UW Protests and My (Unexpected) Bar-Mitzvah

Important note: this is not political. Of course I have my own political opinions, but I prefer to keep them to myself, and as such I'm not commenting on any political implications on what I tell below. I prefer to just describe things to people and let everybody make their own opinion. At a minimum I think we can all agree that this has been a historical situation and I would like to register that I witnessed part of this historical moment with my own eyes.

So, as you may be aware, there has been a number of protests regarding the current conflict in Israel and Gaza. A big part of that has been the various encampments of protesters in university campi around the country, and a few days ago one such camp was put together at the Seattle campus of the University of Washington (UW). As I said, one thing we can agree on is that this is a historical moment, which I wanted to see it with my own eyes, and today I had the opportunity to do so. It helped that the day turned out to be a gorgeous one, sunny and bright, but still not too hot.

The heart of the UW campus, as in many American universities, is the quad, which here consists of a square surrounded by four buildings in Gothic Revival style, with some iconic cherry trees. It makes sense, then, that the Pro-Palestinian protesters decided to set up their tents at the quad. There aren't that many tents, they cover perhaps only a third of the quad. Some tents have specific functions, like library, medical tent, etc. There are loudspeakers and people use them to say their demands regarding the current conflict. By chance, when I was passing by it was time for Muslim prayers so some students were praying together. I spent quite some time there and the whole thing looked peaceful, the manifestation wasn't too loud and the academic life was going on as usual, with lots of students coming and going.

In fact, on the other end of the quad, there was a single tent set up by the UW Chabad, and both sides seemed to be just at peace with each other. I approached that tent and start talking to a nice young lady there, and it was then that there was a very unexpected turn of events...

The young lady in question was the wife of a Rabbi, who was present at the tent as well, together with some Jewish students. As the Rabbi joined the conversation, I referred to the fact that I believe that my ancestors from both my father and mother side were Jewish and eventually converted to Catholicism (quite possibly under duress). The Rabbi, very nicely, told me then that, no matter the fact that I'm a Catholic, the fact is that "once a Jew always a Jew" and as such I was a Jew, and I will always be a Jew, no matter my current religion, which I agreed with him (I had heard that before). He then proceeded to ask if I had a bar-mitzvah, to which I replied that I had not.

To my surprise, he followed that with "So, do you want to have one right now? It takes less than 5 minutes!" I was gobsmacked, but I answered "Yes!" and without hesitation the Rabbi proceeded to wrap my left arm with the traditional leather strip with the box for the Torah (the Tefillin) and put a Kippah on my head and then told me to repeat his words, which consisted of a recitation in Hebrew of a passage of the Torah - my Hebrew by no means is any good but I did my best. Once I finished the recitation, he congratulated me and invited the jewish students presents to dance and celebrate, so they all formed a circle, including the Rabbi and myself, and we started dancing and singing in Hebrew.

Once that was done I thanked the Rabbi profusely and left. To my surprise, I felt truly moved by it, it really made me emotional somehow - I guess the Jew in me got quite happy. Don't understand me wrong, I'm very much a Catholic (as I told the Rabbi) but I imagine this made me relate with ancestors way back in the past, perhaps from a time even before the United States and Brazil were a thing.

Anyways, I got to witness a historical moment and got my bar-mitzvah, so this has been definitely a day!