Running for ruach
Adam Mizock, president of Tehiyah Day School in El Cerrito, is one of three East Bay residents training for the California International Marathon (from Folsom to Sacramento) on Dec. 3 to raise dollars for Jewish day schools.
Mizock, who has two kids at Tehiyah and is completing his fifth and final year as prez, has pledged to donate $1,300 to the school — or $50 per mile, he explains. Joining him are Benjamin Marcus, fundraising for Oakland Hebrew Day School, and Mary Beth Kierstad, for Contra Costa Jewish Day School. Marcus’ wife, Melanie, is admissions director at OHDS and they have three children there. Kierstad’s daughter is in kindergarten at CCJDS and she teaches third grade there.
Notes Mizock: “This is not just an ordinary fundraising run, but rather a great example of the three East Bay day schools joining forces to raise awareness, energy and ruach around day schools.”
A surprising 60th
When Jewish Community Relations Council Executive Director Rabbi Doug Kahn’s 60th birthday happened to fall on Nov. 9, the same day as the group’s monthly meeting, it was surprise party time. The JCRC staff, led by Abby Porth and Tatyana Dunavetsky, associate director and finance director, respectively, spread the word while keeping the surprise a secret from Kahn.
Jerilyn Gelt, who led the meeting, welcomed Kahn “to the club” (of 60-year-olds) and read a note from Earl Raab, who hired Kahn some 28 years ago. Rita Semel, Kahn’s predecessor as JCRC exec, joined the celebration and told the group that she had known Doug longer than anyone there — even his wife, Ellen. Semel also disclosed that she was the only one who knew that Doug had been named after Helen Gahagan Douglas, who had just been defeated by Richard Nixon in the 1950 California Senate race. (Now you all know!)
Yitzhak Santis, the JCRC’s director of Middle East affairs, whose birthday was the same day, produced “The Kahn,” a video retrospective beginning with Doug’s face imposed under the headgear of a different Khan — Ghengis. Taking the mike, a delighted Kahn noted the agenda items of the meeting — Israel, civil rights for the transgender community, Christian-Jewish understanding and election analysis — and reiterated his oft-stated line that “there hasn’t been a single boring day” in his years at JCRC.
“Lower East Side Story”?
In an admission ripe for comedians, Stephen Sondheim and Arthur Laurents, lyricist and scriptwriter for “West Side Story,” told Michael Krasny on KQED’s Forum that early on they played around with the idea of the plot centering on an Italian American Roman Catholic family and a Jewish family. They changed their minds (maybe the gang war didn’t resonate?). The Jets were written as a generic gang and the Emeralds, the would-be Jewish gang, became the Puerto Rican Sharks.
Short shorts …
Al Berger, who lives in Petaluma’s Springfield Place, turns 100 on Friday, Nov. 26 … Zalman Mochkin, son of Rabbi Peretz and Miryum Mochkin of San Francisco’s North Beach Chabad, celebrated his 3rd birthday and his upshernish — his first haircut — on Nov. 14. No news about how he likes his shorn locks … Rabbi Lavey Derby, formerly of Tiburon’s Congregation Kol Shofar, is the new director of Jewish and Family Life at the Peninsula Jewish Community Center in Foster City. He will reach out to congregations and other organizations … Wishing you a joyous and light-filled Chanukah!
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