Stories of Roots and Routes

Within days of arriving in Boston in 1991, Mila and Mike Margul looked for a temple to say mourner’s kaddish for Mike’s parents. As immigrants from Odessa, Ukraine, being in the U.S. meant that now they could observe Jewish customs more freely. Mike found Temple Shalom of Newton on a map and walked 1½ hours to find it. He was met with a warm welcome: temple members brought toys and clothes for their young son, and invited the family to a Passover seder.

 

All of that happened almost 30 years ago, and many of the current members of Temple Shalom were unaware of the community’s role in supporting Soviet Jewish immigrants.That changed this past May at the Community Story Slam when congregants shared stories on the theme of “Roots and Routes.”

 

The night featured five members who attended my storytelling skills workshop series. They gave personal context to the Jewish teaching of welcoming the stranger. Mila Margul shared her poignant story:     

 

“How could I have left it there? My grandma had sewn a small pouch with cloth from my grandfather Benjamin’s worn-out pants. Inside was my grandfather’s tefillin.”

 

Although Mila did not understand what it was for, she did recall seeing her grandfather praying with this ritual object.

 

“My mother was a true product of the Soviet regime, opposing and ridiculing any religious beliefs, so my grandpa had to hide his practice.”

 

After her grandfather’s death Mila had saved the pouch, until amidst the chaos of packing and worrying about luggage weight limits, she set it aside.

 

“Only once I got to the U.S. I realized I had brought items I could easily replace in any American department store. I asked myself: why did I leave behind everything meaningful?”

 

Many years later her son was studying for his bar mitzvah, and Mila wished she could give him something that had belonged to his great grandfather. By chance she discovered that back in Odessa a friend had salvaged the small pouch with the tefillin from the pile of discarded belongings. She promised to ship it to her. It took over three months but finally it arrived just in time for the bar mitzvah. 

 

“Those beliefs of our grandfathers didn’t vanish after all. Had we stayed in our native country we’d have lost them forever, but here in this far away land of America we began looking for and finding our roots.”