Harry - The View from Here has an interesting piece about a new Jewish Agency tour program that could go head-to-head with Birthright.
About 2 years ago a distant related-by-marriage "cousin" of ours came from Australia on a two week Birthright program. She and her boyfriend were part of the first group of Australian kids to be offered the trip.
They wanted to spend some time in Israel after the program finished, so they asked to stay at my parents. Now my parents, being both religious and old fuddy duddies, didn't want them to share a room together. Being rather un-impressed with this sleeping arrangement they eventually moved to stay with my sister. My sister is not all that religious, but she has always kept a kosher home. She showed them round her flat, what was milky, what was meaty... She went out and later when she came home she found a piece of pizza on a meat plate in the fridge. When my "cousin" returned from wherever she had been, my sister pointed out to her that she had put a piece of pizza on a meat plate. She responded, "yeah, but it's meat pizza."
At the time my sister wrote a letter to the Jewish day school where this "cousin" had recently graduate. She asked the question, "how is it that someone can go through 12 years of education in an orthodox Jewish dayschool and come out of it not knowing that a piece of meat pizza is not milky, is not meaty, it's treif?"
I think a fairer question here would be, why bother bringing them on Birthright? What can they gain from it and what do Israel or the Jewish community they come from get back from it. Perhaps it's time to think of better/other ways of inspiring our children to love Judaism and in turn Israel. Comments please....
