First Night of Januca

Another friend of Hugo's is visiting, a doctor from Brazil who is finishing his docorate in homeopathic medicine.  Nice guy, excellent Spanish, lots of mate and chatting.  We went downtown to the big market in San Telmo, but it began to rain so we ran into a local cafe with wifi access to grab a beer and use our phones to find a restaurant.  Found a nice Indian restaurant, since Giovano is vegetarian.

Since tonight is the first night of Hannukah (or Januka, as they spell it here), I looked around for a place to light candles.  Chabad has a big presence in Buenos Aires, 10 different Chabad centers.  There was an outdoor ceremony within walking distance of where I'm staying, and both Hugo and Pablo expressed interest in going, so we went.

I have mixed feelings about Chabad.  I'm delighted that they offer so many free classes and offer services like tonight's worldwide.  I like their teaching style, which takes a concept and repeats it over and over (this is particularly good in Spanish, but Rabbi Teitelbaum in DC has the identical style).  But some of their ideology scares me, reminds me too much of the evangelical Christians that also scare me.  In fact, the beards and look remind me somewhat of my Villanova days and time with a particularly conservate Christian group which I spent a lot of time with (and now regret).   Like they say, take what you like, and leave the rest.

Hugo found some of the language particularly offensive.  As a Buddhist, he prefers the universal God, unity and peace.  Chabad's languages focuses on the God of the Jews, and the importance of separation of Jews from the rest of the world.  While I understand that philosophy (up to a point), I can also see how others would view that as elitism.