B'naiB'rithYadB'Yadnewsletter&flipsideJanuary2020 copy

From the President
& her council
to those members who are not
in the best of health at present
and ……………………
Yad B’Yad collected £210 towards this year’s BBUK Qiryat Gat Appeal to provide Chanukah
gifts for the children at the Kadima After School Club. In excess of £1750.00 was raised
nationally.
Mazaltov to
Rosemary and Geoff Wolfson
on the occasion of their
Ruby Wedding
INTRODUCING VERA BERNSTEIN FOR OUR NEXT SPEAKER MEETING : TUESDAY 7 TH JANUARY
Vera Bernstein became a refugee in the UK after the Soviet invasion of her
country Czechoslovakia in 1968. She started off in a holiday job in Butlin’s,
then a short spell as an au pair and eventually worked in a precious metal
refinery before branching out into market research, and later further studies for
a psychology and business degree. The 1980s signalled an opening of contacts
between East and West and Vera took the opportunity to work as a free-lance
translator and interpreter using her knowledge of Slovak, Czech and
Hungarian. She is married to Eli and the family has belonged to Pinner
United Synagogue since 1975.
Her mother Alice came to join her daughters in London in 1975 after the untimely death of her
husband and their father. She was 54 years old and learned English looking after her
grandchildren.
Vera has been participating as a facilitator in the Northwood Holocaust Education programme
for many years and is now ready to tell the story of her family’s survival based on her mother’s
Spielberg testimony.
Vera’s presentation describes the fates of some family members and how without the help of
some of the local population risking their own lives none of them would have survived. The
presentation’s title – Trust and Betrayal - stresses the role of luck in trusting people who can be
at times both rescuers and perpetrators. It includes photographs, maps and video clips of Alice
telling the stories joined by a narrative by Vera.

MIDWEEK RAMBLE: WEDNESDAY 4 TH DECEMBER
HELLO FROM HAMPSTEAD HEATH
On a delightfully sunny December day seven
members of our Lodge led by Andrea, walked for
seven miles from Golders Green Station to explore
Hampstead Heath.
There were three high points to a very enjoyable walk. The first was seeing a Lutyens designed
church in the middle of Hampstead Garden Suburb with an explanation about it by the Minister.
The second was seeing the magnificent pergola built for Lord Leverhulme and now open to the
citizens of London. The final one was an enjoyable lunch in the café in Golders Hill Park.
Thank you, Andrea!
Tony Swabe
BOOK CLUB : WEDNESDAY 4 TH DECEMBER
UNSHELTERED by BARBARA KINGSOLVER
Unsheltered is a 2018 novel by Barbara Kingsolver. It follows two families
living in the same house at two separate time periods in Vineland, New
Jersey. The novel alternates between the 21st- and 19th-century stories,
using the last words of one chapter as the title of the next one. One
family lived in the house in the 1800s and one is there in the aftermath
of Hurricane Sandy. It draws parallels between the literally blissfully
ignorant Christians and Darwin deniers of the 19 th century, and the
desperate, health-care-and-homeless climate deniers of the 21 st century.
Of the 7 members meeting to discuss this novel, it was a struggle by many to bring out the
good points of the book. Quite a few found it difficult to get into or grasp the Americanisms
with three members abandoning it before the end.
We look forward to a more positive reaction to our next book!
Vivienne Gould