Fabrenging Old School

“This guy,

He too religious for these bochurim huh.”

Naw

He’s just an

Old school chassid

And he’s callin’ out all the stuff I always do…

Eating in zal

Eating cake before davening

Eating in restaurants

Eating a hot dog with ketchup and mustard on it

He knocked us for the way we eat, drink and sleep

You know, the fundamentals of human existence

And he told stories from the old-school-Lubavitch days

• Throughout his fabrengen he asked “Are ya ready for this or are ya not ready for this?” eleven times (and then proceeded to tell us anyway)
• He said “this is gonna knock ya socks off when ya hear this” five times
• “Hold on to ya seats cuz this’ll blow you away” – four times
• “…cuz this ones gonna knock off ya shoes cuz ya already lost ya socks.”
• “If ya don’t got prahplems yeh dead.”
• “…big fat hippopahtamus …” –regarding the yetzer hara

He was the kind of fabrenger that would call you out:

“Hello, sir, in the corner. [from way across the room mind you] How are you sir? Are you with the program? Then why don’t ya listen a little.”

Oh snap

The guy was Fredikre rebbe style. It was a classic what-the-heck-is-wrong-with-you-do-you-know-what-they-used-to-do kind of ordeal. Yiras shamayim, doing it right, not making excuses to justify or make ourselves all holy, and all that jazz.

He was a tad intense about though

“yeh gonna put ketchup on yeh hotdog?”

But it’s what us bochurim need to hear sometimes

And he said that right when I finished making the most amazing mixture of humus and salsa and was about to dip chips into it.

Come on, give me a break

At one point it started to rain. Such a memorable scene. Everyone sitting around a huge rectangle made of tables. Listening to the rabbi from across no man’s land*. There’s no noise but his voice and the torrent of rain striking the skylights above us in the huge expanse of the zal made me think:

Dang

I’m so lucky to be here

That coffee I have before davening?

You’re gonna have to pry that from my cold dead fingers

*no-man’s land is a term I made up for the absolutely wasted space that constitutes the inner area of the square of tables. The bochurim are prone to risk throwing a bag of chips or a roll of tissues across it per request of a fellow peer. If it doesn’t make it across and lands in no-man’s land then it stays there, unless a daring soul goes under the table and nabs it if it’s close enough and most of the time they make it back safely.