2. Emet Men’s Programs Student Interviews

[Music] so why do we need emmett see i wasn't always religious i came to america as a regular traditional bukharian boy six years old about when i came and uh i didn't know anything my friend my great grandfather who i'm named after was a rabbi but when the soviet union came in it destroyed all of uh all of all of judaism as as we knew it till then we had our great grandparents were all religious everybody's got a bobo or babula or something that was uh a uh a capitalist or whatever a rabbi but uh our grandparents our parents never had that chance to be religious and we came up not really knowing anything i went through public school went to the same high school as you guys went to forest hills high born bred uh did you alex he also went to a four society oh yeah those good times now i'm just joking so he's not joking cut his mic but i actually learned hebrew and forces high school i didn't i learned spanish miss harris god bless her you know i i learned god bless them for that so i actually took spanish i didn't get that chance um so so we i grew up really really knowing not much about my jewish heritage and i actually met emmett believe it or not when i was my senior year in high school not in college yet and emmett actually took me i was already starting to get a little bit of interest in judaism and emma took me on some phenomenal shabbatons where i got to experience judaism firsthand and i realized that this is something that i really really wanted in my own life i wanted to bring up a family like that i wanted those values to be part of me and that's why i chose this path where i now get to show guys like you danny guys like you jacob what i experienced as an emmett student 16 years ago and right now the buharian community is at a crossroads we're at a certain at a point already that if we don't if bahrain's today the baha'i youth growing up don't have some sort of an a uh an introduction to judaism and next aaa showing what judaism jewish lifestyle is we're going to get to a point where just like in the the american melting pot you have jews that came in the 1920s 1930s from europe they became assimilated you can't even tell them apart right now you can tell a buhari and jew in 20 years down the line you're not going to be able to tell anymore and that's it that the sad part will be the fact that you have jewish youth growing up that really just just don't aren't jewish anymore they're the lines are unfortunately over and that's why in ahmed we have hundreds of students coming through the door every single year guys like yourselves that are introduced to judaism and you know what why don't you guys tell me about your experience experience in emmett and what you how you grew up and where you are now and how what how emmett was part of that and jacob you want to start off so one of the most important things about emmett is the fact that they create such an environment where you come in and they instantly accept you uh rabbi ruthenberg asked where would we be without emmett um i think the world would be worse off because i know so many students who uh who don't know much who didn't know much about judaism i go to i went to st john's university and i am was part of jsa personally i know so many students we didn't know much but as soon as they attended jsa and emmett they got to connect with the jewish suits and they got to see what judaism is all about personally ahmed was responsible for sending me to yeshiva for two summers in a row right after high school i remember you and i went to see you have a rudenberg and you guys were telling me oh you have to go it's a whole different experience and i was a little bit resistant but then i went to study and it's a whole different experience the connections you make the memories you make and if you think about it the emmett staff and rabbi is they're they're doing it for for the people they're not getting much out of it like what did emmet get out of sending me to israel you know it was me that benefited so i'm always grateful for that fact and i believe that without emmett i wouldn't be who i am today beautifully said thank you jacob it's funny you mentioned that the the sheep experience you know also the arizona experience that uh that you uh you actually and danny both went on on separate years um the arizona trip that emmett has is there to to have two interesting goals one we spend half the morning half the day over there in the mornings learning gemara introducing the guys to what what talmud is what the blood the blood lifeline of the jewish people has been introducing them almost everybody that has never experienced talmud and it's their first amazing experience and the second experience interestingly enough the second goal is we get to you know on a trip with with guys for seven days going to sleep with them at two o'clock three o'clock in the morning if you guys actually go to sleep and waking up with them at seven o'clock in the morning you you get that's only when our phones go off on an alarm thank you danny inside joke for those people that that are watching who went on that trip um waking up with them you bond with them so much that afterwards danny after that trip as much learning as we had and as much jewish growth as we had the personal experience that the personal relationship that you and i developed afterwards and all of the aftermath the the the the amount of just bonding we had afterwards how you were able to open up to me how i was able to help you in any in any way that you requested it it was it was incredible it was irreplaceable and it's funny you were saying what what did we get out of it i'll tell you i planned that trip for um at least four to five weeks and uh you got so sick afterwards oh so much man i wasn't sick afterwards i got sick on the trip um i was quoting and interestingly enough it was my family had to have to deal with it also me being sick and everything it was just what do we get out of it i enjoy making these connections so that i can give over what i experienced in in my rich jewish heritage to you guys and see how you guys enjoy it afterwards danny what has ahmed done for you how do you feel what do you want to share this is such a difficult question because i i don't know where to start um what i could say is basically emmett is not something that's tangible it's not a person place or thing it's not a house it's a home it's not a group of people it's a family um and something that i can really talk about uh i want to start a story i want to start a story can you guys hear me from home okay so a personal little uh idiom or parable i could say is a son asked his father father how big is hashem and the father said you see that you see that uh airplane in the sky how big is it and the sun goes well it's pretty small and then he takes his son to an airplane hangar and at the airplane hangar he says well son how big is this airplane and the sun answers to him well it's huge he says the size of hashem is relative to your distance to him now rabbi when i first came to you in 2017 i believe my distance to hashem was just two four it was miles apart miles many many miles and i'll put it this way i started public school for elementary school public school for middle school public school for high school public school for college nowhere there that i have a jewish experience and i feel as though the moment that i came to emmett was where i was able to discover that incredible incredible closeness that i have to hashem rabbah can you answer this how many how many conversations have me and you had in just the last week alone let me check my phone hold on i call him every single day with regards to my problems with regards to my situations and it's it's funny you actually told me this and i can only credit you for this because nobody else told me this if you see everything falling apart in your life or you have problem at the problem with the problem there's one trick there's one trick to be immortal to be invincible and the trick is look up at hashem and say i know this is from you i know this is from you and keep praying you taught me that this and i could go over it for lessons and lessons of all the possible things that i've learned from emmett and from you and from the close connections that i made with you and my entire friend community we still have we still talk about every single day on the trip we have a group chat we have a snapchat group chat and all i all of that is because of you and when i point to you i point to emmett and that's exactly what i wanted to talk about with regards to my experience with them and to be honest rabbi ruttenberg asked what is your future framit my future is that every single person that joins emmett gets that same exact experience that i got and thank you for listening guys it was beautifully said i have to say one thing as much as you guys gain from emmett emmett gains from you because these relationships that we that that we make it really anytime any one of us emma staff is having like a bad day all we have to think about is like wow pick up a phone have a conversation with you guys and knowing that you guys are growing with us and we're helping you out is such a what what you would say what you would call nachas it's such a such an uplifting feeling that like i'm that emmett's making a difference emmett's there for guys and girls that are trying to find themselves that are trying to grow spiritually have a spiritual connection connection to hashem and even in during these times in of of of the the challenging times that we're in emmett didn't stop you know we had i don't know how many programs every single day every single day of the week before march and even after march or tremendous amount of programs where we're connecting to to our students we didn't let that go we didn't let this pandemic stop us i wouldn't work any other questions we have for the guys oh thank you very much for being here with us our root by the way i've known him for at least 16 years the only thing i come to mind when i think of rob ruttenberg is he's all there he's there for the the jewish nation he is barak hashem an incredible leader mashaan you many years of strength to help lead the jewish people