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- Havdalah #8: Covid, Noise Demo, and Languages
Havdalah #8: Covid, Noise Demo, and Languages
12 Tevet, 5784 / December 23, 2023
White Rose RI
December 23, 2023
Hello, neighbors; welcome to the last Havdalah of 2023.
The holidays are finally over! Hanukkah ended with aplomb and plenty of gelt to go around. With nothing else significant on the horizon, we look to 2024 (and its Implications), which loom over us like an elephant in the kitchen. To keep our minds off That, (don’t look directly at him, maybe he’ll go away), we have a special fun-fact-corner of a Sidebar penned by Katherine, accompanied by our usual line-up of events, educational resources, and mutual aid.
Please be safe over the next two weeks, and we’ll see you in… Oh, right, we’re not talking about That.
Bella ciao.
Free At-Home Covid-19 Tests
There’s warnings of another covid upswing in the offing, so take advantage of the opportunity to order some more free at-home covid tests
Every home in the U.S. is eligible to order an additional 4 free at-home tests beginning November 20. If you did not order tests earlier this fall, you may place two orders for a total of 8 tests.
Your order of COVID tests is completely free — you won’t even pay for shipping.
If you already have covid tests but they’re reaching their expiration date, double check — some of them have had their expiration dates extended:
New Year’s Eve Noise Demo at the Wyatt
When: Sunday, December 31, 4:30pm-6:00pm
Where: The Wyatt Detention Center, 950 High Street, Central Falls, RI 02863
Join AMOR to mark the end of this year by demanding an end to all cages, from Palestine to the U.S. border to Central Falls.
Things to Bring:
Posters/signs
Wear your keffiyeh, red, and green
Noise makers of any kind!
Water
Cough Drops
Some friends!
Rhode Island Coalition to Reduce Poverty 16th Annual Fighting Poverty with Faith Vigil
When: Thursday, January 4, 2:00pm
Where: RI State House, Providence, RI
Faith Leaders, advocates, and community members will come together to announce 2024 legislative priorities to reduce poverty in Rhode Island. The new year is a time of beginnings, including the beginning of the 2024 legislative session. Every year, they gather at the State House to provide inspiration and encouragement to elected officials that together we can improve the lives of all Rhode Islanders and reduce poverty in our state.
Faith Leaders traditionally meet up earlier at 1pm at Gloria Dei Church to participate in the "March to the State House". You can also meet at the state house at 2pm if you aren't able to march.
Faith Leaders read the names of the legislators in the State as a blessing and a call for action. If you want to be a reader of names, you can sign up during registration.
The Rhode Island Interfaith Coalition was formed in 2008 to serve as a faith-based voice on systemic issues that underlie poverty. The Coalition is an advocate for sound legislation and public policies that address the causes of poverty and that promote economic well-being for all Rhode Islanders.
Power Half-Hours for Gaza
When: every day, Monday through Friday, 3:00pm EST
Where: online
Jewish Voice for Peace is holding Power Half-Hours for Gaza every day — join us as we channel our fury and sorrow into collective action to stop genocide.
The same link will work every day.
Continuing Actions for Palestine
The siege of Gaza has continued and intensified. Palestinians are in desperate need of water, fuel, medical supplies, and more; however, this aid has been locked up at the border and prevented from entering into Palestine. Please contact your representatives to call on them to work for a ceasefire and to get aid into Gaza.
This toolkit has a variety of links, including call scripts, groups accepting donations, phone banks, petitions, and more:
Telecom services in Gaza are periodically being disrupted. This makes knowledge of what is happening there very difficult to get and to verify. Various social media websites — including and especially Twitter — while vitally necessary in getting ordinary voices heard, have also been full of dis- and misinformation of people deliberately trying to cause trouble. Especially now, be aware of who is sharing information and why they’re doing it.
Al Jazeera reporting has continued to be the most accurate and reliable so far:
Weekly Mutual Aid Distribution with the John Brown Gun Club
Every week, folks meet at Kennedy Plaza to distribute food, hygiene supplies, harm reduction supplies, and more, usually for about 45 minutes. JBGC has been doing these weekly distributions since 2018 and helps about 30 people each week.
To make a donation, visit their mobile-friendly website that has links for direct donations, Amazon wish list, and the Etsy store where 100% of the proceeds fund mutual aid distribution.
If you have questions about the distribution or ways to donate, you can reach out to them on their Instagram (@jbmutualaid) or Twitter (@rijbgc).
If you’d like to help with distribution, the JBGC asks that you wear an N95 mask and be up to date on boosters and flu shots.
Never Again Para Nadie Film
Never Again Para Nadie is a documentary short produced and directed by Anna Feder, Dan Frank and Justin Reifert.
In the poorest city in Rhode Island, peaceful demonstrators which included people from Never Again Action RI tried to shut down the Wyatt, a for-profit prison, only to be met with violence.
Never Again Para Nadie captures a moment, from our group’s history, when a diverse group of activists attempted to hold a system accountable for holding ICE detainees for no other reason than their country of origin. Following a group of Jewish and Latino protestors, this film asks viewers to engage and mobilize.
Never Again means no one should be denied their human rights.
What is Ladino?
Did you know there are a lot of other Jewish languages besides Yiddish? How about Ladino?
History
Ladino as a language began in Spain prior to the expulsion of the Jewish community in 1492. It’s not known exactly what form it took, but the spoken form was likely interchangeable with standard Spanish of the time with additional specific loanwords from Hebrew to describe concepts lacking in Spanish (sabbath, for example). The written form, however, was done using Hebrew characters rather than the Latin alphabet. After the expulsion, Jewish people left Spain and went to Turkey, Greece, North Africa, the Ottoman Empire (at the express invitation of the Sultan!) as well as a number of other places. This is when the language really began to split from Spanish. It absorbed loanwords from all the languages around it — Turkish, Greek, etc. — and began to diverge in its pronunciation from Spanish, as the language spoken in Spain changed independently of Ladino.
While it was a fairly widespread language in the early 1900’s, especially in Greece, Turkey, North Africa, the Balkans, and Palestine, huge numbers of native speakers were killed in the Holocaust, with entire communities being wiped out. The language itself nearly died out, but a revival of the language is currently happening, especially in the arts, though the language now is usually written in Latin characters rather than Hebrew.
The name itself is actually in dispute, with some of the native speakers considering Ladino to only apply to the vernacular translation of sacred texts with the language itself called something different, like Spanyol or Judezmo; the broadly accepted academic term seems to be Judaeo-Spanish.
Speakers
Estimates vary, but probably around 200,000 worldwide, with very few or none having it as a first language. Generally they’re on the older side, as the language was replaced by Hebrew and the local languages of the speakers.
Where is it Spoken Now?
There are scattered groups of speakers, especially in the Balkans, North Africa, and Israel, and it is recognized as a minority language in Herzegovina, Turkey, Israel, Bosnia, and France.
What’s Written in It?
Until the last century much of what was written in Ladino was of two categories: translations of sacred texts (the Hebrew Bible, the High Holiday prayer book, the Passover Haggadah, etc.), and rabbinic literature, including commentaries on Jewish law and texts. Secular writing started to grow in the first half of the twentieth century, in newspapers and pamphlets, but many of the writers and speakers were killed by 1945. Recently, however, there are efforts to preserve oral storytelling traditions in Ladino, and there has been a variety of secular literature published (folk tales, fables, proverbs, poems, and short stories), as well as song.
Sources
Needledrop: “Durme Durme”, Tanja Solnik
