I’ve been an active participant in NCSY since 2016, but Yarchei Kallah stands out for me as one of its more exceptional programs. This was my my second Yarchei Kallah that I’ve attended.  Yarchei Kallah is such an incredible event. Every NCSYer I have met on YK is working towards growing in their yiddishkeit. Every NCSYer I have met on Yarchei Kallah loves meeting new people. Everyone NCSYer I have met on Yarchei Kallah has so much enthusiasm and ruach (spirit) and is proud of the region they belong to.

The advisors on Yarchei Kallah are a special kind of people. Each one cares about each and every NCSYer so much. It’s not something that you see very often anywhere.

To the senior leadership of Yarchei Kallah, thank you so much. Although I didn’t see the countless amount of hours you spent planning every aspect of the shabbaton, I did see you running around for 90 hours making sure everything was perfect. It’s not only the advisors that care so much. It’s also the senior leadership of the shabbaton. I want to share an incident that occurred to me during Rabbi Lashak’s speech on Shabbos afternoon. I was sitting in the back of the room with some of my friends and I was using another chair for an armrest. Rabbi Baskevkin came in to the room and took that chair to sit on. When he realized that he took my armrest, he got another chair and put it where the chair he took had been. I thought it was amazing that he didn’t want to take the chair that an NCSYer was using as an armrest.

I’m also incredibly grateful for every donor who contributes to such an incredible cause. Because of the subsidies that donors make possible, I am able to participate in NCSY’s shabbatons and programs that I would otherwise have to miss.

I hope that eventually I have the merit of coming on Yarchei Kallah as an advisor and demonstrating that I am worthy of giving back to an organization that has given me so much.

–Hillel Freiheit

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