DALIA SABLE

Lion FM will soon be broadcast into Melbourne.

MELBOURNE’S Jewish community is set to have its very own radio station after a temporary licence was granted to Melbourne Jewish Radio.

But it has been no easy feat for the station, named Lion FM, with the founding committee having engaged in a long and arduous application process with the Australian Communication Media Authority (ACMA).

“The application process was extremely difficult and many times people probably counted us out. I have a belief that nothing worthwhile in life comes easily and sometimes you need to dig in and fight for something,” Melbourne Jewish Radio secretary Stephen Fennell told The AJN.

“Some 18 months after we began this process, here we are about to begin our maiden broadcast. This is such a great achievement for the community.”

Expected to be broadcasting full time within the next six weeks, Lion FM will cater to different listening groups. It will include a mix of news and current affairs, light entertainment, music and special interest programs.
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Purim mask. Photo: AJN file

DALIA SABLE

WITH Purim approaching, community leaders have once again issued a warning to parents and children about the dangers of alcohol abuse.

The sobering reminder is particularly pertinent with the eve of the festival this year falling on a Saturday.

“With the approach of Purim, we are very concerned to ensure that everyone in our community – be it parents, schools, rabbis or community leaders do their utmost to ensure the youth appreciate the dangers of under-age drinking,” said John Searle, president of the Jewish Community Council of Victoria.

“The responsibility, I think, is shared by all those groups to not only give the right message, but to also set the right example by their actions.”

President of the Rabbinical Council of Victoria (RCV) Rabbi Yaakov Glasman issued a firm statement to member rabbis, urging affiliates to address the matter in their weekly sermons. The RCV statement referred to the notion of celebrating Purim by excessive drinking as “unfounded”.
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New Sephardi shul Rabbi Ben Hassan inside the Sassoon Yehuda Sephardi Synagogue. Photo: Peter Haskin

DALIA SABLE

PURIM on Saturday night will be a double celebration at the Sassoon Yehuda Sephardi Synagogue. As well as commemorating the historic victory over Haman, it will be the first festival presided over at the shul by Rabbi Ben Hassan, who took on the role last December.

Describing the community as “very warm and friendly”, he said: “Everybody is made to feel welcome, regardless of how long you have been coming for. Everyone asks you how your day was and you are always greeted with a smile.”

Born in Manchester to an Ashkenazi mother from Germany and a Sephardi father from Gibraltar, Rabbi Hassan practised Sephardi traditions within an Ashkenazi framework. It wasn’t until he travelled to Israel and was exposed to a larger Sephardi community that he wholly embraced his eastern heritage, subsequently attending a small Sephardi shul upon returning to his hometown.

“I think you could say that Sephardi traditions are a bit more lively. Everyone takes part in the service and it’s nice to get everyone involved. The customs are rich and versatile and this versatility is wonderful,” he said.
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Mary Rothstein, pictured on her 106th birthday holding her wedding photograph from 1935. Photo: Peter Haskin/AJN file

DALIA SABLE

MARY Rothstein, who is believed to be Australia’s oldest Jew and possibly the world’s oldest Jew, will celebrate her 109th birthday on Saturday.

Born in Russia on February 27, 1901, Mrs Rothstein could possibly hold the international title of oldest Jew, following the death earlier this month of Switzerland’s Rosa Rein, a few weeks shy of her 113th birthday.

A high-care resident at Jewish Care, Mrs Rothstein is active and coherent, enjoying regular bingo and word games and participating in many of the activities on offer at Gary Smorgon House, where she recently moved from the Smorgon Nursing Home.

Twice a grandmother and six times a great-grandmother, Mrs Rothstein knows all her family by name and remembers the months of their birthdays.

Daughter Ruth Cavallaro credits her mother’s longevity to her active life, telling The AJN that her mother “was always on the go [and] loved to keep herself busy”.
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Deborah Leiser-Moore in Cordelia Mine Kind.

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IT is set to be a big week for performer Deborah Leiser-Moore. Teaming up with Melbourne theatre venue fortyfivedownstairs, Leiser-Moore’s production company Tashmadada will co-host the second annual five-day Searchlight Festival for which she will perform a play that she also developed, co-wrote and for which she produced video elements.

“It’s exciting because there is a really amazing mix of artists coming together for the festival,” Leiser-Moore says in a brief moment of calm. “It is because of the success of last year that we decided to do it again.”

Leiser-Moore will stage her work, Cordelia Mine Kind on Sunday, February 21. Comprising live performance and video, the play draws on Shakespeare’s King Lear, as well as a lesser-known Yiddish version.

It shows the relationship between father and daughter, in this instance an ageing Holocaust survivor and a modern-day version of Shakespeare’s Cordelia, represented by Leiser-Moore herself.
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Kosher food. Photo: AJN file

DALIA SABLE

KOSHER consumers will be able to tuck into a whole feast of information when Kosher Australia releases its Food Guide 2010.

Featuring hundreds of new products, the booklet includes an extensive list of locally produced, kosher-certified and mehadrin -– the most stringent level of kosher supervision -– items.

For the first time, and in an attempt to make keeping kosher easier, the Melbourne-based kashrut authority has also created sections on setting up a kosher kitchen, separating challah when baking the loaves and how to make crockery kosher, including tips on tovelling (kashering) dishes in a specific mikvah.

The guide also includes advice on how to adequately check fruit, vegetables and eggs for blemishes or deficiencies that may render them treif.

A list of blessings appropriate for each food type and an updated travellers’ guide for the rest of Australia and for South-East Asia also features in the new booklet.
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Students in the classroom. Photo: AJN file

DALIA SABLE

AUSTRALIA’S Jewish schools have achieved above average results in the federal Government’s new ranking system for schools.

The My School website compares schools’ performances in reading and writing, and in numeracy tests, using the results from the National Assessment Program – Literacy and Numeracy (NAPLAN). All Australian students in years 3, 5, 7 and 9 sit the NAPLAN tests.

Most of Australia’s 17 Jewish schools scored above the average 500 score for reading, however, at some year levels, certain schools ranked lower than comparative independent and state schools.

Nechama Bendet, co-chair of the Australian Council of Jewish Schools (ACJS), praised the website for improving the transparency of schools’ results. She did warn against putting too much focus on the rankings though.

“The ACJS supports parents’ rights to have access to as much quality information as possible about their child’s school. While there are many variables that are not contained in the scores, properly used, they can show areas of need,” she said.
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Australian soldier Jason Hymans. Photo: AJN file

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AUSTRALIAN soldier Jason Hymans will leave for Afghanistan in January where he will serve on the front-line.

Having enlisted in the Australian Army two-and-a-half years ago, the mission will be his first overseas deployment and will see him posted to the Oruzgan Province in southern Afghanistan.

“I’m excited and nervous,” the 21-year-old told The AJN. “I’ve come to grips with what could happen and the best way to deal with it is just to get on with it.”

The former Brighton Secondary School student will embark on the trip at the end of January after a send-off at South Caulfield Hebrew Congregation in Melbourne, where he and his family are members.

“I’m really honoured about it. They are having a kiddush in my name, which will be very special,” he said.
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Henry Lew. Photo: AJN file

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DOCUMENTARY The Sleeping Book, about the translation of a book first published by a Holocaust survivor in 1948, will be re-screened on ABC-TV’s Compass this week.

It tells of Melbourne ophthalmologist Henry Lew’s mission to revive a story written by Rafael Rajzner that meticulously described Bialystok, its 60,000 Jewish residents and their destruction by the Nazis.

The Sleeping Book follows Lew’s quest to have Rajzner’s work translated from its original Yiddish into English -– with the title The Stories our Parents Found too Painful to Tell -– in no conventional manner.

Lew appealed to the international Yiddish speaking community, sending 10 pages to people in countries all over the world.
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Yad Vashem. Photo: AJN file

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SCHOOL and university teachers from across Australia are setting off for Israel to take part in an intensive course designed to broaden their knowledge of the Shoah.

The members of the 20-strong delegation are participants in the inaugural Gandel Holocaust Studies Program for Australian Educators.

Conducted by the Yad Vashem International School for Holocaust Studies in Jerusalem, the initiative is a long-term course to educate and mentor the group, beginning with an intensive training seminar in Israel, followed by a year-long program back home.

“This is an extremely important initiative and we are delighted to be involved,” John Gandel said upon announcing the successful scholarship recipients.

“The participants will come home to intensify and broaden their study of the Holocaust in their work and to raise awareness of the Holocaust within their communities. We believe their visit to Israel and attendance at the Yad Vashem course will be a highlight of their professional careers and their life in general.”
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