After 13 years of my parents being separated, as of today my parents have obtained their Jewish divorce and in another week and a half will be legally divorced! It’s about time! I know most people should not be so excited but I am! It’s been a long time coming.

Yes, when you get married under Jewish law, you get a divorce under Jewish law. A Jewish divorce is called a get. A husband must present one to the wife and must be provided in free will and provides all legal rights a husband owns back to the wife. In Mommy’s case since Aba is in jail and going to be deported (a story for another day) in the next week or so, she had to go about it to get it presented to him – however, for divorce that was 13 years in the making, it was the fastest divorce ever (she called the Rabbi Monday and got it today!) – if only legal divorces were that fast! I actually really like the fact that its all about free will – there’s a whole procedure in which the Rabbi presents it to you and then you have to walk across the room with it under your arm to prove you are not being coerced!

As I sat there today in Pikesville (aka Jewville – Pikesville is a town in Baltimore that has a high percentage of Jewish people, especially orthodox Jews) at some orthodox synagogue (irked by the fact that the synagogue’s name was written in Ashkenazic Hebrew), I thought to myself that it feels quite natural for me to be sitting in a synagogue like this. My next thought was: this would be the weirdest thing in the world if I weren’t Jewish to be sitting here observing the people and the environment. I know when I walk into an orthodox synagogue that I will not touch a man or try to shake his hand because I know he will not touch me as he is frum (Yiddish for devout – used in reference to the ultra orthodox sect) and thus most likely shomer negiah. For someone, especially a woman, who is a stranger to the the religion, it would be strange I think not to want to automatically want to shake that person’s hand and would most likely be offended if the man in question would not shake their hand in return. I then stared at the beards and thought of all the men I’ve seen walking around in Kemp Mill and didn’t think much of it but wondered how do non-Jews (goys) perceive them? I looked at the prayer books and the writing on the wall – all in Hebrew and thought, here I am and I can read this but this must look like scribble scrabble to someone who has never seen Hebrew before! For me this is all second nature but wow, this has got to be alien for anyone else just walking in off the street!

So my little irk in relation to Hebrew: It irks me when I speak Hebrew to someone and people feel the need to speak English back to me because of my accent and do not think I can speak the language! I speak fluently. I can read. I can write. I cannot help however that no matter how well I can speak Hebrew, I will always have an American accent. Why? Because I am obviously an American. I cannot for the life of me speak with an Israeli accent (despite having two Israeli parents and growing up surrounded by Israelis) because guess what? I’m not Israeli! I’ve had people make fun of my accent to my face, tell me that why should I bother speaking Hebrew to them when I obviously cannot speak the language (because G-d forbid I make a mistake), or like today switch to English (when I know they’re a native Hebrew speaker). This is why as much as I can speak the language, I’m not that comfortable speaking to people beyond my family in Hebrew. Strange, eh?

For those who are not Jewish (I only have 2 LJ friends that I know of that are Jewish), I’m curious – have you ever met a Jewish person (I know people who before they met me have never met a Jewish person)? How was that experience? What has your encounters with Judaism been like? What are your perceptions of the orthodox or have you only seen an orthodox person on TV (or movie) reciting (or wailing) stereotypically “Boruch Otah Adonai”* ?

*A good example of Ashkenazic Hebrew which annoys me as I would say it Baruch Atah Adonai (Blessed are You) .