"Jewish Revival" in Poland

[Jules Levin]

At 05:28 PM 7/12/2007, you wrote:
>Dear SEELANGers,
>The Jewish Revival in Poland has been going on for some time. I was
>fortunate to stay at Hotel Ester, next to a beautiful Synagogue in
>Krakow three summers ago (in the heart of the newly, and fabulously,
>renovated Jewish district), and I had ample opportunities to sample
>Jewish cuisine, Jewish music, and Jewish culture.

I also stayed at a hotel in Kazimierz, and was touched by the 
eagerness of the young
university student staff to provide shabbat assistance to observant 
guests.  There was a
lot of good will there, but in the end Kazimierz can be summed up in 
3 words--Jewish Theme
Park.  It is like the American Indian pavilion at a World's Fair, 
with periodic demonstrations
of the most stereotypical cultural artifacts.  The "Jewish" cuisine, 
decidedly not kosher, is on menus
that include pork products, the Jewish music is performed by groups 
imitating old records, and the
Jewish culture includes souvenir shops with carved figures of dancing 
Hasidic rabbis, etc.  In short,
Jewish kitsch.   One memory stands out--during Yom Kippur services at 
the Rema shul I went out into
the courtyard for some fresh air, and I noticed two women opening the 
gate.  Since the gate has a notice
(in Polish and English) that tourists were not admitted when services 
were going on, I directed her attention to
the sign and explained what it meant, she argued [not rudely] that 
she just wanted to look around for a short
time, etc.  I told her that in any case she could only go into the 
women's section in the back, which was very crowded,
and really, she should come back another time (she had a German 
accent, which didn't help my emotional response).
Finally she left, reluctantly.  For me this illustrated the tension 
between the very modest effort to carry on with real Jewish
life, and the maintenance of the tourist-attracting theme 
park.  Finally, I must say that my wife and I had only positive contacts with
the local Polish inhabitants of Krakow.
Jules Levin

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