Merry Jewish Christmas: From Chinese food to 1656
It’s my favorite holiday.
There’s no cleaning, cooking, shopping, or decorating. I can look at all the glitzy holiday lights and not worry about taking them down in the New Year.
Jewish Xmas is a Christmas Day ritual. First, Chinese food – the restaurants are always open. Then a movie. It’s usually not too crowded since everyone is opening gifts like ugly Christmas sweaters and carb-intensive fruitcake. I get to spend time with friends and family who also love the day.
One year we began at Nom Wah – the oldest tea parlor in Chinatown, NY.
Nom Wah is on Doyers Street. In the early 1900s, Doyers street was nicknamed the Bloody Angle for the notorious Chinese Tong Gang killers. They were infamous for hiding in the bend of the street, whacking their enemies, and fleeing through underground tunnels. Hatchets were the choice of weapon. It led to the expression “hatchet man.”
We feasted on scallion pancakes, “original egg rolls,” and sticky rice in lotus leaf. It was the best in the city – especially on Jewish Xmas.
After our meal we had some time before the movie and wandered through the old streets.
We found it by accident, walking down St. James Place in the shadow of buildings filled with Christmas cheer: Chatham Square Cemetery, now known as the First Shearith Israel Graveyard.
City sounds were muted as if we had stepped back in time. Someone or something spoke to me from the old graves. I read the plaque.
1656? Jews in New York – The New World?
They had come from Recife, Brazil, fleeing the Portuguese Inquisition. In a hard-fought battle with Director-General Peter Stuyvesant, the 23 Jews won sanctuary in Dutch New Amsterdam. They started new Jewish lives and traditions.
The cemetery was an important part of Jewish life. Sadly, most graves were moved or lost in this tiny plot of land. The few that remained were marked by thin, uneven stones about to topple and some above-ground mausoleums. They belonged to Jewish lives and history.
I tried to read the old Hebrew letters. It was difficult. More important was the fact that only a few blocks from my Jewish Xmas was the remains of Jews who fought to live in a place I take for granted. Even the high black fence and surrounding structures couldn’t deny them their right.
Urban development squeezed out the cemetery, moving most of the graves to larger locations. This tiny plot, backyard to crumbling apartment buildings, was all that remained. In fact, it’s the only 17th century Jewish structure in Manhattan.
My Jewish Xmas took on a new meaning. Jews had arrived here over a century before American independence. School textbooks never talked about that.
I vowed to learn more about them.
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