It happened one Tuesday Morning

I woke up this morning, pleased to finally be over my jetlag, and got out the door at 8 AM, too early to go to the Chabad Minyan (quorum of at least 10 Jewish men), which starts at 8:30 AM, and too late for all the other minyanim, which start at around 6:30 AM.  I started putting my tefillin on to daven yachid (pray by myself) but thought to myself that, no, one of the major benefits to living in Eretz Yisrael (the land of Israel) is that you can always find a minyan, so I had better take advantage of it.  In Walnut Creek, you've got an excuse.  Not here.

 

I started towards Chabad house, thinking that perhaps they would have something going on there, even though it was early.  No dice.  Next, I headed for the Ashkenazi shul half a block away thinking maybe I'd get lucky, but the flyer taped to their window said that their last minyan was at 6:35 AM.  So I wandered home.  I started putting on my tefillin to daven yachid again when Galila mentioned that there is a different ashkenazi shul one and a half blocks to the north where they might have an 8:15 AM minyan, so I put my tefillin back in the bag and headed in that direction.  On the way, I passed by Rafi's father's Sephardi shul, where their minyan was just finishing, and bumped into Rafi and sons on their way back home.  I got to the second Ashkenazi shul, but the lights were out and nobody was home.  I looked at my watch: 8:20 AM.  By now I had spent so much time wandering around that I had might as well go back to the Chabad shul for the 8:30 AM minyan. 

 

I arrived at Chabad early to find a bunch of men milling around, shuffling their feet twiddling with the locked door.

As a car swung bye the driver hung out the window, "Hey, you can go to the Ashkenazi Shul down the street, they're open."

One of the bunch of men clumped by the entrance assumed leadership, "No, it's closed," he said, pointing in the direction of the first Ashkenazi shul I had visited.

"Not that shul the other Ashkenazi Shul," the driver shouted as he sped away, "Beit Knesset HaKotel."

We all looked at eachother puzzled.

"What is he talking about?  Did they open another Ashkenazi shul here?  Does anybody know where it is?"

Some of us started putting on our tefillin to daven in a minyan in the street right there.  After all, people had to get to work.

"No," one of the chassidim corrected us, "you can't daven next to garbage," pointing to the overflowing dumpster on the street corner.

Glancing across the street, we saw men pouring out of Beit Yitzchak, the other Sephardi shul in the neighborhood.  My cousin Rafi's shul.  Their minyan had ended, but the doors weren't locked yet.

The leader made his decision, "YALLAH!  To Beit Yitzchak!"

And so I went five shuls in 40 minutes, all of them within a 1 block radius.

 

Later in the day, back at Chabad, we finished Minchah (afternoon prayers) as the sun set.  Rabbi pulled his shofar (ram's horn) from it's carrying case.

"Rabotai, during the month of Elul it is customary to hear the shofar in the morning.  For those who may have missed this morning, I'll blow it now."

"What?" this morning's leader said, "Is that some kind of joke?"

Rabbi looked back at him over his shoulder.

"You know we didn't hear shofar this morning is because YOU COULDN'T GET OUT OF BED IN TIME!"

Rabbi blew and blew again, but he kept blowing air, no earth-shaking sonic blast.  Again, he tried but he couldn't pucker his lips properly, because he couldn't stifle his laughter.