Pesach in Roma

How did you manage to find a Passover Seder in Rome? my friend asked me after I told her about my special experience. It was simple I said. My Italian friend who I met at Shabbat dinner in London, who studies bio medical engineering permanently in London, invited me to join her family’s Seder. It was basheret that I happened to sit at the Italian table during that Shabbat dinner a few months ago.

My Pesach began with my forty-five minute walk across Rome to cross the river and enter the Jewish Ghetto of Rome. Earlier that afternoon, I visited the synagogue miraculously hoping that the Jewish museum would still be open despite it being Shabbat and despite it being the start of Pesach. Although closed, the security guard told me to return to the synagogue at 7pm for services that night. While walking around the synagogue before, I caught a glimpse of the sanctuary. I became determined to see the inside with my own eyes that evening.

Ripe with blisters yet promptly on-time, I arrived at the synagogue that evening only to find other confused visitors waiting outside a closed, seemingly desolate shul. The eclectic group of visitors included a Canadian father with shoulder-length hair and his daughter with colorful sharply-angled hair as well as a group of three seniors stepping outside their taxi dressed for Shabbat services. I befriended an Italian woman, and together we walked around the perimeter of the synagogue, asking the security guards at the various security posts for information regarding services. We were continually met with blank stares and unhelpful responses. Once we were halfway around the building, we spotted a small gathering of four or five seemingly orthodox men dressed for synagogue. Services would start soon enough. That ‘soon enough’ gave me just enough time to walk a few blocks away to bring a beautiful bouquet of pink flowers to my Seder later that night.

Half an hour later, we entered the sanctuary. Venturing into the court yard of the seemingly overcoming synagogue, my head turned upward to be mesmerized by the physical external beauty before me. The multi-door entrance, the multi-story high ceiling, and even the memorial of a menorah—I was brought back to my Shabbat spent at the Choral Temple in Bucharest, Romania just a few weeks earlier. Remembering my first embarrassing moment in Madrid, though, I waited until the elderly couple made their way into the sanctuary before entering so that I would know where to sit. I followed the woman to the right into the women’s section, my eyes peering from one direction to the next, soaking in the glory around me. I was mesmerized and remorse that I could not photograph the beauty—I so badly wanted to remember the colorful design on the walls, the intricate symbols on even the lighting fixtures, the collection of stained glass windows, the Hebrew scripture, delicately painted frescoes, and magnificent gold tabernacle. Ironically enough, after deliberately sitting in the women’s section on the ground floor of the sanctuary, I was asked to move and sit in the upstairs women’s section.

Climbing the stairs, I ran into the Italian woman I met earlier, and I followed her inside the section. She made her way towards the middle section in the middle row, intent on sitting in a particular aisle seat. After sitting down next to her, she scooted forward in her seat and pointed to the name plaque behind her that separated that chair from all others. The dark wooden name plaque read in a gold-colored cursive script the name ‘Graziella Ghiron.’ Graziella was Valeria’s grandmother. Ghiron was probably of Sephardic descent, Valeria guessed. After reclining back in her seat, Valeria reached into her purse and pulled out a small, just a little bit larger than a pocket-sized Siddur. The once sturdy and strong cover was worn with care and love, boasting yellowed pages inside with various note scraps sticking out throughout the book. I peered over as Valeria flipped through the pages. She took out one page first, which seemed rather newer from the shade of whiteness. Handing it over to me, she asked me if I could read Hebrew. I made out the word Deuteronomy from the top of the page, and I explained to her that this was a section of the Torah. I began to read the Hebrew, sounding out letter by letter and vowel and vowel. Soon, though, Valeria joined with me as I realized that I need not read the Hebrew—we recited the Shema together. Valeria stuck the prayer back into one of the sections of the Siddur. She flipped through some more pages and pulled out a small, pocket-sized black-and-white photo of an older woman. I asked who the woman was; Valeria was not quite sure. Folding the photo back into the Siddur, a smile spread across her face as she pointed to a certain page. Cursive written in dark pen read a beautiful message in Italian; Valeria explained that her father gave the Siddur to her in 1975. The Siddur was her grandmother’s, a Siddur first published in the late 1800s and given to her grandmother in the early 1900s. Valeria did not know many of the prayers. She would not be attending a Seder that evening, for her mother was too old and young adult son lacked a connection to his Judaism. And yet. There she was, sitting in her grandmother’s seat and immersing herself in her grandmother’s prayers.

Glancing down at my watch, I thanked and said good bye to Valeria before trying to quietly leave the upstairs of the synagogue to start to make my way to the opposite side of town for my Passover Seder. Despite this effort, I still managed to trip walking down the steps with the eyes of the six women instantly on me and a few gasps.

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The taxi cab dropped me off right in front of Rebecca’s apartment and right on-time for my Seder. Walking up the five flights of stairs, I felt gracious for the warm welcome and hug Rebecca gave me as I handed her over the flowers I managed to carefully maintain both in the sanctuary and in the cab on the way over.

I joined Rebecca and her mother’s significant other in the living room of their flat, after properly greeting and introducing myself to everyone the Italian way of either two kisses on both cheeks or a familiar simple handshake. Soon, one by one the guests who would join our Seder arrived—Rebecca’s aunt, uncle, and young adult son as well as Rebecca’s mother’s dear old friend. I snacked on a delicious fish appetizer and sipped a bitter drink as Rebecca’s mother’s friend—who did not look his age of being in his early 80s—told me about his relationships with various Israeli prime ministers. Proudly wearing a pin of the Israeli flag on his suit, he told me about the time he drove around Rome with Shimon Peres as they spoke in French. Later, I would learn that the kind middle-aged man who served as his caregiver and joined our Seder, was in fact Romanian and just recently discovered his Jewish roots. A bit after 9pm, we pulled the already beautifully set table from the wall as Rebecca and her mother spent some moments searching the flat for some extra chairs.

My first Seder in Roma was filled with new traditions, expressions, and memories that I will always keep with me, perhaps integrating these special discoveries into my own family’s Seder in the future. Italian Jewry is not characterized as Ashkenazi or Sephardic because they are descendants of the the Jews who came directly to Italy after leaving the land of Israel thousands of years ago. However, Rebecca’s mother and aunt both grew up in Libya when it was still a part of Italy, leaving right before the revolution there. Their family's roots are in fact of Sephardic descent. Because of this, I gratefully attended my first Sephardic Seder.

As we opened our Haggadah to the first page, Rebecca’s mother stood up from her seat and lifted up the Seder plate, making her way around the table while holding the large plate in both hands. She proceeded to rotate the Seder plate around everyone’s head—three times in both rotational directions. This Seder plate, though, was different than the one my family would have at home hours later, for there was no horse radish. We then begun our Seder, and I found myself appreciating the amount of Hebrew chanted throughout from the Haggadah. Rebecca’s brother led most of the Seder, carefully and precisely stringing together each Hebrew word in his chants, demonstrating his years of practice and experience.

When the time came for us to remember the bitterness and tears of the Israelites, we dipped our celery in vinegar—rather than my family’s typical dipping of parsley into salt water. When the time came for us to remember the ten plagues, we recited the Hebrew name of the plague and then a collective Hebrew word as Rebecca’s mother held a silver bowl of slushing water as her brother poured in gulp-sized portions of red wine for each plague—rather than my family’s reciting of Dayenu after each plague is said while dipping our pinkies into our wine glasses and then tapping them onto our white china plates. When the time came for us to savor the charoset, Rebecca’s mother gently put a dollop of charoset onto torn pieces of lettuce—rather than my family’s smothering of choroset onto matzah. When the time came for us to start the meal, red rice with fish was passed around bowl by bowl—rather than my grandmother’s special matzah ball soup recipe that has been my favorite dish since I was a little girl. And finally, when the time came for us to enjoy the sweet afikoman, Rebecca’s mother broke off individual small pieces of the matzah, delicately handing a piece to me—rather than my family's annual competitive hunt around the living room to reap the modest cash prize for whoever spotted the rainbow-colored, pre-school-made cover holding the afikoman first. I was instructed to keep the piece of afikoman in a special place, as this was not just any piece of matzah. This was good luck—mazel tov—as well as strength and help for when I would be in a time of need. Keep it in a safe but handy place, she encouraged me.

As the night drew on filled with hours of laughter, love, and emotion and our abdomens became swollen and content, the time came to come back to and conclude our Seder. At the very end of the Seder, though, Rebecca ran into her room and came out with a folded piece of white printer paper. As she unfolded the piece of paper, I made out stanzas of transliterations into Italian and arrows pointing from one stanza to the one written above it. Faces a-lit and a-glow, Rebecca’s mother and aunt began singing a melody that I instantly recognized, almost bringing me back to a Seder with my family in Chicago. Reading her piece of paper, Rebecca soon enthusiastically joined along.

We concluded our Seder with the universal song Chad Gadya—except ours was in Arabic. Rebecca wrote down the transliteration of Arabic to Italian to remember a childhood song that connected her family and reminded them of their Libyan Jewish roots. Rebecca flew from London despite the exams she had both that week and the next to join her family in Rome for their Seder. Why? Because of this song, this moment, this memory is what makes her family’s Seder distinctly and forever their own.