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Friday March 9, 2007

Jewish wedding fair brings out the marrying kind

by dan pine
staff writer

Sharon Gobuty has already nailed down the caterer, the gown and the wedding singer for her upcoming nuptials. All she needs now, she says, is the “video, the florist and the Jewishy stuff.”

That “Jewishy stuff” was hers for the taking at the annual Jewish Wedding Fair, held Sunday, Feb. 26 at Palo Alto’s Lucie Stern Community Center. The Albert L. Schultz Jewish Community Center presented the event.

Gobuty was one of many brides-to-be attending the fair, which featured about 45 vendors specializing in everything from custom ketubahs to balloon bouquets.

Though rainy skies threatened, the mood at the fair was decidedly sunny.

Towering Ukrainian models sashayed through the hall in silk-and-taffeta wedding gowns designed by Oksana Mukha, while Seniya Petrashyshyn of Diamond Bridal tried to interest young brides in the $3,000-and-up couture.

Carol Attia and Shuli Gordon of Under the Chuppah pitched its flower-and-chuppah services. Attia’s chuppahs come in free-standing or hand-held options. “As far as I know,” Attia said, “there is no halachah [Jewish law] on which style is preferred.”

Couples interested in rent-a-chuppah services checked the booth of Afikomen, the venerable Berkeley Judaica store.

Pizazz Party Planners Paulette Miller and Abril Sohn said they do the “hand-holding” for betrothed couples in the midst of wedding planning hell. “We do as much or as little as the client needs,” Miller said. “We’ve even made nail appointments and gone with them.”

While violinist Julie Egger and her band, the Red Hot Chachkas, entertained with some stylish klezmer music, “Kosher Mime” Stella Filler, decked out in the colorfully exotic garb of a Moroccan bride, stood as still as a show-window mannequin.

Lauren Gallegos of Naomi’s Chocolate Catering offered samples from a cascading chocolate fountain, a three-tiered extravaganza of melted Guittard Quetzalcoatl 72 percent pure cacao. Stick a skewered strawberry into the torrent and, she promised, wedding guests will be happy.

The fair also offered a series of lecture/workshops on subjects ranging from “What Makes a Wedding Jewish?” and “How to Pick a Ketubah” to “Tips and Pitfalls that Make or Break a Wedding.”

One of the best-attended workshops was “Two Faiths, One Ceremony: A Guide to Interfaith Ceremonies,” led by Hillel of Stanford Rabbi Mychal Copeland. Her aim was to reassure interfaith couples that resources do exist to help them create a satisfying Jewish wedding. “It definitely can be tough to find a rabbi,” for an interfaith wedding, she cautioned. Her advice: “Be persistent.”

There are several pitfalls for interfaith couples, beginning with nailing down the right time and place. Saturday weddings are usually out, as are most Jewish sanctuaries. Other considerations include foregoing any “Jesus language,” deciding how much Hebrew to incorporate, and even whether to say the “I do’s,” which do not normally figure in the traditional Jewish wedding ceremony.

Copeland also recommended that interfaith couples learn as much as possible about each other’s faith traditions. Otherwise, she said, quoting a book on the subject, “you’re debating stereotypes.”

Workshop attendees had many questions for Copeland. One twinkly-eyed groom asked, “Can you review the ketubah, say, every five years?”

Redwood City interfaith couple David Grabel and Teri Aldridge enjoyed Copeland’s workshop. “This reconfirms a lot of what we learned,” said Grabel, who marries Aldridge on March 31. “What’s important to us is to design a ceremony the way we want it to be.”

As for Gobuty, the fair provided ideal one-stop shopping. The only thing missing was her fiancé. “I couldn’t get him to come,” she said, laughing. “He said, ‘Tuxedoes and cake are the only things I’m interested in.’”

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