Donna Perlmutter's Comments

Donna--please e-mail me at Muziclvr56@aol.com you can give me your phone #, we can talk....there are only 8 more days of school left...I will find out, in the meantime who exactly you should contact...regards, CINDY

Hi Donna--I know you asked about a position in my school. If you can e-mail me and we can talk about your experience, your license, etc...I will then talk to my Principal, and spread the word, or get you in touch with the liason from the Region. Muziclvr56@aol.com speak soon...keep cool, wowowowo it was really hot here these past 4 days. regards, CINDY

The way of the chasid is the spiritual way. that is why we protect them because they keep the essence of judaism.somebody has to because the rest of us have to work for a living.Alice said very nice things. i don't know why i didn't mention arlene,may she pass in peace. sorry

Dear Donna
I was very saddened to hear of the great loss of your dear , sweet mother ( may she rest in peace). May the One above comfort you and may you always remember the good times you shared together. Probably my family wanted to spare me the sad news and that's why I hadn't heard anything. It will take a long time to adapt to this new situation. I'm glad you did the right thing about the Kaddish ...
May you send good tidings in your next letter

Good Morning America

Hello from the old country.
I still have great memories from our last get together. We'll have to do it again. I hear you're Mother's selling out? Where to?
Keep in touch
Al

Left in October 1960, 20 months after Castro took Havana. Had to hurry -- my father insulted a Communist party official and they threatened to send him to the countryside to cut sugarcane. he left the next day, my mom and I followed a few days later ... with 21 suitcases and a tricycle. They didn't close the borders for another 6 months. We were lucky -- although we had to leave businesses, real estate and lots of personal stuff behind.

Oaxaca is very overrated as a beautiful colonial city. Yes, there are crafts ... black clay pottery, the alebrijes (painted exotic animals) and there's a town 15 minutes to the NE specializing in rugs. The Monte Alban ruins just 5 minutes away are special, the Mitla ruins 45 minutes away not so much. The 1200+ year old Tule tree nearby is cool. And visiting on November 2, Day of the Dead is culturally interesting (visit the cemeteries, where families are picknicking with their deceased relatives).

BUT, if you want to see really nice colonial cities, I'd choose Zacatecas and Guanajuato over Oaxaca (you'd fly into Leon-Guanajuato International Airport; these two cities are about 2-3 hours apart by car, and I'd see both of them on the same trip) -- and, for crafts, another 2 hours south of Guanajuato are Morelia and Patzcuaro (painted masks, wicker animals, copper works, clay pots). If you can plan it, I'd be in Patzcuaro on November 2 ... so you can boat to the cemeteries on Janitzio island in the middle of the lake. Patzcuaro and Oaxaca are the two reknowned places for Day of the Dead celebrations in Mexico. The Americanized artist colony of San Miguel de Allende is 45 minutes east of Guanajuato. And Guadalajara is just 2-3 hours further on ... with its beaded crafts.

The advantage of Oaxaca is that you are in one central location; you take day trips to the Monte Alban ruins, the towns near Oaxaca with the crafts and the old tree, and the ruins at Mitla. Only Mitla is more than 20-30 minutes away from Oaxaca. And you can take a short flight to the beach at Huatulco -- which seems close on the map, but is a 6-8 hour car/bus trip because of the mountain roads. The Zacatecas-Guanajuato-Patzcuaro trip is more difficult, lots of driving -- you need a tour or a rent a car (which is expensive in Mexico) -- but there's lots more to do, see and buy.

The tsotchkes in our house are largely from Patzcuaro and Oaxaca. Either is a fun trip.

I lived on kibbutz Urim near Be'er Sheva until I was 6 and also spent another year living in Israel after high school, but I'm mostly from the U.S. I'm in central NJ now (Marlboro).

ah cool well just wondering wat was up with her. glad all is well P

As Bell Atlantic's sole, Spanish-speaking Hispanic (born in Cuba) corporate attorney, they sent me down there to run their Mexican cellular affiliate's legal department. Was fun, despite the crime and pollution in Mexico city. Ixtapa-Zihuatanejo is very nice, much nicer than the touristy Cancun or Acapulco. If you're going back there and want to explore other places, I recommend two other, less traveled beaches: Akumal (about 100km south of Cancun) and, if you like desert, San Carlos (on the Gulf of Mexico; a few hundred miles south of Phoenix and Tucson).

Donna Perlmutter, how about that. I can still picture you as a high school student so clearly in my mind.

Aliza Haklay

right back at you. thanks for the support.i hope with sofia's friends she has a warm house to feel comfortable in, the way i felt in yours.

A wonderful commitment you've made! Does your daughter still remember/speak any Russian? I ask because my kids left Mexico 7 years ago, when we moved back to the US, speaking fluent Spanish and they'e all but forgotten the language. And for my daughter, it was her mother tongue -- she was more comfortable speaking Spanish than English (because she spoke it all the time with her nanny).
I guess you don't know the shtetl of your Perlmutter ancestors. It will be hard to trace any relationship (although I'm sure we tried to figure this out 40 years ago at PS 164). I don't know if all Perlmutters are related -- the name, so I'm told, comes from the fact that our ancestors traded in mother-of-pearl. Your grandfather really didn't want to be in the army! A common experience but he took it to the next level. That's how my mother's father ended up in Cuba ... he left Poland to escape the draft ... and when he couldn't stay in the US due to immigration quotas opted for the warm weather, instead of joining his brother in Montreal.

i think about all you perlmutters al ot. your family was integral in my childhood life. it's a riot seeing all the names again. park slope is a great neighborhood. i lived in barbara's apt. in the heights for awhile. i wouldn't have left except they came back and kicked me out. i've thought about sending sofia to my sister too, to get away from the teenage angst out here in suburbia.

I think the reason it's a German name is because it's from the part of Poland controlled by Germany or Austria during one of the several times in history when Poland was not independent, but divided among the three countries. My father's family came from what was then SE Poland, but is now western Ukraine (called "Galicia" -- the part of Poland controlled by Austria) -- from a town called Skalat, about 45 miles SE of the larger town of Tarnopol. All these Perlmutters were known as "Pinyaks" after Bobe Pinye, who was some sort of wise woman in town in the 19th century. As far as I know, there is only one related Perlmutter family in the US -- my grandfather's brother immigrated to the US in the late teens, early 1920's -- and from Washington Heights, they went on to Clifton, NJ, New Haven, CT and we now have a branch in LA. How about your Perlmutter family? Do you know where they are from?

Hi! Thanks for your note. I always remember the other Perlmutters at school. There were not too many of us around, but -- and I don't know if you've experienced this as well -- a good chunk of the people I meet, especially other Jews, always seem to know a Perlmutter and always ask if they are related to me (and they never are!).

Star in all the shows at PS 164 is probably somewhat of an exaggeration -- maybe lead singer in the Hebrew School choir (where I did most of my singing), but I just was The King in The King and I. Richard Wagner was the lead, Nanki Poo, in The Mikado the year before (and Lun Tha in The King and I), with Robert Sues as Koko, The Lord High Executioner and Peter Jacobson as The Mikado; Peter was also the lead male in The Sound of Music the year before. I was just Pooh Bah in the Mikado -- and, despite my petition, only 5th and 6th graders were allowed to perform in the shows, so I couldn't perform in The Sound of Music.

Donna---Hi, I know that I am older than you---but somehow we all catch up---anyway, I also live in Forest Hills---where about are you???? I am a Kindergarten Teacher in East Elmhurst, near Jackson Heights....write so we can shoot the talk....Cindy