Having some time on our hands, we decided to go to the local synagogue, which only has weekly Friday night services and bi-monthly Shabbat morning prayers. Since we didn't have the contact info of the president of the community (known in Hebrew as the Rosh Hakahal), we hoped to find him there as well.
We were pleasantly surprised to find a number of Jewish folks working in and visiting the building, which also serves as the JCC. We helped seven men (ages 25-65) put on tefillin. For five of them it was their first time. All are involved with the local Jewish community but had never been given to opportunity to put on tefillin! We gladly took down the contact info of all those whom we met, and hope to visit them at home to help them affix mezuzahs to their doors.
And we finally did have a nice meeting with the Rosh Hakahal, who was very warm, welcoming and helpful.
We finished off the day with going to the home of Boris, one of the men we met at the synagogue today. A Jew in his early 60s, he remembers watching his zeide (grandfather), a religious Jew who wore a full beard, wrap tefillin each morning. Unfortunately, since his zeide passed away when he was very young, he didn't have much more exposure to Judaism. After he proudly affixed his new mezuzah to his doorpost, we said l'chaim together, spoke about the Torah and mitzvahs, explained a bit about the Rebbe and Chabad, gave him two Jewish books as a present, and even had a little tentzel (Yiddish term for traditional Chassidic dance) in his living room.
