Thursday, August 9, 2012
By Yehoshua Soudakoff
Posted from Deaf Nation World Expo, LV
RovingRabbis – Rabbinical Student Visitation Program
Chabad.org
At the Deaf Nation World Expo (an international convention for over 30,000 deaf people) last week, I met a fellow from Finland: Kimmo L.
I noticed him as soon as he approached our booth. Tall and thin with overflowing hair, he did not strike me as Jewish, but when he began to share his story, it became clear that I was quite wrong.
“I am one of three Jewish deaf people in the entire country of Finland,” he explained in American Sign Language (yes, there are different sign languages for different countries). “When I was eight, my mother told me I was Jewish, and ever since then I have been interested in the religion.” And interested he was. He told me that he had taken courses in biblical and modern Hebrew at his university, in an attempt to learn more about his people and their language.
So right then and there I offered to help him put on tefillin. His reaction was quite touching.
