#131: Behind the Bima: The HASC Episode

So, this is brand new for me. I've never done this before. Behind the Bima started as a little hobby during Corona COVID. You may remember a small pandemic that hit a couple years ago. And we pivoted to go online and we streamed Shiur and we connected with people, but they missed just the banter, the conversation, getting an insight what's going on in life. You know, the conversation you have at the Kiddush, the conversation before or after the Shiur. So, we started a conversation online and it kept up and we've never ever recorded before a live audience. And you're the first of many, many times. I'm going to go off script even before we start. Earl Butler, come on down. Earl, come. Come here. Come here. Come here. Come here. Come sit for a second, Earl. I need your help with something. You think you can help me? Okay. This is This is the opening for a talk music before we uh So, normally I do this show. That's what the Rabbi two good friends do, the guys I do it with. And one of them is about your height, maybe a little shorter. But one of them I say Wednesday night 9:00 p.m. Yes. Welcome to which he says Behind the Bima. He's not here. So, if I say it's Motzei Shabbos at 11:10, a ridiculous hour to start this show, but it's Motzei Shabbos 11:10, can you say Behind the Bima? Oh. Yeah, you can do it? Okay, you ready? Yes, sir. Motzei Shabbos 11:10 p.m. I'm Rabbi Efrem Goldberg, your host, joined by my dear friend Earl Butler Butler. And we are here to take you Good. Behind the Bima. Yeah! All right, Earl, while you're sitting here, we're going to go totally off script and out of order of what we were going to do, but we can't not take advantage. You know, you're not the first Butler who's coming behind the Bima. You I that your dad, Judge Butler, was a guest on our show, "Ba Bay Bimah". Did you see that? Do you know about that? Yes. That was an incredibly inspired episode. It was really amazing. All right, tell us what How many years have you been coming to Camp Simcha? 33 years. 33 years at Camp Simcha. And does Camp Simcha get old and boring and like, "Yeah, I can't believe I have to go again." or do you look forward to it the whole year? Looking forward to it the whole year. The whole year, you love it. Yeah, I love Camp Simcha. Yeah. And concerts. Concerts, what do you love? What do you love about Camp Simcha? What makes this place special? Well, I mean, we're immersed in being close to God. Yeah. Concerts, that's where we get to God. All right, so far we've raised money for A Time for Music and the Camp Simcha. We're going to talk about Camp Simcha a little bit also. What What's your favorite part of Camp Simcha? Concerts. The concerts. Wow. Have you had any concerts yet this summer? Have we had concerts yet, Shmuel? Yeah, we have. You guys had concerts? So, who's next, Kenny? We have some good ones coming. Who's coming? Who's next? Who's Who's next? Oh, me. Who's next? YBC, I think. I heard I heard Did you hear the news? What? Guess who's coming to town? Oh. I heard Uncle Moishy is coming. I don't think so. Glad you heard that information from Shmuel or somebody. All Shmuel and Yakov told me over and over that Uncle Moishy is coming. You know Yakov? Yeah, yeah. They told me Uncle Moishy is coming. UNCLE MOISHY IS GOING TO COME? YEAH. WAIT, WAIT. ARE YOU SERIOUS? I THINK OH, ME. IS THAT TRUE? Is YBC going to come? Could be. Could be. We're trying to get him. But, Shmuel, he might just be finding out about it now. No. So, Yes. So, your favorite thing are the concerts. That's your favorite part? Yes. YBC is going to be here. What about the people? Do you like the people at Camp Simcha? Sure. They're amazing? Yes, they are. Do they feel say you and you love them? And them. Now, do you only talk to them in the summer at camp or do you stay in touch throughout the year? That's every year. And the whole year they talk, they you're in touch. Yeah, that's right. That's right. That's incredible. Now, it says on here that you're a member of the ASC staff. That's right. What do you do? I take care of everything. You do. So, who would you say is more important at that Camp ASC? Junior Junior staff or you? I think I'll be honored. I'll be honored. That's right. I have to do that to you. I'll be honored. You're doing amazing. Thank you so much. I think I'll be seeing you in the coming hours first. We're going to get some great concerts. There's no question about it. I think I'll be calling you. If anyone can make it happen, it's I'll be honored. So, We're going to be putting together this show starting with I'll be honored. So, thank you for helping us get started. Thank you for taking all of us behind the scenes. Where did I go? I think we're going to have a great time tonight this year. Time for music. We can't wait. Okay, so let's get started with the icon person synonymous with Camp ASC. Of course, the camp director, Shmuel Kahn. Shmuel, please come join us. Shmuel, you and your name, the Kahn family, the Stern family, your names, you are synonymous with Camp ASC. There isn't a Camp ASC without your family family here, without your leadership today, and without all that you do. It's just not imaginable. The heart and soul that you put into this magical special place. And I should say even before we begin, that we're coming off of an extraordinary Shabbos. I'm so honored and proud and privileged to be here with my wife, with my son. This is my third Shabbos in Camp ASC. But I'm proud, you know, sometimes you try to hold on to the people that you'll get into Shamayim if you can carry their coattails. So, my wife has spent many summers in Camp ASC, and now three of my daughters who've worked here at Camp ASC. And if I have any chance of getting in upstairs, it's only by holding on to them. But, what a Shabbos. And it's just for me to come, this is the third time, it is nothing short of a religious experience. To feel connected to Klal Yisrael, to Ahavas Yisrael, to see the capability and capacity for chesed within us, of selflessness and mesirus nefesh, to see extraordinary people. And all of this, this platform, this incubator, this Bais Medrash of chesed is you and is your family. So, tell us how it started. What was it that began in this place? I think I would first like to say todah rabah to everybody and we actually credit for you and your Rebbetzin and your family for being here. So, I would cover most of you and your family and the fact that your wife is a veteran HASC and I can say the same thing to you about the children. The children will not see a family. Amen. Um in short, their their lives have been changed. Uh she's in the Rebbetzin is probably better Rebbetzin since she worked here in Camp HASC. It's nothing. She learned She learned how to give of herself uh without getting a return. It's called And uh I'm sure your daughters are going to do the same thing as they grow and mature. But, I want to just give you a quick overview of what HASC is and how HASC started. It'll take me about a couple minutes and I will start with my parents, they should rest in peace. Um my mother came with her parents in 1934 to the United States from Hungary, Miskolc, Hungary, and my father came in 1938 by himself, '39. His parents sent him because he came from Germany and things was right before the crystal map broke out around this somewhere. I'm not sure exactly. And he came to to the states and he met my mother somewhere in work in in his workplace. My mother was somehow the secretary there. But go back a second. My mother came to the United States in '34 and she went to girls high in Bushwick. It was only was those days and they accepted girls except the boys went to girls high. From there, my grandfather told me he could only let her go to college if she could find a college that was only for girls and she did. The college those days was only for girls and that's where she went. And she became an educator. And she taught high school girls for many, many, many years. She taught the taught the subject of English and those days um there was very few for people who had a college degree and was able to be so articulate as my mother was to express herself and teach the subject English, teach grammar, vocabulary, writing, reading. There's plenty people that are on our staff in Brooklyn right now who are my mother's students in the late '60s and early '70s in high school and they still talk about Shakespeare and things like that that my mother made sure they knew how to read it and understand that type of language. It's a very special language. Anyway, uh get back to how Camp Asterisk Well, my mother was a high school teacher from when my sisters, my youngest, my third sisters started to go to school. I think it was the early '50s and she was high school teacher through the the late 60s when Hask took up full-time with her as first as as she started as Hask started and first of all, the Russian they didn't need any they didn't need the school Hask for their the Hask school for their children because the Russian were all fine and well, and it was Rabbi Borhand from the west side uh Rabbi Borhand who was very influential who was very close friends with my father because he became close friends in about 1960. My parents I know I'm mixing things up, but this we'll sort it out. My parents started a girls school a girls camp called Camp Tevye in 1960. And they were into that and that that took 6 months out of the year to keep that going, and and it was an excellent girls camp at the time. Uh a couple of years after when they they started, there was a stand back, and it was an excellent camp, and girls started to get in there. You actually need to pull out those days to get in there. But they once had an amazing guest drummer from Camp Hask who came over just for their production at Camp Tevye. Do you know that story? No, I don't. But tell me. There was a waitress Was she a waitress at the time or a I don't remember a staff member? But the production they lacked a drummer, and they heard that there was a a girl in Hask who could play the drums, and they came over to Tevye just to play the drums in the production. I I later married her. That sounds interesting. I didn't know that story. I didn't know that story. But anyway, getting back to the starting of Camp Hask. So, in the end Rabbi Borhand asked my parents to start a school since my mother was an educator, my father was was a doer in Camp Fega at the time and the Rabbi wanted to come very close to us his daughters came to Camp Fega to start a school by name of the Not that he just wanted to start a school and I remember there was a debate at the Shabbos table what should we call the school? My father said Hebrew day school for handicapped children. And my mother said Has Hebrew Hebrew Academy for special children. So anyway my mother my mother won the debate and Has started and What what motivated Rabbi Forer to push them? Did he have a personal need? He didn't have personal needs. saw the need for the children. He saw a need and my parents knew about the need as well because in Camp Fega my father had the first first he didn't have any any disabled people the second year he had a blind person and then another person to quilting and as as time went on he took other individuals who had special needs even the Mashgiach from Lakewood Nachman Volk she rest in peace the Rabbi Forer's sister was was was a down individual and she was one of them and Rabbi Forer and and his Rabbis embraced my parents so that they had a place to send their child and it was those days the publication wasn't a place either so and there's so many others like that in that category who took advantage of the school and later on of the campus. What's extraordinary about the story is we have no idea maybe how many others are born and said you know someone needs to do this and maybe they heard that and they agreed someone needs to just not me but your parents even though they had no direct benefit no direct need because there are incredible organizations institutions all over in America and Israel and beyond where someone had a personal need and that gave birth to launching an organization that then had a huge impact. But in the case of your parents, it wasn't to solve a personal need. It was purely, sincerely the shma, only for klal Yisrael, not them at all. To the point where my father and my parents, even ourselves as children, were collecting money and my father had other people to collect money. There was no government funding at all, nothing at all until the middle late '70s when my father used to worry every second week how I'm going to make payroll. Wow. How am I going to make it? I remember that there are people still around today that lent the money for a week, a month, 2 months just so that he could make payroll and he he borrowed from one to pay the other until he was able to stand on his two feet. So it started as a school. When did it also become a home and a camp? So it started as it in 1970, the fall of 1971, my parents called us in to the I I I just gotten married. My brother was married a couple of years and my son was married a couple of years already. Parents called us into the dining room and told us there's a special there's a need out there for a camp for special needs children as as well. Those days were called special needs special needs is a great professional updated word. The handicap it was handicap children at the time. This is a need for our town. We need them and tell me this and let's start a camp. Father told us that we we agreed to start and my father told us, I made an appointment you already knowing that you would agree to it with Max Jaffe who was our real estate broker around here and we came here, I think it was in December and we came traveling through a big snowstorm up here and they showed us this place and we went back home and told my my father and mother what we saw. And he said, "Well, I'll go give a deposit on it." So, he gave a deposit and that's when Camp HASC started. Camp HASC Real visionaries have the vision to buy this plot and to see what could be and to go build it even before it would be filled the way it is today. It takes a lot of vision. And this plot, what you see today, is huge. The plot This plot ended So, no one knows what where building number seven is. Building number five, building number seven right over here. There's a gate there alongside it. That was the end of Camp HASC. Right? It's probably 100 ft from here to to the end of Camp HASC. And up there it was It was nothing beyond It was beyond the hotel. Right? In those days, those days the Catskills was not what you see today. Unbelievable. Those Those days, you didn't see Jewish people up in the mountains. There was no bungalows. It It was It was It was empty. But the This school stayed stayed on. And the school stayed on. And the camp the camp started to grow. And as my father saw the need for another building, another building, he told me, "Go Go make sure it happens." And as time went on, this is what happened to Camp HASC. It became so big. My father and mother, should rest in peace, they would never think that the camp is like this. I want to leave you with that last question, which is what your parents would think if they could see what's happening here today. The number of campers, the complexity of caring for the campers, the staff, if they would be able to survey, and they can where they are, to survey with nachas, the staff over the decades, who what HASC meant for the future of building Klal Yisrael because the leaders of Klal Yisrael today of rabbanim and rebbetzins and machonchim and machonchos and the people within communities. I was talking with my wife earlier today and thinking in our community who were staff members at HASC. And those are the people who volunteer for the Kadisha and the They're perfectly comfortable being uncomfortable because they learned early on how to do that. And so, how many communities around the world HASC is continuing to staff because the people who learned how to be ready to share their pants, you know all that. So, what would they say if they could see? Did they ever dream that they have the vision that it would be today? How many How many campers are here this summer? We have close to 300, about 290, 300 campers. Unbelievable. And we have about 400 counselors beside all the other staff that's here. So, if you tell that to someone on the street that 400 counselors with less than 300 campers, they don't know what you're talking about. Usually a camp has an average camp they have eight to 10 kids in the bunk with two counselors. That's about it. It's really amazing. It's an awesome place here. It's really every single staff person, regardless what you call his name, what person, anyone from housekeeping, or whatever, medical, and anyone else, it's it's a harvest field that brings out the best of everybody in in Camp HASC. And that's where you learn it. And if you didn't If you didn't come with that attitude, with knowing that that thing you're going to learn it, you'll learn it subconsciously because every single counselor and every single person here is doing things for that camper that they never thought they could do. I just want to let everyone who's here speak again for everyone who's here and everybody who's watching later online and thanking you and your family for the impact on Clyde's Row. And we don't take it for granted because I know that you had your own health issue earlier this year. We're here in strength and should be for many many years to come. So, thank you so much. Okay. Now with got history, we've got a little context, we better understand a little bit more how we got here. I don't want to do this recently. It's me and my mouse and my keyboard. And my family texting me when I'm doing wrong. Next, we'd love to bring up Rivali our program director, and Dr. Raisel Yaish, who is our head counselor. Two more icons, two more staples, two more extraordinary people here at Camp HASC and beyond Camp HASC. Rivoli and I feel proud and privileged to call you good friends outside of the Camp HASC. Actually roommates, Rivoli and I were once upon a time. That's for another time on behind the bema, behind the the roommates. And uh Raisel, obviously your your impact on on this camp and and you have it feels so close. So, share a little bit from your perspective how you've seen things change over the years. Each of you could share what was your first summer here at Camp HASC and how have you think seen things change from what it is here today? I'll start. I I started here in uh a long time ago when I was 16 years old. It was my first summer here at Camp HASC as a waitress. And um somewhere after Riv Shmuel's description of, you know, the gym and this building, so this was what I knew when I came in here, this building. Maybe even with the air conditioning already. And I um I I didn't know then that I'd still be here at this stage of my life, at this time, with my family, and raised them here, and having my older son have been staff member here, and my brother being a camper here. Didn't know that then. I was the first of my family that entered this place. Wow. Um but I did know in my heart of hearts that I found my family here, that I found my personal soul family here. That this was a place that I was so proud to be part of. And I just kind of like in my fantasy, like you know, they say what's that called that word where you kind of wish something to be true. Um I imagine imagine if I could stay here and be like head staff. Like that would be just amazing, you know? And you wish it and then you think about it and you dive in for it, I guess it happens. Um and it I then had a brief small period where I was away for a few years. So I did get to see a lot of the change and growth. And I um this camp just keeps growing and getting better. Uh but the staff here has remained the stellar staff that I am proud to say I'm a part of every day. Amazing. What What have you Just give some sense to those who are here now who maybe weren't here way back when when you were a waitress. It wasn't that long ago, but way back when. What Just what are some of the differences in terms of comfort, discomfort, in terms of the campers themselves, and and the care that's necessary for them? You can both obviously from your perspective share a little bit. Maybe I'll be first talking about it and then we'll we'll come back to that what you see in terms of the differences. Sure. I mean, my uh my my beginnings here were quite different than Rachel's beginnings here. Um I too had a sister uh with special needs. My sister Karen. I think you sure spent some afternoons together with Karen uh in my home. And uh Karen passed away a number of years ago, but I grew up with special needs being part of a part of my life. And I always I had friends who worked in Camp HASC. And I said, "There's no way I'm working here in Camp HASC. I'm not a HASC guy." I just That That was my assumption for quite a while. Until one summer my summer job fell through teaching in a in a day camp. And I'm sitting in the Jewish Federation YU. I wasn't 16. I think I was already 20, maybe even 21. Before I had ever worked here, and Jacob Gimel, your cohort in Boca, said, "Ah, your plans fell through? Perfect. You'll work in Camp Ramah as well." I said, "Jacob, I'm not a yes guy. Not working in Camp Ramah It's not happening. I don't need it. It's okay." He said, "You're working in Camp Ramah. Don't worry." And it went on like that for a while, and then Ehud showed up, Ehud Fried, if you remember him, and said, "Okay, we have a bunk for you." I said, "No, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no." Um and Mark Rosen, I did my math correctly, I think this is my 25th summer here at camp. Wow. Very different beginnings, but we've been working together, and got to If I did my math correctly, that's more than half your life at Camp Ramah, which is pretty amazing. I do think, Avi, I'm curious if you agree, the biggest gift we offer the world and our campers, and the biggest thing that has changed since our time here, that we we both started, is our staff ratio. There's many agencies that come through the summer to learn about Camp Ramah, see what they can bring back to their home communities, and they say, "Rachel, I've learned so much, but can we take your staff with us back to Chicago, back to, you know, Maryland, back to wherever they're coming from?" Because that is What has changed is that we realized we offer such a high ratio of staff that our campers get dedicated from loving care, and our counselors then are supported, so they're not tired, they have energy, and they can they can just be awesome. And that's a big change. That's something I noticed. Absolutely. I get calls every year from other typical camps and special needs camps who call and say, "We're about to start our summer. Can you give us the names from your wait list, please, so that we can staff our programs because we're fighting and struggling and thank god Camp HASC has been blessed with the most wonderful staff. I remember that summer when Avi Schacks, when you were the director and we were looking at our staffing ratios and you said, "Let's just do it. We need more counselors to provide the level of care that we need to provide." And it began there and continued the staffing ratios continued and continued. So, yes, I agree that was a major change. It could be that something to do with the fact that you give out the best merch here. Although, I understand now it's called drip. I learned a new term. That's That's news to me. No? But, the merch, I think it's the merch that No, it's it's obviously much more than the merch. It's the magic of this place that makes people really desperate and line up and be willing to be on a waiting list in order to get in here, which is amazing. You both mentioned that not only are you professionally involved in Camp HASC, but your families have benefited from Camp HASC. Can you talk about what that meant to your parents, to you as as siblings, what it means to the family, what Camp HASC provides in terms of respite from that perspective, seeing both sides? I'll just do a little shout out. Keep it up. My parents are here in the audience tonight, actually. Um I think that um the fact that they come here and make effort to be here is because they want to be part of that magic. Uh has touched all their children from both sides, from the staff and the camper side. I think I was like the spy that went first, you know, like the marabbi. I kind of like went to check it out. And then the next summer, my brother, much like Avi, my older brother who said, "I'm not a HASC guy. I'm you know, I'm doing some other programs. We won't say them here." And then one of his friends filled out his application for him and sent it in. And uh since since that point, that summer, myself, my older brother, my younger sister came as a child care staff, and my youngest brother came as a camper. And uh to see it from all those sides in one summer, to see how much we grew and became independent, brave, and confident. And um to see how much my brother at the time, was 10 years old, um came and had his amazing experience to be a camper. He uh he had a hard moment recently where he's now kind of a hard in his late 30s, and he said, "You know, Risa, I'm feeling lonely. I don't feel like I have any real friends." And I said, "Baruch, let's think. Maybe there's someone you could call that you could feel good about." He said, "Hmm, you know, maybe Ephraim Popack or Haim Marcus." These are his counselors from Camp HASC from so many years ago. Wow. Are the people that he felt on a lonely night as an adult that he could call to reach out to are his friends. Wow. So, that's just to show where it's where it goes. Unbelievable. It's the greatest blessing for myself and Sholom is that our children have literally spent every summer of their lives. Now we have several who can't get out of it as well because they're serving in the army um in in Israel. Of course, I'm incredibly proud of them. You should see the rocket launcher that Amichai, my son, is training to use. And you'd stop laughing and probably go, "Oh my gosh." Um but uh what a blessing. I feel blessed that I landed here and I'm still here, but what a blessing that my kids literally grew up here and spent I think literally every year of their lives here or very close to it. Um and grew up in an environment where most of us are here for a short while and learn that what you see on the outside is really it's it's it's it's it's nothing. It's clueless. It's really just uh it's a shadow of what is so much deeper and so much more powerful inside. And it's showing that what's inside a person. They took it for granted. To grow up in an environment like this is is to take that for granted. And that's an incredible blessing. That is a great blessing. Let me end it by asking you a question. I didn't prep I didn't prep anyone for any of these questions. Mostly because I didn't have them yet. But I'll ask you both a question ending a favorite memory of all the years that you've been here. Is there a story with a particular camper? Is there a memory? Is there a moment? Was there a night? I'm going to drag out this question so that you could think about it for a second. Is there something or someone or a Shabbos or an event or a bunk or a role that you played on the way up for the one that you are now that you can share that would make everyone feel What is that magic of Hask? That moment. I have so many and this one just popped in my mind. I don't think this is the favorite but it's the one that popped in my mind so I'll share it. Every year we have a color war and a field day. We used to have sing down also. And there were captains. Yes, Lipa, you've served proudly in all of those. And on the last or second to last night of the summer we gather the captains and we do a dinner all together and we have a chance to ask them to share some of their memories. My favorite memories are their memories of their inspiration. One summer Rabbi Chaim Teller was here in for Shabbos and he stayed over as a last Shabbos and he stayed over. Stayed a couple of days because he was speaking upstate in different places. And he joined us at this captains dinner. And one counselor after another after another shared their inspiring moments from that summer or the summer before that. And Rabbi Teller came over to us afterwards and said, "I do this for a living. I tell stories. I write books. This is what I do. This is unbelievable. This is a book. This is just listening to the counselors speak without any prep about their inspiring moments." That moment of hearing Rabbi Teller listen to our our stories was really it it it helped me realize just how special the experience is here. For the storyteller to be blown away by the story is a whole other level. Yeah, Raizel. So, my my my strongest memory I think is jumped out from last summer actually. Um we had a family of a camper I said I'm I'm long from 16 right now, so it's been a long time since I was a counselor. 17 I was a junior counselor and I was 18. I had a camper here in camp who unfortunately was very impaired, significantly physically impaired. Um and I provided good care I assume. I remember having a great summer, laughing and loving her. And unfortunately, she passed away um shortly after I was her counselor. Last summer so many years later, her family reached out to someone here in camp to say they wanted to come back to Hass on our experience day and visit and show their grandchildren where their daughter Pammy had the happiest summers of her life. And I was quickly called by Reb Judah, "Raizel, you know, Reb Shmuel, this Pammy Kirshener's family's here. Let's uh you know, let's come greet them so you can say hello. They remember that you were her counselor." I greeted them. Tons of family members came for this day. And the mom reached into her pocketbook and she pulled out a letter that I had written and color photocopied at Staples, you know, there weren't such things as like sending phones cell phone pictures on WhatsApp that I wrote on a plane to Israel before I left my year in Israel. And I said, "Dear Mrs. Kirshener, I just want you to have these memories so you could see all the great things that Pammy did this summer." I I do not remember sending that at all. I I see it with my handwriting, so I know I did it. I'm also like not that organized that I can't even remember that I would have like taken all those pictures and color photocopied them and stapled them. And she said, "I keep this in my nightstand and I look at it frequently so I can remember the happiest times of Pam's life and the impact it had on me to think that in that summer as a young kid that I just was having a great time laughing in the rain, playing games with my counselors, and playing in the pool, and just having a great time. You know, that that little pamphlet I I I wrote was something that carried her forward to this day. Wow. So, it hit hit me really strong. Wow. And it hits us strong. Thank you. There's a lot of good reasons that we come up to the past whenever we can, but seeing Risa and Avi are among them for us, so it's wonderful. Two incredible people, everyone, right? Thank you so much. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Okay. Is Matty here? Where's Matty? Matty, come. Come Come sit over here. How you doing, Matty? He's doing good. Thank you so much for agreeing to come behind the bema. So, Matty, everybody in this room knows who you are, but we want the whole world to know who you are. So, tell us something about yourself. The only thing I want to say is that I've been in the camp for since I was like 5 years old in Camp Akeela. I remember like all the things that happened to me when I was a young kid. I was really scared the one of the last years here. But, it's okay now. Since then Keep going. You're good. Yeah, you're good. You were telling us you appreciate all the people here. You like coming here? You've been here No, it's not polite to ask a woman how old she is, so I'm not going to ask what year it was that you started coming, but you've been coming for a long time. Yes. And you like it here? How come? What do you like about Camp HASC? I just like activities and how nice that everyone just gets to be together and talk. Everybody's so nice and warm and loves each other and kind to each other. You said the activities. What are some of the activities you get to do in camp? I get to go swimming. And I enjoy the color war every year that happens. I actually did a color war this summer. I was actually the color war captain. Yeah. How did your team do? Did your team do okay? Yeah, I was on I was actually building and I was color war Uh-huh. They're called building. And I was captain. But the yellow team which is actually won. Yeah. Yeah. Very good. I heard the concerts here are pretty good, too. Concerts are fun? Yeah. So a lot of activities during the day, concerts, a lot of people who care about you. And through the years have you stayed in touch with your counselors, with the staff, even during the year between the summer? I actually kept in touch with my old counselors. Old women, old counselors. Who loved me very much. So I keep in touch with them. But now that I have new counselors, I'm going to meet them. Hopefully through the years I'll meet them as well. That's amazing. Now, where where do you live the rest of the year? Yeah, we can clap. Let's keep clapping. Where do you live in New York? Yeah, let's keep clapping. I need your help when I give it to Joshua Shua. is when people laugh or just keep clapping. We'll keep clapping. So, where do you Where do you live now? Uh I just moved from Canarsie to Howard Beach. Oh. How do you like it? It's actually really nice. It's nice? People are warm and welcoming and nobody double parks. It's good. It's nice. I heard it's really nice. That's amazing. That's amazing. What What's your favorite day of the summer at Camp Simcha? Is there a favorite day that you look forward to? Visiting day. Visiting day. That's a good day. Lot of fun activities? Yes. There's like concerts, stuff like that. And all of campers' parents come in. I love all that day. Get to greet the parents, all the counselors. Get to meet their camper during the hour. Even though it was really hard to clean up the night before. But Everybody has to clean up and pretend it always looks like that. Yeah. I know that move. Amazing. Now, did you ever Have you ever been to Israel? Yes, I actually went my first time with the Israel marathon. Wow, you went with her? Wow. So, you went to Israel with HASC for the HASC marathon. Yes. Amazing. What did you think of Israel? It was actually really nice. Sort of like Borough Park? Nicer. Nicer. Yeah. Amazing. What was your favorite place in Israel? What was your favorite time in Israel? My favorite part of Israel is when I went to dominate the kosher. Yeah, special. Really special. Wow. Now, Mati, do you have a lot of HASC sweatshirts? Um, this is only my second one that I got. Oh, somebody's got to fix that right away. They got fleeces now and all kinds of stuff. We got to get Mati some. Mati, I want to thank you because this Shabbos you made me and my family feel so welcome. I saw you over Shabbos a bunch of times and you came over to say hello and you were so welcoming. So, thank you so much for making us feel so comfortable at Camp HASC. And thank you for going behind the beamer with us. Thank you, Mati. Thank you. Amazing. So, let's introduce the medical director here as well as Dr. Rubin, a pediatric fellow in college St. Jude's in in Memphis during the year and a camp doctor here during the summer. So, both of you have among the enormous staff with you and working with you, but you have a real eye on what it takes medically to make this place happen. Because for those who hear about HASC or see videos or know about the concert or hear the stories or see the picture in the the views I saw on my screen there. So, they see a magical place with a lot of happening, but there's no room for error at Camp HASC. The campers here are such delicate and sensitive medical needs. And they're being cared for by people who have just met them in many cases or take care of them only during the summer. I was asking over Shabbos, I'm trying to learn, I said, "When do you start? Like in February, March?" Compared to the summer the camp the counselors. You get like the whole and introduce to the medical needs and do practice at like, "No, when we come to camp we learn about who we're taking care of and what we need to do." Which is amazing for people who have the utmost medical needs. So, what's that like overseeing, taking the responsibility and the high risk that the two of you take? You're really taking the responsibility for the safety and the security and the well-being and the health not only of the campers but of the staff who need to take care of them to empower them with that. When does that start? What is that like? What are Give us some insight into it. All right. Okay. So, um we really start in September. So, like when the summer ends, we start with the interview process of our campers. Um myself and Esti um So, the the interview process really starts with um me and Ari Paley um and and Rabbi Klein, we interview every single camper that comes to camp. Um so, that's that's a major process in itself. And then every single camper, we go through all the files and myself and Esti go through every single camper. It's a very very intricate process um and that is all the everything that we go through, we have to prepare for the for all the staff and everything that all the paperwork that they get, that's what we prepare for them, you know, for the beginning of the summer. So, give us a sense Give us a sense of documents We'll come to your mom. But give us a sense as you're going through it, what does that mean? It's not like, "Well, they take three pills each day and they have a pill in the box and they're ready to go." Give us some of the You know, take us into the weeds of the medical needs of some of the campers and what it means for a camp to be able to provide that for them. Okay, so um some of our campers have um very complex seizure disorders. Some of our campers have cardiac issues. Some of our campers have um very intense neurological issues. Um so, we have to you know, decide if it's something that our staff are capable of handling. Um, we have to decide if they need overnight monitoring. Um, you know, it's, you know, a very um, detailed process. We have to decide um, if the if the behaviors are something that our our staff can handle. So it's a very long process, a lengthy process. Um, and then we go through the, you know, the charts very carefully and we make sure that um, we provide a very clear um, detailed um, you know, medical, you know, guidance guidance for the staff so that they understand exactly how to take care of their camper. Wow. About 20 years long you're working in pediatric hematology and I've been the centuries and I've seen the work that you do. It's a it's kind of a peculiar way to take time off. Well, to leave pediatric hematology and come to a camp with special needs and with almost high medical needs and take the responsibility. Why why would you do that? Yeah, so I started coming here um, 14 years ago. Uh, we got a call around 2009. I was actually a pediatric hematology oncology fellow at the time. Um, three young children and we got a call that, you know, camp was needing doctors and there had been a doctor who had been coming the whole summer for 11 years but was not able to come and they needed, you know, even if I could give a week or two and we said, you know what? I think we can make this happen and we came up as a family. It was really just a transformative experience. Something that was really special. Um, being able to give back in a way that, you know, I could use my skills that I had learned in medicine but also be able to give back to the community and to work in such a special environment. My husband had been a counselor here for three summers. Um, and I was not I actually did a six-year medical program, so I was did not actually have a summer. Um, meaning in fact back then, um, where I was able to do that. So, I got to experience the magic of Camp ASAC and be able to give my children that experience where we would come as a family and really be able to, um, to experience the blessed and the after that happens here. And so, it we started coming back then, 14 years ago, and we weren't able to come every single summer, but almost every summer since then, um, for anywhere from one to four weeks. I actually came on two maternity leaves and a move, and so we were able to come for longer periods of time when that happened. Um, but it really people will say like, "Is this your vacation?" And I'll come back to work and "How was your vacation?" It's not a vacation. Like, that's for sure. It's not a vacation, um, but it's a very, very meaningful experience and one that I think it is, um, meaningful for myself and meaningful for for my family. Um, we have five children who have also, you know, not as much as everybody as others have have started said, but they have really grown up here and have been able to experience what happens here, the blessed and the after that comes with being in this environment and the sensitivity that they gain as well. Um, and so it's it's just a really special thing to be a part of. So, Shmuel mentioned that today there were close to 300 campers in camp, which is an enormous number when you consider the intricacies of care and the love needed to support for every one of them alone. And my wife was telling me from the days that she was here, the the level of also of care has seemed to have gone up enormously as other camps and other programs have opened up, and although their special needs have gone to other programs, um, Camp ASAC has remained the address for for doesn't turn away people because wants to offer that support and loving program in the summer for the particular camper, but also for the family to be able to get that break. So, for example, she mentioned when she was here in those summers, there were very few wheelchairs. And today, I think half, maybe more of the campers who are still on are on wheelchairs. So, what does that mean? What have you seen in terms of the change in the camp of the the care that's needed? What What does your staff look like who work with you? How many nurses are there? Are they working an hour a day, 20 minutes a day, more than that during the day? What kind of things are they needed for? Over Shabbos, I saw lots of people with walkie-talkies and phones, and they weren't necessarily serving the hot challah of the mountains. This was just this campus. It's a network of technology that's needed to be able to respond to things. So, give us a sense of what's involved. What are some of the emergencies? What do people need to respond to? How big is the staff and what are they doing to make sure that 300 campers are getting the summer they need? Okay, so I can answer that. When we started when I started here, we were a team of seven nurses. Actually, before the summer before I started here, there was actually just I think two or three nurses working. And there were actually eight meds. That's um uh That's That's a a skill that's a certain course that you take um to administer medication. Um after that summer, when I started working here, that was the first summer that nurses um were started working here in order to administer medication. Um that summer, we had seven nurses. We have now a team of 17 nurses. We have six medical assistants. We have four secretaries, an administrator, a doctor, a paramedic, and also some EMTs. So, we're a very big team. Um and we need that team cuz we're two different To be exact, 299 campers in Camp HASC at this point. Congratulations, Shmuel. Um we administer a lot of medications. Um, all different routes, not just by mouth. We give a lot of G-tube medications. We have 44 campers um that get medication by G-tube. Um, we give a lot of medications, um, injectables. Um, we have a lot of diabetics that come to camp. We have a lot of wound care. Um, we have a lot of respiratory care that a lot of um campers that um have different machinery um for their respiratory care. So, um, I I nurses also need to um understand that um they need to be trained on skilled nursing, not just, you know, regular administering medications. So, we can't just have a couple of nurses in and out. So, we have a lot of shift nursing nursing. Um, we also have um what you call a rapid response team. So, we're pretty much running a mini hospital here. Um, that's I was going to say, when you described you're running a pharmacy, and you're also running Dr. and emergency room. So, what what does that look like to you? Um, talk to us what it's like to be running an emergency room. Did medical school prepare you for taking care of this diverse gamut of of needs and what kind of emergencies might you get in your summer vacation here at camp? Uh, so, you know, I was going to say, when you started talking about the screening process, and it really like the the doctor's job here pales in comparison to what the nurses do on a regular basis. They're delivering administering meds on a porch for hours a day. Um, really and and and doing a lot of the triage. So, a lot of the the campers, the staff that will come in on a regular basis, there's injuries, there's cuts, there's colds, there's strep, there's certain usual. But, then we have very complex very complex campers, very complex patients. And so, it really is running an emergency room for all ages because you have everyone from newborn babies who are here as staff to you know to adults and so you know here I am a pediatrician who's also specialized in multiple sub specialties and it really is running a full scale ER for family practice essentially. And you're doing that in the mountains without necessarily all of the equipment but it happens to be because of the amazing staff and the medical directors and then the investment of the camp in making sure that it is a really well well supported well staffed and well stocked infirmary. We have at our disposal just things that many other camps would never dream of. So you know if somebody comes in and there's a laceration we have every kind of stitch every kind of needle every kind of rinse every kind of medication that we may need in any in any instance and Mozzarella literally right here. So it really is like a full scale ER on a regular basis for all ages. But thank god we have all the resources that we need and there's so many so many people. Harry Butler is um So what would So what would it mean to have because there is an infirmary that you just described ultimately at least from the outside I don't know about the inside it's a bunkhouse. And what would it mean if you were able to have a medical center on this campus? What would it mean if you really had a mini hospital? What would it mean for what you could provide in the future for who could come here and ensure you don't have to turn anyone away if you were able to build hypothetically such a center that is on its way and you still need a little bit more you can speak to her Trudy Rochelle phone number is It would be a dream it would be literally a dream a dream that we've been dreaming of for the past I would say since I got here. We've When I got here, we semi fit in the base before that we're, you know, we're doing really good and I like what we're doing and I like what we're doing because that's what they're in for. We're not in firm, we're base before a center for healing. So, um, but right now it is very, very cramped quarters. Every little space is taken up. We really do not have room for the work that we do. Um, we need a new place. Let's make it a reality. There are people watching and listening and please God, by next summer it'll be a reality. There is a very generous people already starting the They do. Your hearing only as a professional capacity, but also as a mom. Speak about that for Okay, um, I have a my oldest child is um, his name is Gabriel. He's a future camper here. Um, now he's 12. Um, he is 20 years old and um, he has I I I don't even know what you want to say he has. He has autism, he has multiple disabilities. Um, he is extremely adorable. He's also extremely difficult to take care of. He has amazing counselors here since day one, amazing therapists and basically all his first were here. Literally all his first were here. Um, not because we were so pushy, we really try not to be, um, but because his counselors believed that he could do the things that he couldn't or we were told he couldn't, and they never gave up, never never gave up on him, and literally he took his first steps here, he said his first words here, he did everything that we really defied all all odds all odds, and he is really just soared beyond our wildest wildest dreams. Um besides our son Gabriel, our our son Ari, and our daughter Atara. children because they grew up here, and our son Ari is a counselor here for 5 years since way before like I don't know I want to say infancy, but really he's he's uh 19 years old and he's been a counselor since he's 15, which is like unheard of, but he is an incredible that counselor, and Is he Is he getting married? He's a great guy. Um but really he teaches all the other counselors here how to be a counselor. He's he's doing really phenomenal, and um I have to say as a parent of a counselor and a and a a camper, um it's just really inspiring to watch my kids their maturity and their just it's just amazing. You don't You don't necessarily think that your children are going to be um involved in the special needs world. You think that they might shy away from it and just not want to be here, but they've grown up here and they just want to spend like every minute here helping um the hardest campers here. Like not the like no, you have to challenge me, give me more, give me harder, um and it's just a beautiful thing to watch. Um I I think that like you know, myself and my husband, that Camp Ramah is our life. It's just it's changed our lives. It's made us better people. It's made my children better people and it's just the greatest thing that's that's ever happened to us. The truth is everywhere here I I want to introduce every single person here. When you got everybody sleeping in the bunk and then you do that. Every person is a is a world and every person is a story. Every person is extraordinary. I want to get a counselor perspective and a staff perspective. So, they got our back and our heart goes with assistant division heads control. And we're going to give We're going to talk about counselors. I want to give a shout out to big listeners of the United Network of Boca Raton Synagogue Rabbi Yudi Krohn. As well as our 780 C here at Camp Gan Israel. Camp Gan Israel has gotten through this episode with a lot of energy and shout out and stuff. Both of you are incredible. Thank you for what you do. Assistant division head, tell us what that means to be an assistant division head. How long have you been coming here? What does it mean? What do you do? And what is it like to be the boss of your friends? So, this is personally my third summer. I've been a counselor for 2 years. And my first summer I was an assistant division head. Um my main role is hopefully just like my division head likes to say, "Bring on the lights." Bring on the stadium. Um counseling is out there. Um whether it be structured about functionality within a bunk or whether it's within the campers, I'm not sure. I do this to help I'm kind of like a going support um with the bunks that I have. Being a division head is a great experience to be a counselor for 2 years. So, having that experience helped out. And that means that I also am a division head assistant now. Um with different guys who are learning or co-workers, and that. So, I'm a it's It's to be here. Nice. horrible Uh this is my fourth summer. My first summer at Camp HASC I was a waitress for one summer, and then a counselor for two, and then this is my first summer as an assistant division head. Um probably the biggest part of my job has a lot to do with like mentoring and communication with counselors. Like probably like being there for the counselors, letting them like help them work through how to work together with their co-counselors, which is the hardest part of HASC. And like working with their campers and learning to love them and like seeing the positive in them and like helping them build a relationship, helping build a bond, build a relationship with the families, like honestly just being there for them all the time. A lot of putting out fires, yeah. Tell Tell us about the profile of a HASC counselor, a HASC staff member. Who comes here to work? Because, you know, I walked around and I saw a lot of people who were doing a lot of good things this summer. They're making more money. Not that HASC doesn't pay well, but it doesn't pay well. You're not here I shouldn't say that. Let me rephrase that. I apologize. You don't come here to get rich. You you're not here to retire on what you'll make in a summer. So, you could make more elsewhere. And this is not a summer to kick back and take it easy, and it's really go with the flow. It's enormously hard work. And as we spent Shabbos here, we walked around, we saw people from many of them affluent backgrounds and homes, many of whom had so much given to them and handed to them and have been pampered and indulged throughout their lives, who probably haven't necessarily lifted a hand to help with much at home as they do here. And you see here people who are just engaged and and we can get into detail. I think it's important for people to understand the type of needs that are being filled, changing an adult, wiping an adult, showering an adult, uh patiently walking step by step for what takes forever to get from one space to another, trying to lift somebody who's lying on the ground and refuses to move and is having a tantrum, who's not a child, but is the age of an adult themselves and and you see staff members who with a smile and love and the davening we'll get to the davening here in just the worst decorum of any davening on the planet and the holiest davening in the whole world at the same time. At the same time. The worst decorum, stamping feet, clapping, banging. I said "Yalla bi Yalla, Allah needs to hide." So many times they clapped I thought I didn't know what I said in English "Please close up here." Okay, no, I didn't know what I left out. I heard all the clapping and the banging. But the stamping of the feet, the yelling, the shrieking, the hollering, the pushing, the and yet it's the holiest davening in the world. It's unbelievable. So who gives up their summer to come here? What's the profile of the people that you're working with? What's your profile? What makes somebody come to be a staff member at NCSY? Um I think we'll probably come back to the two reasons. Number one is like they're looking to get they're looking for something meaningful that they're going to build a relationship. They're going to give endlessly always here like pastor they're going to give and you might not get anything back. You might not get You feel like you're just giving and giving and giving and giving and like giving every bit of yourself. That's probably like reason number one for that like element of giving. And number two is like kind of what you mentioned which is that like the the environment like the chaburah and like the uplifting like at night the learning here like after a whole day you come here and like the program is amazing. It's like you make a yeshiva and seminary and like a tish all in one every night and like they're like make that like the the place of growth with the counselors also is something that like the night like life of camp is really powerful. I left last night at 12:30. I was learning with the assistant director. She was the programmer. We were schmoozing and I left at 12:30 and there were a bunch of people sitting down to first morning. Not because they slept all day or you know they were drinking pina coladas. They worked tirelessly all day and then they were still learning at 12:30 on Friday night. It was it was my buddy. I got to elaborate on that. In terms of the giving aspect, a lot times these guys come after Yeshiva and they feel themselves that they're growing and they're getting getting a lot from themselves when they're when they're being they're learning from things of that nature and really focusing on Torah. And that was a good that was an opportunity to get not just focus on Torah which of course you have at night, but giving yourself in terms of being able to in terms of giving yourself in all areas of the most solid which is which aspect of of the what is Hashem. Really respecting and trying to develop here. And really that idea of Yeshiva of growing in Torah and to have that mixed in with the idea of Yeshiva in general. And looking forward in the future, I always joke that going to ask is like marrying four guys having four kids all special needs. All of them. And so being able to work on that and having those areas where you're yourself which you don't really have opportunities to do in mainstream society is really a That's an amazing amazing image and so what we just said because those ratio of monks by castles is four kids per So right, so you're learning to navigate, compromise, communicate. Like it's not your turn, your turn. I have to change that diaper, change that diaper. You're learning to get along with others and you're learning to take care of a lot of kids and you're learning to take care of all those special needs. And is there anything better to prepare you for marriage and life? Please God, you won't have to encounter the same things, but you'll have to encounter the same principles of how to navigate in life. That's unbelievable. Now I don't want to say anything negative about your friends who haven't worked or come to Camp Simcha, but do you think when you look at your friends who have worked here are they exceptional? Do you see in them that they're the first to respond to help, to do, to give? Yeah, I love seeing the difference of like my friends or like girls this year they come in the beginning of the summer with nothing and they walk out at the end of the summer and they got like so first of all confident in themselves like 100% seeing like what they are able to accomplish over a summer and how much they were able to grow. And also like when I look at them and I see like oh like they come out like willing to give, they come out like wanting to love in a way that like they didn't have when they came in. I'd say something similar to that. There are guys who come in and go out of the program and they And then after you go through all of that, you take care of another human being. And you can't do something like that and not be impacted by that. So, for sure you can see the recognition aspect from the counselor. What What do you think is harder? I heard these stories that everyone thinks that they have the hardest bunk. That's part of the But what do What do you think is harder, taking care of campers with behavioral issues or physical issues? Some of them, their physical issues that are but they're non-following. But they behave really cooperative. And others are are behaviorally they may be in a wheelchair, but physically the needs are unbelievable. And that Which one do you think? might be more challenging. Or maybe just describe the difference between the two of some of those. The behaviorally and physically. Okay. I don't know if you've if you've done had this, but like I have a bunk that like five or six of them are really well balanced in that regard. And like I think it's very like it was very helpful as a counselor to say like, "Okay, I'm going to use your physical energy right now for this next hour and a half. I'm going to be with this camper and I'm going to be like physically like, you know, carrying, lifting, teaching, showering with me physically exerting. But then like next hour and a half I'm going to be with a different camper and the challenge are not going to be physical. It's going to be testing your patience. It's going to be testing the way that you respond to challenges. It's going to be testing the way that you respond to different behaviors. So, like you kind of like you use you strengthen different muscles at different times. And then sometimes you like you let the other muscles rest while you use the other ones. And like five or six of them definitely lend themselves to like a very good balance. I don't know if that's necessarily every bunk, but like it's something that like definitely can can be helpful. So, actually I see some of them have the opposite opposite experience where I've had medical campers who always say they have more physical. For me it's a lot of mental because I've had campers with autism and chest vests and all sorts of medical things that I was able to use every single day. Twice a day just on my bed rest. And that's just a very big mental game having a routine, making sure that I'm keeping track of all my campers, making sure they're all getting the meds that they need at the right your And that's a big mental aspect of it and physically in terms of behavior issues, which I didn't have before. This year is an extension of that. Um that's more of a physical thing sometimes because you have to get get down dirty. But other times it's also a mental thing of patience and wanting to learn. So, last question to both of you, describe the average day for your staff member. How much time are they on, how much time are they off, and what are the kind of things they might be having to do during that day? An average day for a counselor, um I work with teenage girls right now. So, I would say you start off the morning like you usually have a rotation with your co-counselor. So, you start off the morning waking up and then you're spending the morning like at least like getting up breakfast whatever with one camper. Then hopefully you have swim earlier on the day, it's pretty good. Um you go swimming with a different camper. And then let's say lunch with a different camper. Then afternoon with another camper. Nighttime at dinner like with another camper. It all mixes up. We manage to each camper's schedule, who showers when. Let's say, you know, your camper showers after swim. A different camper camper showers like before dinner. Like your camper showers after the day. And a lot of communication with your co-counselors. Like a lot. Cuz like if you did something and like you didn't tell them, they can't like you're back at square one. So, like being in communication with them all the time. Like a phone group chat like like the only thing that matters. Um and then and then at night amazing programming like written. It's amazing that people have anything left at night for themselves. They're there all day. So, at the end of this year we have academics. They have it every day for campers that are under 21. We're going to have a full school program. The school wasn't designed at the end of the So, I think at the end of the summer like for most people the school continues throughout the year to continue their development and maintain what they've developed throughout the year. Um and then there's also concerts and there's different special activities that happen. And they're just so much fun because they're exciting for the staff. And again, it's summer here. And we mentioned the diving before, which is extremely important to us every day. We have a beautiful diving area. No no other program has it. It's just so much fun. And it's really amazing process that we did. What an incredible thank you for all that you do. Thank you for letting us go behind the permission. As I said, it's really hard to stop. I wanted to speak to everyone here. Everyone has a story, but we're going to continue with with Kivi Naiman and Jonah Schacter to come together. For a little bit more. Thank you so much for Kivi and Rabbi and DRS and Kivi Initiatives and Pillar Society and Jonah. He's a son of a friend of mine I grew up with in Toronto I understand. Yes, exactly. My regards to your dad. Will do. He's doing great. Yeah, thank you. Jonah's an alumni of Camp Simcha and not working here this coming summer. Just here for Shabbos. Just visiting. Yes. And yet you got behind the bema. I feel like that's how it works. And I think the the important point to start with is there's continuous energy into it that you've been here for Shabbos you've gotten to see it too. And after a full summer I think there's been a theme so far tonight of giving. This is definitely a place of giving, but I think it's important to realize that as much as you give as a counselor I feel like you get infinitely more in return. I think out of the two months that I spent here I've probably gained in terms of self growth more than I have at any other point in my life. I was I was one of those guys that ate time at Camp Simcha previously that didn't come in doing his laundry. So in addition to now doing my laundry points of being adapted to things that are really challenging and managing different stresses and being even accommodating. Those are all things that I feel like I gained by those experiences this summer. Well, it says the world that you came back and somebody don't I do they can't stay away because there's a magnetic pull to want to be here to want to take away whatever you can of the magic a little bit of it. As I said I've been to three times to Shabbos and each time was a religious experience and really transformational and really really special. So it's amazing you're your for Shabbos. And when I talk about community initiatives, what does that mean? Does the world know about Camp HASC? No, they don't. How do we make sure that they do? What's your role in this magical place? So, thankfully, due to a lot of the swag and merch that's out there, people know the logo. People see it. And Baruch Hashem, the impact it's having on the community at large, people know what HASC is. But people are always looking for ways to really know it. So, like, maybe I've gone to a concert, maybe I've seen a an old movie of a concert. Look at Jewish music, I think of HASC. Maybe I saw it as one of the things where Daily Giving is giving, you know, money. I'm looking at all these different things, and I see Camp HASC, Camp HASC. And part of our goal is to just bring that awareness of what is actually going on here. Because anyone who steps foot, comes up to your park, so knows what's amazing here. And part of what we're trying to do is just spread the word, build up our base, all the people who have been through this place, to get them together, to let them be our ambassadors. We don't need to sell anything. Camp HASC sells itself. And every person who walks around the building, whether you're in the gourmet glatt or pomegranate or whatever, and there's a HASC sweater, that's someone who's repping Camp HASC. And that's someone who's saying, I had something that was transformative in my life, and I'm taking it with me. I want to show the world. It's something I'm proud of. It's a badge of honor. And we don't need to sell people. We just need to keep allowing our counselors to sell. Absolutely. I you know, I don't know that there's a logo or a brand or swag that people wear more proudly than HASC. Which is amazing. They they get that sweatshirt, they work there staff. I think you make them somebody who's like, I'm related to a staff member, so people like me can proudly wear a sweatshirt. Um, but people wear proudly because they feel so connected. You'd think that they'd be getting paid to wear it. That's how proud they are, and it's really it's really something that's amazing. So, something I thought a lot about over Shabbos, and I'd like to hear both of your perspectives, as somebody who's a staff member, somebody who's a rebbie during the year, and and working hard at Camp HASC during the summer. There's an enormous spirit of compromising religiously to be able to work here. And I don't think you have to actually compromise at all, but compromise in the traditional sense that you're not going to close your eyes and lose yourself in Shana Tova oblivious to what's happening around you as you might want to the rest of the year when you have to know the whereabouts of your camp work and what they're doing. And you can't necessarily start Shabbos and Shabbos, experience a fast day, honor the three weeks the way you normally would, right? There's an adjustment when you make you make when you come to the campus. From music in the three weeks, which is appropriate here, to the microphone. For that there there are things that happen that we wouldn't necessarily have elsewhere, but here it has to happen. And you can't shiver and learn and be a master degree that you might. And there are staff members here who are coming off of a year in Israel where they got a first taste of learning in that way, and now they're pressing pause, stepping on the brake a little bit on that while they're they're lifting their muscle to to match that. So, what what's that like? Is it really a religious compromise or step back, or is it just expressing the religious growth or experience in a different way? Is it something that has to be navigated? Because it's not what we're trained to be, a ben Torah, to be growth-oriented, work hard on your davening and your middos and and going into the pnimius of whatever day it is on the Jewish calendar. And here we're like, "Yeah, all that's nice and it's good, but you got other priorities that come before." So, what's that like? So, I think that I believe that they're not necessarily compromises. I think the common phrase we use is derech eretz kodesh Torah, and that's something that's very prevalent here. Where you got to understand that there is a greater good, and it's not a compromise to say that there are other values that I want to work on in my life, and to know that there is a good that you're doing that has meaning for the community that's far beyond what it can be from Shana Tova that you might have on a certain day. So, I wouldn't put it as a compromise. And I also want to add, you mentioned before, and you mentioned you know my dad, so I think that speaking about how contagious is can be, I'm the first member of my family who's worked here. And last year, my parents came for experience day. There's visiting day, which is the parents of the campers who join, and experience day, which is open to the general public. My parents joined for that day. And that was their first time seeing a counselor now they're wearing a counselor hat all the time. They ended up coming back to camp another four or five times to the point that I think some people in the crowd had asked me if they're like considering being campers for the summer. I said not campers, but they're considering being staff. Excuse me. Um Yeah, I just want to mention that how old are they getting into camp? Exactly. Amazing. And I would even add to to their original point of when someone comes to Camp HASC, what they get to learn as a counselor and as a staff member is that sometimes in life the day of it's happened. You get to a place where yeah, you were not able to dive in with Adam in today. And now you're looking at it's like the sun is setting and you can either feel down with yourself like I just came out of your shoe. But I went all day and my friend is in you know, this program and he's studying and he's learning and he's doing whatever and here I am missing Mincha. And when someone goes to HASC and they have that experience and they're dominating, you know, putting on tfillin before the sun sets and pushing a swing with a camper and then they're in public and it's a you know, very public display of their love of Hashem and it's a bad display because it's really late and why am I putting on tfillin now? And all of a sudden they move on from that experience and they say, "That's okay, that Hashem still this is what I need to be doing right now." It's the most transformative experience. A lot of people when everyone's here, they're 18, 19, 20. One day, you know, they they will be diving with a little three-year-old tugging at their you know, Mincha time tugging at their at their pants leg and they'll have to figure out how to navigate that. there are a lot of children like a child throwing down and you know, that's the rub of that scenario that comes up. But in the end of the day, to figure out how to get through that as a person is something that's so transformative. So it's actually not really not taking away, it's giving you the tools you'll need for life by having to navigate it here, which is amazing. One of the things that I noticed also, which I think makes it very special, is sometimes in an environment like this, so you say, "You know what? My religious growth takes a backseat. I'm doing hesed." And so, you just turn it off altogether. And now you find yourself compromising with your eating or exaggerating the compromise in a way on what it needs to be. And I don't think that that's happening here, and I think that's probably in large part due to what's going on in the evenings, the 9 University Madrich program of learning, and the routine is and the emphasis and the amazing nurturing staff, because as much as this environment and campus is concerned with the well-being of the campers, it seems equally concerned with the well-being of the staff. And And there are people dedicated just to that right here. That That's their job. That's their role. That the staff is still in the growth mindset and that they're being the best version of themselves. So, what are some of those opportunities that happen here? So, the programming here is really 24/7. I can mention a camper's day, but they hopefully go to sleep at night and they wake up sleeping the night, but the casual programming is something that's going on throughout During the day when you're with your campers more, that's something that there's support from the medical team, with support from the MIH team. They can happen. That's They make things happen. That's in the name. Um there's a ton of support for them during the day, but like you mentioned, when that all is put to rest, the rest of the night is where there's where the room remains the base. It's popping until 1:00 2:00 in the morning. Um there's no shortage of opportunities to get involved in your derech eretz in terms of how you take care of the campers and in terms of your Torah what you do when the campers are sleeping. That's where we have assistant OGs. It's not something that has to be during their first time. They're experts in every every way. Yeah, I think a lot of it can be seen when you look around at the amount of alumni that feel like they're connected to this place. It It reflects that on the questions you're asking about what goes on here and how do people engage. When If you ask most 19-year-olds or 20-year-olds about their or 30-year-olds about their first job when they were 18, 19, 20, and you say, "But, you know, what was it like?" Some of them say, "Okay, well, it was good. It was a good experience. Maybe it was even meaningful." And I say, "Okay, great. Do you want to visit there? Do you want to donate there? Do you want to be a part of there?" And I imagine the answer in most places, you know, "I did a very prestigious internship where I made money or made good business connections." He he's thankful for the experience. He doesn't say, "Yeah, I'm dying to go back to that office building in the city." Or, "I'm so attached to it. I so desperately want to be a part of it and donate there." But, in here, that's exactly what's happening. The amount of calls and texts and emails, we're trying to track the email, the wrong email, and we're figuring out. The amount of people that say, "Can I come over and visit? Does it work on Sundays? What if I come in late? What if I come in early Thursday or Friday?" And people just want to be a part of it. They were looking for ways People are constantly looking for ways to be a part of what goes on here. We have Let me mention that this society called the Camp Has Pillars Society. It's a simple thing. And a lot of credit is due to a lot of people who really helped me get started, Michael Horowitz among others. And the Camp Has Pillars Society is a group of people that said, "You know what? I'm young. I'm trying to figure it out." Or, "We were young. I want to give $83 a month for a small number of, you know, a meal or two." That much a month, which equals $1,000 a year, to give back to Camp Has. When we started it as an experiment, an idea, something meaningful, a nice way to just identify who our ambassadors are, who the people who love us are. And it grew beyond our wildest dreams. We're closing in on 450 members. We're about to start bringing in over $500,000, half a million dollars yearly. And how how can we join some of these? I know that when you're sitting at a Shabbat table and the word Has comes up, if anyone worked here, all of a sudden it's like a whole conversation. "What summer were you there? Did you have this camper? Do you remember this day?" And the people listening will feel really, really connected. How would they join the Pillars Society? So, the easiest way to join is pillars.campmass.org. Nice and simple. And everyone who signs up will get because as you pointed out before the merch from the corner you get a nice stuff comes in the mail, a nice hat, a nice bag, things that are important, you know, to the people that they can represent. I'm part of something meaningful because when people come through Camp Mass it it's not just about the fact that Camp Mass has raised a lot of money. There are there are 450 people who say I want to even now later on in life from 18 till we have members in their 70s. People who are associated with Camp Mass in one way or another whether they're counselor here, whether they're a parent of a camper, a grandparent of a camper. People say I want to associate with Camp Mass. And this is the easiest and simplest way to do it. And please, you know, tell the world. I don't want to plug other things on you know, on the road show, but it's such a meaningful way to be a part of something awesome. So, what happens if you give hot sauce at the camp? Right. After all the other things She must have died. Now, you should because one of the things um I was speaking to someone earlier and I said, you know, is this Camp Mass maxed out the people who need it? Are there more people who need to come for summer but they can't? If we if we had all the money in the world, would we be able to get the staff? What are there more campers? And the answer I was told is staff would not be a problem. We could get the staff. If we had more money, we could expand the campus and could provide. There were 50 people who were turned away for the summer that that the camp couldn't provide for. And there are more needs and there are more families who need rested and there are more people who need to feel loved. And the only thing holding back is not staff. We're ready to love. It's it's the ability to provide for them. So, the more pillars there are, the more we can provide which is really really nice. So, John, thanks for coming back for Shabbos. And he's coming out of the Beemer. And we are going to we're going to take it home. We're going to take it home after after all of the last but not least. And Gary, you did an effort like you did last OR JUDAH MICHELLE. JUDAH AND I KNOW EACH OTHER FOREVER for a very long time. Please come. We know each other very very long time. Even before I knew Avi Pollak was younger than him. I'm a few years older but we were in high school together. I don't know if either of us thought we would be where we are now. We did this already. We we went behind the bleachers. We did we did we did. You were on behind the bleachers. But I just have to say that I have such I don't know if it's appropriate for a friend a former davening whatever role I had in high school. But to have nachas but you walk around and you see and you see the magic and the raiv the raiven and you just see the way that you handle delicate situations and and people and the love and the leadership and the vision and the difference that you and your family are making and it's just uh fills my heart. I don't want I don't want to seem like condescending. I'm having nachas and two Jews can have nachas from one another. You know you said you have nachas from me so I feel good now. I feel good. I love telling people that we were that we were friends. Okay good. Now I'm good. So tell tell me about this nachas tonight. Being here being here brings out the best in people. That's the first things first. You come here the the the environment the history that we heard from Reb Shmuel the the the the makom is gorer. It it awakens within us and everyone who's here the language the mission the campers the staff members the families it awakens within a person their latent potential to be good to be positive to be a giver to be optimistic to care to be empathetic. So if you come here and feel good, it's because it's a place that awakens the core. It strikes at the core of who we are, of the nishmas Yisrael. And that that's something which has an overwhelming power. And it's a I I feel the same way when I'm here. I have nachas from from everything and everyone who's here. So, tell us a little bit what it means to be the executive director of of Camp HASC. You have such a competent staff, and we've met some of them, and that's a tiny fraction of who they are. What What does it mean? You saw. Everybody works very hard, and everybody does the does tremendous and transcends and puts their heart and soul into it, and I come at the end and get credit. That's That's how it works. That's the job. That's the job of the executive director. You bet. But what what's your vision? What's your plan? What's next for Together? Obviously, the constant stirrings with the staff The goal is The goal is to create a new world order. Masikin olam b'malchus Shakai. The goal here is to bring our culture to life, to enhance Come on, jump in. Jump in big. Come on. No, no. No, no. The The enhance godliness in the world and ultimately to push the world towards its ultimate potential. Now, the dollar amos, the little corner of the world that we have here the opportunity to to enhance, to polish the diamond that we're polishing is called Camp HASC. I mean, this is our specific shlichus, our specific role and opportunity, our challenge. And uh and we're growing, and we're deepening. Our professional services are getting better. We're helping families more effectively. We're training staff more appropriately. Um we're building new buildings and updating a campus that has so much history and that did so much for the Jewish for Klal Yisrael, for the Jewish community. And now, thank God, we have the opportunity to be the helpers and to provide even more and even greater services, but that means that we have to update our facilities. That means that we have to that we have to grow our facilities. We've built three new bunks in the last 14 months. We have an active board of directors and we are rising today. So, some of the buildings here winterize? What what what does that mean to Winterize means my attention Bogota. First of all, I would love to come back to Bogota very soon to discuss that with everybody here. Uh so, right after that it'll be great to come as much as possible. Yeah, as much as possible. You're always invited. Yeah, I mean if you have a good way for me to get there but Always invited. Always invited. Uh but yeah, uh winterize for all of these who who have not yet moved to uh the Santa Land is is it gets cold in certain parts of the world. And what's cold in those parts of the world is you have to put on hats, sweatshirts, and fleeces. You need to go to the buildings that have heat. Especially for an individual that has a immuno compromised immune system or as, you know, or someone who has to use a wheelchair or needs oxygen or or has some type of medical frailty to to to be able to come up to the Catskills, to the country, what's called the north. Above not just above the Mason-Dixon line but we're talking like, you know, north New York. Uh it's it's freezing cold there in the winter. And these buildings need to be heated and need to be treated appropriately. So, thank God we built three brand new beautiful buildings in the last uh 14 months. She knows all the construction. We have an active board of directors. The community is responding to the great need. Um with our sham, right after the summer we're beginning construction on our new base for floor, our new medical center. It's going to revolutionize the way that we provide care. It's going to revolutionize the way that our families, our campers, and our staff receive care and support. It's going to be a professional uh hospital level medical facility in certain aspects. Overnight rooms, respiratory center, cardiac center to deal with all of the different medical frailties and needs that we have. But it'll be able to be used during the winter as well. Wow. Yeah, it's going to change the face of the way and then that's just really the beginning. We could we covered a lot of topics tonight. We did not cover yet You know, the the camp is is amazing that I'm sure for efficiency reasons, all kinds of reasons, there are boys, there are girls, there are men, there are women, but it's it's appropriate, it's modest, it's so growth-oriented and ruchniyus, the spirituality is palpable everywhere. Everything is set up to be appropriate that people can feel comfortable being here. And with all that, I understand there's more more than 200 couples who met Shouldn't have a number. More than 200 and 25 couples. We still have to do another one. So, they didn't have a number. Listen, you need more than 400 of the count. You know, we don't want to limit but and also, you know, we're just begun. Summer is for scouting and you know, whatever. Um Tu B'Av falls out and it builds up. But it also is we do try to maintain an environment of respect, of dignity. Covered up here, yes. Um it it it it's not coincidental that people are here. There's a mission-driven summer here. People share meaningful work um in an in an environment which can be intense but where there's real openness, where you you see a person. Someone who works here, you know that that person is is fueled by selflessness. You know that they're somebody who's focused on the other. That's the type of middah, the type of trait which is the foundation of a healthy home and of a positive healthy relationship. So, you find a boy who knows how to fold laundry. You know who knows how to do laundry? And laundry is just the beginning. And the laundry over here is not like laundry in in in Boca. It's not like the laundry in most of our homes. I mean, you're talking about real intensive physical and emotional work. If someone comes here for a summer and invests themselves and and opens their heart, the level of sensitivity, the level of of awareness, you become an oisgearbeite mensch, a person who becomes someone who's worked on themselves. They open it's it's funny. We often talk about how the hard work in the campus must be so hard. There could be great challenges in that. But even working within a bunk, living in a in a bunk house with with, you know, dozens of your peers your age working together the partnership and, you know, who's covering and the division of labor and you know, it's a real it's a real midos factory. It's a it's Besides the achrayus and the incubation of leadership, um there's a real medo that that that gets worked on here. We cover a lot of topics. We spoke to a lot of people. What didn't we speak about? What's happening here that people don't know about? What do you think of about Hask is most under appreciated? I I think that the the the way that Camp Hask in the last half century has impacted Klal Yisrael is is is a is a story and narrative that it can never be overestimated. Not just in the area of development of disabilities, special needs, the way that we look at others who are different and the way that we see others who are have physical challenges or or intellectual disabilities. That's that's the obvious one. But what what often people don't realize is you walk in the gates of Camp Hask there's a large sign that has the language of the Ariza, the Ari Hakodesh. The Ari Hakodesh felt that that the gateway to the love of God is love of others and that the way one want to enter into their daily davening is by taking upon themselves the mitzvah of ahavas Yisrael and ahavas Hakodesh. That's actually printed in in in in the nusach Ari. You enter into the gates of Camp Hask and one is aware open to that messaging into that charge. So, it's not just that the seven weeks that you hear in whatever professional or personal capacity that ahavas Yisrael affects us from the outside in and also the inside out, but it's for the rest of one's life in every single facet of their personal and professional life, the the there's the the the notion of of going beyond oneself for another. The the automatic response, which is to think of another person. To think of of of of of someone who's different. To be able to accept them. Be able to love them. Not despite their difference, but I mean, here there's a level playing field. Here we aspire to not see the difference between campers and even as the staff. If you can look at another person who is has a disability and see them for their strengths, see them for who they are as a soul as being created in the divine image, then when you're out there in the world working with different types of people, living in a community with different types of people of different political ideologies, different religious observance, different way of interpreting meaning in life and priorities, be able to see them as a person first, be able to relate to them as as as as an shamash, as a human being created in the divine image. That's something which I don't know how we can ever measure the metrics. And and something which is cultivated in the language and in the service, in the humility of being here, is something which has impacted the world of generations. Generations of young people have worked here at at well before I even heard of Camp Simcha. And um I I I I I I I I I I I I I I I I I I I I don't know that I don't know that in this lifetime I Bais Yaakov will ever be able to know the impact of what Rabbi and Mrs. Klein put into the world with a set in motion here and that their family has stewarded and that so many people have the privilege in this school to be a part of this magnificent kingdom of chesed can ever imagine how it's impacted Klal Yisrael. And it's not just in chesed, it's in Torah, it's in mitzvah observance, it's in yirat shamayim, it's in kavod habriyos, it's in community building. I I I I I I I I I I I I I I I I I I I I I I I I I I I I I I I I I I I I of impact we'll ever know how far this took us down the field towards Google Earth. I agree. I think that it spreads and exponentially grows and that impact is is continuing to be felt. And I'll I'll just share one last reflection in closing that I felt over the course of this Shabbos and the previous times that we visited is that every one here camper staff member is a unique expression of Elokim. It is specifically designed by the Ribono Shel Olam as a very holy and pure neshama and that that comes through. In the case of many of the campers there aren't the inhibitions that so many others have. And it's disability, different ability, ability. Everyone has their own challenges and their special needs and everyone's special sort of in their in their own way and there's something even a little bit more authentic when there's no inhibition to smile, to dance, to laugh, to come up and say hello, to greet. And and it's more real. You're in just a more real authentic place. And every every person that was created by Hashem was created by design for who they are. But I think one of the things to also feel is is gratitude. Gratitude for every every unique Elokim. But you know, we offer a bracha and tefillah for everybody who's wants to find a shidduch, for everybody who wants to have children they should have healthy children. But the birth of every healthy child nobody should ever ever take for granted. And when you spend a Shabbos over the summer in a place where you see the gamut of possibilities. For a person who simply has a healthy child there's just endless endless hakaras hatov and gratitude to the Ribono Shel Olam. The gratitude we have for every neshama. But if you have what the world calls a healthy child just just count the brachas. Don't complain about anything else. See things in perspective and context and and the the enormous gratitude that hakaras hatov. So I'm overwhelmed with gratitude to you my dear chaver. I'm overwhelmed with gratitude for the opportunity of being for Shabbos. Overwhelmed with gratitude that you crazy people are sitting here in the middle of the night still listening. Overwhelmed with gratitude for the people who came behind the Bima and were vulnerable and shared. Overwhelmed with gratitude to the cons and the sterns in this entire enterprise and overwhelmed with gratitude for the chef of brocha that Hashem shares with us and with Hashem we should pick up all the campers, all the staff, all of us Camp Simcha to relocate to Yerushalayim and everybody should be healthy and holy. Full of us we welcome Moshiach. And we're filled with gratitude that you and your family and your family came to join us and and and gave us the opportunity to share a little bit of Kiddush Hashem with Klal Yisrael. Everybody's welcome to come join us, come visit, come be a part, daven for us and come help us build the build the community's answer to the community's need. Be a part of it. Thank you. Amen. And when we sign off, stay happy, stay healthy, stay holy. Thank you.