Alumni

Ramah Marriages

Rick Malter & Rosalie Moss Malter
Camp Attended: USY High, Wisconsin
Met: 1955
Married: 1961
Rosalie and I met at the USY program at Logan Square Congregation Shaare Zedek in Chicago in 1955. We both were at Ramah Wisconsin in 1956. We continued to date throughout our college undergraduate years and were married at Temple Emanuel in Chicago in June 1961. The Ramah experience in the beautiful Northwoods of Wisconsin provided us with an appreciation of Judaism and nature that we continue to experience in the Sedona Red Rock area of northern Arizona where we now reside. The Ramah experience also introduced us to clinical psychology and psychoanalysis that shaped our professional education and life's work. We wrote a book together that describes the psychological model that served as the foundation for our therapy practice. I recently wrote an article "In Every Generation..." that describes my view of the dynamics of anti-semitism in every generation." Our work is on our web site www.malterinstitute.org.

Richard Panush & Rena Joffe Panush
Camp Attended: Israel Seminar
Met: 1963
Married: 1965
I roomed on the first Israel Seminar with Ellen Panush Zelenko through whom I met her brother, Richard, a many year veteran of Wisconsin Ramah. We were both at U of Mich in Ann Arbor where we lived for a couple of years after we married. Rich was finishing up med school and I undergrad.

Martin Jeffrey Berman & Marylin Gottlieb Berman
Met at Israel Seminar
Programs Attended: Mador, Wisconsin
Met: 1967
Married: 1971
On our way up to Mt. Carmel, Marylin was saying how she could not stand Southern accents and Danny Berger, an old friend from Ramah Wisconsin said meet Marty Berman from Jacksonville, Florida. Marylin said would you believe - a strong Southern accent? We went to Mador and then Wisconsin for two more years and then got married.

Richard Gavatin & Linda Spitzer Gavatin
Camp Attended: Israel Seminar
Met: 1968
Married: 1987
We met at Camp Ramah in Israel in the magical summer of 1968. We were both 15.

There were two kids from Sweden. I was one of them. I met the girl who became my wife then. Her name is Linda from St. Louis, where we live now.

We had a great time; this was the first summer that Camp Ramah was in Israel. We arrived in Jerusalem, the Goldstein Village, and before we even unpacked, we were taken to a big hall and given a lecture on security and safety. This was the summer after the Six-Day War.

We traveled all over Israel for 7 weeks. We visited almost 100% of Israel. We were in Haifa, Safed and the Golan Heights in the North,Caesarea, Natanya, Herzliya and Tel-Aviv on the Mediterranean, Jerusalem, Bethlehem, in the middle of the country. We were at the Dead Sea, Ein Gedi (the most beautiful place on earth?). We visited Sde Boker where Ben-Gurion’s Kibbutz was, and we spent a lot of time in Eilat.

We participated in an outdoor concert in Bethlehem with Richard Tucker and other singers in Verdi’s Requiem. Beautiful. What an atmosphere. We visited Hadassah hospitals in Jerusalem and my wife, who is a Five Generation Hadassah volunteer, regarded that as a highlight – we both now volunteer for Hadassah in the States. We were all over the place. We even ventured in to Gaza which back then – already – was a very unfriendly place.

Linda and I were “boyfriend/girlfriend” in Israel. Very innocent, holding hands, but we were apparently lovers in our heart, as we never forgot each other after that. I went back to Sweden and she went to college (in Ohio, but still), and then she came to visit me in Sweden and I came to St. Louis and then I moved here in 1987 and we got married in a Conservative Synagogue.

One of the signs that we were “close” already then, at the age of 15, was that one day we were given some “free” time in Tel-Aviv and I wanted to buy a gift for my mom in Sweden. I asked Linda if she wanted to go with me to help me pick out something. We found a necklace that I gave to my mother and that she wore every single day between 1968 and 1984 when she passed away. When I came to St. Louis, three years later, I gave it “back” to Linda and asked if remembered it. She did.

We have no kids but Linda’s siblings do, and their kids are at Camp Ramah, and Linda’s brother, and sister-in-law (now a rabbi) used to be counselors at Camp Ramah.

How important for my sense of belonging was Camp Ramah? Immeasurable. No words can adequately describe the role of that summer in my commitment to Judaism. It was the turning point for me and without that summer at Camp Ramah, I would most likely have gone the way most European young Jews go: Into assimilation. That is a one-way street with no return. Thanks to Camp Ramah I survived as a Jewish person! Thanks and Congratulations on 60 years and we wish you the best for the next 60!

Alan Kaell & Diana Schachter Kaell
Met at Israel Seminar
Programs Attended: Wisconsin, Poconos
Met: 1970
Married: 1975
Alan was from Wisconsin Ramah, Diana was from Poconos Ramah. We met during the wonderful Israel Seminar program. We also worked as counselors at Wisconsin Ramah during the summer of 1972. Rabbi Burton Cohen of Wisconsin Ramah married us in 1975.

Jonathan Kremer & Ellen Helfman Kremer
Camp Attended: Israel Seminar
Met: 1970
Married: 1980
Ramah in Wisconsin, Ontario, the Berkshires and on Seminar gave me a love for Shabbat, Israeli dancing, and the best Conservative Judaism has to offer.I knew that I wanted to live Ramah 24/7. When I remet a Ramah Seminar peer while Israeli dancing at MIT, shared values and experience led to love and marriage.

Norman Beitner & Ruth Lipnik Beitner
Programs Attended: Canada, Israel Seminar
Married: 1977
My husband and I met at Camp Ramah in Canada and then went on Israel Seminar together. We both attended the University of Michigan and ended up in the same dorm. Our son, Aaron, also met his wife, Marci Orman, at Camp Ramah in Canada. They were campers together and also attended Israel Seminar together. However, he went to the University of Michigan School of Engineering and she attended Western Ontario.

Seth Greenberg & Ilene Spark Greenberg
Programs Attended: New England, Wisconsin, Tichon Ramah Yerushalayim
Met: 1986
Married: 1990
My wife of nearly 15 years, Ilene Spark-Greenberg, was a camper at Wisconsin and a counselor at New England. I was a staff brat, a camper, a counselor and a rosh edah at New England. Although we met on our junior year program at Hebrew University, we went back as staff to Ramah in New England together. (Ilene was Tikvah staff, I was Rosh Solelim) We got married in 1990, then moved to Israel in 1992. Beginning in 1992, Ilene and I were madrichim for two semesters at TRY, one of the Ramah Israel programs in Jerusalem. The program started at the end of August 1992, and Calev was born in June 1993. Ilene's last hike was up Massada with the Ramah students in March 1993 - 6 MONTHS PREGNANT! Now that's dedication to Ramah. So, in a sense (do the math), Calev is a Ramah baby.

Aaron Michael Frank & Laura Shaw Frank
Met at Ulpan Ramah Plus
Camp Attended: Berkshires
Met: 1986
Married: 1992
Aaron and I met and became good friends on Ulpan Ramah Plus (I think it is now called SEE). He went to CES-JDS in Rockville, MD and I went to Solomon Schechter in NJ. Because of URP, Aaron came to work at Ramah Berkshires together with all his new Schechter friends. Our friendship grew and grew, and finally, right after Aaron's second summer as a rosh edah, we started dating! Our wedding was a Ramah fiesta, complete with a kayak "borrowed" by our friends from the Berkshires Agam, and a huge sign saying "Ramah's Other Season"!

David Kalender & Talya Hoffman Kalender
Camp Attended: Israel Seminar
Met: 1990
Married: 1991
We met in preparation for our work on Israel Seminar. Once the summer began, our friendship grew over a desperate team effort to find food as the Goldstein Youth Village meals were not gourmet experiences. We married in Israel the following summer.

Aron Coleite & Tracy Strauss Coleite
Met at Israel Seminar
Camp Attended: California
Met: 1990
Married: 1996
We met on Ramah Seminar in Israel in 1990, and had a romantic walk under the stars in the Negev. We dated for a few months when we returned to the US, but those high school romances don't last so long. We were reunited on junior year abroad at Hebrew University in 1994 and got married 7 years later! Now we live in Los Angeles with our 9-month-old daughter, Eden.

Noah Borenstein & Amy Judith Heller
Met at Israel Seminar
Camps Attended: Berkshires, New England
Met: 1993
Married: 2005
Amy and I are an intermarriage, of sorts. We met on Ramah Seminar in 1993 -- she was from Berkshires and I was from Palmer. Years later, we were at Hebrew University together. Despite these many run-ins, Amy and I didn't start dating until we bumped into each other on the subway in NYC in 2003. We were married in November 2005.

Saul Fine & Nirit Shalom Fine
Program Attended: Israel Seminar
Met: 1994
Married: 1998
Nirit and I first met during the summer of '94 while working as counselors for the Israel Seminar in Jerusalem. Nirit was one of the local Israeli counselors, and I, a native Californian, was finishing up my junior year abroad at the Hebrew University. We did not keep in touch after that summer, but re-met a few years later in Israel, after I had already made aliyah, and were married soon thereafter. We are still living happily in Israel today, in a small town east of Tel Aviv, and have two wonderful boys named Matan (5) and Ittai (3).

Saul Blecker & Nina Rabinovitch Blecker
Program Attended: Israel Seminar
Met: 1994
Married: 2004
We were on the same bus on Seminar.

Josh Menachem Kulp & Julie Beth Zuckerman
Met at Israel Seminar
Camps Attended: New England, Poconos, California
Met: 1995
Married: 1996
We originally met through our involvement in international USY, but we "re-met" in the summer of 1995, when we were both group leaders for Ramah Seminar. We had led fairly parallel Ramah & USY "careers" until then, both serving as roshei edot at our respective camps (New England - Julie) (Poconos & then Canada - Josh). We spent a lot of time together during the staff Shabbaton before Seminar, and went out on our first official date on that motzei Shabbat. By the time Seminar officially started, we were already an item, and despite being in different hativot, we managed to see plenty of each other. The campers only found out in the last week or so. We got engaged a few months later, and we've been living happily in Israel ever since!

Geoff Winston & Zip Benjamin Winston
Camp Attended: Israel Seminar
Met: 1995
Married: 1996
We actually met during a course together but didn't get to know each other until the summer. One day one of the staff members told me that Zip had her eye on me. It turns out that she had told Zip that I had my eye on her. Six months later we were engaged. We worked Ramah Seminar the next year as well and got married four days later, with quite a few Ramahniks flying over for the wedding. We now have three kids with a fourth on its way any day now.

Matthew Louis Zerden & Lisa de Saxe Zerden
Met at Israel Seminar
Camps Attended: California, New England
Met: 1996
Married: 2004
Matt and Lisa met the first day of the Seminar trip in the summer of 1996. Lisa attended Ramah in Ojai, CA. Matt was from Savannah, GA but attended camp in Palmer for many years. The first night of their program they met and were together for the 6+ week trip. Returning home was sad; they were so young and so in love but figured it would be impossible to stay together considering their distance and ages but with the support and love of their parents, somehow worked it out. The following summer they backpacked through Europe together, broke up for a bit in college and got back together when Matt graduated from school. From there the couple moved to Los Angeles and were engaged for a year before their wedding in June 2004 in Laguna Beach, CA. Six of their closest camp friends who were on Seminar with them attended the wedding as well. The couple now lives in Boston, MA where Matt is a student at Harvard Medical School and Lisa is a doctoral student at Boston University in Social Work and Sociology.

Liell Karni & Idit Sonnheim Karni
Program Attended: Israel Seminar
Met: 1997
Married: 1999

BACK TO TOP

Elliot Offenbach & Amy Schwartz Offenbach
Camp Attended: Israel Seminar
Met: 1999
Married: 2007

Elliot and I met on Israel Seminar 1999. We were on the same bus and immediately became very good friends. By the end of the summer, we had become great friends and promised to keep in touch. Elliot lived in Chicago and I lived in Buffalo, so in the next year we only managed to see each other once. However, we spoke weekly on the telephone and had a summer of incredible memories that we had shared together. As we went off to college, Elliot attended University of Wisconsin-Madison, and I attended Michigan State University. We each went to visit each other at least once a year and throughout college we began speaking almost daily on the phone and were only growing closer despite our geographic distance! In April 2003, we finally decided to take our friendship to the next level and began dating. We had a long-distance relationship for about 1 1/2 years, but managed to see each other about twice a month. After we both graduated college in 2004, we both moved to Chicago. We married in 2007. Thank you, Camp Ramah, for bringing me the most amazing person in the world and for giving me memories that will truly last forever.

Asher Fink & Merisa Vinick
Camp Attended: Israel Seminar
Met: 1999
Married: 2010
Merisa- Berkshires; Asher- New England: An unexpected match!

Eric Danis & Anat Moshe Danis
Program Attended: Israel Seminar
Met: 2000
Married: 2004
In the summer of 2000, I (Eric Danis) worked as a madrich for Ramah Seminar in Israel. My co-Madricha was Anat Moshe. We got along instantaneously and worked well together. Despite the long hours and some tough campers, we had a great time together.

There was a lot of chemistry between Anat and I, but professionalism and the long hours prevented anything of a romantic nature from developing (although the campers were still more than delighted to tease us and tell us that we were "going out").

Two days after Seminar ended I had to return to the U.S. (I had been in Israel a year). Although I knew I was going to make aliyah, I was very sad to leave my friend Anat and told her so. She agreed that it was sad and that something nice could have developed. She drove me to the airport and we were both quite sad.

We stayed in touch (via emails and a few calls) for the eleven months I stayed in the U.S. (I stayed to work and save money), and we became very close as friends. When I returned to Israel (to make aliyah), Anat and I started dating after only three weeks had passed.

Anat and I were married in the spring of 2004, and 5 of our Ramah chanichim came to Israel for the wedding!

Matthew Cantor & Aviva Fink Cantor
Camp Attended: Israel Seminar
Met: 1997
Married: 2009
We first met in Israel on Seminar Plus, but we didn't keep in touch after the summer. Matt continued on as a counselor at Wisconsin, and Aviva returned to Palmer.

We both went to graduate school in Philadelphia and were so excited when we found each other again.

We married in 2009 and live in Brooklyn. We love having Shabbat dinners with our neighbors from Palmer, Berkshires, Wisconsin and the Poconos! (Submitted 2010)