 a caricature.
Nor was feets a lack of self-control.As someone who became religious later in life, I found the safety net I always wanted in the support I receive from other Orthodox women.
I was 19 years old when I decided I wanted to become an Orthodox Jew.
I was raised in a secular Jewish household by non-religious parents. I grew up attending an Orthodox Hebrew school because it was important to my parents that I had a broad understanding of Judaism, even if we did not personally practice. But I wasn’t involved in Judaism for many years between my bat mitzvah and college.
At 18, when I got to college, I was drawn to the social aspects of Jewish life on campus. I attend a big university and getting involved with Hillel seemed like a good way to make friends, but it wasn’t until I turned 19 and met a community of Orthodox women that my religious connection to Judaism became clear.
In my freshman year spring semester, I met someone who today I am lucky to call one of my best friends. We met through a peer mentoring program that we were both involved in and we immediately bonded when she learned I was Jewish. She was the first person to listen to me when I talked about my experiences growing up in an Orthodox Hebrew school and my secular family. Our friendship created space for me to be vulnerable about my desire to become more religious and my feelings about feminism and Orthodoxy.
At the time, I didn’t know how to reckon with the sexism I felt existed in the Orthodox community with my desire to become more religious. I had a difficult time grappling with the intense modesty culture that existed in Orthodoxy, separate gendered seating in synagogue, and the overall gendered religious practice. My new friend talked to me about her own experiences as an Orthodox woman in a way that made me feel that one day, I would feel ready to become more observant. She brought me to the on-campus kosher cafeteria and introduced me to all of her friends, and she really worked to make me feel included. If it wasn’t for her, I would have never felt ready to start going to on-campus Orthodox events.
I finally felt as if I was beginning to connect to being a religious Jew with a deep belief in Hashem during my sophomore year — and then was suddenly torn from my religious community and sent back home to my secular family because of the pandemic. This could have been a time when all the progress I felt I made in connecting to religious Judaism disappeared, but due to the magic that is the internet, I became more observant than I ever was before.
Over quarantine, I met a community of Orthodox Jewish women and other ba’alei teshuvah (people who were raised secular and choose to become Orthodox) online through “frum Twitter,” a magical corner of the internet full of Modern Orthodox Jews. These girls were the first to introduce me to the concept of tzniut, the set of Jewish laws that advise how both men and women can dress and act modestly. When I expressed my interest in slowly transitioning into modest dress, three girls all around my age created a WhatsApp group to help me transition my wardrobe. They sent me links for where to shop, taught me the amazing art of layering, and created a safe and empowering space for all my questions.
By the fall of 2020, I was fully able to commit to tzniut due to the love and support of these girls I met on Twitter. During a period of such isolation, they made me feel incredibly connected and continued to guide me on my journey to becoming religious.
When my campus opened back up and I eventually returned to New York, I finally felt emotionally ready to fully integrate myself into my university’s Orthodox community. To this day, the support these women offer me continues. Whenever I feel frustrated or upset about how lonely coming from a secular family can feel, I have a community of women ready and willing to dole out advice, listen to me complain, and create space for me to cry. After I spent the first days of Passover with my secular family, it was my rebbetzin (rabbi’s wife) who listened to my hardships about the holiday not going as planned and validated my feelings of frustration. When my uncle interrogated me about my feminism as a religious Jewish woman, I had my best friend crack jokes and make me laugh about the situation. When I couldn’t pick a seminary for this upcoming summer, I had a community of women who helped me assess all the possible options. The support I receive from Orthodox women is limitless and created the safety net I have always been searching for.
The truth is, becoming a religious Jew later in life is difficult. There are years of Jewish knowledge that I will always be behind on, secular family members who, even when they try, don’t understand my lifestyle, and friends who don’t want to be in my life anymore now that I am religious. There have been so many times throughout this journey when it would have been easier to give up and continue being a secular Jew, but the frum women around me inspired me to want more than that.
There are still days this life change feels so lonely, but the small moments make it all better. When a girl in the women’s section at minyan tells me she loves my dress, or when I text my group chat to give them the latest dating update, I know that I couldn’t have possibly made the wrong decision. Becoming a ba’al teshuvah is the path of most resistance, but the community of women I have met assures me with every action that I am on the path Hashem has always destined for me.Crystal Jade Prestige: Refined Chinese Cuisine At Marina Bay
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Crystal Jade Prestige blends traditional Chinese favourites with modern fine dining techniques
A new addition to Marina Bay Link Mall, Crystal Jade Prestige recently opened its doors. Positioning itself as a contemporary Chinese restaurant perfect for business luncheons, the 140-seater restaurant also comes equipped with private dining rooms to have corporate meetings in.
That’s not to say that families and friends can’t enjoy the food here too. Crystal Jade Prestige is the culmination of the brand’s expertise in Chinese cuisine, having spent 20 years perfecting the art of Chinese cooking. Diners can look forward to their favourite dim sum dishes, Peking Duck and more.
A decadently rich dish made with crispy Suckling Pig Skin and Black Truffle Rice.
Decadent Chinese Delicacies
The Roasted Baby Suckling Pig rolled with Black Truffle Pearl Rice ($20/pc, $168/half or $328/whole) is a dish you won’t be able to find anywhere else. Japanese rice is infused with aromatic black truffle and rolled up with a crispy layer of suckling pig crackling. The decadent dish is heavy on the palette, but when paired with the spicy Thai apple salad the refreshing tanginess of the salad helps to cut through the richness of the truffle and pork.
The Tea Smoked Roasted Duck takes a total of 30 hours to prepare.
My favourite dish has to be the Tea Smoked Roasted Duck ($78/whole). What sets this Peking Duck apart is in the way it is prepared. The fowl is first marinated for 24 hours before it is smoked for six hours in a wok with Pu-er tea leaves and spices. This results in supple duck meat imbued with a smokey flavour and is similar in texture to ham.
Glutinous rice stuffed with dried seafood and salted egg yolk.
End the meal in true Chinese style with the Baked Crispy Glutinous Rice with Scallop ($12). Elegantly served in a scallop shell, the chewy glutinous rice is mixed with dried scallop, dried shrimp, Chinese mushrooms and bits of salted egg before being baked. The crispy exterior and topping of puffed rice adds a crunch to the dish that compliments the moist and gooey interior.
Dim Sum Fun
On top of the exclusive ala carte menu available at Crystal Jade Prestige, diners can also order dim sum during lunch. Crystal Jade Prestige does dim sum with a twist, serving deluxe creations like Pan-fried Siew Mai with Foie Gras Sauce ($12.80) and Steamed Dumpling with Shrimp and Black Garlic ($5.80/3pcs).
By experimenting with ingredients that are not usually found in Chinese cuisine like Foie Gras and Black Truffle, most of the dishes I tried to be on the heavier on the palette. However, its innovative approach to Chinese cuisine sets Crystal Jade Prestige apart as a premium Chinese restaurant to visit when looking to indulge.:SAP EarlyWatch Alert is an automatic service monitoring the essential administrative areas of an SAP system. Alerts indicate critical situations and give solutions to improve performance and stability. To check and display these alerts in the corresponding reports, SAP offers the SAP EarlyWatch Alert Workspace in the SAP ONE Support Launchpad.
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