in which we "do" passover

Our seder "plate."

I'm not Jewish, but I'm prone to make broad, sweeping statements along the lines of, "Ugh. Why aren't I Jewish? I wish I was Jewish." Something about this probably has to do with the fact that I'm dating a Jewish boy, and I grew up in a very Jewish community. My high school was across the street from the town's synagogue, and I went to a bat or bar mitzvah pretty much every weekend in seventh grade. (Sometimes I was even double-booked and had to pick between parties. That was a stressful time in my young life.)

Despite my penchant for all things Judaic, my understanding of Passover has always been a little bit...off. When I was younger, I just remember feeling bad for all of my Jewish friends couldn't have regular peanut butter and jelly sandwiches for a week in April. For a while I really thought that Passover had something to do with Kofi Annan - the then Secretary General of the UN - until I was corrected and told that you hid an afikomen, not a Ghanian diplomat.

The lamb bone from a clearly freshly slaughtered lamb.

This brings me to today, my first ever Passover seder. Like most of my experimentation with the Jewish faith, it wasn't entirely accurate. Granted, I don't really know what an accurate Passover seder should look like, but something tells me that what I experienced this evening wasn't exactly normal. My Jewish friends led the proceedings in Lodhi Gardens at sunset, which was absolutely beautiful, but there were also a lot of gnats and mosquitoes. We didn't have wine because all of the liquor stores were closed today for Good Friday, so we had Tropicana grape juice. Our plate was actually a paper bag, and the seder candles were birthday candles from a corner store. No matzoh? Let's use saltines instead! My favorite touch was the comic book that Sarah found at the supermarket near our house that illustrated the story of Moses.

But we did have lamb bones, fresh from the butcher in Gabe's Muslim neighborhood. We had a boiled egg from the kitchen at the program center. Most importantly, we had wonderful hosts. Gabe, Sarah, Ari and Lexi explained what all of the food on the paper bag meant, why it was important and went through the motions with particular fervor. They retold the story of Moses, going into extensive background and referencing that animated movie "Prince of Egypt" regularly. It was also a reason for us to get together as a group and to enjoy each others' company, which is never a bad thing.

So that was my first Passover seder. There were clearly some adjustments made due to the whole "being in India" thing, but it was a wonderful experience. Someone really needs to invite me to a seder at a real dinner table in the States next year because the whole thing seems like a lot of fun. I will also say that I wonder what the other people in the park thought of us: a group of crazy Angreez, singing songs and playing with lamb bones and running around trying to find some crackers hidden in a tree...