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Are you staying home or going to family or a hotel for Pesach? I’m staying home and I’m just curious to see how many people go away to a hotel.
I am staying home. I never went away for Pesach. Although, if you asked me if I was able to go away, well, that is another topic in itself. Those brochure look so fantastic and a vacation for me, is when you don’t have to cook. A girl can dream, can’t she??
Ames, I love your oneliners!! How about starring in your own comedy show, maybe you can get a free room at one of the Pesach Hotels.
I know, I know, some people have a custom of not eating anywhere but their own home on Pesach.
Home vs. Going Away? How about both?
I’m flying internationally on Chol HaMoed. (Not really sure what there is to eat in the Airport in Europe during a stopover, though I am looking into it).
JM, what airport?
Zurich.
I am speaking with some Swiss friends of mine to try to get in contact with a Rov there so I can find out what (if anything) is acceptable.
One friend told me that MAYBE evian water is good.
These liquid rules stink, I’m not even sure If I’ll be able to drink anything. (And I will be traveling with kids!)
We go away. We never made Pesach at home. But we don’t go to hotels we go to Family. I think Pesach is time for family.
Postsemgirl – how much room does your extended family have 🙂
We stay home – I would rather cook than pack! And we happen not to have tens of thousand of dollars to spare …
I am always home. Going away for me, meant going to my mom and dad zichronam livracha.The last five years of their lives, they came to me instead. They are gone 15 years now, and I have bnever had a desire to be anywhere but in my own home. Pesach is the only yom tov about which I feel that way. There is something very special to me about turning the house over – it feels new to me, so I really in many ways feel like I am “away.” I cannot really explain that. I suppose that if I had the opportunity to go to a reliable hotel, I would consider it, but the cost is too prohibitive to really be a viable alternative for me. And to be a little bit gaivedik, my kids look forward to my pesach specialties, and they don’t think anyone cooks them as well as I do. It’s not really that no one cooks as well as I, it’s more that everything I make comes from a long line of my Bubby’s and mom’s Pesach cooking, and THEY were superb cooks. I just was fortunate to learn from the best.
I used to work as the hotel chazzan for a tour company in Los Angeles. It was fun, and the hotels were nice. But I gave it up when my oldest kid started first grade, and wanted to participate in the maggid beyond Mah Nishtanah. The older crowd who attended the cantor led seder didn’t have paitence to hear a six year old read the Hagaddah a little too slowly. So now we stay home, I make Kiddush and my kids read the Haggadah until they get tired, and then I take over. We miss the oppulence and the ease of just locking the door and getting on a place without having to turn the house upside down. But, the trade off of seeing the kids read and enjoy the Seder so much, is its reward too. Foregoing a vacation in the name of chinuch is just another sacrifice we make as parents.
I’ve never made Pesach. We always sell our apartment/house and go to family. We used to go to my mother but my sister has three kids now and prefers to stay home so we all go there. Plus, they move the neighborhood shul to my sisters house for Pesach so my grandfather can attend.
For chol hamoed and the second days we will be at my seder.
One year I went away for Pesach – I was 16 and worked in a hotel as a daycamp councelor. It was a NIGHTMARE.
Cantoresq – we all love to read from the haggadah and take turns too! People used to think that was so strange when I told them, but I couldnt imagine just being a person sitting at the table and not participating in the reading/singing!
Thanks ames. SJSinNYC letting my kids read is a BIG concession for me. As I’m sure everyone here knows, I’m big into nusach and preserving the traditional music that are part and parcel of our ceremonies. The Haggadah too has its traditional chant. As a child, I and our 20 or so guests would sit and listen to my father intone the text, and intersperse his commentary. We all joined in for the songs, and his comments created some conversation during the haggadah, but it was clearly his show. I loved every minute of it and I wish I could, at the same time, make my Seder identical to his, and sit at his Seder again. The image of him at the head of the table, his kippah slightly askew and his glasses tilted the other way, wearing his freshly laundered kittel and chanting with his Hungarian accented Hebrew, and adding commentary that would impress political scientists, historians and roshei yeshiva, is one of my fondest memories. But my wife comes from a house were everybody reads and her parents join us for the Sedarim, so we compromise. The only thing I won’t allow is non-traditional music, no matter its source. Fond as I am of my father’s Seder, I’ve “corrected” certain melodies he used, substituting them for the true traditional tunes. His Echad Mi Yodea, which was identical to his Chad Gadya, was wrong. But he once admitted that he forgot the melody from when he was a child. Eventually my kids will (hopefully) learn the nusach and the music and I’ll enjoy hearing it. When they get old enough, I’ll put in the commentary as well.
i have been an in hotel since i was little cuz my grandparents took us every year. the food is great and its nice that the whole family is together. we do have a private seder… but still THERE IS NOTHING LIKE STAYING HOME!!! you can be comf in ur own place without having a fashion show for every meal. there are ppl that have to bring like 27 outfits… i mean how can one CHAS V’SHLOM wear the same outfit twice!?!?! i think that hotels are stupid and my little cousins still complain on chol hamoed in the hotle that they have nothing to do!!! you spend thousansds and its such a waste. instead, i think that everyone should stay home if they can! its the best thing in the world!
My family used to go away (to family not to hotels) but now we stay home. Its nice but the cleaning kills me. 🙂
Home + going away for holiday meals to family. I’d never want to sell my place for Pesach and go away. I love cleaning it–I mean I love it after it’s all clean for Pesach! It’s such a good feeling to know that your house is sparkling clean for the holiday. I’d never give up on that as hard as it may be.
Jewess, I agree! I love the clean feeling of my house when its scrubbed. But due to limited time, I would rather sell my house than worry that I didn’t do as good of a job as I could have and think about a possible crumb that is laying somewhere.
Once my kids get old enough that its a pain to go away, we will more than likely go away for the sedar and then come back.
Rabbosai!
Is it really in the spirit of the Yom Tov to spend thousands of dollars to go to a faraway hotel?
Or is it proper to spend Yom Tov at home with your family?
Please think about this.
I always stay home, but I do have to admit that I really enjoy looking at the Pesach Hotel ads. They look so appealing! The food, entertainment, comfort etc.
Cantoresq, something you wrote resonated strongly with me. You speak about the importantce of preserving traditional nussach. That was a very large part of my father O”H’s life as a chazzan. He devoted himself to teaching budding chanzzanim that traditional chazzanus is the most beautiful and meaningful form of davening for the omud. It bothered him to hear tefilos that had their own special chein, being sung like popular music. Personally, I understand the value in BOTH forms. Not everyone appreciates chazzanus as my family always did and does. But I do agree that the traditional nussach that has been handed down from Chazzan to Chazzan, should be accorded the respect ti deserves.
ChanieE- we have about 60 people at our seder bli ayin hara because all my cousins and their kids come. My aunt has a big house and it is very nice. I once thought about being at home for Pesach. It would be nice to do it once but we never did it. And also since it is all family it’s not like a fashion show in a hotel. Also living out of town (baruch Hashem) we really don’t get to see our cousins on the east coast so this is the time. I think it’s the best. Don’t worry I do my share of helping to clean and cook when I get to my aunt’s house!!
I am looking forward to staying home this year, the hotel scene gets a little old after a while.
Famous statement in the velt- if you go to a hotel, they wish you a chag kosher. If you stay home, they wish you a chag sameach…
I had yeshiva friends who worked as pesach hotel mashgichim. Many of them had horror stories, and wouldn’t trust hotel kashrus.
Some letter writer to the Yated once pointed out that in the zman beis hamikdash, it was considered perfectly acceptable to leave your house and go away for Pesach. True enough, but I wouldn’t compare the ruchnius of a “glatt kosher decadent luxury hotel ” to “sleep in a tent on the road with your animals with you” experience.
I’ve been behind the scenes at hotels on Pesach and I’ve seen “issues” with kashrus. On the other hand, that’s life. Unless you shecht and kasher your own chickens and meat, milk your cows and grow your own produce, (and even then!), there are going to be problems … We try to minimize them, but life happens. Someone who is observing kashrus because it’s his job (whether just for the week or year round) won’t be as careful as someone to whom kashrus is an inherent value, and this is a problem at all levels of food production – from manufacturing to your local pizza parlor.
Will Hill,
“Rabbosai!
Is it really in the spirit of the Yom Tov to spend thousands of dollars to go to a faraway hotel?
Or is it proper to spend Yom Tov at home with your family?
Please think about this. “
It’s proper for each family to decide , not you, where it is proper for them to spend Yom Tov. JUst because staying home is good for you, is it possible that others might enjoy the spirit of Pesach by going away?
Please think about this.
flatbush27, it must be so mind boggling frustrating for you to see the entire world going to he– in a handbasket. If only people could just do what you tell them, life would be so much better.
We stay home. My mother doesn’t like going away because its not really family time at a hotel. We have a lot of guests and it’s much more fun and personal. Plus we don’t eat out at restruants on Pesach so I don’t think we would trust a hotel.
flatbush 27, there are advantages to staying home and advantages to going away. But I see no advantages for a person posting things to other people in a manner not becoming to a Jew. Please show refinement and respect for others when you write here. Thank you very much.
There are very chashuvah Rabbonim who go to Pesach hotels. Rabbi Frand, Rabbi Pesach Krohn, Rabbi Dovid Goldwasser, Rabbi Yaakov Horowitz. If it weren’t kosher enough do you think they would go?
f27- what people decide to do as far staying home or spending Pesach at a hotel charging thousands of dollars for the chag is their business not yours or mine. If anyone speaks, or contacts you by e-mail… regarding their Pesach Plans then you are free to comment. Let Hashem, Gadolim, and our families guide us to make the right decisions.
thats interesting fb27 do you know this for a fact?
The Rabbonim I mentioned most certainly do eat there. Rabbi Frand goes to Friar Tuck every year for Pesach, he is there the whole yom tov and he does something very nice for neilas hachag. I know because I was there. He did not bring along his own food. For the sedarim he gets his own private sedar room, he has done this for years. We had a very nice time there, people were very nice.
FB27 personally i think thats pretty sad if you are making up facts to support your arguments i could be reading you all wrong but maybe you should rethink your position as a poster in the cr a little and dont go on the offensive all the time another tip try to reread your posts as if you were another person and see if it might be coming across too strong because if you really want ppl to listen to what you have to say the way to go about that is definately not by insulting them even if it was unintentional
flatbush27, you just admitted that you “made up” the “fact” you’d posted earlier, that the chashuve rabbonim who speak at hotels for pesach don’t actually eat there. Would you have admitted this if you hadn’t been challenged by baal kishron and shindy? Then you cite “stories circulating in the velt” as proof that kashrus “at these places” is not acceptable. How do you know those stories aren’t made up either?
Lest you think I’m writing this to justify my own practice of going away for pesach, I’ll add here that I’ve never gone away for pesach and can’t see myself doing it in the forseeable future. For myself & my family it wouldn’t be a good fit at this time, and we couldn’t afford it. But to condemn other people who do so as not caring about kashrus is simply irresponsible.
In other words if I do not agree with what you write then I am excluded from commenting on this particular thread- I do not think so that is up to the discretion of the YW moderators thank you!
am also lax about the laws of tznius. That was a completely inappropriate statement to make and I would hope you see fit to apologize.
The Torah was not given to malachim. It is for us, to LIVE with.
flatbush27- I respect you for admitting that you made that up! I mean it!
flatbush27, when you tell stories (which you now admit are fictional) about chometz food being served in hotels during pesach, you are condemning the machshirim and guests of those hotels. And regarding the cost of going away for pesach, presumably those who chose to go to hotels have considered all aspects of the situation, including costs, in deciding this is the best decision for them. Probably they know their situations better than you or I do, and are not among those who are barely making it.
Lively discussions are part of what makes the cr interesting, but pot-stirring gets dull very quickly.
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