I’m from Los Angeles, California. And to say the least, there are a lot of Jews there. I was raised by Jews, grew up with Jews, went to school with Jews etc. etc. It’s not that Los Angeles is only Jewish. In fact it is very diverse. There just seem to be a lot of every type of person. The point is that never in my life did I ever have to face that fact that I am part of a group of people that make up less than .09% of the world.
During my first week at the University of Michigan, I met many people who had never met a Jew before in their lives. Many people made comments like “oh, that’s so Jewish” or “I Jewed him” down. The comment that bothered me the most occurred during my first week at the University of Michigan. I was riding the bus to Central Campus and was talking to another freshman. I was telling him how I was from Los Angeles and that I loved movies. He then proceeded to say, “oh, well you must be Jewish. I mean if you’re from LA and you like movies. Plus you look Jewish.” I suddenly felt myself in a new situation. I never had to address the fact that I was Jewish when I lived in California. But suddenly, being different was extremely relevant. And the most frustrating part of all was that I wasn’t even able to define myself; it was others who decided what it meant for me to be Jewish. I’m Jewish, which means that I’m cheap, smart and run the media. The question of what being Jewish meant to me was suddenly so important.
After first semester of freshman year, I decided to visit Israel, the Jewish homeland. There is a program called Birthright, which was established under the belief that everyone young Jew has the right at birth to see the Jewish homeland. In other words, I got to go to Israel completely cost-f ...