#leilahbug29

which is a german saying and means something like, that ignorance doesn’t protect one of stupidity.

For all of you who wonder why I posted these pics (fetus schomiche, deleted by now), when it’s obviously so clear that Mitch doesn’t want them to be posted.

I didn’t know. I actually didn’t know or so I would have respected his wish. I’m sorry Mitch, and I can’t take it back. I can just delete this post.

I’m not a traveling mitch grassi lexicon, also I wish I would be. But I learned my lesson today and see, I know something more about him. Thanks to these two respectable fans:

can’t sleep love (feat. tink)

misbehavin’

aha (live)

take me home

to the river

sing

na na na

rose gold

new year’s day

light in the hallway

where are ü now

cracked

lean on

problem (live)

if i ever fall in love (feat. jason derulo)

ref

first things first

water

It’s definitely hard to decide at the outset where to go if you’re unable to visit beforehand (which a lot of people aren’t). First thing I’d keep in mind is that it’s ok to switch once you’re already there. If you choose a place and are unhappy, visit other places for the day and see if they have a better feel to you.

Second of all, try to clarify for yourself what your goals are in going to sem and what is important to you (learning style, size, location, hashkafa, etc). See this post for more of my thoughts on that.

And finally, talk to as many people as you can who have gone to different seminaries about their experiences - what they were looking for going in (and how that compares to what you want), and how the seminary measured up in that regard. Keep in mind that there’s no one seminary that is right for everyone, so just because someone loved a place or someone hated a place doesn’t automatically mean it is or isn’t the right place for you. Some people are more able to recognize this than others, so you will have to filter what you hear in that regard (I, for example, try really hard to present a balanced picture of my first sem to people I talk to about it, even though I didn’t like it, and there are people i wouldn’t recommend my second sem, even though I did like it; but I’ve encountered many people who totally disregard what someone else is looking for when giving advice about sem and decide that what was good or bad for them would always be the same for everyone else). I’m happy to tell you what I know about any of the places I have experience with.

To be honest the full practical details are far beyond the scope of a single post; first you have to understand what you can’t do on Shabbos, and then you have to understand which of those prohibitions are waived and in what way on Yom Tov. This is also one of my weaker areas of halacha for the simple reason that I myself am never cooking on yontiff, because I’m always eating at someone else’s house (G-d willing I will get married soon and that will change). So I’ve learned it all in theory, but without the opportunity to experience it in practice, it’s not as easy to retain all the details. If this is a topic you want to learn about fully I would really recommend finding a rabbi, rebbetzin, or other knowledgeable person in your local community who might be willing to learn with you (I’m sure your local Chabad shluchim would love to help!).

But a few basic things -

Fire may only be kindled from an existing flame on yontiff. This means that while you can cook on your gas stove on yontiff, for example, you can’t turn the flame on on yontiff itself, but would rather need to have left it on from before yontiff (please take safety precautions if you do this). You also cannot turn off the flame on yontiff, as extinguishing a flame is not involved in the process of cooking food.

You can only cook food that will be used that day (where a day is defined as sundown to sundown). So if it’s a 2-day yontiff, you can’t cook anything for the 2nd day until after it gets dark that night. If there is a 3-day yontiff (2 days of yontiff followed by Shabbos) you must make what’s called an eruv tavshilin before yontiff in order to be allowed to cook for Shabbos on yontiff (since you can’t cook for Shabbos on Shabbos).

You may only do things on yontiff that could not have been done before yontiff (either because the food would not last at all that long, or because it would notably diminish its quality to cook it that far ahead of time).

That’s coming up in the next post (queued for tomorrow afternoon). :)