Tuesday, Dec. 16, 2003 | 9:03 a.m.
Three weeks before Hanukkah, Wendy Gelbart begins unpacking.
Menorahs are unwrapped, dreidels are dusted. Hanukkah candy dishes are placed on the coffee table.
At the Gelbarts', Hanukkah is momentous, a holiday celebrated with high spirit and heavy ornamentation. Everywhere you turn is another menorah. Hanukkah towels and soap deck the bathroom. A blue Star of David garland clings to the drapes. Hanukkah snow globes are placed alongside Hanukkah music boxes.
"Growing up, there were times I thought, 'You know, where's our stuff?'" Gelbart said, referring to the abundance of Christmas decorations in malls, homes and public buildings.
"I wanted a tree," Gelbart said. "One year in junior high school, I took our electric menorah and put our gifts under it."
Concerned that her daughters would feel the same way, Gelbart and her husband, Daniel, decided five years ago to decorate for the Jewish holiday, which begins Dec. 19 this year.
"I have boxes and boxes of decorations," Gelbart said. "For the past five years I've been collecting.
"I didn't want my girls to say, 'I wish I weren't Jewish, that way we'd get decorations and lights,' " Gelbart said, referring to 7-year-old Mandy, 5-year-old Emily and 4-year-old Katie.
It's not only Gelbart who is laying it on heavily decorating for the holiday. In recent years Hanukkah decor quadrupled, families and retailers say.
"When I was a kid, you had a very basic Hanukkah," said Helene Rosenthal, spokeswoman for Rite Lite Ltd., a wholesale Judaica distributor in Brooklyn, N.Y. "Things have changed over the last 30 years. People used to have a menorah, a box of candles. Now there's a lot more products out there. There's Hanukkah candles, a lot of ceramic ware, serving dishes, cooking jars.
"Like Christmas, Hanukkah has become very commercial. People, in general, are much more savvy shoppers. When you go shopping for pocketbooks. You don't want four, you want 44."
Shopping for Hanukkah
Las Vegas resident Audrey Merkin says retail stores, including Wal-Mart, Target, Smith's and Alligator Soup, carry more Hanukkah items each year.
Hallmark, which produced its first Hanukkah cards in the 1940s, introduced its Tree of Life brand in 1995. The Jewish line features Hanukkah gifts, decorations and cards.
Yet not all retailers understand the holiday.
"Last year, it was so close to Thanksgiving," Merkin said "I went into Target and asked, 'Are you going to have any Hanukkah items this year?' She said, 'Yeah, but you'll have to wait 'til close to Christmas.' "
Hanukkah, which changes every year according to the Jewish calendar, was celebrated in November last year.
Regardless of the stores, Merkin never runs short of Hanukkah decorations. Her extensive menorah collection is displayed year-round. Every year at Hanukkah, children from the neighborhood come to her house to light menorah candles and taste Merkin's cooking.
"To us, it's more about the cooking and eating," said Merkin, who also builds a sukkah (shelter) in her backyard during Sukkot (a fall harvest celebration). "We'll make latkes, four different kinds of latkes, and sufganiyot (special Hanukkah doughnuts).
"A lot of people overdo Hanukkah because people's kids see other kids getting things. If it was in October, people would think nothing of it. We would still light the candles and give the gifts. There's a lot of other holidays more important. This is to celebrate that the oil lasted eight days."
While some are eager to dress up the holiday each year, Rabbi Felipe Goodman of Temple Beth Sholom says he's concerned by the increasing number of Hanukkah decorations and lights, something he considers the "December Dilemma."
"Hanukkah is a holiday that's supposed to separate us apart. Instead, we are really trying to be like the other cultures, turning it into a more important holiday than it really is," Goodman said.
"Jewish children today are super aware of Hanukkah and not paying attention to other holidays. That pains me tremendously."
Goodman said he would like to see Jewish people pay as much attention to other more religious Jewish holidays, such as Passover, Shavuot (which celebrates the giving of the Torah, the first harvest and the ripening of the first fruits) and Sukkot.
For Hanukkah, Goodman said, placing a menorah in the window is adequate and recommended in the Talmud.
"It tells us in the Talmud we have the obligation to tell the world that God performed a miracle for us," Goodman said. "It's supposed to be this modest and beautiful holiday. Hanukkah greeting cards? We never had that before."
Understanding tradition
Barbara Kenig, who grew up Jewish but barely practiced her religion, ended up walking the line between two religions when decorating for the holidays: She would celebrate Hanukkah with a Hanukkah bush. On Christmas, she would give her son a gift.
"I felt such joy in sharing the holiday spirit," Kenig said. "Not knowing what Judaism called for, I did the best I could do. It was a real Christmas tree, a small tree with Jewish decorations. That's the way we celebrated. It was my way of not giving up what Judaism I had during those days.
"It's a compromise. But that offends a lot of Jewish people ... As I got older, I felt the need for religion and spirituality. The closer you are to your religion the more you understand." The Hanukkah bush is gone and Kenig, now a member of Temple Beth Sholom, has a menorah she lights every year.
"Families celebrate differently according to their values," Kenig said. "The question is, what is the holiday meant to mean?"
To spread the message of Hanukkah, also known as the Festival of Lights, Rabbi Yisroel Schanowitz from Chabad of Southern Nevada mounts a lighted menorah on top of his car. It stretches the width of the vehicle and stands nearly 2 feet tall.
Attached to the plug-in lighter, Schanowitz and others who have car menorahs add a bulb each day of Hanukkah.
"It draws people's attention," Schanowitz said of the menorah that reads, "Chabad wishes you a Happy Hanukkah."
"I put it on before the beginning of Hanukkah and leave it on for eight days. The idea is to publicize the miracle of Hanukkah," Schanowitz said. "It celebrates light over darkness, freedom over oppression and spirit over matter. The message is that even a small amount of light can outshine lots of darkness."
"We're going to have about 10 cars in Las Vegas," Schanowitz said. "We're going to have a little parade. We'll probably go down Las Vegas Boulevard."
The Chabad of Southern Nevada also adds Hanukkah to the lights of Fremont Street by lighting a 20-foot menorah there each year.
Festival of Lights
Rosalie Lazer appreciates the lights of Hanukkah so much she covers her yard with blue-and-white lights and Lucite plaques made by her husband. She sets menorahs in the windows.
"We started this when we moved into this house four years ago," Lazer said. "There's over 20,000 lights in the backyard (alone). It's quite beautiful."
Lazer, whose family didn't have Hanukkah lights when she was a child, said she and her husband have not always decorated to the extent they do now.
"When we lived in Canada we put up our light display as we normally did," Lazer said. "Some kids down the road threw eggs at our house. I thought, 'Tonight it's eggs, tomorrow it will be stones.' We took the lights down that year."
Slowly they began rebuilding their holiday tradition.
"We didn't feel fearful anymore. We felt very proud of our heritage. It's our celebration too. It's just that we're celebrating different. We're proud to be Jewish.
"It hasn't been easy, but we persist. Now we're delighted we've gotten into this custom."
Hanukkah is one of the most visible Jewish holidays, one Lazer said she and her family appreciate.
"This is a fun time. This is a family time," Lazer said.
"During the eight days it's not unusual for people to bring menorahs to each other's homes. We all light our own menorahs and it's very beautiful."
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