it’s time for Chanukah! Hooray!
Awhile ago I decided that for each night of Chanukah I would highlight an organization that does awesome work. Some will be Jewish. Some will be secular. Some might be American, others Canadian. Why, you ask? Because for me, Chanukah isn’t about getting gifts, it is about giving them. Even more, Chanukah is about acknowledging the dedicated work that people do to improve our world.
Translation: you should not buy me a Chanukah gift. Instead you should give that money to one of these awesome organizations.
My meal group on an AJWS rabbinic mission to El Salvador
Do you know about the amazing American Jewish World Service? Well you should. You can go to their website for loads more information. In short though, AJWS does the awesome work around the world to combat global poverty in the name of the Jewish community not through bandaids but by sustaining local grassroots organizations that are doing the right kinds of work. Even Nick Kristof likes them.
Happy Chanukah from me to you.
And super happy birthday to Dr. America!
Rabbi Eleanor Steinman 
Rabbi,
It is nice to have you back and posting again. I see that you prefer Yarmulke instead of Kippah. This is classic “Jewishness”. Same thing called by different names and both are spelled in an odd way. Same for Hannukah, Hanukah, Channukah, Chanukah, Hanukka, Channuka or the several other ways it is typed.
This “on the one hand, on the other hand” syndrome we have fallen into is quite the connundrum. An then we have words like Shalom that mean 3 different things.
As for your message and focus of the post – Yashir Koach!
Chag Samayach and Happy Latkes (or is it Latka?)
Richard, you need to brush up on your Adam Sandler Chanukah song 🙂