H eadlines
Mandate Continued from Page 1
Despite the challenge
it presents to business, the
vaccine mandate is still a “good
thing,” he added.

“If everybody were to get
vaccinated, we could try to
squash this virus,” he said.

Sam Uelkokhan,
the general manager of the Jewish-
owned Shish-Kabob Palace in
Northeast Philadelphia, agrees
with that statement but not the
mandate. Shish-Kabob Palace just
became profitable again after
a difficult stretch during the
pandemic. In Uelkokhan’s
year working there, it’s gotten
busier each week, he said.

To stay profitable, the
Middle Eastern eatery needs
its regulars, Uelkokhan said.

A vaccine mandate may turn
some of them away.

“I was born and raised in
Northeast Philadelphia. I know
these people,” he said. “They
believe what they believe.”
The manager thinks those
customers will choose another
establishment. “If they have to avoid
coming here, they will,” he
said. “Especially when you can
drive for 15 minutes and be in
a county (Bucks) that does not
have this mandate.”
Uelkokhan believes in the
vaccine himself. As he put it,
“I’m not an anti-vaxxer.”
He has also enforced the
city’s mask mandate, which
requires patrons to wear one
inside until they sit down to
eat. The manager enforces this
even though, sometimes, it’s
only for a 5-foot walk.

When people are unwilling
to wear the cover while waiting
for takeout, Uelkokhan even
asks them to wait outside.

But the mask requirement
does not restrict business since
it doesn’t ask people to wear
one during the meal. A vaccine
mandate would prevent unvac-
cinated patrons from even
getting to the table.

“A lot of people are going
12 JANUARY 6, 2022
to look at us,” Uelkokhan
said. “Like it’s us that are not
allowing them to come in.”
“I don’t see what limiting
my business is going to do,” he
added. According to the city, it will
motivate more residents to get
vaccinated, lower case counts
and limit hospitalizations.

Due to the omicron
variant, in the final week of
2021 Philadelphia saw record
highs for case rates for the
almost two-year pandemic. In
Pennsylvania, COVID hospi-
talizations crossed 5,000 for
the first time since last winter.

“Philly hospitals are very
stressed,” said Jim Garrow,
a spokesperson for the city’s
Public Health Department.

Owners and managers of
Jewish restaurants in Philly
understand that concern.

And even if they are worried
about the mandate’s impact on
business, they said they just
want to know what they have
to do to comply.

Garrow said the city is
putting the word out through
business associations and
media outlets. But several
restaurant owners have not
heard about specific protocols
for the mandate.

“We understand those
avenues aren’t always the best
for all restaurant owners in the
city,” Garrow said.

Even the city’s initial mandate
announcement on its website,
though, did not specify the
definition of fully vaccinated.

“Completing vaccinations
means that they have completed
the series of any vaccine that
has been approved or autho-
rized by either the Food and
Drug Administration or the
World Health Organization to
prevent COVID-19,” read the
announcement. Garrow said that the city
would follow the Centers for
Disease Control and Prevention’s
determination, too. At the
moment, the CDC definition
The Shish-Kabob Palace in
Northeast Philadelphia
Courtesy of the Shish-Kabob Palace
is two shots of the Pfizer or
Moderna vaccine or one shot of
the Johnson & Johnson product.

So, for now, that is the city’s
definition as well.

In other words, you don’t
need the booster to be consid-
ered fully vaccinated — and
to eat in a city restaurant. You
just need to show your card or
a picture of your card, marked
with two shots, or one for J&J,
at the door.

Garrow confirmed that the
city would continue to follow
the CDC’s definition moving
forward. “We’ve followed them
throughout the pandemic and,
as we learn more, guidance
changes,” he said.

Only about a third of fully
JEWISH EXPONENT
vaccinated American adults
have gotten the booster, per
the CDC.

City officials are not sure
how long they will continue the
mandate. Restaurant owners
and managers are considering
it alongside their other plans
during the winter surge of
cases. “I believe we’ll continue
to do indoor dining,” said
Pieter Michalis, a shift leader
at Merkaz, an Israeli establish-
ment in Center City. “The only
difference is we’ll be asking for
the COVID vaccination card.” l
jsaffren@jewishexponent.com; 215-832-0740
JEWISHEXPONENT.COM



H eadlines
Yiddish Continued from Page 1
being Jewish was expressed in
that language that they had
grown up with in the home.”
Peltz authored “From
Immigrant to Ethnic Culture:
American Yiddish in South
Philadelphia,” an ethnography
of children of immigrants
conducted in the 1980s. He
found, overwhelmingly, that
these Yiddish-speakers were
preserving their language
to preserve their Ashkenazi
Jewish roots.

“What kept Judaism going
was not the shared religion,”
Peltz said. “It was, on one
hand, the sharing of religion,
but secondly, the adapta-
tion to local life: through
the family and through the
neighborhood.” Today, nearly 40 years after
Peltz conducted his ethnog-
raphy, young Yiddish-speakers
are still trying to hold onto
the language and Ashkenazi
culture at its foundation, either
learning the language in adult-
hood or preserving it through
klezmer music. While interest
in the language has remained
steady, Peltz said, a commu-
nity for Yiddishists is severely
lacking. Sunday schools for learning
Yiddish no longer exist, and
the Philadelphia Sholom
Aleichem House, a space for
secular Jews to discuss Jewish
culture — including Yiddish
— disbanded after 50 years of
operation in 2014.

For the next generation
of Yiddish-learners, finding
fellow speakers to practice with
is challenging. It’s a problem
West Philadelphia resident
Estelle Lysell has had for several
months since she completed a
Yiddish intensive course with
the Workers Circle.

“My friends were interested
in Yiddish; I have friends who
learned some Yiddish, but I
don’t have anyone who was
actually speaking,” she said.

“And when you’re learning a
language in a vacuum for your
JEWISHEXPONENT.COM Founder Susan Hoffman Watts is looking to bring back programming
at the Community Klezmer Initiative, which has been dormant since the
beginning of COVID.
Courtesy of Alan Lankin
When you’re learning a language in a
vacuum for your own sake, that’s demoralizing.”
ESTELLE LYSELL
own sake, that’s demoralizing.”
Lysell began learning
Yiddish in January 2021, when
she bought a textbook for
herself with which to study.

But she wasn’t a fan of many of
the resources available.

Duolingo, which launched
its Yiddish course in April
2021, helps in teaching phrases
and bolstering prior knowl-
edge of a language, but isn’t a
worthwhile tool for someone
starting at square one, she
said. Textbooks and online
courses are expensive for
20-somethings. “For other languages, the
revival projects are teaching
children and
elemen- tary schools for free how to
speak the language,” Lysell
said. “With Yiddish, it’s just
college students paying for it
themselves.” But just as Lysell is looking
for communities with which
to learn the language, pre-ex-
isting Yiddish institutions are
having trouble attracting a
younger crowd.

More than 20 years ago,
Haverford College professors
Seth Brody, Dan Gillis and Mel
Santer — all of whom have
died — founded the Yiddish
Culture Festival, a convening of
Yiddish-speakers for program-
ming, such as poetry readings,
film screenings and klezmer
performances. The festival’s
attendance has held steady
at 20-30 attendees, many of
whom are older community
members. “There were very few
students on Haverford’s
campus who, in fact, were
enticed by this,” said Jeffrey
Tocosky-Feldman, a Haverford
mathematics professor and
organizer of the Yiddish
Culture Festival.

Two decades after the
group’s founding,
the demographics haven’t changed,
he said. Recently, a few
younger community members
have attended programs, but
no more students. Because
the festival is organized by
professors, organizers don’t
have as much time to invest in
publicizing events or drawing
in newcomers, something
Tocosky-Feldman wants to do.

“Pretty much every year, I
go on the Haverford website,
and I look up the Jewish
student organizations and try
JEWISH EXPONENT
and contact whoever’s the head
of them,” he said. “And many
times, the person listed there
has graduated.”
Susan Hoffman Watts, a
fourth-generation klezmer
musician, has had similar
problems attracting
an audience to the Community
Klezmer Initiative, particularly
after COVID.

In December 2019, after
years of trying to organize
events with a critical mass
audience, Watts finally had
success with a “Yiddish
Cocktails” event, packing 80
people into the Philadelphia
Folksong Society building on
Ridge Avenue.

“Was [the Yiddish] terrible
and awful and not great? I
mean, it was; it was crazy,”
Watts said. “But people heard
Yiddish.” After COVID, however,
the Community Klezmer
Initiative has mostly laid
dormant. Watts is hoping to
resurrect programming there
but is having trouble gaining
momentum again. It’s a partic-
ular shame, she said, because
of the welcoming environment
of klezmer spaces.

“One of the things about
the klezmer scene is that it’s
very open-arms, accepting and
loving ... and no matter what ...

you are welcomed with open
arms, loved and respected,”
Watts said. “I think that
people really respond to that
openness.” As Yiddish institutions
work to get the word out to
interested parties, individuals
are dreaming up their own
spaces to practice the language
in community with others.

Lysell is inspired by a
community garden she volun-
teers at, where many of the
other volunteers
speak Spanish. By immersing herself
in an environment where the
language was spoken, she’s
begun to pick it up herself.

She believes the same could
be done with Yiddish, inviting
a group to garden or to make
Shabbat dinner together, to
“limp through sentences” of
English and Yiddish, “slowly
growing our vocabulary.”
“It’d be really cool to see
something like that — active
community organizing,” Lysell
said. l
srogelberg@jewishexponent.com; 215-832-0741
JANUARY 6, 2022
13