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Jamie’s Bar Mitzvah began with a lovely family Shabbat dinner on the Friday – he was delighted that his grandma was able to fly in from South Africa to be there. Jamie’s Uncle Dan and Aunty Nat joined the family from Melbourne, Margot and Dee came from Sydney and his great-aunty Wendy arrived with Jeff from Melbourne, too. Together with his mum, dad, gran (who made the cake), G ...

Ìý As we near the end of term, students and staff are visibly tiring (I hesitate to comment on the state of parents!), but I am confident we will all make it successfully to the Pesach and Easter break. A phone call from my son yesterday, describing his miserable symptoms as he lies in bed with another bout of COVID reminded me to arrange the next booster vaccination for myself ...

Meetings Mention ‘meetings’ to many people and they will sigh, groan or comment that meetings are a waste of time and that they wish they didn’t have to attend them. But every human encounter we have is effectively a meeting. Looking up a definition of the word clarified this for me - the sigh response probably relates to “an assembly of people for a particular purpose, espec ...

Lots of discussions … It has felt as though the past week has involved lots of discussion on issues that have emerged in the media. Some of these are seen as controversial, others less so, but I strongly believe that it’s always far more constructive to talk widely about these issues and involve as many people as possible in discussions than it is to ignore them. Internationa ...

Hannah’s Bat Mitzvah was held on 24 December 2022 but due to a very busy and exciting start to the year we have not had the opportunity to chat about it. Hannah’s D’Var Torah related to Parshat Miketz which she delivered at Chabad Shul during the shabbat Mincha service. This was followed by Havdalah and lighting of the Chanukiah. A great time was had by all dancing and eating ...

Matan’s Bar Mitzvah was held on the 13thÌýand 14thÌýof January and he led all the davening from the front of Dianella Shule on the Friday night. He said it was a bit difficult and he felt a bit nervous, but it was okay once he got going and realised that he did know what he was doing. Lots of family members were able to enjoy the occasion with Matan – his cousins flew over from ...

Eli’s bar mitzvah sounded quite spectacular and was celebrated over a few days. On the Thursday morning minyan, he received his first call up to the Torah, following his Hebrew birthday on the Tuesday. He lained from the Torah and enjoyed breakfast in the Shule afterwards. This was followed by a party on Thursday evening, with his school friends, members of the Shule and his fa ...

We recently caught up with Lisa Kirstein, OKC 2002 and former ¼«Æ··´²îæ» Captain. When reflecting on her journey over the last 20 years since graduating from Carmel, Lisa places her proudest moments into three buckets – time, treasure and talent. Now working as Head of Consumer Payments and Gift Cards for Australia and New Zealand at Wpay, a wholly-owned Fintech subsidiary o ...

For me, the past week has involved a lot of thinking about leadership. Walking my dog early this morning, I found myself wondering who is the leader in this particular relationship. After some consideration, I concluded that I am the leader on our walks, but that I sometimes nobly let her think that she is. I certainly know that I am the worrier of the two of us - I often worry ...

After several years of a Covid-enforced hiatus, the Shlichim, Rabbinic and lay leaders of Australia’s Mizrachi communities joined in Perth from 16-20 February 2023 for their annual conference.Ìý

The occasion was combined with a number of anniversaries for the small but vibrant Mizrachi community of Perth including the 30 year anniversary since the establishment of the Beit Midrash of Western Australia, the 25 year anniversary of Dianella Shule in its current location, and the 40^th anniversary of Bnei Akiva Perth.