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The Charlotte Jewish News - February 2002 - Page 16 The Jewish Travler The Synagogue on the Nevis By Erica Meyer Rauzin The oldest synagogue in the Caribbean is now a square of gray stone ruins across from the old Jewish cemetery in Charlestown, capital of the West Indies island of Nevis, one of the British (though now independent) Virgin Islands. Arriving there as a cruise ship passenger, I ran a few land-based errands. Then I went in search of the synagogue site, although the ship’s information sheet warned, 'Thought to date from the mid- 17lh century, the synagogue struc ture suffered the fate of many Nevis buildings in an earthquake. It is not even certain that the ruined structure, still an active archaeological site, is the temple. It is only known that there was a synagogue somewhere on the island from European records of the period.” Charlestown is surrounded by beauty - sage green hills, aqua ocean, white beaches - but the downtown is down at heels during this unusual tourist-deprived sea son. Only the hotel areas along the beaches are pristine and fancy. The infrastructure clearly needs a cash boost, but the level of civili ty, pleasantness and helpfulness seems to be fine shape despite the slow tourist season. I shopped a bit and then looked for a cab to take me to the ceme tery and synagogue site. 1 asked a woman cab driver what it would cost. “You don’t need a cab for that,” she explained, to my sur prise. “Just go up that alleyway and when you get to the top, turn right. It’s there.” Thanking her, I walked up the alley, passing flocks of young girls in plaid uniforms and starched white shirts coming down from their school. At the top of the hill, past a few small, dilapidated con crete-block houses, was a grassy plot of land, about two-thirds the size of a football field, fenced in with chain link. A few power poles stood just inside, along the fence, but it was otherwise pristine, with about a dozen gray stone catafalques in spread out clusters on the lush, trimmed grass. I was afraid at first that the cemetery was locked, but when I reached the leaf-green wrought iron gate, it opened easily. The graves dated to the sixteen and seventeen hundreds; the peo ple were Sephardic Jews who migrated north from Brazil to escape the Inquisition. At the time, “one-quarter of the Nevis popula tion was Jewish,” says our infor mation sheet, “and it is widely believed that the immigrants intro duced modern techniques for cul tivating and crystallizing refined sugar that made production viable on Nevis and St. Kitts,” the sister island. The stones on the time-ravaged tops of the crypts were hard to make out, although I could detect THE CAROLINAS’ PREEMINENT GALLERY FOR CONTEMPORARY ART Advising individual collectors, museums and corporations on fine art acquisitions since 1983. Jerald ) MELBERG G A L L, E R Y Morrocroll Village Near SoulhPark Mall 704.365.3000 www.jeraldmelbcrg.com the' occasional name and inscrip tion in English, Hebrew and Portuguese. Two hand prints, palms spread like a father placing against the back fence that sepa rates the cemetery from an apart ment building, and sat there for a while, absorbing the quiet, think A view of the Jewish cemetery, Charlestown, Nevis. his hands to bless a child, were engraved on one stone. With a prayer, I put a rock on the grave of a woman named Sarah, thinking how strange it must seem to the people who live adjacent to the cemetery that folks like me wan der up the hill, put pebbles on the tombs - for there were many - and leave. 1 saw a small bench under a shady mimosa tree, standing ing about these Jews 300 years ago. The broken walls of the syna gogue ruins, across the street kitty-cornered from the cemetery gate, form a square the size of a one-room cottage and about three feet high. The ruins show the evi dence of some repairs over time, in the form of concrete patches amid the old, gray stones. Two short pillars in the front of the room may once have been the bima. Here again, the grass is carefully trimmed and the site is immaculately clean. Today, Nevis is an entirely Christian country. The indepen dent Nevisians, from the helpful salesladies to the cab drivers, cops and schoolgirls in blue plaid jumpers are black African- Caribbeans - primarily the descen- dents of West African slaves. And, though this is their country and they are of a different race and a different religion and live in a tropical culture that is very differ ent from ours, they treat our rem nant of a cemetery and our shad ow of a synagogue with care and respect. I thought you’d like to know. ^ . For more information, visit the website of the Jewish Community of Nevis Archaeological Project, www.tc.umn.edu/~terreOIl/Nevis. html. The Cohenheads Dance the Hora? It Must be Freewheeling New Orleans By Tom Tugend Los Angeles (JTA) — The theme of last year’s Mardi Gras parade in New Orleans was “2001: A Space Fallacy” — and the Jewish contingent, masked as the Cohenheads, danced the hora through the French Quarter behind the Mothership Yentaprise, tossing out a thousand Star of David- emblazoned bagels to the hungry masses. Led by King David and Jewish American Princess Adama, attend ed by droid 3CPAs and a klezmer band, the “Krewe du Jieux” flaunted its mission statement: “To kibbitz on strange new worlds; to seek out new life forms and sell to them retail; to boldly schlep where no one has shlepped before.” New Orleans is one of the few cities in America where Jews feel secure enough to play off their stereotypes at the largest public event of the year. Catherine Kahn, president of the Southern Jewish Historical Society and a fifth-generation res ident of New Orleans, confirms the local Jews’ sense of comfort. One of the many pleasant aspects of Jewish life here is “a sense of belonging,” she says. “Historically, this is a city with a great sense of tolerance, the flip side being that we tolerate a lot of crookedness in our public offi cials,” adds Kahn. Cruise from the Carolinas 10 NIGHT CARIBBEAN FROM CHARLESTON Galaxy 799 from $ # ^ Ports of Call: Tortola St. Thomas St. Martin San Juan Nassau NEW ITINERARY! Mann s. lyavei & Cruises Park Road Matthews University Place Arboretum (704) 556-8311 (704) 847-1542 (704) 547-1240 (704) 541-0943 800-343-6266 for the office nearest you www.travelcruises.com « only, valid for 12/302 sailing. Prices are accurate at bme of pnnting, and subjeetto diange. Taxes & fees additional. Restrictions apply. The tone was set when the first wave of young Jewish men migrated from Alsace-Lorraine — then a disputed area on the French-German border - in the late 18th and early 19th centuries The Krewe de Jieux dances it up at Mardi Gras. and found the prevalent French patois more congenial than the strange English language of north ern cities. The new immigrants were read ily accepted by the Creoles ■— descendants of the early French and Spanish settlers — and mar ried their Catholic daughters. Bending Jewish law to fit local realities, the articles of incorpora tion of Gates of Mercy, the first synagogue founded in 1828, stated that “No Israelite child shall be excluded either from the schools, from the Temple, or the burial ground, on account of the religion of the mother.” Today the Jewish community of Greater New Orleans stands at between 10,000 to 12,000. The roots of the community’s religious life are in the Reform movement — the first Conservative congregation was not formed until 1958 — and today there are three Reform shuls, including the Touro Synagogue, which has been in continuous use since 1909. Shir Hadash is the flagship Conservative temple and Congregation Beth Israel is cen trist Orthodox. Even with all this congregation al activity, the city’s laissez-faire attitude comes through in an oft- repeated local gag. “When do New Orleans Jews keep kosher?” “When they eat raw oysters only in months with an ‘r’ in their names.” Which means, in practice, that they abstain only in May, June, July and August — when the oys ters are out of season anyhow. The dictum does not apply, of course, to the Chabad movement, which has established a presence on the Tulane University campus. Tulane, a private university, has a student body that is more than one-fourth Jewish, remarkable in a state where Jews make up less than half a percent of the total population. One reason is that Tulane, in its entire history, has never had a restrictive Jewish quota, so in the early and middle decades of the past century, “a lot of smart Jewish kids who couldn’t get into northern universities came to Tulane,” says Kahn. In return, Jewish philan thropists have endowed many of Tulane’s buildings, academic chairs and a Jewish studies pro gram. The uptown Jewish Community Center, following a $4 million ren ovation, is one of the handsomest in the country. The Jewish Federation has created an innova tive program, under which any Jewish child can receive a $1,000 grant to attend the summer camp of his or her choice. The new focal point for Jewish building and programs is the upscale suburb of Metairie, a favorite of young Jewish couples with children. In the works there is a Jewish “campus” with a new community center and a day school going up to the eighth grade. Well worth a visit is the Dispersed of Judah Cemetery, which displays some of the most elaborate tombstone sculpture of any Jewish burial ground. Politically, New Orleans is largely run by African-American politicians — the population is 60 percent black — though one of the two white incumbents on the (Continued on next page)
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