This week Jerusalemites got more than just Hanukka candles and doughnuts at a
Jerusalem Challenge event held at Beit Yehudit in the German Colony. The
organization’s founder, Lisa Barkan, says Jerusalem Challenge aims “to turn the
city into a living classroom for Jewish peoplehood, offering all kinds of Jewish
experiences to enhance Jewish identity.”
Sunday’s gathering was suitably
entitled Against All Odds: A Hanukka Event for Young Adults, with the speakers
including tsunami survivor Michal Margolis and wheelchair-bound champion dancer
and sportsman Mennie Glass.
“We want to learn from these heroes who have
overcome daunting challenges and who radiate light,” says Barkan. “We target
Jerusalem’s dynamic young adult sector to inspire them in their efforts to build
a community of purpose in this city.”
Barkan says the organization is
also looking for other results. “Jerusalem Challenge aims to prevent the young
adult exodus from Israel’s capital. It reaches out to Israeli university
students and young professionals, soldiers, new immigrants and long- and
short-term young adult visitors to Jerusalem to foster networking opportunities
for social entrepreneurship and community activism.”
The first of those
objectives was achieved at this week’s event, with the 100-plus audience
suitably moved by Glass’s account of just some of the challenges he has had to
face, and still faces, on a day-to-day basis. He is a truly inspirational
character. A young-looking 57, Glass lives on Moshav Kidmat Zvi on the Golan
Heights and went through a cataclysmic series of military mishaps that have left
him wheelchair bound. Add to that an ongoing battle with bone-marrow cancer and
avascular necrosis (AVN), the second of which he says he contracted as a result
of medical negligence.
“I was given a substance to toughen up my bones,
to combat the effects of the cancer, but I should not have been given it. The
substance has a different effect on my bones compared with other people and it
left me with more damage.”
It is safe to assume that many people with
even some of Glass’s health issues to tackle would be content with managing some
of life’s practicalities. Glass, on the other hand, has won medals in the
European and World Wheelchair Latin Dance championships, and has also minton
events around the world.
“I put on a good show for Israel at the
[Wheelchair Latin Dance] World Cup in Holland in April,” he says simply. “I won
two gold medals.”
Glass is evidently made of extremely stern stuff and
follows the ethos sung so exquisitely by Eric Idle in the closing scene of Monty
Python’s
Life of Brian – always look on the bright side of life. “I always try
to see the positive side of any situation,” he states, adding that that goes for
his serious ailments too. “I tell people with cancer that the first thing they
have to do is to accept the fact that they are sick and then to embrace the
disease – then they can start to get on with things and to live their life as
fully as they can.”
Glass is a doer. He finds it difficult to encounter a
problem and not to do his utmost to put things right. His efforts to give
himself the best chance of a quality life led him to taking Kupat Holim Clalit
to court over its refusal to sanction hyperbaric oxygen therapy (HBOT) to
counteract the effects of AVN – the only means left open to Glass to address
that particular health problem. “Clalit rejected my request because the
treatment is very expensive, about NIS 1,200 per session.”
He appeared
before a special Health Ministry investigatory committee, established at the
court’s directive, and achieved the desired result.
“I was very focused,”
says Glass. “I was fighting for my life.”
It is not only his own issues
that get Glass going on the justice warpath. A few months ago his 11-year-old
twin daughters bugged him about taking them for a swim in the
Kinneret.
“I initially said no – logistical considerations can be tough
for me and I don’t always have the strength to deal with them. But when I saw
how their faces fell I agreed.”
However, when Glass and the kids got to
what is left of the lake it took him quite a while to maneuver his way into the
water. “We all had a great time in the lake but I thought that if it’s so tough
for me to get to the water – and I have some use of my legs – how hard must it
be for people who are more handicapped than me. They simply cannot enjoy
the Kinneret.”
He soon made phone calls to the relevant authorities and
eventually set up a meeting with the man in charge of governing access to the
lake to organize a wheelchairaccessible beach.
“This coming summer
disabled people will be able to get to the water,” Glass declares with a smile.
“The Kinneret should be there for everyone to enjoy.”
Glass is certainly
going to enjoy a family event next month, when his daughters – he also has a
27-year-old son from a previous marriage and a 24-year-old stepdaughter –
celebrate their bat mitzva.
“I was diagnosed with cancer one week before
we discovered my wife was pregnant,” he recalls. “The doctor told us, because of
my state of health, that we should consider whether or not to go through with
the pregnancy. At the time we didn’t even know there were twins on the
way. I told my wife I may not be around in a week, month or a year’s time and
that she had to decide about whether to see the pregnancy through. And
now I’ll be at our daughters’ bat mitzva celebrations, when I wasn’t even sure
I’d be around to celebrate their first birthday.”
GLASS CERTAINLY fits
the seasonal miracle bill, and Barkan could hardly have chosen a more impressive
guest speaker for this week’s Against All Odds gathering.
According to
Barkan, Jerusalem Challenge’s main aims are “to turn the city into a living
classroom for Jewish peoplehood and to offer all kinds of Jewish experiences
that enhance Jewish identity.” The organization holds Shabbat events for Jews
from all sorts of backgrounds and walks of life.
“We are building a
community of people with a common denominator. We launched Jerusalem Challenge
in July with three events. We had Shabbat dinner which we hoped would be
attended by 100 people, and 150 turned up, so we knew we were addressing an
important need.”
Barkan also got a volunteer event going whereby she got
permission from the municipality to expand a community garden, near Derech Beit
Lehem. And last Tisha Be’av, realizing the Jerusalem Cinematheque would be
closed for movie screenings on the day, she got permission to use the venue to
hold dialogue and panel sessions about what it means to be Jewish today, and
other related topics.
“We turned the cinematheque into a living Jewish
place for the day.”
For Barkan the organization’s events are about adding
meaning to people’s lives.
“We don’t do parties, we do events with
content and diverse things so that all Jews feel comfortable.”
The event
was sponsored by ROI Community of Young Jewish Innovators, Beit Yehudit, Tzeirim
Bamercaz, Bama’agalei Tzedek and Hitorerut B’yerushalayim.
“The ultimate
goal is for the audience to network, bond and build Jerusalem,” says Barkan.