Recently Karaganda Jewish community accepted one of JDC main workers - a famous Rabbi Meir Shlezinger from Jerusalem. The visit was devoted to evaluating of the situation in Karaganda community and making perspective plans for future religious work in Kazakhstan.

   Rabbi Shlezinger met with Aleksandr Abramovitch, a Kazakhstani Hasadim religious program coordinator; Bella Kamenetskaya, a director of Karaganda Hesed "Miriam"; Irina Kozhanovskaya, a director of "Shemesh" JCC and with Meir Sheiner, rabbi of Karaganda region.

  In a hospital of famous surgeon, professor Sergey Lohvitskiy, Rabbi Shlezinger delivered a lecture about "Jewish ethics in modern medicine" evoked a great interest from the side of listeners. Were also held discussions with Hesed workers, community center members and young people from "Shatil" club. A short improvised lesson, devoted to the Jewish prophets Rabbi Meir conducted for children, studying Torah.

  Rabbi also had a meeting with representatives of Karaganda Jewish community. About 100 people attended it.

   According to rabbi Shlezinger, the visit was a success. An agreed beforehand visit program was implemented in full. On the last day of the visit rabbi Shlezinger went for an excursion to Dolinka - a capital of sorrowful Karlag. After that he went to Astana where he visited a new synagogue and met with Rabbi Yuda Kubalkin.

  Several days ago after the departure of the respectful guest, Hesed "Miriam" got a letter from Rabbi Shlezinger in which he expressed his gratitude to all Karaganda citizens, contributed to that successful visit. Especial thankfulness was addressed to interpreters-volunteers, contributing to breaking the language barrier: Katya Abramovitch, Eva Kipnis and Michail Verhola.

Aleksandr Kotlitskiy