Mikey Greenblatt: Rosh Hashanah in Uman

So I went to Uman this past Rosh Hashani Uman is like the Disneyland of Ukraine if all the rides were made out of cobblestone and the mascots suffered from severe anger issues three languages are spoken in Uman Hebrew, Yiddish, and aggressive you know, Rabbi Nachman was all about meditation and being in the moment not one of the Breslovers pushing me to get to this guy's Kever ever meditated in their life Breslovers are like the Energizer Bunny you know, they just keep going and going and dancing and pushing the only time that a Breslover is still is during Shmoneh Esrei and even then, no silence when I was davening in a Minyan with Breslovers all of a sudden I hear behind me all I did was take three steps back do I get an award here? and then there was the poor Ukrainian locals a lot of these Ukrainian locals are probably in the KGB learned methods of war and torture but they didn't learn one essential thing that would define their livelihood bargaining with an Israeli these poor Ukrainian salesmen an Israeli would walk up the Israeli would say, Kama ze oleh? and this Ukrainian, who literally learned Hebrew just for this moment says, Esrim the Israeli hands him a ten Lo. Esrim Kach! Kach! Ma zeh? Poor Ukrainians have no idea what to do with that people ask me what the craziest part of Uman was was it the dancing, the davening, the partying? no free cholent at Kiddush was the craziest thing I've ever seen it was straight out of the Hunger Games I saw a full grown man take a serving spoon from the cholent dip it in put it in his mouth, and dip it back to establish dominance? I don't know I don't know what's the rationale behind that I learned about the kosher smoke in Uman and how the kosher smoke works is right before Yom Tov, a single cigarette is lit and that cigarette is then used to light every single cigarette in Uman over a two day Rosh Hashanah I'm actually thinking of creating a Netflix documentary where I attach a GoPro to that one cigarette and we follow its journey through Uman in Uman, I learned that there's kids kids go to Uman Uman kids and music festival kids are kind of the same where they're parents are like go out, experience everything just make sure you catch a ride home when it's all over and so you have these Uman kids which by the way, these Breslover wives, they must cut some kind of deal where they're like alright, you can go to Uman. But you got to take at least half the kids so you have these Breslover Dads with 6 or 7 unattended kids running around and the Uman kids are bored out of their minds so they like to play this fun little game where when everyone's saying Shmoneh Esrei they'll sit in someone's seat and start kicking their shins is this kicking and banging to test their Emunah? I'm not sure. I'm not sure why and also with the Uman kids most kids, when they get tired, they take something called a nap when Uman kids get tired they take a drag of their cigarette and a sip of their beer the drinking age, by the way, in Ukraine is if you can afford it my girlfriend and I sadly broke up right before Uman probably because I went to Uman. That could be why and after a breakup, you're very vulnerable you're looking for a sign and upon entering Uman I see this sign big sign, you couldn't miss it it reads Uman loves Trump I still don't know how it's connected to my relationship but I'm hoping to figure that out you know, people ask me was Uman a life changing experience? Absolutely it took about four years off of mine.