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Rating: 
Summary: Thank you from one who's been there
Review: I am one of the "dark" Jews. I remember going through the disbelief of my "jewishness" at work. I have 3 Jewish co-workers, and they all were told for 12 years "I'm Jewish" whenever they'd be talking about Jewish things. I always got "YOU ARE??? oh, that's right, I forgot" How can people "forget " for 12 years, I ask you?
I was also trying to explain to the doctor at the lab one day, when I had to have dye for the CT scan that I was Jewish, and I had understood that the dye is made form shell fish, was this correct? So, he looks at me and says "what kind of Jew are you?" So, no, this is not something that happened ages ago, the doctor "incident" happened 3 months ago; and no, I am not whining just because I am *stating* things that have happened to me.
Thank you so much Loolwa, for presenting the thoughts feelings and words which I had not been able to bring from my heart.
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Summary: Speaking Truth
Review: I bought this book for my synagogue library and sat down and read it myself in the space of two days. The essays are enlightening and disturbing; they tear the heart and encourage the Jewish family to acknowledge all of its members. Blessings on the editor and these essayists for bringing these words to us.
Rating:
Summary: Speaking Truth
Review: I bought this book for my synagogue library and sat down and read it myself in the space of two days. The essays are enlightening and disturbing; they tear the heart and encourage the Jewish family to acknowledge all of its members. Blessings on the editor and these essayists for bringing these words to us.
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Summary: did you know jewish women wore hijabs?
Review: I came across this anthology while looking for books about about women in the Middle East. From the cover, I thought the book would be about Muslim women, but I was surprised to read the subtitle and find out it was about Jewish women! I did not know Jewish women wore hijabs, so I was drawn to the book, and I ended up learning quite a bit of new information. Also, I really enjoyed the storytelling style of writing.
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Summary: Extraordinary collection of essays--a fascinating book
Review: I got the chance to hear author Khazzoom give a concert of Judeo-Arabic music and a lecture about the Judeo-Arabic experience while visiting Seattle recently. The author, raised in Palo Alto, California, is the daughter of an Iraqi-Jewish father. So she was raised, not with the more familiar Ashkenazi (European) Jewish traditions, customs and music, but with those of the Middle East. She explained about Sephardim ("Spanish" Jews who left the Mideast and returned later in history)and Mizrahim, Jews who never ever had left the Mideast. And there is strife among the groups, who engage in discrimination based on widely different cultural values and lifestyles, though all believe in the same G-d and follow the same scriptures.The essays go into much detail about individual lives of women who experienced this discrimination or outright, terrible oppression at the hands of local people in their homelands -- Iraq, Iran and other places. Some of the stories are frightening; in one essay, the writer describes a horrifying massacre in Iraq. Her parents were then left literally stateless, their passports invalid and no land accepting them for refugee status. It's hard not to cry while reading this story. Others talk about a shameful treatment of returnees to Israel, and the division in the communities there. Some of the writers tried to "pass" as French Jews rather than Moroccan, to avoid being treated as an underclass exactly as African-Americans experience in the United States. These stories made me so angry. The essays are also a unique view inside Jewish traditions that are probably as unfamiliar to most Jews as they would be to non-Jews. It was a revelation that some Hebrew is spoken with an Arabic accent, using Arabic words. I couldn't put this book down, and I think anyone interested in the struggles in the Mideast ought to read this, and definitely, if you are Jewish, you should not pass up this book. HIGHLY RECOMMENDED.
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Summary: kicks ass!!!
Review: i think everyone needs to read this book in hebrew school, so they know that dark jewish girls like me are not freaks of nature!!! i wish the book had essays by teenage girls, but i like it that a lot of the essays talk about growing up as a jewish girl in different countries. it was cool to read about the amazing things they did when they were my age.
Rating:
Summary: Wonderful and eye-opening book!
Review: This is a marvelous book -- an engaging read as well as eye-opening about a part of Jewish life that has been so much "under wraps" for most of the Ashkenazic Jewish community. I admire and salute the contributors to this book as well as its editor -- bravo for an excellent addition to the lexicon of Jewish life. I encourage everyone to read this book and realize that Jews are not all the same...we are so much more!
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