International Facebook Campaign Re-Unites Owner With His Tefillin
Image by Getty Images
By Avital Chizhik-Goldschmidt January 31, 2018
A London-native Jewish teen lost his tefillin and tallis while traveling from Manchester to Amsterdam, forgetting to take the bag with him as he departed from the plane.
Upon realizing, 17-year old Nachum Lobenstein was distraught, calling the Amsterdam airport daily for an update, but to no avail.
Little did he know a Jew over the pond in Teaneck, New Jersey, would find it.
When Dr. Meylekh Viswanath, on his way home from Ireland with a stopover in Amsterdam, stopped to pray in the airport, an airport worker walked over to him and showed him a tallis bag.
“He told me that someone had left a bag similar to mine in the airport,” Viswanath told the New Jersey Jewish Link. “He asked if I would look at the bag to try and figure out whom it might belong to. I saw a name on the bag in Yiddish but no address. Still the presence of a Hebrew/English Artscroll siddur led me to believe the person may be American.”
And so began an international social media campaign to re-unite the lost tefillin with its owner.
Viswanath approached his local rabbi for help to find the owner, who turned to several contacts of his to spread the word; Monsey resident Sandy Eller posted a picture of the velvet tallis bag on Twitter and Facebook, asking for shares. Within hours that very night, the image made its way to a local Zurich Whatsapp group, where Lobenstein’s brother Barry happened to be a member.
A few emails later, arrangements were made for the tefillin and tallis to return to the UK.
“I called my father to tell him that it had been found,” Barry Lobenstein told the Link. “He was literally in tears. Something like this could only happen in the Yiddishe world.”
This is a moment of great uncertainty. Here’s what you can do about it.
We hope you appreciated this article. Before you go, we’d like to ask you to please support the Forward’s independent Jewish news this Passover. All donations are being matched by the Forward Board - up to $100,000.
This is a moment of great uncertainty for the news media, for the Jewish people, and for our sacred democracy. It is a time of confusion and declining trust in public institutions. An era in which we need humans to report facts, conduct investigations that hold power to account, tell stories that matter and share honest discourse on all that divides us.
With no paywall or subscriptions, the Forward is entirely supported by readers like you. Every dollar you give this Passover is invested in the future of the Forward — and telling the American Jewish story fully and fairly.
The Forward doesn’t rely on funding from institutions like governments or your local Jewish federation. There are thousands of readers like you who give us $18 or $36 or $100 each month or year.
Support our mission to tell the Jewish story fully and fairly.
