Remember the summer blackout of 2003 in the Northeast? Lots of people used it as an excuse not to leave home, but about 100 hardy souls schlepped their bicycles to Long Island to kick off a four-day bike ride at the Jewish Center of the Hamptons, thanks to Nigel Savage. Savage, who hails from Manchester, England, is the environmentalist impresario behind Hazon, a Jewish outdoor education group formed in 2000. Not only does Hazon hold annual bike rides to raise money for Jewish environmental projects, it runs community-supported agriculture programs (support for small farmers = fresh produce for urban Jews!) throughout the United States, Canada and Israel. Recent entries on the organization’s food-politics blog, "The Jew and the Carrot," run the gamut from a warning about pesticide-covered etrogim to a recipe for warm barley salad to an advice column by "The Shmethicist." Hazon threw itself into the debate over ethical kashrut last December when it publicly slaughtered a goat at its annual food conference to raise consciousness about meat production. Savage helped found the New York chapter of the British-based Jewish educational group Limmud, and even had a previous life as a Wall Street-type in England. According to his Web site, one of his proudest accomplishments is that he may be "the first English Jew to have cycled across South Dakota on a recumbent bike."
Congratulations, Nigel - well deserved!
While talking about Hazon, there is still time to register for the 2008 Hazon Food Conference ("Think before you Eat") at Asilomar in Northern California over Shabbat Chanukah (which happens to be the holiday weekend for the other half of the Judeo-Christian community).
Finally, perhaps you might think about signing up for the Spring 2008 Hazon-Arava Institute Israel bike ride celebrating, among other things the Tel Aviv centennial.
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