Travelling while Jewish and how I learnt to love LA

(In advance I apologise for the awful editing on this blog, writing on your phone can be a little tricky. I also didn't take many photos, so most are the Jewish murals on the streets of West Hollywood)

I hate LA, at least that's what I've always said. 

The idea of a sprawling mass of a city where you need a car to get around has always put me off. The few times I've been before I've done the touristy Hollywood things and didn't enjoy them much beyond the initial novelty.

I wasn't originally planning to visit LA on this trip beyond using it as a transit point, but open ended travel plans led me there on two occasions and I'm happy to say I'm slowly coming around to the idea that LA might not be the worst.

I should clarify that both reasons I ended up there were due to Pesach (for those who don't know, Pesach is a Jewish festival celebrated during the spring each year. It celebrates the liberation of the Jewish people from slavery in Egypt. Pesach involves something called a Seder where Jews, often families, friends and communities gather together to tell the story of Pesach, celebrate freedom and obviously eat.

My first trip to LA was with family. My lovely cousins who live in goleta, just north of Santa Barbara, invited me to attend Seder with them at their friend’s in Manhattan beach. This really meant a lot to me as for me Seder has always been a time to be with family, and I feel privileged that I can go many places in the world and have family to be with.

The Seder was lovely and despite not really knowing anyone there I felt like I fitted right in, the traditions all being familiar and loved the added political commentary about modern day plagues’ and the need to fight for liberation everywhere, albeit except for Palestine… Who apparently don't seem to deserve the same recognition. I recently learnt the term PEP (progressive except for Palestine) and this phrase certainly seemed to apply to the discourse of the Seder I attended.

Then at the end of the week I returned to LA for a few days because I'd been invited to a ‘lesbian immersive performance Seder’, (thanks for hooking me up with the invite Mikey). It seemed like a pretty cool event so I switched up my plans opting to spend a few days in LA. I grumbled about having to get lyfts everywhere for a few days but decided to make the most of it by brunching with old friends, doing some bouldering and yoga, and exploring West Hollywood (gay town).

On Friday night I decided pretty spur of the moment that I wanted to go to synagogue for Shabbat evening services. I googled the nearest reform synagogue to where I was staying which turned out to be in Beverly Hills, I saw that were doing a special end of Passover ‘songs of freedom service’. Despite my Jewish geography I didn't know anyone at the shul but thought I'd be able to turn up nonetheless. So that evening I put on a crumpled shirt from my back pack (who knew the thing i crave most on the road is an iron), and walked *insert LA gasp* to the temple in Beverly Hills.

One of the key teachings of Passover is about welcoming the stranger into your home, for we were strangers in the land of Egypt. With the fairly insular nature of the Jewish community I've always found this phrase slightly lacking in action, but I can say without a doubt that the temple Emmanuel of Beverly hills truly lived out these values. I arrived pre Friday night services and awkwardly sat down, within 5 minutes I was chatting to the guy next to me, Steve, a public school teacher in south LA, he told me all about the community. Hed travelled himself and we talked all about my trip and his previous trips to Europe. He's a lit teacher so the UK was his favourite place and he seemed to know far more than me about the historical homes of various writers across england. I also met the family behind me, one of whom had gone to camp harlam (the summer camp I went to on the East coast) what a small Jewish world.

The service itself was beautiful with a mix of traditional Friday night fare and liberation themed songs to celebrate the end of Passover. I recognised almost all the tunes and there is something indescribably heartwarming about hearing songs from home on the other side of the world.

After the service there was a dinner which everyone I'd met insisted I come to. By this point Steve and his wife Shauna had taken me under their wing and introduced me to, well everyone. I was immediately offered a place to stay by a number of people, future meals and a ride home! While we were eating the senior rabbi came round the tables to get people to  sign a petition for a ballot initiative for November on prison reform, as far as I could see most people were signing. It was so refreshing to see local politics as a normal talking point, and Jewish value.

Steve and  his family gave me a ride home with a detour around his favourite sights in West Hollywood and a brief history of the area. I could not have asked for a better evening.

There is something really beautiful about the efforts people and a community will take to welcome in a stranger, and it's certainly one of my favourite things about Judaism worldwide.

Saturday night brought my other favourite part of Judaism, radical queer Jews!!! I turned up to said queer Seder, and walked straight up to a costume making station where we had to dress our parts in the play + glitter, drag and feathers! 

People started arriving and although there were few like me who didn't really know anyone, most people were friends of the hosts, forming a somewhat patchwork communtiy of wandering Jews, radicals and queers!

Pre the main event we made charoset, built bricks to put them in, made 10 plagues finger puppets and fed grapes/compliments to the princesses of Egypt!

Then came the Seder, we were hosted by Bevin (God) and Dara (eliyahu the prophet)

Who had written a full hilarious play version of the exidous full of old jewish jokes (the character of great aunt ida poviding much of this), queer humour and radical political jokes (yes that is a thing), all under the banner of resilience.

We emulated the rabbis and sat up late into the night discussing Palestinian liberation.

We heard stories of survivors whose struggles for liberation from borders, patriarchy, heteronormativity and the gender binary brought everyone to tears.

We said blessings of thanks for a space where we can live as our true selves and prayed that this will soon be a reality for all, as well as thanking those that have fought in the queer struggle.

Our nirtzah (last part of the Seder whch includes many songs) was replaced with Jewish themed karaoke, we rocked out to drake, Neil young, bette middler, drake, billy joel and by the end some queen had got in there, though no one is quite sure how.

All this while nomming on chicken noodle soup, Cuban brisket and matzah smores!

I really hope to be able to recreate Seders like this in the future as it felt like a truly liberatory experience.

Formal events aside the night was also made great by the people I met,  Bevin, the host is a performer and creator of queer fat femmes! Dara used to work in union organising so many of her friends and former colleagues were there. I really enjoyed hearing about the various unions active in LA and wider California, it seems like a really interesting place to be politically active. I ended up on a table with Leon, who  runs a queer friendly suit company, as well as being a co founder of out-fest a celebration of online queer contributions. I also met Krystal who works in STEM (science technology engineering and maths) co-creating innovative curriculums with students, teachers, educators and universities, you can imagine we totally geeked out together of education. I met Melanie who has moved to LA from NY to co-parent with 3 other people. I also met April who I wrongly assumed was Jewish when she  knew all the Passover traditions, turns out shed just been married to a Jew. She and her friend dana there run a sex toy company, apparently you get to travel a lot through the job and we shared discussions over the best places to eat across the world.

So despite the awful traffic and a tendency to feel somewhat lost, LA has begun to grow on me, as with everywhere it seems to be the people that make a place, and there are certainly enough interesting people to maybe make LA worth a bit more of my time! 

Explorations in the Pacific Northwest: Vancouver, Seattle and Portland once more

The end of March to the beginning of April has been mostly on the road traveling through the region that makes up the Pacific Northwest. 

Vancouver
 
My first stop was in Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada (as opposed to the Vancouver over the river from Portland). 

I'd never been to Canada and everyone i know who's been has raved about how great a city Vancouver is. I'd met many Canadians whilst in Hawaii and several of them had invited me to come stay. So i hopped on a bus that took me across the border and said a shechechiyanu for a country i'd never been to before.

I was staying with Bridget and Shayne who'd id met at a hostel in Mauiu, we'd gone out hiking together, who are students at the University of British Columbia which is an absolutely stunning campus right on the coast.

They wanted to give me the ultimate UBC experience so we started out going to a dance show with all the student dance societies, followed by food and drink in the new snazzy students' union building (yeah i was totally comparing it to SUs in the UK), they had a nap pod and a climbing wall in the SU, We clearly missed a trick not suggesting these to the campus master-plan last year. It's always great to see vibrant campuses but especially ones which are so diverse as the majority of student leadership appeared to be from either Asian, international and First nations backgrounds, with white students actually being in a minority, with UBC being one of the top schools in Canada this was really impressive.

Shayne and Bridget are keen outdoors people and run the Women's outdoors club at UBC which encourages women and girls to get outside and have adventures. I got to take part in their launch event which was a huge scavenger hunt in the nearby national park, it was super fun and I met a lot of bad ass women! 

My last day In Vancouver I got a proper tour around downtown from Rowen who i'd also met in Hawaii, although the plan was to go round and see all the sights when we sat down we uncovered the fact that we both share an interest in postcolonial thought, feminist and critical theory which was amazing, so in the end we mostly ended up drinking beer and chatting about politics and the world. I did get to see great parts of downtown though and explore the beautiful Stanley Park.

Rowen also used to work for a sea plane company so managed to hook me up with a free 30 minute sea plane tour where i sat in the cockpit and chatted to the pilot about how the plane worked, oddly this was actually less scary considering my huge dislike of flying.

Seattle

4 hours each way from Portland and Vancouver lies Seattle, the main city in Washington State. A Port city known for its proximity to military bases, Defense industry, Microsoft and most recently Amazon.(See picture to the left - Amazon has bought up the entire area surrounding this lake, people have no nicknamed it Lake Amazon...)

However industry is only really a small part of Seattle's identity. Set between the stunning mountain ranges of the Olympics to the West and the Cascades to the East, with the ever visible Mount Rainer looming over the city, Seattle is a friendly and laid back northwestern city, the Portland before it was Portland perhaps? or the place you move if you can't deal with over the top Americanisms and don't mind the rain (There are certainly quite a few Brits here who say it feels like home). 

This was not my first time in Seattle as I have family here who I have visited on two previous occasions. My cousin Rachel (on my dad's side), her husband David and their daughter Maia live in the southwestern part of Seattle, I don't get to see them very often to it feels great when I have the opportunity to visit. Rachel and

David are both actors and it's always fab to hear about their projects, including a recent performance of Titus Andronicus that David directed and Rachel performed in! Whilst Maia is just about to start high school, and I really loved getting to know her interests, whether about twins, feminism or her upcoming trip to Peru. We talked lots of politics, especially Bernie Sanders and managed to get out for some lovely walks. I also saw my cousin Michael who is a slightly more distant cousin from the UK, we took a great hike out to little Si which was quite the hike with fantastic views.

I also managed to catch up with my friend Nozomi from the UK who moved to the US and Canada about 5 years ago, she's a drummer but has decided that a career in the sciences might be more useful so is getting a degree in chemistry. She took me out in Capitol Hill area which is the kind of queer alternative area, with rainbow zebra crossings which was fab.

A return to Portland

All the way along this trip I've been trying not to plan too far ahead, leaving space to go with recommendations and stay when i find somewhere I like, this is certainly been the case with Portland. During my first stay in Portland I went to a couchsurfing meetup and got chatting to lots of excellent people there. One of them was Brandi, who despite only having a brief conversation, invited me to come and stay at theirs when i passed through Portland again. Her house are regular couchsurfing hosts and have created a wonderful vibe for the house and guests. I feel like I should probably write a whole blog on how amazing couchsurfing is so I won't go into a huge amount of detail here. 

Portland 2.0 involved meeting more excellent people; Rachel, a woman with ALS who myself and Brandi cooked dinner for one evening, Julie an eccentric old hippy who gave us a tour of the Kennedy School (an old school that's been turned into a bar/movie theatre/ hotel/ hot pools/ restaurant etc), or Alice who I met at a party who works in a feminist non-profit which works to empower women of colour.

I also made it out to Forest Park, Tabor Mountain as well as the cable car with a pretty fab view over the city. I was also taken to buy Oregon weed which is fully legal... so it was a pretty strange experience walking into a store, showing your ID and then asking what kind of high you would like by two dudes who'd walked straight out of Harold and Kumar. Portland you have stolen my heart and I will be, without a doubt, returning as soon as possible.

Trains and Winter Rains

There probably is no more a fitting way to leave the pacific northwest than on a 17 hour train journey through the Oregon mountains, with the sun setting a providing an incredible view of mountains, lakes and forests.   

Woofing at chandelier springs and dinner with a cult

Woofing at chandelier springs and the night I had dinner with a cult 

There are moments in life where you arrive somewhere and internally ask, ‘where the fuck have I ended up?’ Chandelier Springs, a farm in valley centre California (about 2hrs from San Diego) has certainly provided quite a few of those moments. 
When you read the profile of a farm on the woofing website you begin to get some idea of the kind of place it is, and further conversation with the host always helps. But places like chandelier springs are hard to put into words.

I arrived at the farm which is set back from an already remote town, down a dirt track, past abandoned trailers. I knew I'd be meeting someone called spencer and it turned out to be a sandy haired 26 year old recovering addict, devout Christian, music loving, cartoon artist and son of an eccentric farmer. After struggling with the highs and lows of life for a bit his dad has let him take over the running of a diverse organic farm which has ultimately become his recovery and passion. Doug, his dad, who is the host runs a soil business but his organic farm is his real passion which he ultimately hopes to make money from, but for now it's mostly experimenting with crops and creating a sustainable community filled with woofers. Spencer always refers to him as doug rather than dad, which tells you a whole lot about their relationship, and they seem to have pretty different ideas about the direction of the farm, but ultimately they both want to teach woofers and create friendly communities. 

It can be a little frustrating when you plan a work day with Spencer in the morning and mid way through Doug arrives (he doesn't live on the farm) and pulls you away to do something different. But all the work is interesting and nothing is rushed so this really makes very little difference. Doug has been teaching me how to build an earth house (building technique involving tyres packed in with dirt) as well as how to look after chickens. Spencer on the other hand has given me responsibility for 3 different gardens, the bank garden where were growing kale, bak choi and chard, the solarium where we're growing tomatoes and the wave garden where were growing squash/courgettes and onions. This on top of all the regular watering, weeding and planting that happens. It's all fun and none of it too tiring or long so I've had plenty of time to read and play music (they have a ton of instruments and recording spaces on  the farm).

Despite being a fairly reserved person on the surface, as one might expect from a person who essentially lives on their own in a trailer in the middle of nowhere, Spencer is actually quite sociable. Everything is cooked over wood fires that we together ourselves so meals are a long and relaxed affair, Spencer loves cooking for everyone and sitting around chatting into the wee hours about everything and anything, whether it's religion, food or music he always has a story and he certainly thrives off the stories of the woofers that come and go. 

Right now there are two other woofers here, veronica and prince, they're from Stockholm in Sweden and are doing a woofing trip up the west coast. They've not done much before but are super enthusiastic. Prince is a vegan and very into meditation, but also works selling technology so we have very varied conversation. I've enjoyed sitting up late with veronica talking about the nature of God, religion and belief. 

We are also about to be joined by Jordan, a woofer from the farm next door called morning star ranch, aka a cult/judeo Christian sect called the 12 tribes of Israel, which leads me to the next where the fuck am I moment, this Friday night as we were invited to ‘shabbat dinner’ at said farm.

From the moment I arrived at chandelier springs I began hearing about morning star, first it was explained to me that the roadside deli just before you turn off the for the farm (the yellow deli) is actually run by the farm next door, cool, an organic farm running it's own deli, how awesome, do they use the products from their farm at the deli? 
Oh wait the deli profits go to a boss man/corporate entity that runs the farm, less cool! 
Hang on a sec now you're saying this boss man is actually the leader of a judeo Christian cult…? 
So this farm is actually a cult?! A Jewish/Christian cult?????
What do you mean they've invited us to a party on Friday night!

My 4th night at the farm a guy called Colin turns up at the farm. Spencer seems to know him, he's a woofer on a local farm, previously he was at morning star. Were all cooking dinner and chatting, everything's normal until someone asks Colin where he's going next. He's off to a bit of land in the middle of California to build an off grid community, apparently the end of days is coming in the form of a new world order - micro chips in everyone's arms etc - and an off grid house in the US and a love of yashua (Jesus) is the only thing that can save you! Who knew! 
We are then treated to a whirlwind of conspiracy theories including how the Bible predicted this period of war and corruption as the end of days, that said war and corruption is only a thing in the US and for the last 40 years (gotta love young US conspiracy theorists who think the world revolves around them) and lastly the government is closing down Walmart to build mass concentration camps…
Apparently Colin the prophet (as I have now named him) believes it his purpose in life to spread the word of the end of days, these are the kind of people that live at morning star. 

On out afternoon off we head down to the yellow deli for some food and to use their WiFi. I end up chatting to a guy named ravak, who upon hearing my name is yael, gets very excited and tells me his name comes from the word ruach (spirit/wind) and I should come along on Friday for erev shabbat….so thats the party everyone keeps talking about. Ravak also mentions that a woman has recently joined who was also brought up Jewish, she's from new Jersey. He probably thought this would pique my interest in their practice as they're always recruiting. All I thought was, ‘I wonder if we have any mutual friends’.

Queue Friday and we're heading to the ranch for dinner, we've all got kind of smart clothes on and Spencer has warned us not to get too freaked out. Apparently he often takes woofers as it's an interesting experience. We arrive and are immediately welcomed and offered peach matte, ravak immediately finds me to introduce me to haneena (not her original name), said Jewish girl from NJ, she's from cherry hill and had loads of friends that went to the same summer camp as me and we immediately begin to play Jewish geography, all the while I'm thinking, how does a reform Jewish gal from the east coast end up in a Christian cult in California, but more on that later. 

So the room were in has a huge hanging banner saying Shabbat shalom and it looks like a challah cloth we used to have. As everyone settles down the focus is music and dancing, songs of worship are sung whilst everyone dances (those of us from CS just sit and observe). The women are all white flowy shirts with colourful skirts and scarves over their heads (they take these of later so they are clearly ceremonial), whilst the men are in jeans and plaid shirts, all with near long hair in a ponytail and a mid length pointy beard. Everyone has on a matching headband. 

Once the dancing finishes there is essentially a communal text study where people get up and share texts and thoughts that interested them from the week. Only the men spoke, although one man commented that the women are allowed to speak as well…
We were then welcomed formally and the ceremony finished with the counting of the omer!!!! Although they didn't called it the omer, but they did talk about Shavuot and counting the days from Passover. No one seemed able to explain why though. 

Dinner was equally interesting with fresh challah! And much talk of their practice and tradition. I sat with Jordan the woofer who I mentor earlier would be joining us at CS. He turned up to the farm yesterday looking for somewhere new to stay as he had arrived at morning star not realising how much of a crazy cult they were and hated it. On the surface everyone was very friendly and hospitable but knowing what I know from Jordan and Spencer the community is extreme, judgmental and controlling. 

So back to haneena, how does a progressive Jew from the east coast end up in a place like. Honestly I still haven't figured it out. We talked best length after dinner, she went to college, worked in advertising and was fairly unfulfilled, not an unordinary story.  She became interested in environmentalism and got involved in all sorts of Jewish social justice programs, ones that I have friends involved in. She was planning to move to Portland and join an sustainable Jewish community there. She said she came to the area to woof, met people from morninb star and began asking questions and eventually decided she didn't need to go to Portland this was the place for her. I can see the comfort, familiar dances and music (it's all Israeli folk and klezmer), and sense of meaning and spirituality behind ritual (something I'm aware is fairly lackjing in large parts of the reform community in the US) and a tight knit fairly young community in a beautiful location. But mostly I'm still confused… it's super Christian, I've never really met a Jew who was lost and thought the answer was Jesus, I know it happens, but it's strange to meet someone who is essentially a bit like me, or at least people I know on the east coast who think that way. It also makes me sad because I feel like there is something for everyone in Judaism and if not there is plenty of space to create, especially in the US, so the idea that someone who believed in progressive values didn't believe the Jewish community was for them and that a fairly conservative cult could better serve them, makes me wonder where the Jewish community/this personss community went so wrong. 

Anyway I've been invited back to morning star, the food was great but I'm not sure whether I'll go, for all the novelty it's a bit sad to watch. Maybe I need to be more open minded about other people's beliefs but i also think that any community that needs such strict levels of uniformity and control is worrying.