Here in Moishe House Vienna, we organise Shabbat about every 2 weeks, shiourim, day trips, cooking club, musical nights, movie night, pingpong tournaments, game nights, themed nights, artistic events. In the future, we hope to incorporate some interactive event using internet with other Moishe Houses and important speakers. We would also like to add more trips and create a Jewish business League.
We hope all is well for everyone.
Shabbat Shalom!
Daniel, Michael, Eytan
Thursday, February 4, 2010
Wednesday, February 3, 2010
MohoDen - To infinity, and beyond...
New Directions
As we are still a relatively new house in the Moho community, we are often moving in new directions. The creative aspects of our programming has been informed by various ideas, new members, and fun conversations at each of our events -- leading to tikkun olam activities, an upcoming discussion that could range from Raj Patel's new book The Value of Nothing, Alan Derschowitz's new book The Case for Moral Clarity: Israel, Hamas, and Gaza, the State of our Union, as well as ways for supporting relief and rehabilitation activities in Haiti.
In examining our house programming, we will continue to have our shabbat dinners at least once a month, with different food themes...and we'll also be going ice skating the end of this month, which should be good fun. we look forward to continued input from our members and well, tapping the creativity that is core to our community. We're also looking forward to taking advantage of the new web-based programming tools being offered to us as Moho members for future event planning.
As we are still a relatively new house in the Moho community, we are often moving in new directions. The creative aspects of our programming has been informed by various ideas, new members, and fun conversations at each of our events -- leading to tikkun olam activities, an upcoming discussion that could range from Raj Patel's new book The Value of Nothing, Alan Derschowitz's new book The Case for Moral Clarity: Israel, Hamas, and Gaza, the State of our Union, as well as ways for supporting relief and rehabilitation activities in Haiti.
In examining our house programming, we will continue to have our shabbat dinners at least once a month, with different food themes...and we'll also be going ice skating the end of this month, which should be good fun. we look forward to continued input from our members and well, tapping the creativity that is core to our community. We're also looking forward to taking advantage of the new web-based programming tools being offered to us as Moho members for future event planning.
New Ideas for Moishe House Boston
Here at Moishe House Boston, we've been thinking about how we can grow in the areas of spirituality, music, and fun. In particular, we were interested in how to help people experience enjoy Shabbat as a whole, not just Friday night. We also have been trying to figure out how to get broad community feedback on the vision and direction of our community, to help our community board develop a vision statement, short and long term goals, and a strategic plan.
So, three new program ideas. First, the fabrangen (means "bring-along" in yiddish), a program on one or two Saturday afternoons a month where people bring food, mashke (whiskey), Torah teachings, and niggunim (melodies) to share, and we just jam together until Shabbat ends, at which point we will do havalah together. Fabrangens were a big thing back in the ghetto in Eastern Europe, especially among chassidim, and we are bringing them back. We are going to do it on weeks when we also have Shabbat dinner, so that people in our community can get the feel of a holistic Shabbat experience.
Second, on off weeks where we don't have Shabbat, once a month we are going to have a group sing/jam session, where people bring their instruments, voices, and song books and we just sing and jam together. We sit in a big circle, and go around so that each person gets to pick a song. Two of our community board members did this as the "Pajammy Jam" session where people jammed while wearing pajamas, so we may incorporate that too as we make this more regular. At least while the time works, we are going to open these sessions with Havdalah, to help with the holistic Shabbat goal.
Finally, we are holding a big membership meeting on March 7th, and we just brainstormed a program that is designed to get everyone thinking about the vision of our community, and give our community board direction to move forward. It is also designed to include everyone, not just people who like/feel comfortable talking at meetings.:)
Here's how it works: we write 10 key questions on the wall, in the form of spectra, and people will be asked to put a red sticker dot on where they think we are now, and a green sticker dot on where they want us to be. For example, we are trying to figure out whether our social justice work should be more focused on local or national or international issues. So we have a spectrum with "Boston" on one side and "The whole world" on the other, and "National politics" somewhere in the middle. We assume most people will agree that we are now focused on Boston, but we are curious whether people will say - with their green sticker dots - that they want us to stay Boston focused or be more in the middle.
We look forward to reading your brainstorms and getting ideas from you!
Margie, Moishe House Boston
So, three new program ideas. First, the fabrangen (means "bring-along" in yiddish), a program on one or two Saturday afternoons a month where people bring food, mashke (whiskey), Torah teachings, and niggunim (melodies) to share, and we just jam together until Shabbat ends, at which point we will do havalah together. Fabrangens were a big thing back in the ghetto in Eastern Europe, especially among chassidim, and we are bringing them back. We are going to do it on weeks when we also have Shabbat dinner, so that people in our community can get the feel of a holistic Shabbat experience.
Second, on off weeks where we don't have Shabbat, once a month we are going to have a group sing/jam session, where people bring their instruments, voices, and song books and we just sing and jam together. We sit in a big circle, and go around so that each person gets to pick a song. Two of our community board members did this as the "Pajammy Jam" session where people jammed while wearing pajamas, so we may incorporate that too as we make this more regular. At least while the time works, we are going to open these sessions with Havdalah, to help with the holistic Shabbat goal.
Finally, we are holding a big membership meeting on March 7th, and we just brainstormed a program that is designed to get everyone thinking about the vision of our community, and give our community board direction to move forward. It is also designed to include everyone, not just people who like/feel comfortable talking at meetings.:)
Here's how it works: we write 10 key questions on the wall, in the form of spectra, and people will be asked to put a red sticker dot on where they think we are now, and a green sticker dot on where they want us to be. For example, we are trying to figure out whether our social justice work should be more focused on local or national or international issues. So we have a spectrum with "Boston" on one side and "The whole world" on the other, and "National politics" somewhere in the middle. We assume most people will agree that we are now focused on Boston, but we are curious whether people will say - with their green sticker dots - that they want us to stay Boston focused or be more in the middle.
We look forward to reading your brainstorms and getting ideas from you!
Margie, Moishe House Boston
Tuesday, February 2, 2010
Envisioning the Future of MHDC...
In conjunction with the retreat (and probably largely as a result of the retreat) our house did some soul searching about the kind of programming we’d like to offer. At points in the past, programming has come about in a fairly haphazard manner. So we were interested in thinking more deliberately about our programming, offering more Jewish content and generally providing a meaningful forum for folks in our community to interact with the world and feel like they’re improving it and also deriving some personal satisfaction from their involvement. Slowly but surely I think we’ve been making this happen. We hosted a Tu Bishvat Seder last week, next week we’re hosting a guest speaker from the African Refugee Development Center in Israel and serving brunch, we’re devoting our next Shabbat to Haiti relief, we’ve decided to offer up our house as a place to say Shabbat blessings even on nights when we’re not hosting a dinner, and we’re exploring an exciting partnership with Challah for Hunger. So, in short, I feel like we actually are realizing our vision in a lot of ways.
And though we need to be realistic about how quickly and dramatically we can change our programming (and whether we even want to change it that dramatically) it is instructive to envision what could be. For a long time I’ve been trying to figure out meaningful ways to engage our community in the larger DC community. I love the idea of doing more volunteer projects and working with local non-profits who are already doing fabulous anti-poverty/community-uplift work. We do that to come extent, but our involvement could be much more extensive. I think it would be great to gather a team of folks from our community who build relationships with local groups so that our house and the MHDC community have a constant stream of community-based projects to engage in.
Other thoughts – For a while we’ve talked about the possibility of having a community art show – gathering art from members of our community and displaying it (possibly selling it too). Maybe featuring a local band, or a few local bands? And overall just taking advantage of the space that our house affords us and making it beautiful with other people’s art (if only temporarily)!
-Rivka
And though we need to be realistic about how quickly and dramatically we can change our programming (and whether we even want to change it that dramatically) it is instructive to envision what could be. For a long time I’ve been trying to figure out meaningful ways to engage our community in the larger DC community. I love the idea of doing more volunteer projects and working with local non-profits who are already doing fabulous anti-poverty/community-uplift work. We do that to come extent, but our involvement could be much more extensive. I think it would be great to gather a team of folks from our community who build relationships with local groups so that our house and the MHDC community have a constant stream of community-based projects to engage in.
Other thoughts – For a while we’ve talked about the possibility of having a community art show – gathering art from members of our community and displaying it (possibly selling it too). Maybe featuring a local band, or a few local bands? And overall just taking advantage of the space that our house affords us and making it beautiful with other people’s art (if only temporarily)!
-Rivka
When Are You Coming Over?
Shabbaton Weekend
This is a perfect blog prompt because I just came up with the ideal Moishe House weekend for our guests. Since we live in an amazing house in a luxurious location the idea of an energy packed 36 hours feels amazing. I imagine the retreat taking place during the Spring Summer time, right before sunset. Our first ritual is to welcome Shabbat in a very powerful way; we would gather and decompress inwardly and together. The food that we serve is healthy and kosher. As we enjoy the cuisine and the company we ease into discussions about “what does it mean to be Jewish and how can we preserve our values for the next generation?” After dinner we sit back and relax enjoy some sweets and just hang out and set up our sleeping bags on our huge patio and get ready for an evening under the stars. I love sleeping outside in nice weather and our patio can accommodate a lot of people. The following morning we awake at sunrise with meditation and yoga. After practice we have a delicious healthy breakfast and then begin to have discussions about our lifestyles and what we can accomplish and how to deal with success. Torah is the best self improvement text out there, which would serve as the ideal resource. This will lead us into noon prayer and meditation. After our noon ritual we have lunch and then nap time, during this block of the day, our guests can walk by the lake or lounge at our place. After our lunch break, we reconvene for another session reflecting on nutrition and being well. Then we as a group we begin to prepare for Havdala and then dinner. After dinner we go out into the world as individuals and a group and then party till the Sun comes up. This and so much more will be created as our ideas come to fruition.
This is a perfect blog prompt because I just came up with the ideal Moishe House weekend for our guests. Since we live in an amazing house in a luxurious location the idea of an energy packed 36 hours feels amazing. I imagine the retreat taking place during the Spring Summer time, right before sunset. Our first ritual is to welcome Shabbat in a very powerful way; we would gather and decompress inwardly and together. The food that we serve is healthy and kosher. As we enjoy the cuisine and the company we ease into discussions about “what does it mean to be Jewish and how can we preserve our values for the next generation?” After dinner we sit back and relax enjoy some sweets and just hang out and set up our sleeping bags on our huge patio and get ready for an evening under the stars. I love sleeping outside in nice weather and our patio can accommodate a lot of people. The following morning we awake at sunrise with meditation and yoga. After practice we have a delicious healthy breakfast and then begin to have discussions about our lifestyles and what we can accomplish and how to deal with success. Torah is the best self improvement text out there, which would serve as the ideal resource. This will lead us into noon prayer and meditation. After our noon ritual we have lunch and then nap time, during this block of the day, our guests can walk by the lake or lounge at our place. After our lunch break, we reconvene for another session reflecting on nutrition and being well. Then we as a group we begin to prepare for Havdala and then dinner. After dinner we go out into the world as individuals and a group and then party till the Sun comes up. This and so much more will be created as our ideas come to fruition.
Monday, February 1, 2010
New Directions from Philadelphia - sounds like GLEE!
Something we here at Moishe House Philadelphia have been struggling with for the better part of a year and a half now is how to best incorporate regular education into our events, Jewish or otherwise. We are fairly good at hosting speakers from out-of-town (especially Pardes) that draw a good crow, but those events are few and far between, so the crowd they draw does not have to commit that much. The problem arrises when we attempt to create a regularly scheduled event involving education for people to come to.
As brief background, in the last year and a half we have attempted regular secular learning events where participants lead presentations, regular Jewish education events where we bring in learned people to discuss topics that participants choose, and even sent out a survey to ask about this information. Unfortunately, no one showed up for the former two events and only 5 people filled in the survey. Basically, even though people have nebulous "interest," no one is putting their feet on the ground for it.
With that in mind, we are experimenting with a partnership with another few Jewish organizations in our area on a program called "Topics on Tap." It is a irregular regular event where a series of speakers present or facilitate conversations on Jewish topics weekly over the course of a month. It is an interesting compromise where participants do not have to commit to one event but might be more willing to come because it is 1) at a bar and 2) for a limited time only.
Another concept some of us (read: Brian) are pondering is called "pecha kucha." MHProvidence told us about this at the regional retreat, but the basic concept is that anyone can present on a subject using 20 powerpoint slides with 20 second for each slide. That limits the presentations to 6 minutes and 40 seconds each and creates a fast-paced educational environment. It might work and it might not, but it is something new we could try.
Now you've gotten a little peak into how we at MHP are thinking about our programming. If you have any suggestions, by all means send them over!
As brief background, in the last year and a half we have attempted regular secular learning events where participants lead presentations, regular Jewish education events where we bring in learned people to discuss topics that participants choose, and even sent out a survey to ask about this information. Unfortunately, no one showed up for the former two events and only 5 people filled in the survey. Basically, even though people have nebulous "interest," no one is putting their feet on the ground for it.
With that in mind, we are experimenting with a partnership with another few Jewish organizations in our area on a program called "Topics on Tap." It is a irregular regular event where a series of speakers present or facilitate conversations on Jewish topics weekly over the course of a month. It is an interesting compromise where participants do not have to commit to one event but might be more willing to come because it is 1) at a bar and 2) for a limited time only.
Another concept some of us (read: Brian) are pondering is called "pecha kucha." MHProvidence told us about this at the regional retreat, but the basic concept is that anyone can present on a subject using 20 powerpoint slides with 20 second for each slide. That limits the presentations to 6 minutes and 40 seconds each and creates a fast-paced educational environment. It might work and it might not, but it is something new we could try.
Now you've gotten a little peak into how we at MHP are thinking about our programming. If you have any suggestions, by all means send them over!
New Directions for Mh Warsaw
New Directions for Mh Warsaw
What we're lacking? I personally don't know, if think that we doing our best to provide all kinds of events: cultural like concerts or lectures, religious like shabbats, we always are organizing something during holidays, parties, cooking classes.
But we can always do something to improve our Mh offer. I think that we need to focus on regular events for smaller, regular gropus like 10-15. Of course a party for 60 people should take place in Mh Warsaw but we need to organize something like learing groups(maybe hebrew, yiddish) or disussion gropus.
The other thing is trips. We had amazing and very memorable trip to Auschwitz last week. And for sure when EUJS will invite us next tmie we won't hesitate.
The other thing is that we need to start to work on tikkun olam kind of events, because swaps are not enough, we already planned enviromental lecture for Tu Bishvat with our former MH resident Jakub.
So what I really think and I hope the rest from Mh Warsaw team will confirm that we do need a time to think for new driections for us, but without that time we'are also doing great!
What we're lacking? I personally don't know, if think that we doing our best to provide all kinds of events: cultural like concerts or lectures, religious like shabbats, we always are organizing something during holidays, parties, cooking classes.
But we can always do something to improve our Mh offer. I think that we need to focus on regular events for smaller, regular gropus like 10-15. Of course a party for 60 people should take place in Mh Warsaw but we need to organize something like learing groups(maybe hebrew, yiddish) or disussion gropus.
The other thing is trips. We had amazing and very memorable trip to Auschwitz last week. And for sure when EUJS will invite us next tmie we won't hesitate.
The other thing is that we need to start to work on tikkun olam kind of events, because swaps are not enough, we already planned enviromental lecture for Tu Bishvat with our former MH resident Jakub.
So what I really think and I hope the rest from Mh Warsaw team will confirm that we do need a time to think for new driections for us, but without that time we'are also doing great!
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