himself. He grew up highly assimilated — a “three times a year” Jew, he said — in New York and began studying Judaism only after college.

“Maybe because I was always on a journey,” he said, “I approached Judaism as something that could help people on their journeys. I always felt Judaism helped me become the best Aryeh I could be. It’s not just about acquiring information or doing things. It’s always about revealing a deeper part of myself; becoming a better father or a better neighbor.”

And so in 2006, rather than continue to “create little encyclopedias,” Rabbi Ben David said, “I did a very scary, personal, crazy thing. … I felt we had to do something else in the Jewish world for people to have personal and spiritual growth. Because of my travels from coast to coast, I saw that most Jewish educational institutions were focusing on conveying information, and where could an adult go to explore their personal and spiritual growth in a non-agenda-setting place? So I created Ayeka. …”

To become a better person
“What we do is use Jewish wisdom as a springboard for a person to check in with themselves and see how they can take the next step in their personal journey. Each person decides when and what; there is no preaching or advice. We go to all denominations. We use the mind to touch people’s hearts and to bring it into their lives.”

Jewish Community Center Executive Director Jacob Schreiber became familiar with Ayeka while he was working in Atlanta and is anxious to bring it here. He has trained as a presenter, and will help train others to carry out the program here.

“In our community, there is a thirst for experiencing how our religious tradition makes our lives better on a daily basis,” Schreiber said. “And if we don’t use our Jewish tradition … why be a part of it?”

Schreiber said the Ayeka program and its aftereffects have helped him “to become a better, more complete human being.” He said his “awareness” and “gratitude” have been heightened.

Rabbi Ben David put it this way:

“We create a safe setting with kindred spirits, and something very magical happens,” he said. “I’ve done this with 20,000 people, and always something magical happens — people make friends; couples tell me they’ve had the best conversations they’ve had in five years or 15 years.”
Rabbi Ben David says the program “always start(s) with text, Jewish wisdom, because we have a lot of wisdom. But the goal is not to say something smart. The goal is to figure out how this wisdom can affect my life and make me a better person. Because I’m not a bad person, but I can always be better. …

“We’re all struggling, and this venue was created to allow us to use Judaism to help us grow. It’s a great feeling not to be stuck. In your 30s and 40s, life can become so busy it’s overwhelming, so this is a reflective thing to help us become unstuck. It’s not painful; it’s really enjoyable.”

Ayeka kickoff events
On March 9-13, in collaboration with CAJE, The Temple, Congregation B’nai Jehudah and Congregation Beth Israel Abraham and Voliner, the Jewish Community Center’s Department of Adult Jewish Learning will host Rabbi Aryeh Ben David, founder and director of Ayeka, as he conducts a series of introductory workshops.

The plan is to offer regularly scheduled workshops for groups of 10-16, starting in the spring, with additional groups to be formed in the fall.

For more information about the program itself, visit ayeka.org.il. To sign up or for more information about the local program, contact Jeff Goldenberg, JCC director, Department of Adult Jewish Learning, (913) 327-647 or This e-mail address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it .

Rabbi Ben David’s schedule is as follows:

• Tuesday, March 9, at Congregation B'nai Jehudah — Meet for cheese, fruit and wine at 6:15 p.m., followed by an experiential study of Jewish values and themes at 6:30 p.m. Open to the community

• Wednesday evening, March 10, location to be announced — Evening-long training for Ayeka facilitators

• Thursday afternoon and evening, March 11 — Teaching sessions with Helzberg Fellows and alumni

• Friday, March 12, at Jewish Community Campus — “Feed Your Mind” lunch session hosted by the Melton Alumni Association, 12:15-1:45 p.m.

• Friday evening, March 12, at Congregation BIAV — Meet for dinner at 7 p.m., followed by an experiential oneg and tish. (Contact BIAV to RSVP, [913] 341-2444)

• Saturday, March 13 — The Shabbat-afternoon event will be at Kehilath Israel Synagogue at 4:45 p.m. Mincha and a Seudah Shlishit will follow at 5:40 p.m.

Israeli-made ‘Aluminum Show’ gets party started

In its 62 years, among other things, the modern Jewish state has established traditions of technological brilliance and high artistic achievement, particularly in the field of modern dance.

Those aspects of Israeli culture come together in the Israeli-created-and-executed “Aluminum Show,” which comes to the Lied Center in Lawrence, Kan., next Friday, Feb. 26.

“The Aluminum Show” is also set to return to this area in May 2011 as part of the Harriman-Jewell fine arts series at the Folly Theater. (See box for details, Page 17)

With its imaginative use of the titular material and a combination of dance, puppetry, original music score and special effects, “The Aluminum Show” has drawn comparisons to the Blue Man Group, “Stomp” and other singular stage shows.

The Jewish Chronicle spoke to choreographer Ilan Azriel from his home in Tel Aviv this week, to ask him about the international success of his seven-year-old creation.

Azriel, 42, was born in Dimona, Israel. He performed with Inbal Dance Theater in Tel Aviv and the Kibbutz Contemporary Dance Company before establishing his own Dollbeat Group in 1997.

He spoke through an interpreter, U.S. producer David Azulay of Maryland-based Teev Events.

Azulay said Blue Man Group is a more apt comparison than “Stomp,” particularly as “The Aluminum Show” has lots of audience participation. Many people say it creates a party atmosphere.

“The show is very unique and very artistic,” Azulay said. “Ilan understands why people at first try to compare it to Blue Man Group and others, but it has a life or a genre of its own. It keeps growing and changing with the years and the audience response. I don’t know what genre we will put it in. Eventually, the genre will be after the Aluminum Show.”

Azriel said the show has a definite Israeli feel to it.

“Probably the most Israeli thing about the show is the strong will to succeed against all odds, which is a very Israeli thing,” he said through Azulay. “And also the dancers are Israeli, the ideas and all the materials in the show are made in Israel.

“It comes from a factory on a kibbutz — an aluminum factory he (Ilan) worked with that made custom pieces for the show.”

‘This is my dream’
Azriel explained that, unlike typical dance shows, the notion of “The Aluminum Show” sprang from the material itself.

“Ilan visited factories and workshops that deal with aluminum,” Azulay said. “He went to a laboratory in Israel, where people actually experimented with the material until he got the result he wanted. And only after that, he went into a studio in Israel started collecting dancers and rehearsing. It was a completely opposite process. Usually, you start with a dance and dancers. Here, he started with the material.”

At one point in the interview, Azriel answered for himself in English, saying that before “The Aluminum Show,” he had created and been performing “a small show with puppets; 10 minutes in Las Vegas.”

“This is my dream,” he said. “I wanted to show something like an hour and a half. So I go back to Israel and I am looking for something — the material. In a small shop in Tel Aviv, I find a package of (aluminum) tubes and open it, and they all went down on the floor.

“I put my hand inside (one) and start(ed) to move, and I say to myself that if I put a light outside, and I take big tubes, I can do something — 10-20 minutes — with that. At the beginning, I thought it would be an element in the show. Instead, it grew into becoming the show.

“It basically started as a formal study: Here is a dancer, a tube, a light, all kinds of different elements like air blowers, and when you put all of them together, the formula worked into a show.”

Thus, ‘The Aluminum Show” is the culmination of Azriel’s artistic career to date, and it is proving popular with audiences of all ages, around the world.

Azriel said through Azulay that “he was always a dancer, but because Ilan is dyslexic, as a child and an adult, he believes it’s connected to his rich imagination. This always was in him, and he was trying to implement it on stage.”


‘Aluminum Show’ set for Lied, Folly
The Lied Center of Kansas will present “The Aluminum Show,” an interactive theater experience featuring metal puppets, dancers, foil balloons and giant metal shapes, at 7:30 p.m. Friday, Feb. 26.

Tickets range from $12 to $28. For more information, or to purchase tickets, visit www.lied.ku.edu and click on “The Aluminum Show” under “highlights.” Or call the ticket office, (785) 864-2787, during regular business hours.

For information on the May 5, 2011, engagement of “The Aluminum Show,” presented by the Harriman-Jewell Series at the Folly Theater, 300 W. 12th St., visit harriman-jewell.org and click on the 2010-11 season box, and then the link to “The Aluminum Show.” Single tickets will range from $15 to $60, and single-ticket sales will begin in August. For now, one may obtain tickets to “The Aluminum Show” only as a complimentary add-on to a six- or-12-show package.

KC doc was part of Haitian emergency response

(Editor’s note: Dr. Allen Parmet, a member of the New Reform Temple, a local occupational-medicine specialist and an Air Force veteran, was among the first group of doctors to respond to the Haitian earthquake. What follows is his explanation of the trip, lightly edited.)

I am a member of the Missouri Disaster Medical Assistance Team (MO-1 DMAT http://mo1dmat.org) We are a state-based volunteer group who train continuously and respond to disasters within the state of Missouri, or on request to neighboring states by joint agreement. The DMATs are overall part of the National Disaster Medical System, under the Department of Health and Human Services. As a medical response team, we can be federalized, that is called up to serve anywhere the nation needs us. As a retired military officer and physician, I felt that my experience could continue to be of use to our country.

MO-1 DMAT was activated on Jan. 22 and our team sent to Port-au-Prince, Haiti. The 36-person team was all-volunteer (out of about 90 total team members) and consisted of 3 physicians, 2 nurse practitioners, 3 pharmacists, one social worker/chaplain, 13 nurses, 5 paramedics and 3 logistics, 3 security and 3 administrative/communications specialists. It’s a big team that has to do a lot of training every month to learn how to use our equipment and work together. We set up tents and establish a field hospital, with about 50 beds, an ICU, diesel generators, oxygen supply, X-rays and lab.

In this case, we were paired up with another NDMS team called an IMSURT (International Medical-Surgical Response Team). There are 3 of them, East, West and South, as opposed to about 40 DMATs) that sets up a specialized surgical hospital. It doesn’t have the independent operations ability that a DMAT has, but together we make a pretty big, multi-specialty hospital. A preliminary IMSURT-E went into Haiti about Jan. 16 and set up operations at the GHESIKO Clinic, the main AIDS clinic in Haiti and founded about 25 years ago, supported by several US institutions. On Jan. 24, MO1-DMAT and IMSURT-W arrived to make it fully operational. IMSURT-W had 12 surgeons and a pediatrician, plus lots of nurses, but little support personnel. We were soon the largest functioning hospital in Haiti. The only others were the University Hospital — really tents operating on the site of the destroyed university and an amalgam of Haitian, French, Swiss and other medical teams — plus the Israeli army hospital, which was augmented by our OH-5 DMAT (Ohio has 5 teams, smaller than Missouri, with one big team). When the Israelis closed down their operations, they sent their unused supplies to us. I guess that about 10 percent of our teams were Jewish, considering how many of us were trying to read the packing lists from the Israelis. These medical operations were separate from the Search and Rescue Teams, which came from dozens of countries and concentrated on finding and rescuing trapped people.

Over the next 10 days we saw well over 1,400 patients, vaccinated nearly 1,000 people, trained the Haitians in the tent city at our front gate in field sanitation (with the help of a platoon of the fabulous 82nd Airborne staying with us). My particular role was to do anything necessary to support the operations. So with one of our doctors running the front-door clinic, another working the night shift, I was in charge of the wards (about 40-50 inpatients), infectious disease, sick call for medical staff and army, public health doc, ran all the laboratory tests and infectious-disease consulting. And anything the ward nurses needed me to do, like fetch medications, empty urinals, start IVs and give them a break. Everyone worked like that, doing anything and everything that needed to be done. I can tell you that officially we worked 12-hour days, but in reality, everyone pretty much put in 18 hours or more. Exhausting but fulfilling.

We were rotated out on Feb. 4 (replaced by IMSURT-S) and went to Dulles, debriefed and flew home the next day. Quite a shock to go from 95 degrees and 95 percent humidity back to 20 degrees and snow in KC. No more MREs. Makes you really appreciate hot food, showers and flush toilets. At least we got to go home. Despite our “austere” arrangements, hot-bunk sleeping in a 40-person tent, sponge showers and using buckets to do laundry, we were living better than 95 percent of our patients. They still need a lot of help restoring services and replacing medical personnel. Haiti lost half of all the nurses and doctors in the quake.