I have just returned from 9 days in the States with my little family attending my cousin Bonnie's lovely wedding weekend and seeing my Idaho in-laws.
The Jewish New Year starts this evening (all Jewish holidays start at sunset, unless they are minor fast days...but that is another story). I will probably spend tonight at home with a festive meal and my family -- this sounds more like a holiday than traveling to Tilburg either by myself or with a crabby toddler. Tomorrow I will go to Tilburg -- possibly by myself.
Somehow, holidays are a reminder of both the old family traditions (a sweet new year with Baskin Robbins at my grandparents' home in Chicago), and the fact that I am defining my Judaism as I go along.
To that end, I am planning a journey to the Amsterdam Jewish Museum for next week (I hope). This is a complex of Jewish sites that are no longer (with the exception of the Portuguese Synagogue) actively used. The Netherlands was very receptive to Jewish refugees from Germany and Austria at the beginning of the War, but by the end more than 80% of all Jews were dead. That means that there are an awful lot of Jewish sites that are now repurposed. That said, the Dutch have done a marvelous job of coming to terms with their past. There are monuments everywhere. They were at best embarrassed and mostly morally outraged that their tolerant society was overwhelmed by the Germans.
Some of my friends know that I am not really an Eastern European (Ashkenazi) Jew -- I am about 1/4 that. The rest is either German or Spanish. I am at least Sephardic tracing through my Mother's line (Eric has been doing Genealogy) and possibly elsewhere as well. That line left the North West coast of the Netherlands some time in the 18th century. So, I guess some of my wish for traveling to the Jewish Museum is to find my roots.
Also, it is time for me to start looking for holiday gift ideas, as it takes a while for things to get back to the States.
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