A Karpas Eulogy | Passover haggadah by Serena Jake

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My Bubbi was a vivacious woman. She wore enormous, wide-brimmed hats, much to the chagrin of anyone sitting behind her in temple. She wore elegant jewelry and loved getting her nails done, though it was never quite the color she wanted. She once played guitar in Idlewild with Pete Seeger, a fact she related frequently at the seder table, before launching into a spirited rendition of “If I Had a Hammer” (when she wasn’t complaining about how unorthodox my mother’s “Tarot-card-themed Haggadah” was). My Bubbi once saw Eleanor Roosevelt speak at her college in the 1930s, and said Mrs. Roosevelt was one of the most inspiring women she’d ever seen. She also complained about how “squeaky” her voice was - “an inspiring woman, yes, but her voice was so squeaky!” Once, at Hanukkah, she lit a plate of latkes on fire. Once, she bumped her head into a store window, and sued the company for their glass being too clean (she won). Once, my Bubbi took my eight-year-old mother to a protest against the Vietnam War, and yelled in the faces of police officers who were mercilessly beating the protestors.

My Bubbi passed away last week, on my mother’s 65th birthday. They had a complicated relationship, and this was a pretty fitting way to go (“She always had to have the last word!”). As we enter into yet another year of Zoom gatherings - a second Zoom Passover for many of us - it almost felt normal to attend my Bubbi’s funeral over Zoom. Almost.

Instead of a Webinar, it was a regular Zoom meeting. The outdoor funeral service was live-streamed in one box, while in the other boxes were 20 confused Jews trying to figure out how to access “speaker view." What was supposed to be a somber event opened with a cacophony of voices asking what the hell “pinning a video” meant, while many self-appointed experts tried (and failed) to lead them to the three little dots at the top of their screens. Finally, the service commenced, but we were all perplexed when instead of the Rabbi’s voice, we heard very loud Mariachi music blaring from our speakers. I privately chatted Ethel to please mute her microphone, thinking the music was coming from her box, but when she did eventually find the mute button, it turns out she was not the source of the sound (sorry Ethel). It was, in fact, coming from the next funeral over, and there was nothing we could do to quiet it. So as my Bubbi’s friends from her Messianic Jewish temple declared that she was with God now, their words were punctuated by a very loud trumpeter blasting an upbeat tune. “My mom would have loved this Mariachi band,” my mother remarked in her eulogy. “She was born in Cuba, and this was the music of her childhood.” Well, no Mom, Mariachi is not Cuban, and Bubbi would have hated this.

But then something wonderful happened. At both the funeral and the Zoom memorial that followed, people told the most incredible stories of my Bubbi’s life. Stories I’d never heard before, told by family members I’d never met before. Stories of her generosity, her vitality, her style. Stories of pain, of violence, of historical trauma. Stories of resilience, of survival, of rebirth. The story about the first time she met my Dad’s parents, and dropped a full roast chicken in his mother's lap. Stories of her teaching guitar, and singing the songs of Pete Seeger. (“Turn! Turn! Turn!” played over a slideshow of old pictures, and the line “a time to refrain from embracing” hit differently this time around). And then, from our little Zoom boxes, we asked each other questions. “What was she like as an older sister?” “Do you forgive her for the things she did?” “Why the big hats?” Dozens of questions, asked from hundreds of miles away from one another. Yet I’ve never felt closer to my entire family, to my history, and to my Bubbi, in all her complexities.

(We dip our leafy greens twice into the saltwater twice and recite the blessing)

בָּרוּךְ אַתָּה יְיָ, אֱלֹהֵינוּ מֶלֶךְ הָעוֹלָם, בּוֹרֵא פְּרִי הָאֲדָמָה

Baruch Atah Adonai, Eloheinu Melech ha-olam, borei p’ree ha-adama.

Blessed are You, Lord our God, Ruler of the universe, who creates the fruits of the earth.

The karpas is a vegetable dipped in saltwater. Usually it’s something green - a sprig of parsley, a stick of celery, a scaffolding of scallions - to represent the coming of Spring. Some families use potatoes, because in Eastern Europe - where my Bubbi’s parents were from - fresh green vegetables were hard to come by, and potatoes were everywhere ! Karpas can also translate to “fine wool or linen,” and some say the karpas represent Joseph’s amazing technicolor dreamcoat, which first led the Israelites into Egypt - the inciting incident of the Passover story, and the cause of so many sleepless nights where your brain can’t stop humming “Go go go Joseph you’ll make it someday!”

The saltwater represents the tears that the Jews wept as slaves in Egypt. It’s a reminder that we cannot welcome spring without first remembering our ancestors’ suffering - and that from our suffering comes the promise of spring. So if the karpas = spring awakening, the saltwater = the bitch of living. Or, to quote the Jewish poet Carol King (originally Brooklyn’s own Carol Klein), “You’ve got to take the bitter with the sweet.” That’s what I took from my Bubbi’s Zoom memorial - destruction and reconstruction, music and mayhem.

There is also the question of why we dip the karpas in the saltwater twice? Is it to clarify that we cried a lot of tears in Egypt? Is it because Jews are famous for double dipping? Or because we like our food extra salty? My favorite answer to the question is this: It’s simply meant to inspire more questions. To quote my friend Martine, “Maybe the why of the karpas is just that it’s weird. Something we’re not used to that’s going to prompt the kids to be like ‘hey why are you putting that leaf in salt water’ and then you can be like ‘glad you asked here is our national epic,’ you know?” As was true at the memorial, the weirdest questions always lead to the best stories.

haggadah Section: Karpas

Source: Tirosh Schneider