(Column 12, January 24, 2011)
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Compiled by Donald H. Harrison
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Jewish organizations
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Robert Zweiman, past national commander of the Jewish War Veterans, had an article in the January 20 issue of The Forward explaining his organization’s lawsuit against the Christian cross atop Mount Soledad. http://www.forward.com/articles/134845/
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The Anti-Defamation League’s multi-media Holocaust curriculum “Echoes and Reflections”, will be presented Monday, Jan. 31, at the Joan Kroc Center on the USD campus, with a keynote address will be delivered by Rachel Korazim, Ph.D., former Academic Director, Distance Learning Programs, for the Jewish Agency for Israel. The conference also features a luncheon and panel presentation with Holocaust Survivors as well as speakers from the United States Holocaust Memorial Museum and USC’s Shoah Foundation Institute.
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Jewish Family Service announces it is forming a group for the second generation of Holocaust Survivors. A circular reads: “Come share your experiences as a second generation child of a Holocaust Survivor. This group will meet on Tuesday nights from February 15 to March 22, 2011 from 6:30-8:00pm. Sessions will be held in Room 135 at the JFS Turk Family Center, located at 8804 Balboa Ave., San Diego 92123. Facilitated by Teri Wilner MSW, LCSW and Marti Kutnik, MSW, MFT, LCSW. Teri and Marti are licensed clinical social workers with years of experience working with Holocaust Survivors and their families. $15.00 per session. Call (858) 637-3221 to register.”
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Remember the days of “take your child to work.” Soille San Diego Hebrew Day School decided to reverse that last Wednesday, with students taking their parents to school. According to Kolenu, the school’s newsletter, the halls reverberated with the sound of proud students explaining to their parents what they do in their classes.
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The 12th Annual San Diego Jewish Music Series, March 23 – April 3, 2011, will have “such a range of events this year,” says Music Series Committee Chair Sylvia Bendelstein. “The series offers events to please every musical taste.” On Wednesday, March 23 at 7:00 p.m., in conjunction with the Italian Cultural Center of San Diego, Raffaele Trevisani, an internationally renowned flute soloist on tour from Italy, and Julian Schwarz, a cello prodigy from the Coburn School of Music, perform the works of Bloch, Briccialdi, Morlacchi, Schocker and others. The concert takes place at the David and Dorothea Garfield Theatre at the Lawrence Family Jewish Community Center, JACOBS FAMILY CAMPUS at 4126 Executive Drive, La Jolla. Ticket prices range from $22.00 – $26.50. For information or tickets to any of the festival events call the JCC Box Office at 858-362-1348, or visit the web site at www.sdcjc.org …. On Sunday, March 27 at 2:00 p.m. – Aaron Kula’s Klezmer Company Orchestra will give a 21 and up performance will be at The Belly Up. 143 South Cedros, Solana Beach. Ticket prices range from $20.00 – $36.00…. On Sunday, April 3 at 1pm and 4pm, Sing Out! San Diego Jewish Choirs, will offer two distinctly different programs – both including local adult and youth choirs,. They will celebrate the vast musical collection of Cantor Henri Goldberg. Scheduled to appear: San Diego Jewish Academy Children’s Choir, San Diego Jewish Men’s Choir, Sisterhood Shirah!, Temple Adat Shalom Choirs, Temple Beth Am Choirs, Temple Beth Israel Choirs, Temple Emanu-El Youth Choir. The concert takes place at the David and Dorothea Garfield Theatre at the Lawrence Family Jewish Community Center.
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Upper school students at San Diego Jewish Academy (SDJA) have a lot to celebrate — they’ve performed remarkably this year on national standardized exams. “Our students’ standardized test scores have been excellent in the past, but this year’s impressive scores are the best ever for both middle school and high school students,” said Dr. Jeffrey Davis, the principal at SDJA’s Maimonides Upper School. “The ERB test results provide us with our grade level median percentile scores,” stated Davis. “We use these grade level scores to measure our students’ performance. In this year’s test, our students far outperformed the national norm group,” explained Davis. Principal Davis added that the SAT and ACT test results for SDJA’s high school seniors were also remarkable. “Although SDJA students have consistently performed exceptionally well on both of these exams, what’s most impressive is the upward trend and improvement of students’ scores for the past six years,” he stated. “For example, the mean composite SAT score of our graduating seniors for 2011 is 1,800 and the graduating class’ mean ACT score in English and Math for 2011 is 27.3—both the highest scores ever.”
Oren Meyers, visiting Israeli professor at San Diego State University, will present a series of lectures in the North County, according to Lawrence Baron, acting chair of SDSU’s Jewish Studies Program. He’ll lecture twice on “The Shaping of Israeli Memory of the Holocaust” — at 6 p.m. April 6, at the Encinitas Community Library (540 Cornish Drive) and at 4:15 p.m., in the Grand Salon of the Campus Field House of the Student Union at Cal State San Marcos. On Sunday, April 17, at 1 p.m. his lecture topic at the Vista Branch County Library *700 Eucalyptus Ave) will be Israeli Media: Past and Present, and on May 4, he will discuss the journalistic work of his late father, Nechemia Meyers, at 6 p.m. in the San Marcos Branch County Library (2 Civic Center Drive).
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Author and commentator Michael Medved will discuss “Israel and the American Presidents” at 7:30 p.m., Monday, Feb. 21, at Beth Jacob Congregation, 4855 College Ave. in San Diego. Tickets are $25.
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The Programming Committee of Congregation Dor Hadash, San Diego’s only Reconstructionist Synagogue, is accepting submissions for their second festival of Jewish plays to be performed in San Diego, California in July 2011. A Question of Water by Steven Schutzman, the 2010 selected play, was very well received and generatedstimulating discussions following the performances. All plays, either one-act or full-length, must be completed works written in English that have not yet been produced. The plays must address Jewish themes or have major Jewish characters who contribute to the primary story line of the play. There are several goals for the festival: 1) to provide playwrights another outlet to present their works before an audience without the expense of full production, 2) to replace a popular, but no longer active, Jewish play festival in San Diego, and 3) to bringawareness to Congregation Dor Hadash and Reconstructionist Judaism through linksfrom theatre and playwriting sites across the country.Accomplished theatre director and producer, J Marcus Newman, will direct staged readings of the selected play(s) on Saturday evening, July 16, and Sunday afternoon, July 17, Specific performance details to come.
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Jews in the general community
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Landmark’s La Jolla Village Theatre has an exclusive showing beginning Jan. 28 of “Barney’s Version,” a film based on the last novel of Mordechai Richler. Landmark describes the film as the “witty story of Barney Panofsky (Paul Giamatti), a seemingly ordinary man who lives an extraordinary life. A candid confessional, told from Barney’s point of view, the film spans four decades and two continents, taking us through the different ‘acts’ of his unusual history. There is his first wife, Clara (Rachelle Lefevre), a flame-haired, flagrantly unfaithful free sprit with whom Barney briefly lives la vie de Boheme in Rome. The “Second Mrs. P.,” (Minnie Driver),… shops and talks incessantly, barely noticing that Barney is not listening. And it is at their lavish wedding that Barney meets, and starts pursuing, Miriam (Rosamund Pike), his third wife, the mother of his two children, and his true love. With his father Izzy (Dustin Hoffman) as his sidekick, Barney takes us through the many highs, and a few too many lows, of his long and colorful life. Not only does Barney turn out to be a true romantic, he is also capable of all kinds of sneaky acts of gallantry, generosity, and goodness when we—and he—least expect it.”
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Norine Dresser and Freda Wasserman have teamed up to write “Saying Goodbye to Someone You Love,” subtitled “Your Emotional Journey Through End of Life and Grief.” The book, highly recommended by local klezmer musician Yale Strom, is based on Dresser’s experiences caring for her terminally ill husband.
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In Memoriam
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Sarah Nowicki, wife of Norbert Nowicki, mother of Renee Nowicki and Richard and Michele Nowicki, and grandmother of Daniela & Marisa Nowicki, burial at El Camino Cemetery.
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Harrison is editor of San Diego Jewish World