The tables are set. The kitchen has been turned over. The chametz has been sold. We are in the home stretch of a nearly yearlong process. It began with Dan Turk helping to arrange our Passover order from Streit’s in the middle of a pandemic and supply chain crunch. Several weeks after passing through the...
Passover is coming. If you haven’t made your seder reservations yet, the deadline is today, Friday 4/8 so please visit our Passover page ASAP. But also…the Mormons are coming? Yes, it’s true. On Sunday, April 24th at 2:30pm nearly 200 LDS’ers, Zionists the whole lot of them, will visit the JCC to learn more about...
The Presidency. No, not of the United States but the JCC. In our nearly 70-year history, just over a minyan of men have held the title and borne the responsibility of leading our august institution. In the beginning were gentlemen from Harbin and Shanghai of Russian extraction. More recently, the Americans have held court. But...
Before we get to Passover, let’s take a moment to appreciate just how amazing Purim was at the JCC. Instead of charging admission fees, we trusted that the community would step up in terms of donating to World Jewish Relief’s Ukraine Crisis Appeal instead and did you ever. We are currently holding at over 150,000...
The war in Ukraine continues to be on our minds and in our hearts. Many of our ancestors emigrated from Ukraine relatively recently after centuries of shtetl life. We have partnered with my rabbinical school YCT for a learning session on Monday, March 14th at 9:00am JST focused on the Torah of Ukraine. The event...
Once upon a time, the JCC held parties so raucous that people were literally led away in handcuffs. This is not hyperbole. In the 1950s during a ‘Monte Carlo Night’, the good people of the Tokyo Metropolitan Police Department raided our center and arrested two board members on suspicion of illegal gambling. We are all...
The below photo shows the 1955 JCJ Purim Party. Dapper suits and evening gowns…on a Tuesday night. It might only be 67 years ago but it feels like light years away from the modern iteration of the JCJ. Let’s reclaim some of that faded glory on Wednesday night, March 16th at our Purim bash to...
Our Purim extravaganza on March 16th is shaping up to be a night for the ages. Following the Megillah reading, we will dance to the musical stylings of an incredible, world-renowned Japanese Klezmer band. We would love to see you there so please RSVP by replying to this e-mail if you plan on joining. There...
To paraphrase the chorus of a title track from the late 90s (but still touring) Backstreet Boys: ‘The JCC is back. Alright!’ We’ve got some exciting events in the works including a Family Shabbat + Friday Night Dinner on 2/25, an in-person Saturday morning service on 3/5 and of course our big Purim bash on...
Greetings from the lovely APA Hotel Yokohama Bay Tower. I can’t help but note the irony in pointing out that of all the quarantine hotels available, your rabbinic family were brought to one whose owner unapologetically dabbles in anti-Semitic conspiracy theories. But in either case, we are thrilled to be back in Japan and look...