After
our flight from Vegas, Stephan and I stayed at an extended stay hotel
for about a month while we looked at apartments to rent for a year.
Living in the hotel was kind of fun. I don't know what it is about
staying in a hotel that always has sort of a fun feel to it, but we
enjoyed our time there. It's probably because whenever we've stayed
in hotels in the past it was associated with vacation and being in a
new neat place that serves free fresh baked cookies at night with
coffee. A true adventure isn't really an adventure without bumping
into some rocks along the way. We experienced our first power outage
living in the hotel with our 3 month old. It was summer time and
being in a hotel with a 3 month old with no AC was not a pleasant
experience. Thankfully, our little one handled everything very well.
I would bring him downstairs sometimes to the lobby to cool off and
would always get comments on how calm he was. Thankfully we were able
to check into the hotel next door which had power and the hotel we
originally stayed at gave us our money back for the days that the
power was out.
Once
we survived the power outage and another rock we bumped into was
figuring out where to live. In the short term, we ended up picking an
apartment in Rockville, MD and started the process of getting our
things together and seeing how to start the process of converting to
Judaism. My husband started his new job at GEICO and that's where he
met his first observant Jew. He asked him if he had any problems with
the company being Jewish and all and he told him they should set up a
time to meet to talk more. Anyway, they hit it off and Yaacov called
a friend of his who recommended 2 rabbi's who do conversions -
one in Rockville, and one in DC.
We
wanted to make sure we went with a credible Bes Din because we wanted
to do things right. We have heard sad stories of people who wanted to
convert and went with people who were not credible and had to find
out the hard way. For instance if you want to move to Israel to
become a citizen as a Jew, they need to know you converted with a
credible Bed Din otherwise your conversion will be considered
invalid. So we, not knowing this when we moved, ended up going to the
one Bes Din who's head Rabbi actually worked with the Chief Rabbi of
Israel on coming up with a standard for converts in the U.S, to be
accepted in Israel. So we were so happy to find that out and knew we
were in good hands.
The
Rabbi in Rockville held weekly classes about the Torah portion of the
week, Jewish history, and other things that we needed to know. Just
as important was the Shalosh Seudos every Shabbos, giving us our
first taste of kiddush, challah, Shabbos songs, and davening
(praying). We met lots of Jews, many who were on a similar path
as us, not being raised as observant Jews. We also met another
Rabbi who substituted for the Rockville Rabbi when his voice went
out, who we liked.
It
was to expensive to buy a house in Rockville though, so we looked
for where the best place for us to live would be after factoring in
things like, affordability, Jewish schools for our kids, distance
from work, how many shuls(aka synagogues) were in the area.
Stephan's little spreadsheet indicated that Silver Spring was
the place to be. It had a good sized Jewish community with 4
different shuls we could go to if we wanted, the most affordable
housing, and was next to a few kosher restaurants and grocery stores.
We
eventually got around to calling up the Rabbi who is head of the Bes
Din and set up an interview for our conversion. On the day we went
down there, there was traffic (we weren't aware of how bad D.C.
traffic can be at the time) so we were late for our first meeting
which we were not happy about. Luckily, the Rabbi was still
there. We apologized and the first question he asked us was "Why
do you want to do this crazy thing?" We laughed and told him our
story. When we told him about the article that we found online about
"A Primer: Why Jews Can't Believe in Jesus" the Rabbi asked who
wrote it and we told him it was Baruch Gershom and he said he knew
the author, who was using that as a pseudonym, and he lives in Silver
Spring. We were stunned and thrilled that the community we had
already picked is the same community that the guy who wrote the
article which started this whole thing.
Anyway
the only problem was we were having trouble finding a sponsoring
Rabbi. A sponsoring Rabbi is required in order for you to convert. He
is the one you study with and basically teaches you how to be a Jew
and vouches for you to the Bes Din that you are in fact doing
everything you are being taught. I was actually told by a Rabbi that
there is no way we would find a sponsoring Rabbi in Silver Spring or
really anywhere because it requires so much work and it's not really
an obligation on any Rabbi to do so, so why would they do it? The
only other option to convert was to for Stephan to take a year off
work and study with the Rockville Rabbi. That was definitely not
possible for us since were not Rockefellers and couldn't afford to
take that long off of work.
Feeling
defeated and restless with how hard it was to just be able to find a
sponsoring Rabbi, I called one of the Rabbi's on the Bes Din and
vented to him about how frustrating it was. That Rabbi was really
understanding and told me he would help me find a Rabbi in Silver
Spring. Being the pessimist that I am, not really thinking it
would happen, I still didn't feel any better about it. However he
ended up calling me back and gave me a number to a Rabbi that said he
wold be willing to help us. The rabbi invited us over to meet and
talk and as we were driving there, I said, "Wouldn't it be neat
if it was that nice substitute Rabbi we met in Rockville?", and
Stephan laughed and agreed. The door opened and sure enough, it was.
I think they were surprised to see it was us too. Finally we could
move forward in our conversion and live in the place we felt we were
meant to live in.
Now
it was time to start house hunting! YAY! We found a nice Jewish agent
who helped us out a lot with the house hunting process and ended up
with a really great deal on a great house with only a 5 minute walk
to the Shul we wanted to go to. We packed up all of our things for
the 3rd time in 2 years and moved on over to our new house. We met
some people from around the neighborhood and most of them seemed to
go to the same minyan(Prayer service). Stephan decided to try
out that minyan. His first time there, he was looking around to see
where he should sit and the Gabbi(usher/coordinator) noticed that he
looked lost and suggested that he sit by his father-in-law who could
help him out. The father-in-law came over and reached out to
shake his hand and introduced himself, and guess who it was... It was
Baruch Gershom! Stephan shook his hand in disbelief. Now every
Shabbos, Stephan davens right next to the guy who wrote the article
that got everything started for us. I think it's safe to say we're in
the right place now.
