Purim

We had a Megillah reading for Purim on Sunday, which was really nice. As in previous years, we did this at the university, using an old Megillah from the University's special collections. About 40 people came, including a dozen preschool and primary age children, who got well into the spirit of things as Rabbbi Rose read the Megillah. My 9-year old daughter was marching around with the others, shouting "two ... four ... six ... eight, who do we really hate - Haman!". Afterwards the adults chatted and ate, while the children continued running around. Special thanks to Sarah, who happened to be in London on Saturday night and did an emergency shop for us then when our Internet food order failed to appear on time.

Nice to find out that my son likes shul

After a quiet January, things are getting more active, with a visit by Rabbi Rose a few weeks ago, and a shabbat dinner a few days ago. We will celebrate Purim on 28 Feb, this is always a big event.

On a personal note, I was surprised and very happy last week, when I went for a walk with my son Moshe (who is 12 but has major learning impairment; he cannot speak and generally functions more like a 2 or 3 year old). I told him to go where-ever he wanted and he led the way to the Aberdeen shul, and was very disappointed that it was closed. Its nice to see that he wants to go to shul! We're starting to think about what sort of ceremony would be appropriate when he turns 13, as he does like shul, but could not manage anything like a norma Bar Mitzvah

AGM, discussions

We had our AGM (annual general meeting) a few weeks ago. As had been the case for the past few years, much of the discussion was about the building, which is not in good shape. We raised 17K a few years ago and used this to fix many problems (I suspect this was the first repair work done for decades on the building), but new problems continue to surface. We need money (on the order of 50K), we also need people to put in substantial amounts of time (for fundraising, organising repairs, arranging things, etc). It was a bit depressing, to be honest, but hopefully things will work out

Shabbat dinners are back

We finally have a working cooker again, so we had a shabbat dinner at the end of October. An excellent turnout (especially of students), and a good omen for the future. Last weekend a visitor asked if we could provide a minyan for a yahrzeit; we managed this for the Friday night service, but didn't quite make it for Saturday morning (9 men instead of 10). It definitely seems easier to get a minyan for a Friday night service (perhaps because it is shorter)? Today Rabbi Rose visited from Edinburgh, and led a shiur to discuss Judges 19-21. Which I found very interesting as I don't know much about the Tanakh outwith the Torah

Death of a caretaker

I am sorry to report that on 21 Sept, our caretaker, Doug Marshall, passed away. Doug was 86 years old, and had been our caretaker for about 30 years (I don't know the exact time, different people tell me different things). During this time he helped our community in numerous ways, far too many to list here. Doug is survived by his wife Gladys, who will continue (at least for the moment) as a shul caretaker.

Doors Open Day, Rosh Hashanah

Summer is over, as always it is a very quiet time for our community. Unfortunately we are having problems with the cooker in our kitchen, which means we can't have a communal dinner, but hopefully this will get resolved soon.

On Sunday, 13 Sept, we opened the shul to the public as part of Doors Open Day; this is the second time we've done this. We had 150 visitors (who gave us over 100 pounds in donations), which was really nice, and shows that there are plenty of people in Aberdeen who are interested in the Jewish community. Many thanks to Debbie and Mark for organising this!

Rosh Hashanah services started on Friday night (18 Sep). Rabbi Eli Kohn once again agreed to come up from London to lead our High Holiday services, which was much appreciated! We had 30 people on Friday night and over 40 on Saturday morning, which is a very good turnout for the Aberdeen Hebrew Community. One of our members, Sarah, organised children's events on Saturday morning during the service, and we had around 15 children there, which was wonderful; its nice to see so many children in the shul!

Summer is here, looking for tenants

Summer is here, which is a very quiet time for the Aberdeen Hebrew Congregation, as many of our student members go home for the summer, and families of course go on holiday during the school holiday period. So little happens in the community in June, July, and August.

Having said that, though, we are looking for a new tenant for the shul flat (ideally someone who has a connection to the Jewish community). We also are going to need to do work on the electricity in our building, and would welcome advice and/or donations about this. For more information (about either), just email info@aberdeenhebrew.org.uk