Spasiba, Todah, Thank You!

A bat mitzvah girl in Silver Spring has made a serious change in the lives of hundreds of Beit Shemesh children this week. Naomi Kruger is the cousin of the Benjamin Kruger, z"l for whom the Benjamin Children's Library of Beit Shemesh, is named for. Benjamin's parents, Eliyahu and Tami Kruger started the children's interactive library in memory of their young son who so loved books. The collection began with a few shelves and has grown through the hard work of the family and volunteers throughout the community, and Partnership 2000 thanks to our generous partners in Washington D.C. and South Africa, to a beautiful library with well over 12,000 volumes.

The uniqueness of the library is also in the large English collection which serves the ever growing Anglo community there, at present the mix of Hebrew and English books is about half and half.

Today however through the generous ingenuity of Naomi Kruger the library now boasts of a beautiful collection of Russian children's books for the large Russian community. Naomi asked at her bat mitzvah that each family give a $5 donation for the Russian books. The guests responded open their hearts as well as their purses and Naomi successfully raised $1600.

These books in Russian are especially important as the love of books, reading, and education starts with a child's first loving exposure upon the laps of their parents and grandparents. It is frustrating and painful, especially in these homes where education is so highly valued and stressed, that the only books the children have access to, the adults cannot always read to them. These books will provide a chance for bonding that is so important for the whole family for often in immigrant families the parents are demoted in their children's eyes, as the adults often can't speak the new language, talk to the gannenet , nor even read the book the children bring hone from their gan.

This new collection to the library is as important for the parents and grandparents as it is for the children. One simple kindness on the part of a young lady across the ocean will touch these families lives forever.

Shvat 5760 - February 2000