ILENE GELBAUM ORAL HISTORY

EMMA MORGENSTERN:All right. This is Emma Morgenstern, and today is October 7th, 2010.

ILENE GELBAUM:October 8th --

EM:Oh, sorry. It's October 8th, 2010.

IG:It is.

EM:(laughter) I'm here at the Yiddish Book Center in Amherst, Massachusetts, with Ilene Gelbaum. And we are going to record an interview as part of the Yiddish Book Center's Wexler Oral History Project. Ilene, do I have your permission to record this interview?

IG:Absolutely.

EM:Okay, great. Thank you. So, can you start by telling me about your family background as far back as you can remember?

IG:Well, as far back as I can remember, my grandparents came from Russia, both sets of grandparents, and settled in Brooklyn, New York. In those days, I have 1:00been told, it was all farmland. And my mother grew up in the same house that they settled in. And I have actually recollections of that house. My grandmother used to make the best chocolate pudding. And as kids, we used to be able to scoop out and lick what was left in the pot. I remember that vividly. They spoke Russian and Yiddish and no English. They never learned English. And passed away in the same house that they had settled in. And we moved when my mom got married down the block, (laughs) really. It was less than a mile away. And I grew up there. And we moved a little further, when I was very young, into a cooperative. 2:00In those days they called it that, not a co-op. And that's where I grew up. I was able to walk to school, walk back from school, drop my books off, and then I went to Yiddish school. For twelve years, I went to Sholem Aleichem Folkshul. And twelve years after school. And I had the most incredible teacher, Lerer Mordkhe Schaechter, who was convinced that in his lifetime Yiddish would be gone. And he was an activist teacher who fought for Yiddish and was instrumental in founding YIVO. So, he was a wonderful teacher. Only spoke to me in Yiddish. He would not speak in English. And he used to send me -- every holiday, I'd get a wonderful Yiddish story that he'd write out in a card. And we'd always send 3:00him pictures of the kids growing up. And he was an important part of my youth.

EM:In what way was he important?

IG:Because he -- in those days, women were trying to become something important, not just be the husband's wife. And he was a strong believer that Jewish women were strong and could accomplish anything. And he instilled that in me. And I think I lived up to that promise. And I was grateful for that, you know?

EM:And what was he like in general as a person? What was your interaction with him?

IG:Well, he was a very soft-spoken guy. And he talked about his family, but we 4:00never met them. And he just was very soft-spoken for such an activist person. And always very -- positive thinker. And would always help you do more, become more, write more. And he used to bring us to the Yiddish theater in New York, and we'd sit and enjoy that. And he always expected so much of you. I think that was probably the expectations in the Jewish community. Where I grew up, everyone was Jewish, you see. All the bobes [grandmothers] used to sit out in the street in their aluminum chairs and be knitting or crocheting or -- and yente-ing [gossiping] about something. We couldn't get away with anything when we were dating, because everyone was watching you. And they would report back to your mother. You had to toe the line. And of course, I always wanted to become one of 5:00those bobes. And I did! My grandkids call me bobe. And it's kind of sweet when they call on the phone, and you pick up the phone -- "Hi, bobe. I love you." And they hang up. So, I kinda hearken back to my days when you used to have to pass the lineup of bobes. They'd comment on what you were wearing; your skirt was too short; your hair wasn't properly kempt, where were you going? You know. So.

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EM:Can you tell me a little bit about why your parents sent you to the folkshul [Yiddish secular school]?

IG:Ah. Well, I'm sure one reason was that in order to communicate with our grandparents, right, it was important. Also, I think that -- it's odd, because in those days -- like, I know I'm from Russia. But I don't know where in Russia. 6:00They didn't talk about it. It was like, that's the life they left behind. And when they came to America, although they didn't totally assimilate in that they didn't learn -- my grandparents never learned English -- they never talked about the Old Country. I think that was my parents' way of keeping their children connected without having to relive everything. So, I think that's why. And I think it's a great idea. And I wish that it was still available now for the kids today to do that because, honestly, now they go to Hebrew school. They learn Hebrew. They learn about Israel. Nobody really teaches them about Eastern Europe in the old days, and certainly they don't learn any Yiddish. So, when they were 7:00born, you know, we -- "Oh, your fiselekh [little feet]! Your -- give me your hentelekh [little hands]. We'll wash your hentes [hands] now." You know, you have to -- but I've noticed each generation, there's less and less Yiddish in the vernacular. So, it's sad, kind of, because I think my grandchildren's children probably, unless they call themselves bobe, you know, probably they won't even be that. So --

EM:And did you -- you actually spoke Yiddish at home primarily?

IG:Not in my household, but around my grandparents, only Yiddish was spoken. So, when we were at their house or they were part of the Pesach seder or the -- you know, that kind. But my parents spoke English. They were born and raised in 8:00Brooklyn, so I think that was -- but, you know, it's interesting. When you are totally involved in a Jewish community, and everyone around you is Jewish, you don't think of the importance of that. You just take it for granted. You live like that, you see. You don't really hit the point where that's important until your kids start dating, you see, and then you realize, Oh my gosh, you know? And so, I wish I could go back and instill more Yiddishkayt in my children instead of just taking it for granted. But I can't. So, I'm working on my grandkids.

EM:So, can you tell me a little bit about when you met your husband?

IG:Ah. So, in those days, I went to Sholem Aleichem Folkshul. He went to Arbeter Ring. So, in those days you went for the number of years it took you to graduate 9:00the folkshul, and then you went to what they called then Hebrew high school, which was really Yiddish high school. And so, my husband was one year ahead of me in school, so he was at Hebrew High School in Manhattan. You had to take the train into Manhattan. So, I went for my first day. And there, up on the stage -- okay, the school started in September, so Rosh Hashanah, Yom Kippur -- so there, up on the stage, was this fellow playing the shower pipe. The school was too poor to have a shofar. So, they attached a trumpet mouthpiece to a rubber shower hose, and there was this guy -- kinda good-looking -- up there on the stage, and playing beautiful, like a ram's horn. And so, afterwards -- you know, I was 10:00pretty nervous. I was in Manhattan, all on my own. And in a new school. I didn't know anybody. But something about him seemed so familiar, you know? I just -- I couldn't put my finger on it. So afterwards, when everyone was mingling, I have to tell you, I went up to him with the corniest -- the -- corniest -- line: "Don't I know you from someplace?" I'm serious. I did that. And it plays over and over in my dreams these days. But I did know him from someplace, actually. Because it turns out that even though we went to different folkshuls growing up, we went to the same high school, and I was the tallest soprano, and I stood right in front of him, because he was the concert master on the violin. And I had been standing in front of him, and I didn't know it, until I saw him up on the stage in Hebrew High School. And then, we started going on Sundays to Hebrew 11:00High School in Manhattan together on the train. And at the time, I was dating a guy named Izzy, who was the butcher's son. And (laughs) my husband never forgot that. But we used to go, and our relationship developed -- I was all of fourteen. He was sixteen. And we are now together fifty years, and married forty-five of those. So --

EM:Wow.

IG:-- but it was pretty corny. But I did know him. (laughs)

EM:So, what year were you married?

IG:We were married -- oh, gosh. We actually eloped in 1965, and didn't tell anybody. Because in those days -- oh, it would have just ripped my mother's heart out, because you -- you know, you had to have the big Jewish wedding. And 12:00so, we never told them. They died not knowing, both parents. Even Mark's parents, we never told. And -- (laughs) and we got married a year later with the proper Jewish wedding -- you know, the big gdile [joy] where both sides of the family invite all their friends and family, and did the whole thing right. And the rabbi. I don't know what they said at the ceremony, because it was all in Hebrew. But I know we're married. (laughs) So --

EM:Where did you elope?

IG:We elo-- why did we elope? It's more why we eloped, because -- you know, I was in nursing school in Mount Sinai Hospital -- in New York, in those days -- and if they discovered you were married, you were kicked out of the program. You 13:00were not allowed to be married. In fact, dating was quite an ordeal, because Mrs. Wilson used to make rounds in the dormitory, and you had to have your feet flat on the floor. That was the important thing. So, it was pretty restrictive. And so, we eloped and told nobody. But we eloped in Jersey City, right across the border, and had our two best friends with us. So --

EM:How old were you?

IG:Fourteen. Not fourteen. I was -- how old I -- I was eighteen, and he was twenty. And so, the proper wedding was when he just had turned twenty-one, and I was about to turn nineteen. Yes.

EM:And so, all of your family was at the wedding.

IG:Yes. And the Jewish family, that's -- it's an amazing process. Because at 14:00that point, you know, in nursing school, I actually felt very akin to the call by President John F. Kennedy to give service, that all the youths should give some type of service. Volunteer. Do something important with your life. And I heeded that call. We had a graduate from Mount Sinai who had joined the Peace Corps, and she was sending home the most -- not "home," home to school -- the most amazing letters. And I'd read those letters, and I'd just -- it spoke to me. It was me. And so, I made it a condition of my marriage that, "Marry me, and we're joining the Peace Corps." And he had actually had hopes of joining VISTA, which was the arm in the United States. And so, he was okay with that idea. And we did. I worked at Mount Sinai as a graduate for probably a year and a half. 15:00And we got an assignment to go to Sri Lanka. And so, we didn't pass it up. We did that. And lived there for three years. Learned Sinhalese. So, it's easy to learn multiple languages when you grow up speaking two languages, right? And that actually worked out well. And we went to Fresno, California, for our training, where we were totally immersed in Sinhalese. And totally immersed in rice and curry. And the reason I am here today in Amherst, Massachusetts is for our Peace Corps reunion, our fortieth Peace Corps reunion, where we will be feasting on rice and curry all weekend and sharing our Peace Corps/Sinhalese 16:00memorabilia. So, this particular reunion is really special because both of our Peace Corps directors will be there and be able to share their side of our story that we probably haven't heard. So, it'll be exciting.

EM:That's great. And what kind of work were you doing there?

IG:Well, I was a registered nurse. And Mark had done some biotech stuff and learned how to take slides and blood smears and read 'em under the microscope, and -- we shared a high school teacher that was -- Mrs. Cleod, I remember her. And she was very strong on, "You'll need this skill sometime in your life, okay?" And we actually did, because the village -- the jungle village we were put into was -- I say "jungle" because the elephants would pass by our house 17:00every day on their way to do their work in the jungle. And they'd rip up our manioc, which is a root like a potato. Manioca. And they'd rip it up and eat it to gain sustenance to go do their work. And so, the village we were put into, I don't know -- a lot of people don't know that Peace Corps doesn't decide, Oh, we'll send volunteers to Sri Lanka. It's not how it works. The government of Sri Lanka requests volunteers. So, they wanted volunteers to introduce this new miracle rice from the Philippines, called IR8. And so, we were sent there to introduce this miracle rice. By the way, it tasted awful. But it was an amazing yielding crop, so it -- it was supposed to lift people out of poverty. But 18:00nobody liked the way it tastes. So, they grew it for export, but it never was successful as a crop for Sri Lankans. But, what we noticed was ninety-two percent of our village was down with malaria at any given time. There were no workers in the field. They were sick, so sick. So, there I was, a registered nurse, a husband who had some background. And we actually opened a malaria clinic. We would do the finger sticks and read the slides and dispense the medication. And the local jungle apothecary actually had the medication, free, dispensed from the government, but he was charging for it. And what would happen is a family of eight or ten could only afford to treat the father. But they didn't understand how malaria works and how if you don't treat the entire family at the same time, it just ping-pongs back and forth. And so, it was a big 19:00problem, despite the fact that they sprayed our homes with DDT constantly. It was hard to control malaria, very hard. And so, that's what we did. Where did we wind up living? We wound up living in the midwives' quarters. Because frankly, it was so out-stationed and so in the jungle, no midwife from Sri Lanka wanted to live there. And so, we had this midwife quarters. It was a cement building, actually. And so, people started calling me to deliver their babies. And I delivered -- my first baby was my neighbor -- across-the-dirt-road neighbor. It was her third child. And it was just the most normal, natural, wonderful birth. Because I didn't have any equipment, right? You had nothing there. And I had a 20:00bottle of aspirin. And that was it. And so, we had bandages that they gave us to -- you know, 'cause open wounds in the tropics don't heal very well. So, we would do a lot of bandaging. But that was basically what we did in our malaria clinic: treat malaria and bandage -- no things to do deliveries with. And no instruments, no suture material, no numb-y stuff, nothing. Anyway. So, it was a wonderful, easy delivery. It just set me on a track for life. And, of course, I had Mark, my husband, to boil water. That's what he did, because he was so scared, you know? I mean, it was just so totally different for him. And we didn't even have electricity. So, we delivered that baby by Petromax, which was 21:00a kerosene lantern, you know, with the flies hitting the lantern and dropping down dead. So, it was kind of very surreal. But we did it. And the reason I tell you about the birth of that little boy? His name was Sumina Sayna. And Sumina Sayna sent me a letter. I have to tell you, I was collecting my mail a few years ago, in Torrance, California. I'm at the mailbox. You know how you flip through the letters? Most of it's junk. And there was this envelope, with the most gorgeous stamps. Sri Lankan stamps are all gold foil. They're gorgeous. I wasn't expecting a letter from Sri Lanka. So, I'm excitedly opening it, trying not to tear the stamps, you know? And I open up the letter. And it was a letter from 22:00this baby boy I had delivered. And why is he writing to me? So, he didn't really know me, because when we left country, he was not even three. But he had heard the stories about us, growing up. And he was writing on the day he graduated nursing school to thank me for giving him a purpose in life and to share what it meant to grow up hearing the stories about our living there, and how grateful he is to have become a nurse, and he wanted to share that story with me. So, I'm standing at the mailbox, sobbing, tears pouring out of my eyes. I could easily -- that could happen right now. It just brings back so many memories. And my neighbors must have thought I was crazy. But it was the most heartfelt letter. We went back. We took our teenagers when they were fifteen and nineteen. We went 23:00back. We did a trip around the world one summer for three months that everyone was off school. And we went to our village in Sri Lanka. And they instantly enveloped my children, okay? My daughter had long, flowing hair, which Nona braided perfectly in Sri Lankan style with the coconut oil and everything, and I mean, my kids loved it there so much they probably would have stayed without batting an eyelash. It was an amazing experience. But we didn't see him because he was in school that year. And so, we didn't even meet him then. But his name is prominent in my life every day of my life because his mother -- who had no money, okay -- had a brass tray made with his name inscribed in it. And that 24:00tray sits on our mantel. So, we see it every day. And so, he made something of his life. So, the lesson to be learned from the Peace Corps is that you're not going to change anyone's culture or way of life or show them, Oh, this is the better way. You can change one person's life, affect one person's life. And so, that's what I think I accomplished. Granted, I delivered other babies. But I changed this young man's life a little bit. And I feel it was worth everything. So --

EM:That's a wonderful story. (laughter) I know you had mentioned something about celebrating Hanukkah in Sri Lanka?

IG:So, how did Jews -- so, you know, this is my year for completing circles, okay? So, we are here to have our Peace Corps reunion. And also, because of my 25:00age, there are other reunions, so Mount Sinai's nursing school class that I graduated is having a reunion next June. Nobody seemed to care about the other reunions very much; you get ten people coming, something. We had a graduating class, I think, of eighty-two. So, this year, this upcoming year, will be our forty-fifth reunion. And people are getting excited. So, we're getting emails from all around the world: "Oh, I'm planning on coming," "I'm planning on coming," "I'm pl--" So, I'm reading them, excited. Oh, I haven't seen most of these people in forty-five years. And guess what? So, I'm reading the email one day, and one young lady chimes in -- Nancy, Nancy Shamban, who was one of my Jewish classmates at Mount Sinai. And so, I'm reading -- "Oh, I'm planning to go, and blah, blah --" and it gets down -- "but I may not make it because I'm still working in Sri Lanka." I'm thinking, Okay. I mean, don't you think that's 26:00an amazing coincidence? So, not only is she working in Sri Lanka, but she's working not far from my village, okay? And so, we started corresponding. And we're gonna Skype her this weekend from our group get-together, and see what it's like these days in Sri Lanka and in Badulla, right, where she's Skyping from. I didn't have electricity! We didn't have running water! She has Skype. I think it's fascinating. So, we're going to connect. And the reason I bring up Nancy is because one of her emails -- she's finding it hard celebrating Jewish holidays in the village. She's there doing mental health work; I guess there was a lot of problems after the tsunami, and the people that survived are having a tough time. And so, she's there doing that kind of work with a volunteer group 27:00out of UK. But finding it hard to be Jewish. And so, I sent her an email telling her about what we did. So, we made friends with the carpenter, okay, and his family. And my husband drew a hanukiah [Hebrew: menorah] -- very simple -- and the two of them, the carpenter and my husband, made a hanukiah. So, they made it out of a hardwood called burutha, which -- it actually glistens when you turn it. It's kind of a blonde wood, like this, perhaps, but it glistens a little bit. It's a fitting wood for a hanukiah. And they just drilled basic holes for the size candle you could get in the local store, the local katai. And so, it has many years of singeing in the wood, because there wasn't anything to collect 28:00it. As the candle burnt down and out, it would singe the wood. So, you could see the candle for day number one is the most singed, and the candle for day number eight is the least singed. And for the shames [sexton of the synagogue], they made a Jewish star out of a halmilla wood, which is a red wood, so it would have a prominence. And we managed to celebrate. And when we'd save up enough money -- because we weren't earning any -- we'd keep a few coins back from the money they gave us for food and housing, and when we saved up enough money, we used to travel to India. We would take the ferry at Rameswaram and travel to southern India. And there is a treme-- was -- a tremendous Jewish community in Cochin, 29:00India -- which, from Sri Lanka, it's north and west. So, we would get on the train in India and take the train due west, and it would end in Cochin. Actually ended in Goa. And we visited the synagogue there for Rosh Hashanah and Yom Kippur. And it's a Dutch synagogue. It's beautiful. The entire inside is that Delft tile, that blue and white tile? It's gorgeous. The bimah and all the things in the synagogue were not made out of wood; they were made out of brass. And then, there were the brass polishers. And there were a large contingency of southern Indians who converted to Judaism. So, it was quite an experience. And 30:00so, that's what I told her, how Jews celebrate Jewish holidays in Sri Lanka. So --

EM:Did you ever feel like there was a Jewish component to the work you were doing in Sri Lanka?

IG:Well, in that -- you know, you're supposed to do mitzvot [good deeds], and I always felt that that was a big mitzvah that we were doing. In fact, years later, when I became a midwife, I actually met the Rebbe -- in Brooklyn. One of my patients was his granddaughter, and she took me to visit. So, I met the Rebbe, and he told me to go forth and deliver many healthy babies. And I thought it was interesting; he never said many healthy Jewish babies. So, yeah, I think there's a definite mitzvah in doing the work that we did. Because, you know, God 31:00gives you the day. You've gotten up, you're alive, you're healthy. You need to help somebody else who's less fortunate in some way, or just somebody -- I don't think the people in Sri Lanka were necessarily less fortunate, but they needed help in various areas: malaria control, there was nobody to deliver the babies. So, it was kind of nice to share in that experience. But they were very proud people who I think were very happy with what they were doing in their lives.

EM:And what did you do when you came back to New York?

IG:Well, so I came back. I was pregnant with my first daughter -- my first child. And in those days, it was impossible to get a job as a nurse when you 32:00were pregnant. I know that sounds ridiculous in this day, but nobody would hire you if you were pregnant. And I went back to Mount Sinai, and I said, "You owe me, because I graduated here, I worked for you, I'm an asset, and it's okay that I'm pregnant. I want to work, and you owe me a job." And they gave me one. They had never hired a pregnant nurse before. And the proviso was that I work in the newborn nursery. Because they could not envision a pregnant woman lifting and turning patients and taking care of laboring patients, and so they actually came up with this plan that -- you could work in the newborn nursery. Which I did. In those days, a newborn nursery was fifty cribs, and we'd start at one end and 33:00we'd bottle, bottle, bottle, bottle, bottle, bottle, till we got all fifty kids fed. Then we'd go back and diaper, diaper, diaper, diaper. So, it was kind of easy work for a pregnant person. And that's what I did. And then, we moved briefly to New Jersey, where I worked in opening one of New Jersey's first birthing -- in-hospital birthing centers -- where I met my best friend for life, Nancy. And where I decided I wanted to become a midwife. And in those days, things were different, in that most nurses, even though they were out in the workforce, working hard, doing difficult things, making names for themselves, still needed their husbands' permission to apply to the midwifery program. But I 34:00was not like that. I told my husband, "I'm gonna be a midwife." And I took the application booklet home and filled it all out, brought it back the next day. And the three of us had agreed we would go together and apply. And the two of them, their husbands wouldn't let them. So, I sent mine in anyway. And I got accepted. And I went to midwifery school in University of Medicine and Dentistry in Newark, New Jersey. And graduated. Looked for a job. No jobs in New Jersey. One interview. And the choice was moving back into New York City, but I thought I would try out in California, where midwifery was flourishing. And I went on twenty-five interviews in California and picked a great job. And I have just retired from that job! For Kaiser Permanente, in Anaheim, California, where I 35:00delivered over five thousand babies. And pretty proud of that. And I started delivering the children who I delivered, so I basically am part of whole families, and it's just incredible.

EM:So, what does that mean to you, to be a midwife, to bring all these babies --

IG:Oh, God. It's impossible to even put into words, because -- I mean, a birth is just an incredibly wonderful moment. I miss it terr-- I have to tell you, I miss it terribly. But it's -- I think -- okay, this is just my opinion -- when you look into the eyes of that baby as it's being born, I mean, they look right 36:00up at you. And it's like you could see right through them, or they could see right through you. And they look all-knowing. I feel like I'm delivering an adult mind in a baby's body. It just -- they look at you all-knowing, you see? And then, I think when they're born, you spend a lifetime relearning what at that moment you probably knew. It just seems that way to me. I have no way to confirm that. But it's just amazing. And even more than delivering the baby, than the actual wondrous moment of birth, okay -- even more than that, you get a sense of how strong women are. Where did we get the name the weaker sex? For God's sakes. When you watch a woman deliver a baby, it is the most incredible 37:00thing to watch. Every woman has her own personal journey that she has to complete. No one can do that for her. Not even all the drugs and all the epidurals and all the things they give these days to women, okay, none of that makes a difference. It's like she has a purpose and she has to complete that purpose. And they do it with such grace and such strength. And such inner forces. You just are bowled over every time. And after every birth I kiss and hug my patient and just tell her that. Because who else is going to tell her that? Nobody, okay? Nobody is ever gonna say, "You are amazing. Look what you just accomplished here," you see? Nobody. So, I thought that I owed it to my patients to tell them what I was thinking at that moment. And on the day I 38:00retired, my patients brought their kids back to share the day with me. That was -- that was an amazing day. So --

EM:And what were some of the challenges of being a midwife?

IG:Hm. People don't know much about midwives in this country. It's kind of a shame. They don't know how well-trained we are and how -- see, we fit into the scheme somewhere between nurses -- labor and delivery nurses -- and obstetricians. You see, obstetricians are trained to deal with illness and abnormal and urgent things: diabetics, high blood pressure, you know, that sort of thing. We need obstetricians. Unlike a lot of private obstetricians think, midwives are not looking to replace them. We are looking to work in a team effort. When we need that physician, we need that physician, right? But that 39:00physician should concentrate on taking care of patients who are sick, and midwives should concentrate on taking care of patients who are well, for whom birth is just a normal part of everyday life, not an illness. Contrary to popular belief, midwives mostly work in hospitals. We don't do home birth. Maybe less than three percent of midwives in this country do home birth, and the rest of us work in large hospitals. So, I hold the record for having delivered fifteen babies in one twenty-four-hour shift. So, we work hard. And our patients -- we have a special bond with our patients, because most of us are women, although the midwife they hired to replace me is a guy! So, I thought that was only fitting. And we understand what our patients are going through. Most of us 40:00have had children, although it's not a requirement to have had a baby to be a midwife. Nor is it to be an obstetrician, right? So, I think if people understood more about midwives, they wouldn't be so uneasy about it. But the number of midwifery deliveries in the United States is climbing every year, because people are discovering, Wow, this is a wonderful thing. So, I feel like I've made a great contribution in that way. Not only the people I've delivered but, you know, getting to go around the country and around the world, talking about midwifery. Do you know when we -- there's the International Confederation of Midwives? There's a Triennial Congress someplace in the world. And I go to them because it's fascinating. So, we went to the one in Vienna, for example. 41:00And we were there twelve days. Three thousand midwives from around the world attended. And you get to sit at the same table with the Eritrean and Ethiopian midwives! You get to eat breakfast with the Palestinian and Israeli midwives -- at the same table, politics gone. Just the basics of, Well, how -- do you know what the Israeli midwives have to go through every day to get to their hospital where they work? I mean, it's just incredible to hear that. And most of the Eritrean midwives are men, unlike in this country, where most of the midwives are women. So, you learn so much. A new product out of Japan to treat high bilirubin in newborns. Still hasn't been started in this country. So, you learn 42:00a lot. You grow a lot. And you meet women around the world. It's like the Olympics. So, we march into this stadium, the group from your country wearing native costume. We wore scarves for the United States, red, white, and blue scarves. That's what we came up with. Not very inventive. But, you should've heard the audience when the Japanese midwives entered. Two hundred strong, in kimonos. The gasp that -- (inhales) went up in the audience just at the sight of that was incredible. And they wound up interviewing me for their professional magazine in Japanese. So, they had a student midwife with them, a Japanese student midwife, who was bilingual, and she did the interpreting, okay? She and her new husband just visited us this week, the day before we got on the plane to 43:00come here. So, I, you know, tried to encourage her to finish her midwifery program, to -- you know, it's tough. And she did it. And she's so happy. And so, they came to visit to thank us, thank me for making sure she finished what she started. But she did have an amazing journey. And I feel happy to be part of that. So, you know, we recruit and train new midwives. We make sure the profession grows, much like making sure Yiddish survives, isn't it? And I think -- so there's part of that in me. And we have to replace ourselves. You're young; you're twenty-two! But when you're my age, you realize that you're not going to last forever, and you need to ensure that you replace yourself with 44:00somebody who's smarter and better and has great new ideas and could make their mark in the world. So. I'm working on it.

EM:All right, well, speaking of the younger generation, can you tell me about your children?

IG:See, I always knew from a very young age that I was going to be a nurse. Honestly, I never -- it was as though I had blinders on, and I never would've even given consideration to anything else. I think when my children were growing up, though -- when I say "not give consideration to" -- Mark and I used to sit on the stoop outside our house in Brooklyn and talk about my nursing. And I even told him then that I would be a midwife. Because we were on the bus route to Kings County Hospital, and we'd watch the bus every day go right by us. And I'd 45:00say to him, over and over and over, "You marry me, I'm gonna be a midwife someday. You know what that's gonna be like, being married to a midwife? I'll never be home. You might have to learn how to cook and clean and do things like women do." (laughs) But honestly, he was okay with that. And Kings County had the largest midwifery program in the country. I always thought I would go there. I didn't know I'd be living in New Jersey at the time. But when my kids were growing up, it wasn't so clear for them. They didn't have a passion, a one-lane passion that they developed at a young age. My daughter eventually became a nurse and a nurse practitioner. And my son, he had more of a passion. He wanted to play the tuba. He became a tuba player. And now, he teaches for the school 46:00district he grew up in, in California. He's the music director. So, I'm happy that they found their way in life, because it's hard when you don't have that idea from a young age and just keep moving towards that. And I didn't know how to handle a daughter that didn't have that idea. Because I was unprepared for that. But I'm glad she found her place. And it's important. But I hear my granddaughter talking to her friends, and she thinks maybe she'd like to grow up and be in the medical profession. I'm thinking, Yes! (laughs) Secretly I'm thinking yes. So --

EM:You talked a little bit before about what it means to be a bobe.

IG:Yes.

EM:So, can you expand on that and say what it means to be a bobe for you?

IG:(sighs) To be a bobe, you have a responsibility to your grandchildren. You 47:00know, their parents -- parents are very busy. Grandparents are not so busy. So, we have time to think about the things that are important, like making sure they get a Jewish education. Of course, when I was younger, I always envisioned that I'd be doing the teaching, which is not possible. But you have to make sure that they have a Jewish education. And that they're with Jewish people. I took that for granted growing up. I was always with Jewish people. But my kids and grandkids didn't -- my kids growing up, they lived in a Japanese community in Torrance. It was all Japanese when we were there. So, they didn't know other Jewish kids unless they went to Hebrew school. So, that was important. And now 48:00my grandchildren, growing up in a neighborhood which is somewhat Jewish but not predominantly. I'm happy that my children thought that their children should go to Hebrew school. Unfortunately, they're learning only Hebrew, not Yiddish, and they're learning about Israel, very little about Yiddishkayt. So, I try and read them -- and my husband, who is a kindergarten teacher, he -- we read them a lot of Yiddish stories, Yiddish books. Try and make sure that they know where their heritage is from. One of the other things you do at my age, which you will get to, is your genealogy -- which is important. And I'm trying very hard to put together that family tree. And so, we'll have that to leave for the grandchildren. Because I realized when my parents passed away, I realized the 49:00questions I never asked. How foolish! Now there's nobody left to ask those questions. So, I think it's very important that we -- that's our responsibility. My kids don't even have an interest in that yet. They're not at that stage in their lives. So, I'm sort of forcing it down their throat a little bit. But -- for example -- and the real reason I wanted to come today was to tell you the story of Rosita, okay? I mean, this encapsulates everything I'm trying to do with my grandchildren and the genealogy and our Yiddishkayt. This is important. So, my husband and I, his family came from Poland, and my family came from Russia. They grew up blocks from each other, and they really didn't know each other until they had kids, until me and my husband were born. And even though we 50:00met at Hebrew High School, after we got married, they told us that they actually wheeled us in carriages together. His grandmother lived next door to my aunt Mary, and we were wheeled together in carriages. And there's pictures of that. But they never shared that until after we were married. But -- so our backgrounds are different, from different parts of Europe. But nonetheless, we have to meld that together and show our grandchildren how that works on the family tree. So, my husband's parents, his father was a bit older than his mother. And he was world-traveled. And we have his passport. After he emigrated 51:00to the United States, he still traveled a lot, before he met Mark's mom and got married and settled down in Brooklyn, New York. So, Mark has a whole family history that is not part of our growing up together in Brooklyn, right? And I know nothing about my family's history from Russia. But Mark's father left stories. So, it seems that Mark's father was from a large family -- I guess families were large in those days -- and true to form, they didn't expect a lot of the kids to make it. So, I think there were ten kids born, a couple of sets of twins. Six survived, okay? And Mark's father was the youngest. Mark's 52:00father's siblings, the six siblings, there was the eldest brother. So, the youngest brother, the eldest brother. And eldest children have more responsibility. So, you can imagine in this Jewish shtetl [small Eastern European village with a Jewish community] in Europe, in Poland, that the eldest brother would run the family business, would look after the younger siblings, would have the most ties to the community. So, when it came time for them to leave in the 1920s, the five siblings left -- I don't know if all five left. But some of the siblings left. I think four of them left -- and settled in New York. They came through Ellis Island. We were just there and were able to see that. And didn't go very far from Ellis Island to Brooklyn, and settled there. One 53:00sister and her family that stayed behind died in the Holocaust. But the eldest son, he -- the eldest sibling, when it came time for him to leave, he did not go to New York or go into the United States. And we don't know why. But he settled in Argentina. And it may have been that that's where predominantly Jews were headed in those days. I'm not really sure. Mark is not really sure. And nonetheless, he settled in Argentina. We have evidence that -- well, maybe he tried to get into the United States and couldn't get in for some reason. But my father-in-law's passport from all the travels, there is a trip to Argentina. So, 54:00we know maybe there was some effort even again to get him out of Argentina, bring him to New York. But I don't think he made it past Cuba in those days. But nonetheless. So, deep in Mark's brain, he knows he has some family there. But we sent out an email in 1999: no response whatsoever. Okay? So, we let it go. But here we were headed to South America to visit -- two of our Brazilian exchange students had babies this year! One had a set of twins, so three babies to visit. And I said to Mark, "We're gonna be so close to Argentina; shouldn't you look up your family?" So, he wrote a letter -- the story of his father's journey, he wrote it in a letter. And my daughter-in-law put it out on Facebook to all the Gelbaums in Buenos Aires -- of which there turns out to be eleven, okay? We got 55:00three responses. That's a pretty good response rate. Two of them said, Oh, no, we don't recognize this story. We are not your relatives. Sorry. One of them said, "Oh my gosh! This is our story! We know you! We are your relatives!" And, you know, you get a letter like that, you're a little nervous: is it true? You hear so many horror stories about this -- you know, maybe they want to extort money; maybe they're bad people. Anyway. We had a number of months before we were going. So, we started corresponding back and forth by email. It turns out that the granddaughter, who is thirty-one, speaks fluent English because she studied to be a chef in New York City for five years. So, she would write these lengthy, lengthy emails. Even till the day we got on the plane, Mark was kind of 56:00nervous, because, you know, are they telling the truth? Are we gonna meet up with some bad fate when we go? So, we just -- we went. And so, we spent a wonderful time in Brazil. We saw our babies. And we headed off to Buenos Aires for five days. And we met the most incredible family, okay? I mean, they could have been terrible people, right? Or they could have maybe -- having some dementia. Or, you know, there could have been any number of things. But that's not what we met. We met Rosita. Rosita is the daughter of the eldest brother that settled in Argentina. Mark is the son -- my husband -- the son of the youngest brother that settled in New York. And Rosita is eighty-five years old. 57:00Mark is sixty-five years old. The difference in the age of the parents, right? Twenty years' difference. Rosita turns out to be the quintessential, most wonderful grandmother, the matriarch of her family, the Jewish matriarch of an incredible Jewish family, okay? The sweetest, nicest, sharpest, healthiest eighty-five-year-old I have ever known, okay, who orchestrated our entire five days -- where we would go, who we would eat with, what we would do -- and gave us the journey of a lifetime, okay? Her name is actually Julia Rosita Gelbaum -- probably "Hulia" -- Rosita Gelbaum. Why did we find her? Because Argentinian 58:00women are proud, and they don't change their names and take their husband's name. So, she's still a Gelbaum, okay, which is -- she had three sons, and those three sons all had girls. So, all the granddaughters -- I met the most accomplished, most intelligent, feisty women who are assertive and have all become incredible human beings. Two of them are actually pregnant and due on the same day in December, which I find amazing. One is about to get married on the same weekend as one of the Gelbaum boys getting married in Atlanta, Georgia, the end of this month. What is the chance that the granddaughter in Argentina and the grandson in Atlanta, Georgia, would be getting married on the same weekend? 59:00Two Gelbaums on the same weekend, thousands of miles apart. I'm just finding this whole thing to be so surreal. So, even coming to the meeting with Rosita for the first time, my husband was nervous, okay? They had told us, Oh, bring some family pictures, okay? So, we brought a whole envelope of family pictures. Rosita came to the meeting with the family pictures. How did we get our family pictures? When Mark's father was alive, he had this trunk. You know, the footlockers you used to travel with? Locked, in the hall closet. Instructions not to open it. So, when he was alive, nobody opened it. When he passed away, his wife, Mark's mom, refused to open it. We waited -- when she passed away, the 60:00three boys sat down with this trunk and broke it open. What was inside? I was expecting all this travel paraphernalia from all these amazing trips he was on. No. There was a collection of photographs. No names, no dates, no places -- just these old photographs. That's what we brought to meet Rosita with. What did Rosita bring? Where did she get her photographs? When her father was alive, he had this trunk, locked, with instructions not to open it. And when he passed, okay, his wife -- Rosita's mother -- opened it. What was inside? The identical pictures. Identical. There is no possible question that these are not our relatives. The identical things were in there. The travel cards that they had to 61:00get in and out of the country, in addition to the passports, right? But the identical pictures. I mean, we sat there sobbing. It was just an amazing thing. We got to know each other in five days better than most families get to know each other in a lifetime. And leaving there, you had to pry us apart. I mean, we were all crying and hugging and kissing and wondering if we'd ever meet up again. Rosita is amazing. And so, to put a modern twist on this story -- by the way, every bit of which is true, right? -- modern twist to this -- so we're back one week from Argentina. We're home one week in Torrance, California. And I don't usually answer my phone -- my cell phone -- if it's from some number I 62:00don't know. Okay? I don't know why I answered that 800 number at that time. But I did. Who was it? Rosita. She has VoIP. And she called me from Argentina. She's called again on my birthday to wish me a happy birthday. And, I mean, it's just an amazing connection. And I just feel so privileged to be part of it. But it actually happened to us, and I just -- I tell Rosita's story to anyone who will listen, because it can happen. You just have to be open to it and trust a little bit and, you know, venture into the unknown. When we were in Argentina, she took us to where she got married, in the oldest synagogue in Buenos Aires. There are ninety synagogues in Buenos Aires. I mean, we have three in our area, in 63:00southern California. You know? Ninety synagogues. When they have High Holiday services, they're talking about thousands coming. I just find it amazing. And so, when we were there, we had to catch a plane back at 4:30 in the morning. So, we couldn't stay for Shabbat dinner on Friday night. So, they made us Shabbat dinner on Thursday night. And it was so wonderful. And I just would wish this kind of experience on anybody else. It just -- A, it shows you how small the world is; B, it shows you how big your family could be and you don't know it. And it just shows you that Yiddishkayt is alive and well around the world. Rosita speaks Spanish and Yiddish. So, I held my own pretty well, I have to tell 64:00you. When she calls on the phone, it's in Spanish. On my birthday, I had just woken up, and she called in Spanish. And I had to muster, you know. And I had a hard time that morning. But she's amazing. And I hope she lives to 105. So, I want to take -- you asked my responsibility to my grandchildren? Rachel, my eldest granddaughter, is eleven years old, just turned eleven. And, "Bobe," you know. She's interested in our trip, interested in our family. We actually spent the first ten days befor=e we went to Brazil and Argentina in New York City, and we brought our grandchildren to visit the relatives they had never met. Of course, they grew up three thousand miles away. I'm hoping to take Rachel to Argentina to meet her cousins. Because her cousin is exactly twenty years older 65:00than her and going to have a baby, so we'll go and visit that baby. And Rachel can meet her equal on the family tree. And I think that would be a perfect completion of that circle. So --

EM:Wow, that's incredible. (laughs)

IG:And it happened to me! So, I feel like, you know, I need to tell people these things are real. They can happen. So --

EM:So, what role does Yiddish play in your daily life now? I mean, you talked about growing up in the folkshul --

IG:You know, unfortunately it doesn't much play a life, other than, you know, when you run into somebody else your age who grew up in a similar experience. When we were in New York for those ten days, one of our Peace Corps cronies 66:00actually came down with his wife, drove down and picked us up, and we drove into Brooklyn and drove around to the old neighborhood, which is now mostly Haitian. And I don't think there was much more than the vestige of Yiddishkayt on Eastern Parkway, because of the Lubavitch that still live there. But we discovered that he grew up not far from us in Brooklyn, New York, a fact that we never knew before. So, that was nice, reminiscing that way. But not much -- where we live now, it's a world community. There are so -- talk about diversity. Our Japanese exchange student this year, she lived like an American while she was here. She ate Thai, Chinese, Vietnamese, Indian, Pakistani, Sri Lankan, and Mark's matzah 67:00ball soup. It's pretty diverse where we live. It's no longer strictly a Japanese community, no more than where I grew up is strictly a Jewish community. So, the world is melting together, and -- it's fun trying to still be who you are in the middle of the melting together. It's good. I like transitioning back and forth between that. We talked about the Triennial Congress of Midwives. I have to tell you a story about that. Because I was delivering a baby one day, in Anaheim, California -- you know, most deliveries are pretty exciting. The husband's 68:00scared out of his mind, and the wife is in pain a little bit and working hard and sweating, and, you know, the midwife is trying to manage this delivery and that laboring patient, and you can hear everybody and -- you know. So, it's usually pretty hectic. For some reasonm this particular day was not. It was a nice, calm birthing room. And I guess I was able to sit back -- I was waiting for things to happen, and I sat back and took notice about my surroundings. And I thought, Oh my God, Ilene. Look at this room. The patient and her husband are from Iceland. The pediatrician standing over there is from Nigeria. The nurse, who I worked with for years, is from Anaheim, California. And here you are, a midwife from Brooklyn, New York, waiting for this baby. And I'm thinking, This 69:00is incredible. The whole world, in this room, together. And this was not lost on me. And after the birth is over and, you know, the baby's all wrapped up and successfully breastfeeding in mother's arms, and everyone's dispersed, and this is what my patient said to me. I mean, this is verbatim what she said to me. She said, "Ilene, I want you to take my father's name and address in Iceland. If you ever get to Iceland, you had better look us up." Okay. So, you know, I'm polite, and I take the piece of paper, and I pocket the paper. But secretly I'm thinking, Okay, Gelbaum, how are you ever gonna get to Iceland? It's, like, on the way to where, exactly? You're never gonna be able to do this. But the thought of it was pretty exciting, wouldn't you think? You know, you don't get 70:00an invite to Iceland every day of your life. Okay. So, I never lost that piece of paper. I don't know why. The thousands of papers we juggle every day, I never lost that paper. Where do you think the Triennial Congress of Midwives was holding their next congress? In Oslo, Norway. Nine months later, in Oslo, Norway. And I investigated how I'm gonna get to Oslo, Norway, and the best flight turned out to be on Iceland Air. And Iceland Air, if you don't already know that, gives you a free three-day stopover in Iceland. I pulled out that paper. I called. I went to Iceland to visit my family that I had delivered in Anaheim, California. Well, they were so excited, okay? So, the father took three days off of work. Mom wasn't working, because in Iceland, you get two years paid 71:00time off to breastfeed your child for the health of the country, you see? So, she was home. My baby was gorgeous. I have to admit, if I had anything to do with making that baby gorgeous, but she -- I mean, big, round face, big, rosy cheeks, platinum blonde hair, the bluest eyes you'll ever look at, okay? And she was just delightful as a nine-month-old. So, we had an amazing three days. We drove all around southern Iceland. Took me to meet all the extended family, okay? So, the grandmother insisted that my cross-stitch wasn't exactly right; my needlepoint skills were lacking. And so, she sat with me, teaching me how to do it correctly. I made a pincushion, okay? And while she was teaching me that, she 72:00was telling me her birthing stories. Her stories, from when she had children. I mean, where do you get this opportunity? So, I still have that pincushion. I use that pincushion to this day. And it brings back memories of sitting there, listening to her birth stories when I'm sewing. So, now I have to make sure my granddaughter learns how to sew, 'cause that too is a dying art. They bring things to the cleaners to get 'em sewn, instead of taking out a needle and thread and mending. That's not done anymore. So, all of these things, you have to complete these circles. But --

EM:So, you've talked a lot about women --

IG:Yes.

EM:-- in your -- in this interview. I'm curious what advice you would give to women of the next generation: mothers, Jewish women -- anything?

IG:What advice would -- well, of course, I was raised in the generation that said you could have it all. And I set out to have it all. And I think I pretty much did have it all. But I had it all because I have a wonderfully supportive husband and tolerant children, who tolerated the hours I had to work to have it all. But I think what I see now in the current generation -- your generation -- I think women are waiting too long to have children. They're waiting too long to get married, or to get connected. I guess marriage isn't all that important these days. It's who you're with and what you do together that's most important. But I think that finding that stable relationship and having a family is getting pushed later, later, later, later, later. And there are consequences of that. And the consequences are clearly that you may not be able to have children. 74:00Infertility is rampant. And it's really heartbreaking. Also, it's very much harder to find a mate when you're older than when you're younger, because you're bringing baggage into the relationship. We didn't have any baggage to bring, you see? We were two innocent kids who fell in love and got married. That doesn't happen. Now women are looking for qualities in a list they've put together, either a real list or in their mind. And they're rejecting men based on that list, and then they're winding up in sad situations when they're older. And I think you shouldn't let that happen. You have to put yourself out there and be open to the world. And say yes more than you say no. Because when you say yes to things -- what if I would have said, "Oh, I'm so sorry. I have no chance of ever 75:00getting to Iceland, so there's probably no way I could ever --" so, but I didn't. I said, "Okay, this is a possibility, and I can do it some day." I didn't know when, but I kept it open. So, I think I would hope that women could see that they are worth so much, their value is so great, and they could do so many amazing things with their life -- just to go out there and do it. Not to keep rejecting. Take chances. It's worth everything. You only get this one go-around, I think. I'd like to believe I get another chance, but -- because there's things I haven't done yet that I would certainly hope to. And then, you want to find somebody you have something in common with. The more things you have in common with that mate, the longer your relationship is going to hold up. 76:00Because life is tough. Married life is tough. Family life is tough. And trying to do it with several religions, several different upbringings, several different -- it's tough. Makes it even harder. It's so much easier when you marry someone with like upbringing. I can't even begin to tell you how much easier. So, it's worked out well for me. I'm sure there's lots of better advice, but that's what worked for me. And I hope my grandchildren marry Jewish. That would be nice. And we're still open to every possible cultural thing to learn about, but I think their life would be easier marrying what they're familiar with. It's the place you turn when you have setbacks. People say -- my son just 77:00asked me this week -- my grown son, father of my grandchildren, okay, asked me this week, "Mom, do you believe in God? Do you really believe in God?" And I'll tell you what I told him. I said, "David, when you deliver that baby, for that moment you are absolutely, one hundred percent sure that God exists. There is no question in your mind. So yes, I absolutely believe in God. Do I believe that means we're gonna have this perfect life with no setbacks? No. And, you know, you get pissed at God and wonder, Why did you give this incredible person cancer? Why? Why couldn't you give some horrible guy on death row cancer instead? So, that kind of thing. It's hard to understand what the larger plan is. But I'm thinking there's probably a plan." So yeah, so I believe in God. And 78:00I hope he comes to grips with his dilemmas, whatever they are at the moment.

EM:And could you reflect on how your relationship to Judaism has changed or stayed the same over your lifetime?

IG:(sighs) So, I was sitting and reading the Jewish newspaper in LA one day. This was 1986. The "Jewish Journal." And I saw this headline. It was -- I mean, giant letters, you know, the kind you don't normally see unless -- like, "World War II Ends" kind of thing. But big letters: "Hebrew Union College Graduates First Class of Mohelim [ritual circumcisers]." Tiny print underneath it said, "Half the graduating class were women." Next day, I was in Rabbi Lewis Barth's 79:00office, telling him I was applying for the program. And frankly, when he -- he and a wonderful physician had set up this program to train mohelim. Mohelim and mohelot [female mohels], okay? But they never knew about midwives. So, they only thought obstetricians were doing circumcisions. "We will train Jewish obstetricians to provide this community service." It never entered their mind that Jewish midwives were doing circumcisions, and therefore there's this other pool to get students from. So, he took me provisionally, because he wasn't sure, would I actually complete the program? They knew nothing about midwives, right? 80:00But he was very gracious, and really a dear, dear gentleman. And the program was tough. It was thirteen months. And I learned so much about my religion that I didn't learn as a kid growing up in folkshul, because you're only a kid, right? So, you're fooling around, and you're not paying attention, and you -- you know, you're just a kid. So, as an adult when you learn about Judaism, your eyes are bulging. There's so much to learn. And he's the professor of Midrash at Hebrew Union College. So, I just -- I learned so much from them. And so, I became certified as a mohel at the end of the program. Out of the four students in the class that year -- two obstetricians, one pediatrician, and one midwife -- just 81:00one obstetrician and myself passed the course. And I've had a wonderful career as a mohel. That may rub some Jews the wrong way, but it really is very much connected to midwifery. Because think about it: as a midwife, women and families invite me into the most intimate time of their lives. What a privilege to be able to be part of that, right? It's a privilege. And as a mohel, you get to go into people's homes, meet the entire mishpokhe [family]. You get to help them transition from whatever level of Judaism they were working at to helping them to see how they can raise their children as Jews. And you're performing the first ceremony. You're just -- it's a mitzvah. It's an incredible opportunity 82:00that I've had the opportunity to meet these people that I would never meet otherwise and to be part of a very stressful time in their life. And when you're done, I could also help her with breastfeeding. You know, eight days is a very tricky time for a woman. All her hormones are just going crazy. The breastfeeding is not working the way she had planned because of all the stress getting started at that. And here we're doing this big thing with all these invited guests. And so, my midwifery helps me help the families handle what they have to do. And again, I have been so privileged. I have gone to Japan twice to do brises for American families living and working there. I mean, they need a 83:00mohel. And I was really honored to do that. So --

EM:That's great.

IG:-- that's how -- that's the -- how my Judaism affects me, you know, as an adult.

EM:All right. Well, is there anything else that you'd like to talk about?

IG:Oh, God. (laughter) None that I can think of at the moment, thank you.

EM:Okay. Well, thank you very much. I'm gonna stop the interview here.

IG:You're very welcome. This was a pleasure.

[END OF INTERVIEW]