Celebrations of Tradition
Amy Skopp Cooper, National Ramah Director
Reflections on Kayitz 2023 - as of Thursday, July 6, 2023
NRC Officers and Camp Presidents at Ramah Darom
What an incredible Shabbat through Monday at Camp Ramah Darom, where National Ramah Commission officers and camp presidents came together for our annual summer meeting. This is the first time that we have met in person since 2019, and the opportunity to share time together was beautiful. I am incredibly grateful not only to this group of NRC board members, but also to board members from all of our camps, who give tirelessly of their time to strengthen the Ramah Camping Movement.
Darom is an incredible camp where the setting is spectacular, art installations abound, and the camp is steeped in rich tradition, including magnificent Shabbat tefillot, edah-wide tisches, staff “cholent and learning,” and a vibrant campwide havdalah and rikud gathering (video below) that is truly spectacular.
Havdalah and rikud at Ramah Darom
Darom is also a relatively new camp; its first summer was 1997, thanks to true visionaries who realized the need for a Ramah presence in the South. Angela Cohen, Darom’s current board president, has the unique distinction of being the first president to have attended Ramah Darom as a camper! And both Anna Stern Serviansky, director, and Ayala Wasser, assistant director, are products of Darom. The camp has clearly celebrated and nurtured its professional and lay leadership pipeline and created an environment where people want to return and serve this community. These leaders and so many others at Darom inspire us to do the work we are doing.
Dr. Yizhar Hess meeting with staff members at Ramah Poconos
Fast forward a couple of days and I am now at Camp Ramah in the Poconos, where I am joined by Dr. Yizhar Hess, Vice Chairman of the World Zionist Organization. It is an honor to welcome him to Ramah, to show him the centrality of Israel in all that we do, and to thank him for the important support we receive from the WZO. Yizhar spent yesterday meeting with campers, mishlachat, and staff. He shared his own story of how shlichut in Arizona helped shape his religious life and his quest to create and sustain egalitarian Jewish communities in Israel, and passionately reminded everyone of their commitment (regardless of citizenship) to Medinat Yisrael.
Camp Ramah in the Poconos
It is always wonderful to return to Poconos, which was the Cooper family’s home camp in the mid-1990s. Yesterday, July 5, the camp celebrated July 4 and, according to tradition, only spoke in English! It says a lot about Ramah when counselors struggle to find the English words for everyday camp Hebrew—try translating rosh edah, nikayon, tefillot, etc.! The mood was joyful and the translations quite amusing!
Celebrating our leaders, camp traditions, and the centrality of Israel and Hebrew have all been part of my remarkable week. I’m heading to the Rockies for Shabbat—more to come next week!