Students find unconventional ways to celebrate Passover

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Wed, 15 Apr 2020 03:51:49 +0000
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Andie Cohen’s family holds Seder through Zoom. Credit: Courtesy of Andie Cohen

Though restrictions put in place to combat COVID-19 have changed the way many are celebrating Passover, they haven’t stopped some Ohio State students from appreciating the meaning of the holiday.

Passover, which began April 8 this year and runs until April 16, celebrates the liberation of Hebrews from slavery in Egypt. However, it was difficult to celebrate with stay-at-home orders and grocery store shortages, and Jewish Ohio State students who have found themselves separated from their families had to get creative to keep the celebration alive.

The holiday’s traditions include gathering over a feast called a Seder and reading the Haggada, which describes the story of the exodus. Some Jewish families also participate in a literal and ritualistic cleaning of the home before the holiday and eat traditional foods at their Seder, such as bitter herbs, a nut and fruit mixture called charoset, wine and matzo, which is unleavened bread.

Riki Shenkar, a fourth-year in pharmaceutical sciences, said she was able to have a Seder at home with her family in Columbus, Ohio, but was missing her sister’s family and her 92-year-old grandmother, a survivor of the Holocaust. In keeping with Orthodox Jewish tradition, her family does not use technology during the beginning and end of the holiday, so they did not have a family gathering online.

Shenkar said the differences did not end there.

“Definitely is an interesting experience, having no extended family here and a little harder access to food,” Shenkar said. “It’s hard to find matzo because of coronavirus. I was going to order matzo online, but I guess a lot of Jews are ordering matzo online.”

Although she could not be with her entire family, which she said is usually her favorite part of the holiday, she said she enjoyed the time to appreciate the meaning of the holiday.

Andie Cohen, a third-year in women’s, gender and sexuality studies who lives in Columbus, Ohio, is originally from a Jewish neighborhood in Cleveland, where her brother and grandparents still live, but her parents were in Florida when the stay-at-home order was announced, so they decided not to travel back. With her family spread across the country, they held their Seder over Zoom.

“It was probably like a 45-minute quick read-through of the Seder,” Cohen said. “And that was kind of nice because it included some family members who wouldn’t be at our Passover Seders because they live out of state. We tried to do the same things we normally do but you can’t sing all at once on Zoom, so it was kind of a hot mess.”

Cohen said she upheld her personal tradition of watching “The Prince of Egypt,” a film about the exodus from Egypt, and she later found out her brother had watched it as well.

Aside from the film, Cohen’s and her brother’s observations of the holiday differed. Cohen said she was not able to go out and get traditional food items for Seder because of COVID-19.

Hannah Griswold, a fourth-year in comparative studies, said she never misses Passover because it is a yearly point of connection for her family. This year, Griswold put together a last-minute Seder for her roommates that she said left her feeling fulfilled and empowered.

Griswold bought wine on the first day of the holiday and settled on saltine crackers after being unable to find kosher items in Kroger. She said she made charoset at home, and her roommates joined her for wine, an online Haggada reading and “a ragtag” nonkosher celebration. Griswold said she felt fulfilled and empowered hosting her own Seder.

“I’d been having a bad day and I hadn’t been planning to do a Seder at all. So it was a really last-minute burst of energy, of like, ‘I don’t want to not have done this,’ and ‘I don’t want to lose this to the coronavirus,’” Griswold said. “I was kind of overwhelmed with a feeling of thankfulness to have any sort of small celebration.”

Correction: A previous version of this story stated that Passover began April 9. It has been corrected to April 8.