Shebrew in the City
Shebrew in the City is a podcast exploring all things Jewish. Combining interviews and informational episodes, join Nicole Kelly as she discusses her journey with motherhood, spirituality, and everything from Hanukkah to the Holocaust. Giving a voice to modern Jews and spreading love and joy, whether you're Jewish, Jew-ish, or not anything resembling Jewish at all, there's something here for everyone.
Shebrew in the City
"Dreidel, Dreidel, Dreidel" - The Hanukkah, Chanukah, Hanukah Episode
Are you ready for eight days of lights, miracles, and mouth-watering food? We, Nicole and Patrick Kelly, invite you to embark on a captivating journey through the rich universe of Hanukkah. From historical treasures and bustle of present-day celebrations, this episode illuminates the essence of Hanukkah. We uncover layers of cultural significance and pull out fascinating tidbits about how the commercialization of Hanukkah influences our experience of the holiday today.
Hanukkah isn't just about history; it's a vibrant tapestry of traditions and celebrations that season our lives with joy and connection. Embrace the warmth of candlelit blessings, the competitive thrill of a dreidel game, and the gastronomic adventure of savoring latkes and sufganiyot (jelly-filled donuts). From the excitement of our childhood memories to our discovering new holiday recipes, we bring Hanukkah straight into your living room. But that's not all, we also explore the less common but surprisingly delicious roast goose and discuss the evolving identity of Hanukkah in America.
This episode also delves into the intriguing world of Christmukkah, a fusion of Christmas and Hanukkah traditions. Discover its 19th century German roots and how interfaith families today embrace it with warmth and creativity. We also shed light on the commercialization of the holiday season, from the rise of ornaments and decorations featuring both Jewish and Christmas symbols, and even the trend of Hanukkah advent calendars. Along our journey, we explore public menorah lightings, the controversial use of mascots, and the role of Mahjong in Hanukkah gift-giving. Finally, we share our thoughts on celebrating Hanukkah with loved ones and making the most of this special holiday. So, let's light up those menorah candles, spin the dreidel, and create beautiful Hanukkah memories together!
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Hi, this is Nicole Kelly and this is she Brew in the City. If you like what you hear and want to hear more of it, you can subscribe and also follow me on Instagram at she Brew in the City to see what my life is like day to day. I'm also on Patreon if you'd like to have access to some special episodes and offers. Looking for tips and tricks on a new city, top Dog Tours is the best place to check out walking tours. We are in Boston, philadelphia, toronto and New York City. Visit us on topdogtourscom to book your tour today and check us out on social media for offers, discounts and pictures.
Nicole Kelly:Hi, this is Nicole Kelly and this is she Brew in the City, and this is our first informational episode. So half of our episodes, roughly, are going to be interviews with people and then roughly the other half are going to be informational episodes where we're going to talk about everything from holidays to the Holocaust, to something topical possibly, and this first episode is going to be about Hanukkah, and I'm here again with my husband and producer and editor, patrick Kelly.
Patrick Kelly:Hello, I'm excited to light some menorahs and get down to about Hanukkah.
Nicole Kelly:So Hanukkah actually starts tomorrow. We've been recording these kind of front, loading them, so they're not actually going to be airing around the time they're recorded, but this is going to be airing, I think, in two days.
Patrick Kelly:So, yeah, this is the first one that's going to be as topical as any of them. It will be right on time for when it happens, and we kept pushing back this recording time.
Nicole Kelly:Things kept happening.
Patrick Kelly:I'm excited to get into this deep dive. You told me that what we're going to talk about is not what I think I see on all of the Instagram feeds at the moment, which are the Maccabees in 200 BC did this?
Nicole Kelly:So, patrick, when I say the word Hanukkah, what do you think of?
Patrick Kelly:With my limited prior knowledge, I'm going to try to put my brain back into maybe before we were together and before we were married, but my knowledge of Hanukkah was ultimately that it was a Jewish-esque Christmas right, that it was a day where Jewish people would get gifts it always tended to correspond around December or Christmas time of year and that there is some level of some ancient history which I'm fairly familiar with because I'm a big fan of ancient history.
Nicole Kelly:Is ancient history, your Roman Empire, just general ancient history? I don't know.
Patrick Kelly:I feel like I'm not going to lie. I do think about the Roman Empire a lot. That's really weird, I do. I mean, it's so much, it's so important.
Nicole Kelly:I didn't realize the Roman Empire was so important to men until recently, oh so important.
Patrick Kelly:I also think about ancient Greece and ancient Egypt.
Nicole Kelly:So I'm saying ancient history in general is your Roman Empire.
Patrick Kelly:Mesopotamia and all of those places. But yeah, I feel like my general understanding of the cultural importance of Hanukkah for American Jews is definitely that it's this holiday season that seems to correspond a lot with Christmas tradition in the sense of gift giving and being with your family and having this kind of warmth built up. In some miracle that took place.
Nicole Kelly:Yeah, so none of that was incorrect information. We're going to talk a little bit about the history of Hanukkah and kind of the traditions, but what I really want to focus in is how Hanukkah has changed in America even within my lifetime, and how crazy that is and the commercialization of that. We talk a little bit about this on our holiday tour. If you're in New York City at the end of November or December, please check out Top Dog Tours as a holiday tour. It's very popular. We have a whole Hanukkah stop in the Diamond District.
Patrick Kelly:That's why it's called the holiday tour, because we discuss Hanukkah.
Nicole Kelly:It's true, but we also talk a little bit about the commercialization of Christmas too, so I feel like it's appropriate to talk about the commercialization of Hanukkah on this. So Hanukkah is obviously a Jewish festival, and it commemorates the recovery of Jerusalem and the rededication of the second temple at the beginning of the Maccabean Revolt against the Seleucid Empire in the second century BC.
Patrick Kelly:They were the ones basically were formed post Alexander the Great. So Alexander the Great had conquered most of the Middle East and parts of Egypt and stretched his empire all the way out to India, and with that he brought with him all of this Greek culture and these guys after his empire died, these generals that basically broke up his empire, and that was one of them.
Nicole Kelly:And Hanukkah is not mentioned in the Torah, so it's a super minor holiday that has kind of been blown up because of the commercialization and the association with Christmas. So basically, you know, the miracle is that there was a menorah in the temple and you needed, basically, consecrated ritual olive oil to light the menorah and there was an issue with the supply chain, because war tends to do that and there was only enough oil to last one day and lasted eight days, which is the miracle of Hanukkah, which is why there's, you know, we light menorahs, we we do a lot of cooking with oil, because it's very olive oil centric and that's why Hanukkah is eight days and nights, because the oil lasted eight days. And it starts on the 25th day of Kislev in the Hebrew calendar, which is shorter than the Gregorian calendar, which is why Jewish holidays in general are always on different dates which is also why Easter is on a different date because it correlates with a Jewish holiday, and we will talk about that in a further episode.
Nicole Kelly:So it's always different. This year it's starting on December 7th and next year it starts on Christmas, which will make it very easy to remember because very Christmas. Very Christmas we're going to talk about that too. In 2027, it starts on Christmas Eve and then, of course, in 2013, it was on Thanksgiving.
Patrick Kelly:Yes, I remember that year. That was the first year we lived in New York. That's right, your family came. It was a lot of fun.
Nicole Kelly:Yeah, we did a big Thanksgiving meal, we let them in, my mom gave us a menorah and we had presents and that's not actually going to ever happen again during our lifetime.
Patrick Kelly:I feel like if I had wherewithal at the time, I would have tried to combine the two holidays. More done like turkey latkes done like something really over the top.
Nicole Kelly:We had just moved to New York and I feel like you weren't seriously cooking yet at that time.
Patrick Kelly:Not at that level.
Nicole Kelly:No, I feel like you can forgive yourself for that. Going back to oil and light, we light a menorah or a hanakia, which has nine branches. For a kosher menorah, there is a branch that is either taller or to the side, and taller. It's either in the middle and taller, or to the side and taller than the rest of the branches. That's called the shamesh, which means attendant in Hebrew. You use the shamesh to light the other candle. That's why it may be in an office lobby or in pictures You'll see. Why is there only one or two candles lit? It's because that correlates with the night of Hanukkah and in the final night all the candles are lit. I've learned a lot actually doing research for this, things that I didn't know about, like general traditions of what we do and why we do them. Apparently, it's traditional for Ashkenazi Jews for every male member of the household to have a menorah and in a lot of families, girls as well the light every night.
Patrick Kelly:Like an individual menorah.
Nicole Kelly:Like an individual menorah, but for Sephardic Jews usually it's one set of lights for the entire household. Now I'm Ashkenazi. Everyone basically gets their own menorah. Our mom bought our daughter one on her first Hanukkah and we have our own menorah. I feel like at my family's Hanukkah parties it was like a little fire hazard because there'd be 25 menorahs just being lit.
Patrick Kelly:I remember there being multiple menorahs being lit. I think one of the first times I went over to your aunt's house for a Hanukkah celebration, but I don't think I ever correlated that. That's why there were multiple menorahs.
Nicole Kelly:Because everyone gives their own Maybe.
Patrick Kelly:I just kind of thought like, oh, it was like the different families of your family getting together to light menorahs.
Nicole Kelly:We would also travel with our menorah. I don't know if people do that when they go to other Hanukkah parties, but when we used to have parties at our house, there would be maybe like 50 people, so everybody would just bring their menorahs. I don't know if that's an us family thing or an other people thing. You can let me know on Instagram if your family also brought their menorahs to other parties. But I've also heard seen people that like even within the family, they'll have like maybe like two parents, two kids. The mom will really like menorahs, so they'll have lots of menorahs because there's so many different options.
Patrick Kelly:Well, they're very decorative and then some of them are really kind of over the top, like, like, especially for little kids, like dinosaur menorahs or race car menorahs or super hero menorahs or whatever.
Nicole Kelly:Yeah, Our daughter has one that's locks that have her name on it, that my mom got hurt on her first Hanukkah. So super interesting to me is because you know I'm Ashkenazi. We use the Shamash like the other candles Apparently Sephardic Jews will use, will light the Shamash last and I don't know why.
Patrick Kelly:That's interesting.
Nicole Kelly:Yeah, I'm a little bit scared because I thought the whole point of the Shamash was to use it to light the other candles you said that that means the attendant. Yeah, so maybe it's like it's just attending to the other candles.
Patrick Kelly:Or maybe it's more of a representation of an eternal light.
Nicole Kelly:That's possible. That's possible, yeah, if anyone. Again, if anyone knows the answer to this, please let me know.
Patrick Kelly:I know All the Sephardis out there.
Nicole Kelly:Apparently, some Hasidic Jews, even if they're Ashkenazi, do this as well. I have very personal feelings about electric menorahs, but I'm reading that they're acceptable in places where you can't have fire, which makes sense, like hospitals, places where there's older people, like a college dorm. Yeah, I just feel like if it's not that kind of case, I just feel like it's kind of lazy. I don't know if that's very judgy of me, but I feel like I'm very OG. I like the actual light. I think it's really cool looking at the light of the menorah and you know it doesn't flicker in the same way for electric menorahs. I feel like part of it is the candles kind of slowly go down and then they go out, whereas in electric menorah you literally just have to like turn the light bulb. So it's just not as it's not as meaningful. I think I've never done it, but I have no desire to do it what doesn't feel a ceremonial.
Nicole Kelly:Yeah, no, I mean, look, I'm all for modernizing ceremonial objects to make your lives easier, but I feel like if you have the opportunity to have a menorah that has actual light, I experiment with that. I think it's cool.
Patrick Kelly:This might be a weird comparison, but it's kind of like an electric shave versus a traditional straight raising shave, where the ceremonial aspects of getting like a traditional shave with the foam and the hot towel and the actual closeness of that shave versus just you're in a hurry and you turn on the buzzer and you rub it over your face and you run out the door.
Nicole Kelly:I agree, I think the lighting of the menorah it's always kind of it would always be right before presence. So we were always in a super big hurry to light the menorah to get our presence. But it's like a moment and it's supposed to be a thing. You're supposed to say blessings and I feel like I'd say feel weird saying blessings while I'm turning a little light bulb on an electric menorah. But I never had to do it in like a dorm room or something where I think it would make sense. So where do we put our menorah? Except in times of danger, which you can figure out, what that ever of that means for you, you're supposed to be placed outside one's door or in a window on the opposite side of a mizuza, so on the outside of the door. So this is supposed to publicize the miracle, so that passersby can see it and they are reminded of this. So we put it in our window.
Patrick Kelly:Well, I'm assuming, when they say your door, this is in an era where you didn't live in a tenement, or you didn't live in any guy-rise apartment building. Yes, I feel like we put a menorah on a little tape If we put a little.
Nicole Kelly:Well, there are a lot of Jewish people in our building, so I feel like if we all put our menorahs outside the door again, it would be a fire hazard.
Nicole Kelly:So I think that's why people put it in their window. But I think I almost have a little bit of sense of pride putting it in my window. To me especially, there's that really famous picture of the menorah in a window in Germany and behind it across the street are these Nazi flags. So I feel like, especially with everything that's going on right now, it's also a little bit of a sense of resistance and Jewish pride in displaying it and not being afraid to display something that is so obviously Jewish.
Nicole Kelly:I mentioned the blessings and it being very ritualistic and taking a moment to do that. There are typically two blessings that are recited during the eight days, but the first night you say shahahianu, which is basically a prayer when you've come to a moment you've been excited about, like a baby being born or going to new and new school or up a holiday, so it's a celebration blessing. So the first night you do the three blessings. Hanukkah is not a Sabbath-like holiday. You are under no obligation to refrain from activity. Basically, you just have to make sure you're home in time to light the menorah at sunset.
Patrick Kelly:Is that what makes it more of a minor holiday than anything else?
Nicole Kelly:the fact that you don't have to there's no restrictions, there's no fasting, you can use electricity, you can use elevators, you can go in cars, except when it falls on like Shabbat. Yes, so on Shabbat, obviously you're supposed to if you were at Shabbat observant to observe Shabbat and then light the menorah at the same time as the candles. But it's not like. It's like, okay, it's Hanukkah, you're supposed to fast, or you're supposed to not get in a car, that's, you know, it's a minor holiday, you can go to work. So it's not like you're not allowed to go and live your basically your everyday life. So, after lighting the candles, what do you do If you're not gonna eat dinner right away? You would obviously pay a game of dreidel. So I feel like I've never just like played dreidel.
Nicole Kelly:And I will. Okay, I'm gonna call some of my relatives out on this. There was a year where we were at my great aunt's house and I really wanted to play dreidel, but two of my cousins had gotten married a few months earlier and their wedding video was ready and they were like we can either watch the wedding video or we can pay dreidel and I was like this is a really hard choice because I want to watch the wedding video. So we ended up watching the wedding video and I don't feel like we ever like seriously played dreidel and I feel like that's something I want to do with our daughter.
Patrick Kelly:I think I've played dreidel seriously once and it was during an elementary school. Really, the elementary school I went to was multicultural, so we had a little bit of everybody there, and anytime a holiday that was not a mainstream American holiday would come up.
Patrick Kelly:I remember our teacher would have the kid of that class, make a presentation about it, and like her, maybe the parent come in and bring a food or bring in do like a little presentation thing. And I distinctly remember one year they did the Hanukkah thing and then all the kids sat around in like little clumps and played a game of dreidel with some gelt, and I think that was my only real, true memory of sitting down and actively participating in playing dreidel other than nowadays as an adult, and just kind of spinning it around.
Nicole Kelly:Well, people put it as like decoration on tables parties. So it's like what do you do? Do you know how to play dreidel?
Patrick Kelly:Well, I know it's a gambling game that is today mostly played with chocolate, and I know that each symbol means something else, like every letter means you put half of your pot in, or you take half the pot, or you take all the pot, or you lose everything.
Nicole Kelly:I could be completely wrong about this, but I remember from Hebrew school this is the only time that you're actually allowed to gamble, because Jews are not supposed to gamble.
Nicole Kelly:But this is allowed for some reason. I'm sure I could ask one of Arabis about that. So the Hebrew letters on the dreidel, they kind of, are an abbreviation for Neska del Hayash Shem, meaning a great miracle happened there, referring to in Jerusalem. But apparently in Jerusalem or in Israel in general, they switch out the last letter for Pes, meaning a great miracle happened here, but this is a newer thing.
Patrick Kelly:Well, I think dreidel is, comparatively to Jewish history, a newer game.
Nicole Kelly:I don't know exactly when this started. I'd have to look that up.
Patrick Kelly:I mean, I would assume probably 1700s, 1800s.
Nicole Kelly:I would have to look that up.
Patrick Kelly:Small shtetl somewhere somebody started spinning things.
Nicole Kelly:Like what are we gonna do? Because there's nothing else to do.
Nicole Kelly:And we talked about gelt, which is traditionally like actual coins, but because of Americanization and we'll talk about what companies started, that in a little bit it's chocolate-covered coins. So this actually comes from an Eastern European custom of children presenting their teachers with a small sum of money at this time of year as a token of gratitude is really what gelt actually is, but they've turned it into this. We've turned it into this gambling thing. We took something beautiful that children did and made it a vice.
Patrick Kelly:Yeah, why not? I mean, aren't most things?
Nicole Kelly:So let's talk about my favorite part about Hanukkah is the food. So what do you think of when you think of food for Hanukkah?
Patrick Kelly:Well, definitely latkes. I love a good latke. For me, I think that is the iconic Hanukkah food. I can't really think of other Hanukkah-esque foods other than latkes that jump out at me. I will say the jelly-filled donuts as well, but that's to me, as far as my knowledge go, I think, a newer thing. I don't think I actually really knew about some Sufganiote till Sufganiote. Yeah, see, I don't even say it. Right, I'll let you talk about the donut. That was like a newer thing for me. That I learned, I think, when we started giving the holiday tour. I didn't really know about those. To be honest, I don't think I even tried one until maybe a year or two ago.
Nicole Kelly:Yeah, halakkas are definitely kind of a mainstay and I want to be very clear about this and I mentioned this on what's gonna be our next episode there is a big difference between a latke and a potato pancake, and I will fight you to the death about that, because to me it's about texture.
Nicole Kelly:And I went to Katz's and they were trying to pass off this crap as latkes and they were to pay potato pancakes. A potato pancake is made with mashed potatoes and a latke is from shaved potatoes, and that is a hill I will die on.
Patrick Kelly:Sure, to me they're very different.
Nicole Kelly:They are. It's a texture thing.
Patrick Kelly:Don't get me wrong. I enjoy a good mashed potato pancake because I feel like I don't know. My mom used to make them, especially right around after Thanksgiving.
Nicole Kelly:You have the leftover mashed potatoes, but that's not a latke, it's a very different thing.
Patrick Kelly:I never associated the two together.
Nicole Kelly:They're very different.
Patrick Kelly:Yeah, because to me a latke is more hash brownie. Yeah, Then.
Nicole Kelly:It's crispy. It's not soft on the inside. Have you ever heard of the infamous fire department latke fiasco when I was in kindergarten? No, so my mom, like you, my mom was gonna make latkes for the class because I think I was probably the only Jewish person. This is before. I went to a private school that was predominantly Jewish and my mom's oil got really hot and the fire alarm went off and the fire department rolled in being like we're here for the fire and I was really excited by the whole thing, because a fire truck coming into your house when you're six is very exciting.
Nicole Kelly:That seems exciting it was exciting and we bring it up every year. And be like when my mom makes latkes, don't make the fire department come. So latkes are actually traditional for Ashkenazi families. A lot of other different types of Jews and yes, there are other types of Jews eat a lot of different things. Sephardic Jews eat boomuelos. Boomuelos. I hope I can't speak Spanish which are made from flour, yeast, water, sugar, oil and honey, so very, very different.
Patrick Kelly:I think just preface everything. We apologize for mispronouncing any word that is not an English word, and we will also apologize for all the English words we mispronounce, as well, there might be a few of those too.
Nicole Kelly:So Sephardic, polish and Israeli families will eat jam filled donuts instead of jelly, and you know, I don't think.
Patrick Kelly:I really know the difference between jam and jelly. I don't know.
Nicole Kelly:This is something I need to ask one of my chef guests be like. So what's the difference between jam and jelly?
Patrick Kelly:I wonder if jelly is more, I guess, like jello-y.
Nicole Kelly:I don't know Right.
Patrick Kelly:Like it's a consistency difference or is there an actual?
Nicole Kelly:Yeah, I don't know.
Patrick Kelly:Yeah.
Nicole Kelly:I don't know. We talked a little bit about sufganiote, which are fried jelly donuts, and we are having those at our daughter's like class holiday party that we're hosting and I'm excited to try them because I have. I didn't really grow up eating those either. I don't know if it's because my family just didn't like them, or it's not a big thing in LA, but they're huge here. There's a lot of places to buy them.
Patrick Kelly:Yeah, maybe it's a West Coast thing.
Nicole Kelly:Yeah, west Coast East.
Patrick Kelly:Coast. Though I love a good donut I love donuts. I don't think there is like I remember growing up there where these little mom and pop donut shops everywhere in.
Speaker 5:California.
Nicole Kelly:And here you get Duncan and there's like nice bakeries and then like the high end donut places there aren't a lot of just like Mom and pop, like hole in the wall, hole in the wall donut places where you get you know the classic.
Patrick Kelly:I love donut, kind of donut, yeah.
Nicole Kelly:If you want to get me something for Hanukkah, get me some donuts. Hungarian Jews eat cheese pancakes, known as cassola, which are like cheese latkes, which I want to make because what is better than cheese and potatoes together? Yeah, that sounds great.
Nicole Kelly:I think that's why we need to find a recipe for that. Lakas, however, are not popular in Israel, really. Yeah, I think part of this has to do with the kind of percentage of the population that is not Ashkenazi, which is the majority of Israel. So Sufgani are much more popular there. You know, they have traditional strawberry filling, but they've also kind of messed around a little bit, you know, with chocolate cream, vanilla cream, caramel, cappuccino and other flavors, and apparently they're because people are trying to watch their waistlines during the holidays. You can get now mini Sufgani out which have half the calories which like at that point, like why you know, why even try you know you're like you're eating a donut, eat a donut.
Nicole Kelly:You know they're. I'm just saying it's 400 to 600 calorie versions, which what is the real one? If that's half, but you know if you're eating, if you're going to eat a donut, eat a donut. You know what I mean.
Patrick Kelly:Two donuts equal like an entire day of worth of calories.
Speaker 5:That sounds great.
Patrick Kelly:I mean yeah, that's how it should be.
Nicole Kelly:I guess we also used to eat roast goose. Eastern European and, you know, american Jews back in the day used to eat roast goose. I don't think I've ever eaten roast goose in my life.
Patrick Kelly:I don't think I've ever had goose.
Nicole Kelly:I don't think I have either.
Patrick Kelly:Pate, but I've never had an actual goose Granted. There were all of those like old English fowl kind of things, Isn't it in Christmas Carol?
Nicole Kelly:in the morning he wakes up, they get a roast goose when he talks, is it?
Patrick Kelly:a goose or a turkey. It depends on the translation. Sometimes it's a turkey. Okay, well, let's be clear In the Muppet Christmas Carol which is it's probably a turkey in the Muppet Christmas Carol.
Nicole Kelly:For those of you that have not seen it, this is actually the most accurate portrayal of a Christmas Carol. It just happens to have Muppet.
Patrick Kelly:It's accurate in the sense that you know.
Nicole Kelly:It's the closest to the book.
Patrick Kelly:To the book and Michael Cain took it like he was doing the Royal Shakespeare Company's version.
Nicole Kelly:I remember seeing that in theaters because, even though we're and you get two Barleys for one.
Patrick Kelly:Yeah, yeah.
Nicole Kelly:Because, even though my family is Jewish, we used to go see Christmas movies, obviously because it's like Christmas is now like a general American holiday for a lot of people. So I remember seeing that in theaters and loving it, and I it still holds up, I think. Going back to food Indian Jews eat fried dough balls soaked in sweet syrup, which sounds amazing.
Patrick Kelly:Yeah, that's actually a popular Indian dessert. They're like honey, they're like Serpy honey, serpy honey.
Nicole Kelly:Yeah, and Italian Jews. They'll eat fried chicken. They'll eat those cheese latkes as well, and fried sweet rice cakes. So we see a theme here Romanian Jews eat pasta latkes. I don't know what that would look like.
Patrick Kelly:You mean like shredded pasta instead of shredded potato?
Nicole Kelly:Yeah, kind of like pasta.
Patrick Kelly:That's interesting, it's not.
Nicole Kelly:Italian, it's Romanian Jews, syrian Jews eat a dish made of pumpkin and bulgur wheat that are like pot latkes, and they also have their own version that is spiced with all spice and cinnamon.
Patrick Kelly:Well, it's probably more traditional to not have potato, because potatoes weren't even introduced into Europe until around the 1500s.
Nicole Kelly:So for the very the older Jewish communities, then as Rocky Sephardi, it would make sense that they'd be making like more sweet versions.
Patrick Kelly:Yeah, and things that are non-potato based.
Nicole Kelly:Yes, we, america, gave the world the potato.
Patrick Kelly:And the tomato and a lot of things. You were just talking about how.
Nicole Kelly:What did people eat before people, the Europeans, found America.
Patrick Kelly:Yeah, like North and South Americas, where most of these things like. It's hard to imagine that like food wasn't spicy around the world until, like, the Americas was founded.
Nicole Kelly:And they didn't have chocolate.
Patrick Kelly:No chocolate, no peppers. Like Indian food wasn't spicy that's crazy to me Korean food wasn't spicy, kimchi. You know, the Portuguese were the ones that introduced peppers into Korea and, like the 1600s, World travel saving dishes since the 1500s.
Nicole Kelly:So I keep talking about how Conica and America has really changed. And this kind of all started around the civil war in Cincinnati, of all places. So in Ohio, Rabbi Max Lillenthal, he learned about these Christmas events they were doing for children because this was also the time that Christmas was becoming very commercialized as well, because people started caring about children.
Patrick Kelly:Yeah, people suddenly realized that children weren't just little workers that can work in minds and factors.
Nicole Kelly:I mean, they did continue that well into now.
Patrick Kelly:Well into now in some places, yeah but I would say that there was this concerted effort that suddenly children should be children. Yeah, and not just like small, little things that can do manual labor with little hands.
Nicole Kelly:Yeah. So people celebrating Christmas are like, oh, this is a way to, you know, spoil our children, you know, one time a year, and give them gifts. So you know, rabbi Lilinthol sees this and he kind of adapts this for the kids in his own congregation. He has like a Hanukkah assembly where they tell the story and they light candles and they give out candy, because, you know, the holidays in general is just an excuse to go crazy and eat a lot of candy, which I appreciate. His friend, rabbi Isaac Wise, had a similar event at his congregation and they edited, apparently, a national Jewish magazine where they publicized their innovative Hanukkah assemblies and they encouraged other congregations to establish their own, which kind of leads me to believe that before this Hanukkah wasn't really celebrated in a congregation like a synagogue. I'm going to like four Hanukkah things in the next week through the synagogue and the school. So it's kind of crazy that before the Civil War congregations weren't having Hanukkah celebrations, which is kind of crazy to me.
Patrick Kelly:Well, do you think Hanukkah was just a it was a minor holiday.
Nicole Kelly:Because it was a minor holiday.
Patrick Kelly:It was just kind of a blip and if it was going to be celebrated, it's kind of celebrated at home. It was a home.
Nicole Kelly:Yeah, it was much more of I think you know, from what I can guess, from what I've read, it was celebrated at home. It wasn't as much of a communal event. You wouldn't have had Hanukkah parties with your family coming over. It was just like we're going to light a menorah and then we're going to eat some food.
Patrick Kelly:So pretty much every day, yeah, pretty much. It was like a Shabbat thing.
Nicole Kelly:It was just kind of like we're going to light candles and have a meal, but by the 1920s, because Jews are really starting to assimilate into American society. This is fun. Colgate promoted toiletries as Hanukkah gifts, like you know. Things like toothpaste, toothpaste, great Hanukkah gift toothpaste.
Patrick Kelly:I'm a fan. Hey, oral hygiene is very important. It is, you know, I will say, I'm sure, hanukkah Harry. I know Santa Claus loves delivering some, some good toothbrushes and toothpaste, so it also makes a good Hanukkah gift as well, I can imagine. Yeah.
Nicole Kelly:And then candy companies like Bartons, which you know you can get a lot of. During Passover they started selling gelt and this is also fun, aunt Jemima, america's most racist. What is the word? A word?
Patrick Kelly:A mascot.
Nicole Kelly:Yes, so, aunt Jemima, america's most racist mascot was making flower Flower. Is it the most racist?
Patrick Kelly:I don't know. There's Uncle Ben's up there, there's, there are a lot of racist mascots that we land, of the land of lakes.
Nicole Kelly:Oh land of the Native American girl. They took her away. They took her off. Yeah, the native girl got taken off of the land. Now they're just land of lakes, and then it's literally just a lake.
Patrick Kelly:With the sunset.
Nicole Kelly:It's the lake with the sunset. I don't know.
Patrick Kelly:Aunt.
Nicole Kelly:Jemima's up there because like.
Patrick Kelly:I mean Aunt Jemima's bad.
Nicole Kelly:It's pretty bad.
Patrick Kelly:What's that? What's that? Bojangles place Bojangles. Yeah yeah, that's pretty bad. There is a lot of that place is still open. I know.
Nicole Kelly:Yeah. There's there's a lot. So Aunt Jemima which I believe is the most racist mascot uh, they, they, their flower was proclaiming the best flower for latkes. So people are getting in kind of the marketing of this. The Hadassah newsletter is saying Mahjong sets are very appreciated Hanukkah gifts, I'm assuming for the moms, because traditionally Jewish women love to play Mahjong, which I'd love to figure out. Why that happened. I can do like a whole episode on that, so it's.
Patrick Kelly:So it's really complicated, it is.
Nicole Kelly:There's, there's a club, there's a group at the synagogue that meets, and I'm kind of like intrigued, but I don't want to be the person that's like how do I do this? How do I do this?
Patrick Kelly:I'm sure, that's how they get people in, though they're like okay, now go and study these 300 characters.
Nicole Kelly:I know.
Patrick Kelly:This is how you play the game.
Nicole Kelly:But I've seen women like it's great, they go crazy fast, I it's.
Patrick Kelly:It's a whole thing If you ever in New York's Chinatown had down to Columbus Park you could see the guys playing Mahjong and the other guys around them are like are betting and like, yeah, they take it super seriously.
Nicole Kelly:It's very serious but you know, mahjong makes a perfect Hanukkah gift and it starts to become super commercialized. You know Jewish women's magazines or printing articles about decorations and gift giving and it kind of becomes a big part of the holiday. So I think this is happening because Jewish families are doing this to maintain their Jewish identity, which is kind of like distinct from Christian culture, but they're also kind of mirroring Christian culture in America. You know they don't want their kids to feel left out, because I feel like people talk about like the magic of a Christmas and things like Christmas trees and stockings and decorations, where when they're talking about literally giving you toothpaste for Hanukkah, I feel like Well, I think that's the SNL skit with Hanukkah Harry, where he shows up and he's like, what did I get?
Patrick Kelly:And it's like you got a belt. It's like, how would you like some black pants?
Nicole Kelly:Yeah gifts can be fun too, and I think that you know sociologists have actually looked into this that this was a way for Jewish parents to make sure that their kids weren't alienated. So that's really kind of why that happened, and especially in the 1970s when the Habad Rebbe Menachem Schneersten basically his whole thing was public menorah lightings. This is a very topical thing because a lot of places are canceling their public menorah lightings because of what's going on in Israel and they're concerned about protests. But Habad was really instrumental in making sure that public menorah lightings were happening all over the place, so he was really instrumental in kind of facilitating that. You know, we have the largest menorah in the world in Central Park. We do. There's a big one they do in Prospect Park too.
Patrick Kelly:Does it say how big it is? What makes it the?
Nicole Kelly:biggest.
Patrick Kelly:It's very tall oh okay, so it's the tallest menorah, it's like the biggest tallest, menorah.
Speaker 4:Cool.
Nicole Kelly:Okay. So, just like you know which I think is kind of cool, because the public tree lighting which the second public tree lighting happened in New York. The first home was in Boston they beat us by 20 minutes.
Patrick Kelly:Boston.
Nicole Kelly:Boston, and we got to give you something at least.
Patrick Kelly:So I don't know if there's much of like a Christmasy thing in Boston. It's all New York Again come take our holiday tour and you can learn all about that. New York is a great one. Actually. Philly does a good Christmas. Yeah, philly does a good Christmas.
Nicole Kelly:They have like a big Christmas market, but you know the idea of like these public Christmas tree lightings. I like the idea that we're kind of mirroring that with menorah lightings and you know big public celebrations. And what's kind of exciting is at some point they start celebrating Hanukkah at the White House, which is super cool, because what's more American than the White House? Yeah, so in 1951. Who's the first president to celebrate? Harry Truman? Truman Truman In 1951, then Israeli Prime Minister, David Ben-Gurion, who I believe shares my birthday. I feel like that's late 1950.
Nicole Kelly:Truman.
Patrick Kelly:Really Well kind of. I mean FDR was very and Eleanor was very friendly toward, yes, jewish people.
Nicole Kelly:Yes, they used to actually like a huge Roosevelt of being Jew, Like he had so many Jews in his cabinet and around them. They were like, as Roosevelt, Jewish, but I don't know, maybe, maybe I don't know that that does make sense. But Harry Truman was the first one to have a menorah in the White House and it was presented to him by Israeli Prime Minister David Ben-Gurion. And then in 1979, Jimmy Carter took part in the first Hanukkah candle lighting ceremony of the National Minora at the White House and it was on the White House lawn. In 89, George HW Bush displayed a menorah in the White House and in 1993, Bill Clinton invited a group of schoolchildren to the Oval Office for a small ceremony, which I think is kind of cool. In 2008, George W Bush held an official Hanukkah reception in the White House where he kind of linked the occasion from the 1951 gift. He used the menorah and David Ben-Gurion's grandson and the grandson of Truman lit the candles. So it was kind of like a connection between that, which I think is really cool.
Nicole Kelly:So, in 2014, the White House commissioned a menorah made by students at the Max Reign School in Israel, and they invited two of those students to the US to join Barack Obama and Michelle Obama at a celebration that had over 500 guests, which I think is kind of cool.
Patrick Kelly:Did you leave out a couple of press events?
Nicole Kelly:I look I didn't have. There's no information about a couple of those, a couple of those presidents in between. I'm not sure if they celebrated Hanukkah. I know that the first Passover was celebrated during Obama's administration.
Patrick Kelly:Well, I'd be saying I'm kind of shocked that, like Reagan didn't have anything, or Ford, or Nixon.
Nicole Kelly:They might have, but there's no like special information on Kennedy. Yeah, I know there's a lot of presidents that I'm like. Really, Kennedy, like you couldn't have gotten.
Speaker 4:Like.
Nicole Kelly:I find it really hard to believe that Jackie Kennedy would not have thrown a Hanukkah party or at least had a menorah in the White House somewhere. Now I want to talk about, as a geriatric millennial, the buzzword Christmaca, because I remember that when this kind of became a national thing because of oh, my first memory of Christmaca has got to be the OC, that is.
Patrick Kelly:I remember that was the big thing for a while, and, granted, I was living in Orange County at the time, so anything that happened on the OC was either embraced fully or I rolled by anybody who was from Orange County at the time even just calling it the OC.
Speaker 4:So what's it gonna be? Huh, you want your menorah or a candy cane. Hmm, christmas or Hanukkah? Uh, but don't worry about it, buddy, because in this house you don't have to choose. Allow me to introduce you to a little something that I like to call Christmas. Christmas, that's right, it's a new holiday, ryan, and it's Sweepin' the Nation. Hey, fellas, we got the treat hey. Or at least the living room. Guys a little help.
Speaker 4:Just saved a spot for you right there. Put your muscle into it. Excellent To the right to the right to the right. Don't hurt it, those needles are brittle, that's perfect. You guys, you guys. A plus, a plus. I love the holidays, I love them all.
Nicole Kelly:We didn't really know how to raise stuff.
Speaker 4:Yeah. So I raised myself and in doing so I created the greatest super holiday known to mankind, drawing on the best that Christianity and Judaism have to offer. And you call it Christmaca. Just hearing you say it makes me feel all festive. Allow me to elaborate. You see, for my father here, a poor, struggling Jew growing up in the Bronx, well, christmas had meant Chinese food in a movie. And for my mom over here, waspy McWasp, well, I meant a tree, I meant stockings and all the trimmings. Isn't that right? We're very proud, I'm not a wasp.
Speaker 4:Sure, you're not. Other highlights include eight days of presents, followed by one day of many presents. So what do you think Sounds great for you guys?
Nicole Kelly:Do you think that is the first instance of Christmaca?
Patrick Kelly:If there is an instance before it, I am not aware of it.
Nicole Kelly:So it's actually a lot older than you would think and, like all things Christmas related, it started in Germany. The way we celebrate Christmas in America has a lot to do with our German immigration, so this actually started in Germany in the 19th century with middle class Jews. A lot of them would have what we would now call like a Hanukkah bush, like Christmas trees. You know Theodor Herzl, who is the founder of Zionism. He celebrated Christmas, or at the very least he had a tree up in his house for his children and he suggested they call it a Hanukkah tree. So way, way, way back, we have Hanukkah bushes and Hanukkah trees.
Nicole Kelly:That's interesting yeah yeah, yeah, so there's actually a German word which I'm going to butcher, weinigke, which is a combination of Christmas and Hanukkah. So this is a 19th century Christmaca word in German. So way, way, way, way, way, a long time ago Wow, you know a lot of German families, you know, especially in the middle class, they were assimilating to German society, which we all know. What happened because of that? They sell. It comes up every day, guys. They basically just literally celebrated Christmas, but like as a secular winter festival not related to the birth of Christ. So they would have, you know, a Christmas tree, they would have stockings.
Patrick Kelly:Well, like many Americans today, yeah.
Nicole Kelly:So the first historically documented Christmas tree like we actually have, like historical proof of this, was actually erected in Vienna in 1814 by Jewish socialite Fanny von Arsteen, who had brought the custom over for Berlin. So the first literal, documented Christmas tree was put up by a Jew.
Patrick Kelly:That's so funny.
Nicole Kelly:Yeah, it's kind of crazy. So this all started like way before 2003 with the OC. So if you're not familiar with you know this episode. There is a main character, seth Cohen, whose father is Jewish and his mother's not, so he basically grew up in this interfaith household and they celebrate both, so he kind of combined the words and called it Christmaca.
Patrick Kelly:Well, was the word called Christmaca? Was that a? Was that a device of the OC television show or what? That word you mentioned earlier, the German word, is what they used to refer to it as.
Nicole Kelly:I think the OC is kind of what started the Christmaca thing. I mean obviously existed in German, but I'd never heard the word before you know all that with the OC Gotcha.
Patrick Kelly:So the German word is the traditional word. Yeah.
Nicole Kelly:And then the writers of the OC created Christmaca for this episode Because, as far as I know, like, the creator grew up in a very similar household and that was kind of what he celebrated, so he kind of Well, that's kind of the story on Seinfeld of how Festivus came to be right.
Patrick Kelly:The fam that one family actually created a Festivus and then the writer decided to put it into an episode of Seinfeld.
Nicole Kelly:Yeah, and I think you know with you know a lot of Jews marrying non-Jews and everybody kind of want to want to celebrate holidays and bring their traditions. This becomes super popular. You know, now I think we see I see a lot of advertisements on even Judaica websites for ornaments. I'll see things like Tree Toppers. I saw like a Matzabox ornament on Modern Tribe which I thought was really cute actually.
Nicole Kelly:You know I'll see dreidel ornaments, jewish star ornaments, like on Etsy. You know people are doing that. So I think you know maybe a partner you know does they're not celebrating Christmas but the partner really wants a tree, or maybe you're a Jew who really wants a tree because you consider it an American thing. So I think definitely in like the last 20 years, people have really embraced, you know, aspects of Christmas and turned it into Hanukkah. You know the idea of like a Hanukkah advent calendar. You know, with the If you don't know what an advent calendar is, because I didn't know it until a few years ago basically it's like a countdown to Christmas and you might get like a little paper thing and you open a door and there's candy inside or you have like a really, really fancy one. So it's basically a countdown for Christmas, but now you can do like a counting up for Hanukkah. It'll be like you add a candle, that sort of thing, like my daughter has when she made in like a little preschool class. So that's, I think, something that's been adopted from that as well.
Nicole Kelly:And other things like pajamas. I did not grow up getting Hanukkah pajamas because these things don't exist, but because a lot of people get pajamas for Christmas, especially on Christmas Eve. Hanukkah pajamas have become a huge thing. I feel like every children's company that I buy clothes from advertised Hanukkah pajamas this year. So it's definitely become a. It's definitely become a big part of the holiday, I think because of Christmas. I mean, are there other things that you see that you're like that is clearly a knockoff and I can think of. Another thing is baking. We have a. I'm staring at a make your own menorah with frosting kit that I got at Target and that's it's definitely reminiscent of like a gingerbread house.
Patrick Kelly:Yeah, yeah. I think there's a lot that I see that tries to tie at least traditional commercial aspects of Christmas into Hanukkah. Like what Like in some way and in some cases I think they're really culturally ignorant and kind of disrespectful.
Nicole Kelly:Oh, there is an Instagram called Hanukkah fails, which is really funny.
Patrick Kelly:Well, I, but honestly, let's. It's clearly like some ad rep somewhere decided to have a company you know told them, hey, you've got to create Hanukkah stuff, and they just hired some designer to Google search a Hanukkah, or they Google search Jewish, and then they just pulled images and created like a sweater or created something that is just a little culturally insensitive, I would feel. But there are certain things that I do think are interesting that have become more and more Christmas. Ask, within Hanukkah, that I've even witnessed things like houses being decorated with lights.
Nicole Kelly:Yeah.
Patrick Kelly:You know, of course, the Hanukkah Bush is the big one with tree toppers that are the star.
Nicole Kelly:David, which, interestingly enough, if you, I saw Leopold shot, which the first act takes place in Vienna in the late 18 hundreds and they had like a mixed faith family and they put a Jewish star on a Christmas tree, which I thought was really interesting.
Patrick Kelly:Hmm, that is interesting yeah.
Nicole Kelly:You can, you can Google image that Leopold shot and you could probably see that so clearly. This is something that, like, maybe was even happening, like I was saying, like in the 19th century.
Patrick Kelly:Yeah, maybe. Maybe that was part of that traditional Christmas celebrating that was going on in Germany back then.
Nicole Kelly:I just feel like even you know, my mom talks about like I got a doll for Hanukkah. It wasn't like she was getting a present every night, and then, when she had us, it's a present every night. And now our daughter is like it's a present from us every night and it's a present from my mom every night and it's a present from my sister every night. So it kind of becomes, you know, it has become super commercialized.
Patrick Kelly:Well, I think it has become more commercialized, as Christmas has become more commercialized. I would agree with that, I mean again, you see, one holiday and because Hanukkah has kind of become fairly reactionary now. Yeah. To the aspects of Christmas. I mean even things like holiday movies, like on the Hallmark.
Nicole Kelly:Oh my gosh, it's just a Hanukkah movie. That was only like 80% offensive.
Patrick Kelly:But you know, those Hallmark holiday films that come on that of course are traditionally very Christmas based, but they've now tried to introduce more Hanukkah, which I appreciate I'm all for representation and I get excited about this merch I'm not going to lie, I own a lot of it.
Nicole Kelly:But it is very telling that we've turned kind of this minor holiday into not a competition with Christmas but, like I said earlier, as a way to make sure that Jewish kids don't feel othered or left out or like, well, why don't we get to decorate, you know, with frosting and cookies? So it's like, oh well, we now have a menorah kit, you know that sort of thing.
Patrick Kelly:Well, I will say I do think that it is going both ways, that it's not just that Christmas is becoming bigger and bigger and bigger and more and more commercialized and it's affecting all of these aspects of celebration within Hanukkah, within American culture. I think that traditional Jewish things that are celebrated around the same holiday as well have now, in turn, affected Christmas in the sense of things like big blockbuster movies coming out on Christmas.
Nicole Kelly:Day. So this is a thing that my parents used to do in the 80s. They loved to go to movies on Christmas because nobody was there, because everybody was obviously opening up presents with their family and having breakfast. However, through the course of the 90s, people started to realize that you know, you have breakfast, you open your presents like what do you can do for the rest of the day, until dinner. Oh, we're going to go see a movie.
Patrick Kelly:And now Traditionally, I believe that it was kind of a Jewish thing to go out and see a movie on Christmas and get. Chinese food and then get Chinese food and I think the Chinese food thing has now become even more popular, even amongst Christian families who don't want to maybe make a meal. Hey, what are you going to order? Order Chinese food.
Nicole Kelly:Yeah, it's interesting that kind of the holidays have affected each other, especially in America.
Patrick Kelly:All these American things that are happening and the way that certain people who are maybe not celebrating those holidays, are now suddenly adopting the ways that people used to do when these holidays were going on. This idea of eight days of presents now for some families gets spread out for Christmas over, you know, the entire month.
Patrick Kelly:If you're going and visiting a grandparent that's far away, maybe you're going to celebrate that day of gift giving, and then maybe Christmas Eve is a whole another day of gift giving, and then you have the actual day of Christmas, there's a lot of gift giving.
Nicole Kelly:It gets expensive.
Patrick Kelly:Maybe some of these things are, maybe not consciously, but maybe with their effecting each other their culture affecting each other and possibly, who knows, in a couple of hundred years, christmas might become the norm over two different separate holidays.
Nicole Kelly:It's definitely possible, yeah, so it's been fun talking to you about you know, some things that I learned and kind of just touching base about Hanukkah in general.
Patrick Kelly:Yeah, it's fun to do these little informational episodes, and one that's so topical because it's Hanukkah, it's starting tomorrow.
Nicole Kelly:Yeah, so if you're listening, please have a happy Hanukkah or a merry Christmas, if that's what you celebrate.
Patrick Kelly:Crazy Kwanzaa, crazy Kwanzaa, yeah, happy holidays.
Speaker 5:Girl, it's that special time of year, the festival of lights. But ain't no light shine brighter than the one in your eyes. Got a weekend in day of love for you, this Hanukkah girl. Got a weekend in day to show you how much I care. Got a weekend in day of presents for girls. Who's better than any, nora? When you light the candles, baby, I wanna be there. I wanna be there. Keep the flame struck the night and say the blessing You'll do your sparkling eyes and reflect the flame. Keep the flame. Your perfect lips sing out the prayer we're both expressing. You make a lot of. Call it my name. Got a weekend in day of love for you, this Hanukkah girl. Got a weekend in day to show you how much I care. When the world gets set, our hearts will free us, just like Judas Maccabees. When you light the candles, baby, I wanna be there.
Speaker 5:Candle fire, oh girl. You spin me like a train. Candle sex. You pick me up when I fall down. Candle sex. Then you wrap me like your place and rock me like a cradle. Candle fire. Your eyes are fires that make me melt. You're rubbing your spleen and holding her down.
Speaker 2:Girl baruch, atah, I don't know how you do. Elo, hey, new melech, I all love to be with you.
Speaker 5:I share my life with you, the midst of love. Vitsibhanu lechalich, never leave me. Shell Hanukkah. Got a weekend in day of love for you. This Hanukkah girl Got a weekend in day to show you how much I care. Got a weekend in day of presents for her Girl shines brighter than any menorah when you light the candles. Baby, I wanna be there. Good yonza baby Got a weekend in day of love for you. This Hanukkah girl Got a weekend in day to show you how much I care. Got a light of love who stay reflected Eight times longer than expected when you light the candles, baby, I wanna be there. When you light the candles, baby, I wanna be there. When you light the candles, baby, I wanna be there. Happy Hanukkah girl.
