Page 35 - Kol Bogrei Habonim - Autumn 21
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scrumping) and spooky Victorian graveyard, I remember Sundays hearing older and
I’m sure the vicar and his flock were smarter people than me discussing politics,
delighted to have a giant prefab shoebox full Zionism, history, big names like Herzl and
of hippies plonked across the way. Marx. Conversations peppered with the
exotic modern Hebrew language which I was
My memories of Habo in the 70’s and early
80’s are strikingly thus: Bell Bottoms - there wasting every opportunity to learn at my
must’ve been a glut of denim back then. I Jewish day school during the week. Good
wish I still had mine. I’d make two pairs of looking young men with wispy beards and
decent jeans out of them that didn’t make you kibbutz watch straps and kaffiyas with
look like a psychiatric patient. Playing rumpled movement shirts and groovy smiles.
mahanayim in the only (I’m guessing) indoor Hippy chicks with flowing sleeves and
basketball court in Yorkshire in the 70’s. No wooden jewellery. I looked up to them. My
one in Yorkshire had even heard of basketball slop shirt was mucky, and my belly stuck out
back then. The enormous Gestetner printing over my cheap jeans from Leeds market.
machine in the small office. It was the size They were nice to me though. Our madrichim
and had the smell of a Hillman Minx and it - cool Mark Platt, kind and funny Sarah
churned out song lyrics and other propaganda Leviten, Adam Malin on guitar,
which were stapled together to make books sophisticated Roz Sills, dark but clever Stu
which were used once and then left to go Saffer. Roy Graham, basically a ghost… I
mouldy on a shelf. know there were so many more… please
forgive my memory. They were patient and I
felt safe. I wasn’t an easy kid: loud, manic,
unruly. Life in our (what was then called)
broken home wasn’t easy. My little brother
and I felt marginalized from the wider,
wealthier, outwardly unbroken Jewish
community, and Sundays at Habo were a
kind of brilliant desert island for me. A
playground of equals. We were a family, we
loved our tribe, and we had a purpose - Israel,
although I certainly didn’t have a clue what it
meant. I was too busy running round the gym
till I had an asthma attack. Other places for
Jewish youth to hang out on the weekend
looked shallow and pointless. And the kids
had posh sneakers and money. That stinky
Moadon in the woods began to act like a
1967 - Opening of the Fir Tree Lane new lifeboat. There were others too, Jewish kids
Moadon in Leeds by David Ben Gurion.
who had fallen through the community’s
On the left Rosh Ken - Barry Plotkin, cracks but also weren’t at home with The
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