I was chatting with a blog reader the other day over Gchat and I was telling him that I could hook up with folks to stay with for shabbos in the city he’s living near in upstate New York. I gave him a couple of people to call and his response was “Hi you don’t know me, but I want to invite myself for shabbos” and how insane that sounds. He was serious, he had never before in his life made plans for shabbos and had never been introduced to the art of shabbat hospitality.
Now I admit, I am the shabbat hospitality master, I have lived in and traveled to enough Jewish communities to have a huge network of people to stay with, eat at and sleep by if the need arises. I have stayed with my friends daughter in Omaha, eaten dinner and lit menorah at my buddies sister in Southbend and slept on the floor of the chabad in Anchorage for Rosh Hashanah, but I was really trained by the best – I learned the art of getting “shabbos hookups” in yeshiva.
When I was in yeshiva, it was the ultimate score to be invited to your rebbes house for a shabbos meal, this meant that you got to daven in shul (only if it was Friday nights) and eat a normal meal that would taste a lot better than the gruel they served in yeshiva. Getting the invite was random, you never invited yourself and random invites were rare. There are rebbes I had that never had me over for a meal and once in a while a kollel guys wife would say those longed for words “come back anytime” which meant you had to actually take them up on the offer and most people were too embarrassed to, including myself. One year I became friends with this dude Yossi (he may be reading this) who taught mishna brura seder and somehow I developed my art through him, I was able to crack that initial embarrassment and just invite myself whenever I saw him. Eventually I figured out what signs to look for and how to feel out the situation – was there a lot of back and forth talk over the phone? Did he say something like, we didn’t make much this week? There were so many different tones of voice I could pick up and clues as to “dude it’s not a good week” even if they didn’t say as such.
Things were never too problematic for meal invites until I lived in Dallas, the first place I moved to where I didn’t know a soul and due to the friendliness of the community it actually worked out quite well. It was the type of place where you could (and I did every week) walk up to someone and say “hey I heard you have good food – can I eat at your house?” and they would smile and say “sure”.
Not all communities are like that, in the Bay Area it definitely isn’t like that – people are a bit more closed – but that isn’t to say that you cannot call up and get the shabbos invite. I have a large enough network where, fortunately, due to the blog I can locate a fan in random places who is more than willing (sometimes begging) to have me over for shabbos. Luckily, most people recieving calls from me are comfortable enough to let me know that the answer is NO, which is cool, I just hate when you call up on Monday and it’s Wednesday night and they still haven’t said anything about shabbos – which always puts you in the “who do I call next” bind.
I’ll be moving to Baltimore soon — what’s the shabbos invite situation like there?
Singles are arranged via one Eitan Blass (a saint). Also see
http://www.shabbat.com/default.aspx
Young marrieds are often invited.
Once people have kids, most people don’t invite or go out hardly at all.
My family is an exception; we have 12-20 for almost every Shabbos meal we are home. So drop me a line when you get to town.
I find Baltimore extremely unfriendly.
Invites are are rare, and most people in shul never talk to you or even in fact know your name since they community is so huge.
I agree, Anon. We’ve been here almost four years, and it’s full of clique-y, unfriendly groups, both frum and nonfrum. If you’re not from here, or didn’t go to school here, they have no time for you. The few friends we’ve made are from somewhere else originally.
Ah the classic argument, I myself found Baltimore exceedingly friendly, but this may be because I went to Goldbergers and judge friendly based on people saying good shabbos to me in the street.
I live in Baltimore. When my family moved here we had endless invites (not just from Goldbergers people!)
Now that I am married with my own home we have between 10-20 people each shabbos and those are mainly people who invite themselves! And that includes families with as many as 11 kids! I personally love it when people invite themselves, it saves me the headache of thinking of who to have. And on the rare occasion when my hubby and I feel like eating out I will call whomever I feel like going to and invite myself!
I think the community is overall pretty non-judgmental and cool but, like any other place, it has its fair share of snobs. You just smile and wish them good shabbos and move on with life. Some super friendly shuls – Goldbergers, Chabad, Shaarei Zion, Suburban, Hertzbergs (ish)
I find people in Baltimore DO NOT say good shabbos to others on the street, at least not in the neighborhood I live in.
Once I said good shabbos to someone and they ignored me and a nearby black guy asked me in all seriousnous if our religion forbid saying hello on Saturday, since he had noticed people all day walking by without greeting each other.
Yes, I agree.
There are pretty much two main groups.
The people whos families have been here forever, and NY transplants who are friends with all of their old friends from NY.
Most people don’t say Good Shabbos to me on the streets and often when I do say Good Shabbos to someone I don’t know they stare at me like, “do I know you? Why are you talking to me?”
Weird. I totally find people to be friendly. And I live in super yeshivish-ville. I’m alright with the fact that not all of my frum male neighbors feel comfortable greeting a woman but that’s maybe 3 men on the whole block. All the kids and women say good shabbos even though we have very little to do with each other (I’m only married a couple years and they’re all much older than me with huge families). I feel confident, however, that if I ever needed anything i could knock on any one of their doors and they would be there for me even though we are the crazy lubavitchers of the block. They may not be my best friends but they wouldn’t ignore people.
About Baltimore — been more then a decade but I found the people friendly. On weekdays and Purim, if walking, someone would almost always stop their car and ask if I need I ride.
When walking at meal time on Shabbos, there were several times when people would spot me from the window, open their door and ask if had to where to be for a Shabbos meal. Not living in the right part of town to walk from home to shul, I always had a place to stay and meals arranged at different houses. Kind of took it for granted.
There have been towns where invites were rare and I ended up renting hotel rooms near the shul. Don’t want to say where, I guess that’s a type of lashon hora.
Also, when I was conservative, I found a very unfriendly nature – example — ”you’ve come to our Temple 3 times in the past 2 months, if you want to come again become a member.
When I questioned at a different synagogue about paying for seats on the High Holy Days and what about people in the community who could not afford it, the response was ”They can come in with financial statements to discuss a discount, pray at home, we sell prayer books in the gift shop, or go to the Orthodox if they really need a service”
My folks loved having you over at my house – until you asked to move in, that is.
You don’t come to Friday night meals as much as used to. Possible connection?
Since I live in the hood and I’m here all week, I tend to go away for shabbos – on top of this, I used to come so often because I didn’t know anyone else in the hood.
Haha. “Here’s leftover ribs from work. Can I use you’re internet?”
they have a site called shabbat.com made just for the purpose of finding meals for shabbas. I used it once to get lodging and shabbas meals out in north florida once
Thanks for the info Ill check it out
Adam, I live in Baltimore. Come for Shabbos! Baltimore is a warm, open, welcoming community. Depending on which neighborhood, you should have no problem.
I hate to sound mean, but it’s very shnorrish to invite yourself over. Can you really not stomach the idea of eating at home? I do it and am none the worse for it. In fact, it’s made me stronger. It’s part of growing up.
Eating in your house by yourself is no way to spend a shabbos, the kid I was talking to lives about 15 miles from the frum community and therefore can’t just invite people over. I myself look forward to being married and having loads of peeps over to sample my food and see me make kiddush in my underwear.
I think it’s schnorrish to invite yourself to a weekday meal. Shabbos and Yom Tov are different. It’s not a time to be eating by yourself, unless you really don’t have an alternative. If you want to make it up to them, bring a little gift, or a nice one at the end of the year.
Wow i actually agree with yankel
I always bring something and usually ask before if they are wine drinkers because there’s nothing like bringing a $60 bottle to someone who doesn’t drink wine.
It’s good to have a network, and even if someone doesn’t, it’s good they can still find someone BH
Easy way out is just ask the Rabbi.
Asking the Rabbi works in a smaller community. In Baltimore, the Rabbis, by and large, are not in the hosting business.
Again, I disagree. There is not one rabbi here that I know who would not hook you up for a meal (and i know most rabbeim)
Someone mentioned shabbat.com before… I have stayed by the creator of that site numerous times, and have had the best shabbos experience of my life! It really is an incredible site and if you ever need a place to stay, check it out! And plus, you don’t need to master the art of inviting yourself over, you just need to master the art of politely declining so many welcoming invitations!
Shabbos alone is not something I would want to do 52 weeks a year- but doing it some of the time hits the spot! First of all, you get a head start on your shabbos napping (or reading if you aren’t tired enough to nap)- I frequently find that I am out cold midway through the meal, wake up an hour or two later, and finish and do Birkat Hamazon later in the evening. (That probably comes from drinking a whole kiddush cup on an empty stomach!) Second, you don’t have to worry about “have I made enough food for ___ people?” Third, you don’t have to be as civilized as you are in front of company (whether you are the host or the guest).
Woodrow-Exactly. I don’t see what the big deal is. And it’s infinitely preferable to seeing (some) guys make kiddush in their undies. If they’re married, all guys. If they look good, it’s a waste, and if not, well I certainly don’t want to see that.
Good-looking married guys in their underwear…mmm….
Just the fact that Hesh’s post (which did not mention the Mid-Atlantic region once) has been inundated with anecdotes about Baltimore’s unfriendliness (as much as one may try arguing tooth and nail against it), well, it’s enough to cast some aspersions on the town’s much ballyhooed ‘friendliness.’ Hesh, I’m seriously happy that you like it there though. Talk to you soon homie.
hesh i wanna see you make kiddush in ur underware with your wife and 8 kids…..