RABBI GOLDFEIN BEATS THE KGB: Snippets

Yamamai Chassidus Providers

In continuation to the previous article (HERE) with a written summary of Rabbi Goldfein’s Farbrengen on Sunday, we present you here the continuation, this time we took all the snippets and put them together into one part. Enjoy!

DISCLAIMER: Considering the fact the Farbrengen wasn’t recorded, and Sholom Ber wasn’t inside the whole time, due to the fact he was being bothered by Benny Hershcovich, not everything was written down. And even what was written down, was written in summary, and people are bound to forget. So this series of Articles include roughly 70% of the Farbrengen. Sorry!

* The Competition
Some time later, after I already started going every year, I realized that there is another Bochur who goes very often to Russia, and we were overlapping. One day I met him and he told me he wants to start a competition, who will do more clandestine trips to Russia. This Bochur’s name is Berel Lazar. When the big “Marina Roscha” synagogue was inaugurated and Putin came to visit, I stood in line to shake his hand, behind Rabbi Shemtov, ahead of Rabbi Krinsky. When I got to the podium, Rabbi Lazar covered the microphone so it would not be recorded and told me: “I think I won the competition...”

* “My Problem & Your Problem”
It is known the Ukrainian Goyim are big Schmuks and anti-semites, they are way worse than the Russians. It is a known fact that the Goyim in Ukraine have done more trouble for the Jews, more than any other nation in the USSR. Usually I landed in Moscow or Leningrad, but this time I landed in the Ukraine.

The law in Ukraine is that every person has to declare the amount of Money he is bringing with him. I had a big amount of money and I didn’t want to declare it for fear of it being confiscated so I decided to play it dumb. When I was called in, he scanned my passport and my information came up on the computer, he saw I came into Russia quite a few times, so he started speaking in Russian and he asks me: “How much money do you have?”. I told him: “Speak in English”, he got angry and repeated the question in Russian, and concluded “You know Russian”. I answered again: “Speak in English”, so he was fuming by then but he asked me in broken heavy-accented English: “How much money do you have?”. I said I will write it on the paper. So he gave me the form and I filled in the amount in cursive letters, making it virtually impossible to recognize the Zeros. By then he was already about to kill someone and he told me to read it to him.

Then I answered: “In life there are two columns, ‘My Problem’ and ‘Your Problem’, this goes under the column of ‘Your Problems’ ” When he heard this, his eyes were smoking from the anger, but couldn’t do anything and let me through.

* The Misnagdishe Chickens in Russia
In general, only Lubavitch did Peulos in the cities, except for Moscow & Leningrad, where Misnagdim used to go there and claim credit for the Peulos Lubavitch did. I saw once a Peula of those Snags. They took two kids and sang with them “Hevenu Shalom Alechem” and took pictures and went back home...

Once, I was with two Snag Bochurim in the Moscow airport, and I with another Lubavitcher decided that we have to light the Menorah in the airport. This Snags were petrified that “They are going to throw us out!” but we didn’t care and we lit the Menorah and we sang some songs while the Snags were hiding from fear...

* “She said: “Write Slowly” so I wrote SLOWLY...”
As the time went by, the trips were becoming easier, easier to bring in what we needed. In Chanukah 1986, I went there with my wife and we had six suitcases, half-a-suitcase of our clothing, and five-and-a-half of stuff for the community. We had 200 boxed Menorahs, a few hundred boxes of candles, a big quantity of Mezuzos and Five Shchita Knifes. When we got to Customs we had this witch מכשיפה who bothered us.

When she checked the Mezuza she said: “This is secret codes, secret messages promoting the revolution”, I tried to convince her that it is religious articles and there is no problem but she didn’t want to hear. So then she told me I should write on it, I didn’t know what to do, I can’t write on the front side where its smooth, I have to write on the back, but she was looking, so I shuffled around the Mezuzos, like shuffling cards, until the top one was on its back, and I turned to her. She told me “Write slowly”. So I wrote SLOWLY and gave it to her... She got angry and started screaming “Do you want problems?” and she continued screaming.

In the meantime the other guy was busy opening up the Tefillin and ruining them, so I screamed to them that they aren’t allowed to do it because it is religious articles. Then I called the supervisor and made a great Tumult and finally received back all what they took away.

* Near-Arrest Experience in Moscow
One of times, we arranged a Chanukah Party in someone house. I didn’t realize that one the other side of the road there was a government building with a security checkpoint on the street in front of it. After the party, we walked together, a group of 12, all merry and happy and we reached the checkpoint. We, the strangers had no business doing anything on that street so we were worried. So the Russian dudes figured out a way of doing it. We all crowded together and some gave the documentation and the guard couldn’t remember who he checked who he didn’t, so we all passed and patted the guard on his shoulder...

* The Different Lubavitcher Sects
Moscow 1987. I went with one more person, and when we got to customs in the Moscow Airport, the light turned red on me, and red on the other guy. And we were both pulled into investigation in two different rooms. When I entered I had a few pairs of Tefillin, so I was asked why I need so many so I said: “One for the morning prayers, one for the afternoon prayers and one for the evening prayers”. He then tells me: “It seems interesting, because the other guy said the reason he has multiple pairs is because they are all written differently, why do you say different things?” I answered: “He is most probably from a different sect in Judaism...”

* KGB Spying on Lubavitchers in New York!
Some people think that we fooled the KGB and they didn’t know what we do. I think they knew but didn’t care if we didn’t make a big Shturem out of it. One of the times I was sitting in the investigation in the airport, the investigator pulls down a screen, like a projector and shows me a series of pictures of Lubavitcher Bochurim & Baale-Batim in NY, pictures of all the people who go to Russia in different places, in Crown Heights, on Mivtzoim, etc. and he told me: “We know exactly what you do here”, but he didn’t make an issue. So I answered him “I tip my hat to you that you are so good...”

* The Rebbe knew exactly what happened and how.
The Rebbe always demanded a full Duch (report) immediately after we returned. After my first trip to Siberia (see in different part), I returned to the USA on Thursday night, and wrote the Duch. I went straight to Philadelphia where I spent Shabbos and planned on giving it to the Rebbe in Dollars. I sealed the envelope and put it in my pocket. When I came to Dollars, the Rebbe turns to me and says: “May it be a good beginning”. The Duch never left my pocket, and no one saw it, there was no way the Rebbe knew that I wrote in the Duch that it was very successful and hopefully it will be a good beginning...

* The Lady who helped the Rebbe
One of the times I went to pick up some stuff from the “offices” of the organization, Rabbi Moshe Levertov OBM, the leader of the organization gave me a slip of paper with a name of an old lady and told me: “You should help her out in everything, she helped the Rebbe when the Rebbe needed it”. Till today I don’t know what she did, but I never asked...