Chabad Japan prepares to welcome Jews during 2020 Olympics

Four Chabad Houses around the island nation will offer Jews a home from home during this summer's Games.

JANUARY 28, 2020 10:03

Giant Olympic Rings are installed at the waterfront area at Odaiba Marine Park in Tokyo, Japan, ahead of an official inauguration ceremony, six months before the opening of the Tokyo 2020 Summer Olympic Games, January 17, 2020 (photo credit: REUTERS/ISSEI KATO) — Giant Olympic Rings are installed at the waterfront area at Odaiba Marine Park in Tokyo, Japan, ahead of an official inauguration ceremony, six months before the opening of the Tokyo 2020 Summer Olympic Games, January 17, 2020

(photo credit: REUTERS/ISSEI KATO)

With record numbers of tourists set to descend upon Japan for the Olympic Games later this year, the team at Chabad-Lubavitch of Tokyo are preparing to provide a home away from home for Jewish visitors, and hopefully educate the local population about Judaism as well.

Rabbi Mendi Sudakevich, who has been in the city for 20 years, arriving there from his native Kfar Chabad, Israel, will be hosting a range of events along with his wife Chana, and a team of rabbinical students flown in to staff pop-up stations around Japan's capital.

According to Chabad.org, the couple are planning to create a temporary Jewish center within the Olympic village hosting a full schedule of Shabbat and weekday services, and will offer kosher food and meals. “We will have parallel activities going on at the Chabad House at the same time,” Sudakevich said, highlighting that the center has a mikvah as well.

The couple are one of four serving the Jewish community in Japan. Sudakevich told Chabad.org: “There is one Chabad center in Kobe (a 264-mile drive or three-plus hours on the bullet train from Tokyo) and two new ones: in Kyoto, which is Japan’s No. 1 tourist destination (a six-hour drive from Tokyo), and in Takayama, Japan’s Alps (two-and-a-half hours west of Tokyo). Many tourists go there to see the real Japan.”

And while the community import many kosher products from America, they are also proud that shechita is performed in Kobe by Rabbi Dovid Posner, the Chabad rabbi of Kyoto, giving Jews in Japan a local source of kosher meat.

Most Japanese people know very little about Judaism or the Jewish people, but Sudakevich hopes the Games and the events around them will help to change that. “Japan’s Jewish community is unique in that it is mostly a community of people who come to work here for a few years - bankers, lawyers, those in high-tech,” he said, noting that most are transient, in their 20s or 30s, and return to their home communities after a stint in Japan. "There is no second generation," within Japan's Jewish community, he added.

Meanwhile, interest in Japan as a tourist destination is rising, bringing more Jewish people to the island. Tourism in the country has enjoyed a massive boom in recent years, up from 8 million visitors in 2010 to 40 million in 2019, exceeding Japan's targets by 15 million.

Sporting events have contributed to that surge.

“We hosted the Rugby World Cup over the recent High Holidays," Sudakevich said. "It was a big thing. We had many visitors - Jews from South Africa, Australia and England. It was a little taste of the Olympics. The biggest challenge was finding an appropriate place to host the activities.”

But the rabbi remains undaunted. He has been in contact with various Olympic delegations ahead of the Games to offer his services. Among them, Team Israel's baseball team, which has qualified for one of the six places in the Olympic finals.

The team will be returning to Japan, having visited last March, when one of their games coincided with Purim. “We read Megillah for the whole team,” Sudakevich said.

He looks forward to recreating the experience on a larger scale for the Olympics.

“It is going to be a crazy month,” he said. “Good, but crazy.”