We had a break-even session in Olympia
Saturday, 28 April 2012 22:49
 By Joel Magalnick, JT News Editor
Social-service agencies, including those of interest to the Jewish community, often hold their breath at the end of each legislative session, hoping their programs won't be cut in that year's budget. This year was even more of a nail-biter given the surprise special sessions that pushed lawmakers into all-night budget negotiations. In the end, human-service programs that had been axed in a breakaway budget passed by Senate Republicans and three Democrats were kept at levels similar to last year's budget.
On the other hand, an autopsy reform bill designed to ease the concern of Orthodox Jews easily passed in the Senate, but failed to reach a vote in the House.
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Camp Kalsman offers kids the Jewish summer of a lifetime
Saturday, 28 April 2012 22:08
 By David Berkman, Special to Soundly Jewish
This summer over 700 Jewish children from across the Pacific Northwest will have the summer of their lifetime at URJ Camp Kalsman. Spending part of the summer living, playing, learning and praying with other children fosters, among other things, a compelling experience of kehilah, community.
This sense of kehilah — multiplied when children return year after year — is further strengthened by the removal of outside distractions. There is no homework, parental pressure is significantly dissipated, the chaos of the school year disappears. Camp Kalsman becomes not just a special place, it is a special time. Living in a fully Jewish environment, sports, arts, nature, even adventure-based programming take on a Jewish lens and provide campers with the basis for forming Jewish community and identity.
Camp Solomon Schechter strengthens arts and sports programming
Saturday, 28 April 2012 21:20
 By Jef Nobbe, Special to Soundly Jewish
Camp Solomon Schechter, through the generosity of the SAMIS Foundation, the Alfred and Tillie Shemanski Trust Fund, and the Special Initiatives Fund — money market fund of the Jewish Federation of Greater Seattle — continues to expand its arts and sports programming.
"At camp, we emphasize the values of integrity, derech eretz (respect) and tikkun olam (repairing the world)," said CSS executive director Sam Perlin. "We do this through sports, omanut (art) and teva (nature) to create our ideal Jewish community."
Blintzapalooza: we schmooze, peruse and nosh — for a good cause
Saturday, 28 April 2012 19:18
 By Herb Levine, Soundly Jewish Editor
Nothing in our area brings Jews and non-Jews together quite like the food line at Blintzapalooza, the annual community fundraiser held by Temple Beth Hatfiloh in Olympia. And there are the stacks of used books to browse.
Blintzapalooza represents weeks of hard work from temple volunteers, and it's all to benefit community social causes (except for a few bucks collected this year from book sales for the temple adult library).
Tacoma high school hosts a visitor from Israel
Friday, 27 April 2012 14:45
 By Herb Levine, Soundly Jewish Editor
The students in the 12th grade World Issues class at Tacoma's Lincoln High School listened closely to the intense young man at the front of their classroom, as he explained that the widely circulated photo of an "Israeli soldier" stomping on a "Palestinian girl" was a staged fake, and how it had served as anti-Israel propaganda.
Ran Bar-Yoshafat, 28, has a law degree from Hebrew University and is working on an MBA from Tel Aviv University. He is a past Israeli mixed martial arts champion and IDF Special Forces veteran, and since February he has been this year's shaliach (Israeli representative) to the Pacific Northwest, based at the StandWithUs office in Seattle.
What do you do when the boy doesn't want a bar mitzah?
Thursday, 26 April 2012 18:34
 By Herb Levine, Soundly Jewish Editor
Yonah was nearly 13, and he refused flat out to study for a bar mitzvah, on the grounds that he didn't believe in what he would be studying. The situation that confronted his father, Matt Biers-Ariel, is familiar to the Jewish parents of many boys and girls approaching their teenage years.
Although Biers-Ariel's response is unique, as described in his new book, The Bar Mitzah and the Beast: One Family's Cross-Country Ride of Passage by Bike, his tale will resonate with anyone who has ever struggled with this particular challenge in passing on our heritage.
My children will not be spectators in synagogue
Saturday, 24 March 2012 23:47
 By Anna Petersen, Special to Soundly Jewish
My children love Shabbat. They enjoy celebrating with songs, food and friends. Luckily for us, Ephraim and Shiphrah are still young enough that going to synagogue is a fun experience and not a chore. One of their favorite pastimes is scurrying down the hall from the synagogue's front doors to the sanctuary, playing bashful with all those who dare to say hello. They enjoy flipping through the prayer books and following along, even though they do not yet know how to read.
We rarely take the kids to a "regular" Friday night service, since the davening begins at bedtime. But whenever there is an early service, we go if we do not have Shabbat dinner plans. We had that chance recently, but our community celebration of Shabbat hit a bit of a snag.
Powell and Heller Conference focuses on aftermath of Holocaust
Saturday, 24 March 2012 22:12
 By Herb Levine, Soundly Jewish Editor
For two intense days, many members of our local Jewish community devoted their attention to the fifth Powell and Heller Holocaust Conference, held annually at Pacific Lutheran University in Parkland.
This year the focus was primarily on the post-war period, the struggle for the restoration of stolen art objects — notably Gustav Klimt's "Portrait of Adele" — debates over the roles of churches and universities in the Holocaust after 1945, and the complex process of victim compensation.
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