At the same time, Rabbi Yonah Bookstein and his wife had returned to the US after a stint in Poland and been offered the opportunity to try and revive the Hillel campus in Long Beach, which was on the verge of dissolution. Rabbi Yonah quickly set about trying to set up a website for the Hillel; one that would bring in the students and make them want to be involved. He tracked down Abitbol who was responsible for designing the McGill University Hillel website in Montreal, and as a result became aware of Abitbol’s Jewlicious blog. After first asking if he could write for the blog, Rabbi Yonah then asked if it would be possible to create a festival based on the tenets of the blog. And so, the Jewlicious Festival was born.
The first Jewlicious Festival, held in the summer of 2004, drew around 150 students. Last year over 1,000 young people attended from 30 different campuses all over the United States and Canada and this year even more are expected to attend, along with participants from Israel.
These days Abitbol lives in Jerusalem, but for the next few weeks he’s here in LA, helping prep for Jewlicious 6.0, which will take place at the Alpert Jewish Community Center in Long Beach from Feb. 16-19. Dressed in jeans and a baseball cap, he’s clearly excited, if not slightly exhausted to talk about the extraordinary success of the Jewlicious Festival.
As its website proudly proclaims: Jewlicious Festival 6.0 is a three-day gathering of Jewish students & young adults, featuring leading Jewish personalities, musicians, artists, and writers from around the world for a world-class concert series, inspiring Shabbat experiences, discussions and workshops. And with prices for the three day festival starting as low as $36, it’s something even the most financially strapped student can afford.
Rabbi Yonah Bookstein is considered the “face” of Jewlicious, he’s been entrenched as the center of the Long Beach Hillel for six years now and his dynamic personality and ability to engage young Jews has reached celebrity-style proportions (he was recently named as one of the Jewish Forward’s “Top 50”). However, Abitbol is also very much a part of the festival’s success.
Wearing a Jewlicious sweatshirt, the 40-something Abitbol looks as if he could easily blend with the 20-somethings that come to the festival. However, he is not keen to take too much credit for the success of Jewlicious. In fact, he says he’s not even sure of his title. “I don’t know, um.. International Director of Something or Other?
“This festival is a grassroots movement,” he continues. “It’s like an inverted pyramid with myself and Rabbi Yonah, his wife and a crew of dedicated staff people at the apex, but we’re all just subservient to our constituents.”
Those constituents are the young people that make up the committees that run every aspect of the festivals. They are volunteers, students, and young adults, and, Abitbol says, “Whatever they say, goes.” He cites one example where there was an artist he wanted to bring to the festival (Jewlicious is renowned for its exciting and diversified musical performers), “but the committee said, ‘We don’t like her music,’ “and that was that,” he says, adding, “They are always right. We might think we know what young people’s interests are, but that’s not always the case. I think we’re the only festival where the people in charge with the titles are the ones that during the festival are picking up garbage, sweeping floors and sleeping under desks.”
So what is it that makes Jewlicious such a success, when, as Abitbol points out, the fastest growing young segment of the Jewish population is the unaffiliated. “It’s funny,” he notes. “When you show up on Friday right before Shabbat dinner at the JCC [for the beginning of the festival], there’s a little elevated platform above the dinner are. You see close to 1000 people milling around, and you can still easily identify the Jewish community professionals that are there, because they’re the ones walking around slack jawed at how something like this could happen. The crowd is not all Hillel kids, or religious people. At Jewlicious you have everything from Breslav Hasidim to lesbian peace activists interacting and not killing each other.”
That, says Abitbol is the secret to Jewlicious’ success. “We’re not here to shove an agenda down anyone’s throats. We basically create a weekend that is a positive Jewish experience. A lot of people that come to the festival are completely unaffiliated and all of a sudden they are at the first positive Jewish experience they’ve ever had. And it’s not divisive or political, it’s a celebration and it allows people to feel good about their identity. We give them a taste of what it means to be Jewish and what they do with that afterwards is entirely up to them. You don’t have to be religious, or listen to JDUB record artists or have Matisyahu on your iPod 24/7.”
However, in an ideal world Abitbol confesses that it would be good if people came away with more than just having a good time. “Rabbi Yonah would love it everyone became more religious. And I’m a Sephardic Jew and I think the solution to all the problems that plague the Jewish world is for everybody to adopt the customs and traditions of Moroccan Jewry. You’d eat better food, you’d dance better, you’d be happier, you’d be able to eat rice on Passover,” he says, laughing.
Turning serious though, Abitbol says, “With so many young Jews either taking their Judaism for granted or outright rejecting it, I’d just like them to be able to make their decision about what role their Jewish identity plays based on something substantial –an informed opinion, and that’s what we hope to give [these people] at the festival.”
This year the program once again boasts a variety of presenters on different topics covering everything from studying contemporary issues through the Talmud and a panel discussing the Lesbian, Gay, Bi and Transgender community, including Bat Kol, a religious lesbian organization based in Israel.
As usual there will be great music from the likes of Electro Morocco, Matisyahu, Moshav Band and Rinat Gutman from Jerusalem – “The female version of Matisyahu,” says Abitbol.
, There’s nothing to lose and everything to gain by attending Jewlicious 6.0, says Abitbol. “You’ll be well fed, super entertained and you’ll meet some of the coolest people around,” he says. “People who will challenge you, entertain you and provide you with thought-provoking stuff. Or,” he adds, smiling, “You can just have a good time and try and hook up.”
Jewlicious 6.0 will take place from Feb. 19-21 at the Alpert Jewish Community Center, 3801 E. Willow St, Long Beach, CA 90815. For more information, visit www.jewlicious.com