The 2022 Maslul Argentina Service and Learning Trip
From December 19-28, 2022, our group of 11 Maslul Argentina participants representing seven different Ramah camps, and two National Ramah staff members had an extraordinary experience that combined work at a Jewish summer camp outside of Buenos Aires, meaningful service in the historic Jewish communities of Entre Rios, and time in the vibrant city of Buenos Aires, home to the largest Jewish community in Latin America.
“Maslul Argentina deepened my understanding and widened my perspective on Jewish life and culture globally. Experiencing both familiar and unfamiliar traditions on a completely new continent to me was truly a beautiful and inspiring experience.”
The camp we visited was sponsored by Noam Argentina and had participants from three different Noam chapters in Buenos Aires: Juventud IONÁ, Juventud Benei Tikva, and Juventud Dor Jadash. At camp, our participants pushed themselves to join activities, teach tefillah and rikud, speak Spanish, and make new friends and connections in the Masorti AmLat community. They are going into next summer at Ramah excited to share some of their favorite Argentine camp traditions.
“I will use the skills that NOAM campers and staff taught me: use language to the best of my ability, and when that fails, communicate through play, games, sport, song, and dance. And I will do so with joy.”
In Entre Rios, we learned about the history of Jewish immigration to the area. We celebrated Hanukkah with the remaining Jewish communities in Basavilbaso, Villa Clara, and Villa Dominguez. We filled old synagogues with prayer and song. We cleaned graves at the cemetery in Basavilbaso, doing an important act of chesed for both the dead buried there and their living descendants.
“One surprising element of the trip was the way in which interactions with the Argentinian Jewish community helped me feel connected to Israel. In Entre Rios our group saw blue tzedakah boxes in a museum that Jewish immigrants used to raise money to establish Israel. The
boxes were nearly identical to the ones passed around my Hebrew school classroom as a child.”
We ended our trip with a whirlwind tour of Buenos Aires with the guidance of Turismo Judaico. We stopped in La Boca, La Plaza de Mayo, La Casa Rosada, Templo Libertad, Asociación Mutual Israelita Argentina (AMIA), and a kosher McDonalds (the only one outside of Israel).
At each site, we were struck by the culture of memory in this city. Memorials for the 1994 AMIA bombing were everywhere. We were moved by a grassroots memorial for Covid victims in La Plaza de Mayo inspired by the Jewish custom of placing a stone at a grave.
“The strong value of honoring tradition was extremely powerful to me and really exemplified a lot of what Judaism means to me. I found it really striking that in a community where the Jewish population was quickly decreasing, there was still a focus on the rich Jewish history in the area and the importance of tradition. ”
We also visited Club Náutico Hacoaj, an extraordinary JCC and cultural center just outside the city. There, we learned about their informal education initiatives, including a first-of-its-kind in Argentina disability inclusion program called MAGAL (circle). Our last meal together in Buenos Aires was at Al Galope, for some of the tastiest kosher BBQ on the planet!
We have a deep sense of accomplishment for what we achieved and learned during our trip. We are grateful to our partners at Shalom Corps and for the support from the Morton M. & Miriam Steinberg International Travel Fellowship and The Immerman Foundation for helping make this experience possible. Muchas gracias as well to our friends at Turismo Judaico, Seminario Rabínico Latinoamericano, Masorti AmLat, and Masorti Olami.
– Dr. Daniel Olson and Maya Klareich, National Ramah Commission