Kulanu Highlights
- Announcing the 2011 Kulanu-Kaifeng Speaking Tour!
- Help Suriname's Young Jews Visit Israel
- Beautiful Slideshow on the History of Jewish Kaifeng
- Get Involved with Kulanu
Announcing the 2011 Kulanu-Kaifeng Speaking Tour!
Shi Lei by SJI
Shi Lei's 2010 Kaifeng speaking tour received rave reviews, and due to popular demand, Shi Lei has agreed to return next year for three weeks only, from February 15th through March 7th, 2011, to share the history of the fascinating Jewish community of Kaifeng. A professional tour guide in China (specializing in tours of Jewish sites), Shi Lei has studied Hebrew and Jewish studies for three years in Israel, and is an experienced lecturer. Shi Lei will discuss what Jewish traditions were lost in Kaifeng and what was preserved through the centuries, and what some young Chinese Jews are doing to re-connect to their roots now.
Click here for more about the Kulanu-Kaifeng 2011 speaking tour!
(Thanks to the Sino-Judaic Institute for this photo of Shi Lei.)
Help Suriname's Young Jews Visit Israel
Suriname’s Birthrigh Israel’s candidates
Suriname, the smallest country in South America, is home to the oldest surviving Jewish community in the Americas. Until recently, the Jewish community was disintegrating. Now, with help from Kulanu volunteers, the Jews of Suriname are working to reconnect with the Jewish past, and with the wider Jewish world.
In order to support this renaissance, the Jews of Suriname hope to send a group of its young people on Birthright Israel. There, Suriname's young Jewish leaders will have the opportunity to see Israel, connect with Jews from all over the world, and learn Torah. Then, they are committed to returning to Suriname and bringing back what they have learned in order to strengthen and revitalize their community. Click here to read more about this group and their trip, and go to www.kulanu.org/donate to make a contribution toward their Birthright trip to Israel!
For more photos and bios of some of the participants and a more detailed proposal, click here.
Beautiful Online Slideshow on the History of Jewish Kaifeng
Kaifeng Jews reading Torah
Enid Bloch, a photographer and scholar from Buffalo, NY, in collaboration with Shi Lei, has made a superb slideshow telling the history of the Kaifeng Jewish community. Shi Lei will be working with this slideshow as the basis for his presentations.
You can view this Kulanu-Kaifeng slideshow at www.kulanu.phanfare.com.
For more about the Jews of Kaifeng, see the China community page on the Kulanu website at www.kulanu.org/china, and check out the Kulanu-Kaifeng speaking tour coming to North America in February, 2011!
Get Involved with Kulanu
Check out our Getting Involved Page for lots of ideas on how you can support Kulanu. Here are a few:
- Make a donation
- Check out our volunteer opportunities
- Help spread the word by becoming a fan of Kulanu’s page on Facebook. You can now become a fan by texting "fan Kulanu" to FBOOK (32665) on your cell phone!
- Tell bar and bat mitzvah students, as well as rabbis and Jewish educators, about our bar/bat mitzvah program - send us your address and let us know how many brochures you would like to distribute.
We appreciate your support of Kulanu's work with Jewish communities around the world!