During the past two decades, plenty of time, money and creative energy has been spent on the idea of taking Jewish-Jewy things and making them cool and mainstream — all with the idea of making Jews feel cooler and more mainstream about being, well, Jewish.
Well… turns out Jewish summer camps have had the secret ingredient all along — gaga.
Yes… it turns out everyone is gaga for gaga these days.
So says The New York Times in this report:
Believed to have originated in Israel, the game — which translates to “touch, touch” in Hebrew — has been a standby of Jewish summer camps and community centers in the United States since at least the 1970s. Now, to the surprise of parents who recall the game from their youths, gaga is solidly mainstream.
Young people are playing gaga this summer with fervent devotion, from this sunny day camp in Silicon Valley to Lake Beauty Bible Camp in Long Prairie, Minn., to the 20,000-square-foot Ultimate Gaga arena in Syosset on Long Island.
What’s next? The Maccabiah Games? The Olympics?
Let me end with this: If you took all the reporters and editors in Jewish journalism and put them in a gaga circle… I would be the last one standing.
Any takers?
