DETROIT 40% OFF CITIZEN® & SEIKO Watches Erik Alesin, Yulia Safian, Nikki, Jason Porth and Ania Safian help Rabbi Aft conduct a family program. Rabbi Returns From Teaching In Soviet Union SUSAN GRANT Staff Writer It's Time for Huge Savings! SOUTHFIELD STORE ONLY Open Saturday and Sunday from 12 p.m. to 5 p.m. 552-0080 Southfield & 12 Mile Full service watch and jewelry repair. For the area's largest selection of watches. Keeping Detroiters right on time since 1927 *Some models available in men's and women's. Other savings available at these locations: PONTIAC FARMINGTON HILLS (Orchard Lk. & 13 Mile) 851.0440 (Voorheis & Telegraph) 333-2263 MT. CLEMENS (Canal & Garfield) 263.7700 GRANDPARENT INTERVIEWS MADISON HEIGHTS (12 Mile & Dequindre) 541.0808 DYSAUTONOMIA Don't let their stories be lost forever ot_iocoor3oacioaciourioc0000cioc000poopooporloopoia ODODOCIDOD ❑ 00.0000000 000 F.200000 000000000000 1 4 ( 41 661-0748 STARLIGHT VIDEO PRODUCTIONS 18 FRIDAY, JANUARY 11, 1991 No child should be denied correct diagnosis and proper treatment . Support the Dysautonomia Foundation. Dysautonomia Foundation Inc. 3000 Town Center, Suite 1500, Southfield, MI 48075 (313) 444-4848 itting in his office at the Agency for Jewish Education thousands of miles away from Vilnius, Lithuania, Rabbi Bruce Aft still hears Ania's voice ask- ing him "to remember me, remember us." Ania. There are other names too. Zelig. Emma. All forever stuck in his memory. It's been more than a week since his return to his Southfield home from a two- week trip to the Soviet Union. But as Rabbi Aft gets back into the weekly routine of being Midrasha College of Jewish Studies director and Jewish Community High School principal, he can't forget the students he met in Riga, Latvia and Vilnius. Rabbi Aft was one of three Americans sent to Riga and Vilnius from Dec. 16 to Dec. 30 as part of B'nai B'rith International's effort to reach out to Jewish com- munities in the Soviet Union. He was joined by Jason Porth, 17, a North Farmington High School senior and national B'nai B'rith Youth Organization vice-president, and Peter Stark, a Jewish educator from Boston. The trip was paid partially by the Maurice C. Zeiger Lodge of B'nai B'rith and the Jewish Welfare Federation of Metropolitan Detroit. In Riga and Vilnius, Rabbi Aft co-conducted a four-day B'nai B'rith youth camp designed to teach 40 teens, ages 12 to 15, about Judaism. This is the second time B'nai B'rith Interna- tional has provided educa- tional activities within the Soviet Union. Last summer, the organization held camps in Leningrad and Birobid- zhan near the border with China. first it was a challenge trying to teach Judaism to Soviet teens using non- Jewish translators who knew little about the re- ligion, he said. But once those hurdles were over- come, the students, espe- cially those in Vilnius, seemed eager to learn about Jewish holidays, life cycle events and Israel, he said. They also wanted to know how Jews live outside the Soviet Union, Rabbi Aft said. He was surprised to learn that many students had never heard former Soviet refusnik Natan Sharansky. Religious plurality within Judaism was also a foreign concept to some students, Rabbi Aft said. Many had heard Orthodox rabbis speak about Judaism and couldn't understand how Rabbi Aft could make kiddush with non-kosher wine or still be a religious Jew without a yarmulke. Rabbi Aft, Mr. Stark and Jason did more than just talk to teens. They spent a few evenings with younger children and their parents organizing family programs on Judaism. Family programs are rare in the Soviet Union, so the trio wasn't sure it would work, Rabbi Aft said. But when one man said he had never seen so many children so happy, Rabbi Aft knew it was successful.