By Michael Routburg
On Sunday, December 18th, about 700 residents gathered to celebrate Chanukah with a Shlomo Simcha Concert and Menorah Lighting Celebration.
Eli Okun served as the Master of Ceremonies and introduced Chief Adam Hofstein to lead the Pledge of Allegiance and Cantor Gary Sherman to lead everyone in song.
A wonderful concert by Sholom Simcha accompanied by Yitzy Zions on keyboard followed. Speeches by Rabbi Goldblatt from Chabad (The Fire That Never Dies) and by Rabbi Edelman from Young Israel (The Messages of the Chanukah Lights) were augmented by videos from Rabbi YY Jacobson and Charlie Harary to give inspiration and insight into the lighting of the Chanukah candles.
The large Menorah was lit by Chief Adam Hofstein (the shamas candle) and by Rita Pickar (the 1st night candle), while the Brachas and Maoz Tzur was lead by Cantor Gary Sherman.
Goodie bags with dreidels and cookies or sugar free cake were provided on the way out. With special thanks to CenClub (Rita Pickar, Mike Birdman, and Andy Hackett) and all of the volunteers who made the event a way to ‘kickstart’ the festival of Chanukah.