“My parents always wanted me to engage with Judaism, which I did to an extent as a kid, but on their terms, and that didn’t really resonate with me. When I came to Brown I had this wonderful realization that being Jewish is a rich experience and I got this new feeling for what it meant to be Jewish and how diverse that can be. I went on Birthright as a bright-eyed freshman not knowing anyone or anything about Hillel and that’s where I started to build my Jewish network on campus. I’ve always liked asking questions and that perfectly aligns with my Jewish identity because I feel like being Jewish is about learning and engaging with those tough questions. I used to meet with Rabbi Mordechai and we would have a set agenda for learning but we’d get so off track because I’d keep asking a million questions, and the same thing now with Rabbi Michelle and Moshe. I have non-Jewish and Jewish friends asking me what Judaism says about this and sometimes I know but most of the time I don’t and that's what’s exciting for me, that I can always look to someone or something to find an answer and try to enrich my life, my identity and my engagement with Judaism. Judaism makes me really hungry to learn and I’m thankful for something like that in my life, especially now that I’m closing out my formal education, because having something I can continuously touch upon and engage with in a learning sense is really important to me. I was Learning Chair at Hillel for a while and that was exciting because I didn’t feel qualified to do that, so I would say, ‘I’m putting on an event and I know nothing about it so I’m gonna be engaging as much as you are if you come’ and that was great because people saw it as an approachable way to learn without being intimated. Once my term ended I was an active participant at Hillel and I loved knowing on Friday nights I could go to dinner and see people I knew, and that community kept expanding into a big family on campus. I think it’s important to have a Jewish community as a young adult and Hillel has provided me with that, for which I’m really thankful. I always see people from Hillel, from birthright or from the broader network around campus and that’s made me feel very secure here. It makes me feel good walking away from Brown and feeling like Hillel was very much a foundational part of my experience here and that my Judaism will continue afterwards.”
Hannah is planning to move back to New Jersey, bond with her new dog, and maybe have a short stint living on an organic farm before finding a job in the healthcare field.
Hannah is planning to move back to New Jersey, bond with her new dog, and maybe have a short stint living on an organic farm before finding a job in the healthcare field.
