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On December 7, 2021 more than 40 Hillel stakeholders, staff, and students came together in New York City to celebrate Jewish life in Latin America and recognize this year’s esteemed honoree, Georg Lipsztein.
I came to college not expecting to be that Jewish. But, I realized your identity and your culture will follow you, and in my case, Judaism followed me. And no matter how I practice at any given time, I'm going to be Jewish and involved in Judaism.
I was raised by my mom who is a strong Jewish woman, and her influence helped me become who I am today. She is the reason why I’m so connected to my Judaism. She made me feel empowered as a woman and fall even more in love with Judaism.
I was born in Mexico City into a Jewish family that included my parents and grandparents. For my entire life, I’ve had a Jewish support system in Mexico, not only with my family, but with the Jewish community there.
But the beauty of Hillel is that everyone is welcome, no matter how “Jewish” they feel. Through my experiences, I realized that Judaism was a lot more relatable than what I learned in Hebrew school. In general, I started to feel more proud and more excited to be Jewish.
There are definitely moments within the LGBTQ community where I don’t feel accepted as Jewish, and within the Jewish community where I don’t feel accepted as queer. But what I think is really special about Hillel’s Nice Jewish Queers (NJQ), is that at the same time I’m really able to be accepted as both.
Being a Jew of Color always puts me in an interesting place. In my experience, when people think about Jews, they think about white Europeans, but there are a bunch of Ashkenazi Jews like me who aren’t always counted or represented. There may not be many of me in the world, but that doesn’t mean I don’t exist.
The place that I've gotten to do a lot of my own personal passion projects in college has been Hillel. It's made me more of an active Jew, to see Judaism more as doing things for other people, with other people, than just an individual practice.
I’ve really connected to Judaism through music. I play the guitar, drums, and trumpet and so music is something I really love. My first time at Hillel, everyone was singing Salaam. I thought it was a very nice song, but I didn’t know how to sing it or play it. Nowadays, I probably know more music and songs than my other Jewish friends.
“My first Hillel dinner at school was when I was a prospective student. My host’s name was Dana, and she, along with the people I met that weekend, are the reason I’m here. From the moment I stepped into the admissions building to check-in, I felt welcomed and loved, and it continued throughout the rest […]
