July 7, 2006/Tamuz 11 5766, Volume 58, No. 41
FEATURES
Aloha oy vey
Jewish life on laid-back Big Island requires drive
ANDREW MUCHIN
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Photo by Andrew Muchin |
Today, Barry practices orthopedic surgery in Kailua-Kona, one of the island's two largest towns, and leads Kona Beth Shalom, a 30-year-old unaffiliated congregation. Gloria writes Jewish-themed plays and performs with Barry in Kona's Traveling Jewish Wedding Band, a klezmer group they founded.
Kentucky librarian Woody "Yehuda" Plaut was visiting an employment Web site two years ago when, as he tells it, he accidentally clicked on the Hawaii button. A few months later, he became librarian at Konawaena High School in Kealakekua on the Big Island's southwest coast. He says Jewish life, despite some frustrations, has never been better for himself, his wife and their two teenage children.
Michael Aranowitz went to bed two years ago in his northern California home wondering if he'd ever conquer his chronic asthma. He says he awoke with a vision of a volcano beneath an orchid. The South African-born psychologist deduced he had received a message about the Big Island of Hawaii. He visited and quickly convinced his wife, Vivienne, that they should move the two time zones west.
Today, his breathing is fine. And thanks in part to Vivienne, his Jewish life is fulfilling. Vivienne founded the Northern Hawaii Chavurah in late 2004. The informal group gathers in homes to celebrate Chanukah and Pesach and meets monthly at the Spartan St. James' Episcopal Church in Waimea for Shabbat dinner, schmoozing and a few Hebrew songs.
Some "chavurahniks" also belong to KBS, which meets monthly for Friday evening and Saturday morning services on the outdoor terrace of the luxurious Outrigger Keauhou Beach Resort, south of Kailua-Kona on the island's southwest coast.
Combined, the two groups' approximately 200 members, spread over 100-plus square miles, constitute what may be America's geographically largest small Jewish community.
Big Island Judaism is not your father's Judaism, unless Dad migrated to the land of loud shirts for slightly, oh, intuitive reasons and likes to combine Hebrew and traditional Hawaiian phrases. Thus, "shalom" and "aloha" become "shaloha," the greeting a visiting Jew is likely to hear from Big Island landsmen.
As in any small community, Jewish practice on the Big Island depends on the eagerness to roll up one's sleeves for more than tefillin. Congregants lead services, teach Hebrew, cook for potluck dinners, coordinate holiday celebrations, maintain a Web site, publish their own cookbook, visit the sick and ritually prepare the dead for burial.
"My joke is, 'You come to services, you're elected president,'" remarks Barry Blum. Turning serious, he declares that every member of a small Jewish community counts, sometimes in ways they could never imagine. The traffic deaths of KBS members Jerry and Judy Rothstein last year, for instance, resulted in KBS buying land for a Jewish section in the Homelani Cemetery in Hilo.
Big Island Jewish religious life is unique, however, in that just about any minyan requires someone to drive an hour or more at night on poorly lit two-lane highways. For 11-year-old Becca Barrett of Waimea, the hour drive to the Outrigger for services "feels like a bazillion hours."
Paul Janes of Laupohoehoe on the island's northeast coast recently sought to resign from the KBS board of directors because of the 200-mile round-trip drive to meetings. The board refused and he still attends meetings, but "seldom can my wife and I go" to simchas, he notes sadly.
Janes and his wife, Judi Steinman, left New Jersey two years ago, drawn by the Big Island's beauty. Steinman has joined Vivienne Aranowitz in organizing chavurah events. She also occasionally sings Hebrew songs with Janes for patients at Hilo Medical Center. Janes volunteers there weekly as a Jewish chaplain.
The island's Jewish kahuna has to be Blum, who has been president and worship leader of KBS for more a decade and is certified to officiate at weddings as well as entertain at them with his band. In 2002, he and Gloria helped good friend Karen Breier publish KBS's "Shaloha" cookbook. It features traditional Jewish recipes with an occasional Hawaiian accent, such as Pineapple Kugel.
The children's Hebrew teacher is Neil Soicher, a skinny, enthusiastic homebuilder, organic farmer and Ph.D. engineer. He teaches weekly in Waimea on a student's lanai. (Nobody says "patio" in Hawaii.) When the Kailua area had Jewish kids, KBS sponsored a Hebrew class there.
With a membership of 60 households spread over half the island and a floating Hebrew school, KBS is unlikely to have a permanent synagogue anytime soon. "I'm not actively pursuing it," says Barry Blum. "If somebody wants to be a generous benefactor, we'll name the building after them."
The success of organized Jewish life on the island may depend more on improving outreach to the island's estimated 600 unaffiliated Jews. Steinman claims, and Janes and Barry Blum agree, that "there is a hidden Jewish community on the island. It takes a Chanukah party to get them out."
Plaut, who meets far more Jews now than he ever saw in Kentucky, says KBS always has "a core of 20 to 25 people that will show, but to have it on a regular basis has eluded us."
KBS and the chavurah post their activities online and in a local paper, so why don't more Jews participate? Some just feel negatively toward Judaism, says KBS board member Una Greenaway, an organic coffee and macadamia-nut farmer just up the mountain from the town of Captain Cook on the southwest coast.
"They're not big on the guilt trip they sense from some Kona Beth Shalom members," she says. "Judaism has that problem anyway. Most people don't relate to the inspirational, spiritual, positive side of Judaism. They remember rote learning that wasn't inspiring."
For those who desire another Jewish option, there's always Aranowitz. As the Northern Hawaii Chavurah was cleaning up after a recent dinner, he announced that he would be leading Jewish Green Flash Meditation at a well-known beach.
Green Flash is particularly powerful for stress reduction, he explains.
And what's Jewish about it?
"Me," he replies.
Say "Shaloha," Michael.
Andrew Muchin is a freelance writer in Shorewood, Wis.