One of the things that 18-year-old Noa Karsenty will miss from home during her year volunteering in Milwaukee is dancing.
Karsenty, who arrived in Milwaukee on Aug. 15 as a “Shin Shinit,” a cultural ambassador with the Jewish Agency for Israel’s Young Emissary Program, has traveled to Brazil, Denmark, Spain and Argentina with her modern dance troupe.
But Karsenty hopes that her dance talent will serve as another way to volunteer her time and abilities; in addition to her duties as a preschool teacher at the Harry & Rose Samson Family Jewish Community Center, she hopes to teach dance here.
“Each year each Shin Shin brings a different slant to the position based on their skills, [though] the skeleton is the same,” said Pnina Goldfarb, director of the early childhood department at the JCC.
Karsenty admits, “It’s different being without family, friends and the things I am used to.” But when she decided to come here for a year, it was because “I wanted to do something different.”
In Israel, Karsenty spent her high school years volunteering, helping the elderly and working with teenagers with problems.
“When I graduated, I wanted to keep volunteering,” she said.
Karsenty and Chen Avigad, another Shin Shinit, who is working at the Milwaukee Jewish Day School for the year, are both from the Sovev Kinneret, Milwaukee’s Partnership 2000 region near the Sea of Galilee.
The two didn’t know each other before they began the rigorous interview and test process last December, but now they are good friends. “We get along great,” said Avigad.
So well, in fact, that they plan to take a trip together over winter break to visit another Shin Shin who is currently volunteering in West Palm Beach, Florida.
For both women, this year of service precedes their two-year mandatory service in the Israel Defense Force. Both will enlist next year.
The Shin Shin program, which is entering its third year in Milwaukee, according to Milwaukee’s Pnina Goldfarb, “is becoming well established in the community.”
“It’s at a different level we haven’t achieved before. The expectations of the community are now that there will be a Shin Shin in the JCC and there will be one at MJDS,” Goldfarb said.
Karsenty and Avigad, who are both staying with host families during their year of service, have similar hopes and goals for the months ahead.
“I think it’s important that the kids in America will know Israel and know people from Israel. Jewish people need to stick together now to support Israel,” said Avigad.
In addition to their tasks during the day, Karsenty and Avigad both have other duties. Karsenty teaches Hebrew one night a week at Congregation Sinai and Avigad does the same at Beth Torah religious school.
Together, they would like to form a group for teenagers while they are here, “to teach them about Israeli food and dance,” said Karsenty. They plan to start the group over the next month.
After the school year, both will serve as counselors at the JCC’s Steve and Shari Sadek Family Camp Interlaken in Eagle River for two months.
Though their schedules are hectic, according to Karsenty, “If we are here, we want to do everything.”
Avigad, who calls Israel “the major thing in my life,” agrees. “I hope that I can give the kids and others I meet the feeling of Israel. I want them to feel Israel from not only the news. I hope they will visit and maybe make aliyah.”
‘Warm community’
Karsenty and Avigad are not the only Israeli emissaries who have recently arrived in Milwaukee.
Husband and wife Gafnit and Rabbi Asi Bin-Nun are teachers from Allon Shvut who are taking over as the emissary teachers at Hillel Academy, a position previously held by Sigalit and Rabbi Yoel Turgeman.
It was through the Turgemans, who taught at the school for five years, that the Bin-Nuns first heard about the opportunity to come to Milwaukee.
“We heard it is a very warm community,” said Gafnit.
The Turgemans interviewed the Bin-Nuns, as well as Rachel Jacobson and Bruria Gellman, two National Service volunteers, who are also working at Hillel.
The Bin-Nuns both teach the same courses, including Hebrew and Judaic studies, at varying grade levels. They also teach at the Milwaukee Community Cheder on Sunday mornings.
The transition for the couple and their two-year-old daughter, Halel, has been easy so far, they said.
“We feel very welcomed by the school, community and the shul [Anshe Sfard Kehillat Torah],” said Gafnit. She described Milwaukee as “calm. It reminds us of our settlement.”
B. Devorah Shmotkin, principal of Hillel Academy, is happy with the arrival of the couple.
So far, she said, “they have been warmly embraced by the community and have given generously of their time and expertise to many areas within Hillel.”
She added that the Bin-Nuns are a “mirror of the excitement that is presently going on at Hillel Academy.”
The Bin-Nuns will be here for two years, with an open option to stay longer.
While here, “We want to get to know the community and learn from them. We are representatives and ambassadors for Israel,” said Rabbi Bin-Nun.
He added that the couple hopes “always to learn and give…. to bring the love of Israel here.”
“We are very happy to be here. If the whole year is as successful as the first month, then we will have fulfilled our duty,” he said.
Rachel Jacobson and Bruria Gellman, both 19, are serving their second year as National Service volunteers, by assisting the Bin-Nuns and other Hillel Academy teachers in the classroom.
Jacobson, who at age two moved from South Africa to Israel with her family, said her work teaching and tutoring Hebrew and Judaism at Hillel, is important to her because she wants to “bring the love from Israel, to bring it to all the kids here, whoever needs it.”
During her first year with National Service, Jacobson worked in Kiryat Mozkin, near Haifa. There she worked with children and teenagers from dysfunctional families.
Being here makes her appreciate Israel even more. “You miss it and you want to be there. It makes you suddenly realize how lucky you are growing up in such a lovely country,” she said.
Gellman, whose parents made aliyah 24 years ago from St. Louis, Mo., was born in Israel.
For her first year of National Service, Gellman worked in Maale Adumim, in an elementary school with disabled children. She also served as a “big sister” to Russian children and taught drama classes in the community.
“My job is to give the most I can,” she said.
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