I cannot say what my summer job is, but lets just say that I get to go where most dont go. I get to be escorted around by fearful camp directors, showing off their garbage strewn campuses under watchful eyes and speaking yiddush behind mine and my non-Jewish colleagues’ backs. I get to witness chasidish girls clad in striped polo shirts that are tucked into their long black skirts scream the bentching and sing songs with their bunks. I even get to see Chaisdish cheerleaders get up and do camp chears. Quite interesting, considering I usally just see them power walking in robes down rt42. I get to become the object of stares from little boys and girls who may have never seen up close a boy who is apparantly frum yet wears shorts and t-shirts. I get to sample kokosh cake from virtually every camp, while drinking lemon lime Mayim Chayim. I get to be greeted by shocked friends of mine in the less chasidish camps who cannot believe the job I have attained, and the level of power I wield. Last year I even was checked out continuously by this very frum chasidish girl- oh she was hott.
In my travels through the underground camp society I have come across many situations. To keep this short I will focus on two interesting notes.
Today while visitng a chasidish camp in Hurleyville, the director was talking to me and mentioned that if I wanted he would be happy to help me don the Tefillin. I found this statement of quite amusing since my tzitzis were flaling about and a rather large black velvet yarmulke- the yamy of choice for frummies- covereing my head. I explained to him that I had davened already and do every day, he was quite suprised. I was wearing shorts so maybe he thought I was not frum- of course when related to the second in command he also found it quite funny.
The other thing I find funny is the lack of Jewish geography on their part. In most camps and bungalows the manner of speak is yiddish and therefore not much small talk is made. Yes I can bust out some “vus din naimen” or ” vus is dus” or “ich veis nisht” or even “essen ze bright” but thats about it oh the best one I learned this past weekend “kishin mine tuchous”. This lagnauge barrier forces me to skirt the Jewish geoghraphy playing field with questions about their sect and location of their yeshiva’s. This brings them into the light that I am of the more left wing yeshiva genre yet can still keep up with Jewish geography on a mild chasidish level. “Vere is your foder frum?”, oh Boro- Park, is he frum, wow I would have never expected this blank blank(cant say my job) was frum.