Coming Home: The Moth Podcast

0:00Hey LA, the Moth Grand Slam is coming to you on October 9th at the Bing Theater. 10 Winning Storytellers with Never Before Herds Stories Unlike at an open mic, each of these stories is coached by a Moth Director. Like me. We connect with the storytellers before the show. Here's sneak peek of the story they're going to tell and offer pointers and advice to help them as they continue to craft their tale for the stage. It's a lot of fun to coach these shows and even more fun to see them live. Don't miss the Moth Grand Slam. Find tickets at the Moth.org slash grand slam. That's the moth.org slash grand slam. Welcome to the Moth. I'm Emily Kouch. In this episode we've got two stories all about finding out where you come from. The process of figuring out who you are in relation to your family, your culture, your background, even your language. With both the Jewish high holidays and Hispanic heritage month coming up, we wanted to reflect on this journey of discovery and growth. With two stories about tradition and identity and what comes up when those two things intersect.

1:03First up, we have Gwendolyn Lopez Cohen. Gwendolyn told this story at a special event that the Moth put on with Barnard College at their annual reunion. Here's Gwendolyn, live with Moth. So it's Martin Luther King Weekend in 1992, my senior year of Barnard. And I'm sitting in my room at Hewitt Hall. There's a knock on my door. It's my friend Rachel from down the hall. And she says, Hey, you want to go to cannons? And I thought, well, you know, honestly, for first studying to going out, but it's my senior year. And so it's kind of now or never. So decided to go out. And we went to cannons, a local dive bar. And that night at the bar, this naughty looking guy walks up to me and says, Hey, aren't you in my art history class? And I looked at him and was like, no, and it turns out neither one of us was taking an art history class. But it was an icebreaker. And at the end of the night, he said, you know, would you like to have dinner some time? I said,

2:04sure, my name's Gwendolyn Lopez. And I live at Hewitt Hall. And you can look me up. Fast forward four years and we're dating. And I'm working as a first grade teacher on the Upper East Side and taking premedical classes at night at Hunter College. And we're both pretty busy. So we decided, you know, we made a regular Friday night date of sorts going to the synagogue by Nate Jesterin on the Upper West Side. And you know, my boyfriend was Jewish. It was important for him to go to the synagogue. And I found that, you know, I was really drawn to the singing and the dancing and the Hebrew prayers. And there was this magical feeling at Nate Jesterin, this incredible spirituality. I had grown up unitarian and, you know, celebrating Christmas and Easter. So I didn't have a strong religious affiliation myself. And I found at these Friday night synagogue services

3:07that I felt a real connection to God that I'd never experienced before. And there was something about the music and the dancing and the Hebrew prayers that really helped me to leave behind all the stress of the work week. And I start to really feel relaxed and at peace. Eventually, my boyfriend and I had a conversation where he said, you know, I'm Jewish. It's really important for me to have Jewish kids. I thought about it. I thought, well, I feel very connected to Judaism. So I decided that I wanted to convert. So a local rabbi or someone referred me to a conversion rabbi, a Shibi University named Rabbi Bomzer. I went to his office at Shibi University and I sat down with him and they said, you know, I really, I've been going to synagogue on Friday nights and really feel strong connection to Judaism happened to be dating this Jewish guy. And I really want to become a Jew, make it official and convert. And then I said, you know, and it's not so surprising

4:08to me because my grandmother was from a Jewish family in Germany. Maybe that's why. I'm not sure. And he looked at me and he said, well, which grandmother are we talking about? And I said, well, my mother's mother came from Germany in 1938 because of World War II and she had to leave Frankfurt. He looked at me and he said, well, chances are you are a Jew. And he recommended that I learn more about my family heritage and look into this. So at that time, you know, I was kind of surprised. You know, growing up unitarian, I was taught that religion is a personal belief system. So it was something that an individual would choose. And my father had grown up Catholic and had come from Puerto Rico to the States and I stopped practicing Catholicism and didn't identify with it anymore. My mind just the two things didn't, didn't make sense that you could be a religion that

5:09you didn't practice or that didn't believe in. So in any case, my mom referred me to my great uncle Henry, my grandmother's younger brother, who was a family historian. And it turns out that he had mapped the Meyer family descendants back to the 1500s in Germany. So I made a file of documents that included my birth certificate and a copy of my mother's birth certificate and a copy of my grandmother's birth certificate that actually was stamped is real I to shut literally Jew right on her birth certificate. And I brought these documents to the bait bin which was a Jewish court in Brooklyn. And they reviewed my file and they took a look at it and they issued an official letter stating, Gwandalin Lopez is a Jew in Hebrew, of course. So in 1996, I was married by an Orthodox rabbi and my grandmother attended the wedding and she came up to me afterwards and she said, you

6:12know, I've been to a wedding like this before. And of course, I wanted to say, yeah, grandma, because you're Jewish, but you know, out of respect and to be polite, I just nodded and smiled since I keep a kosher home and I make going to synagogue a part of my regular practice. And I can't spend real gifts to have the current, the only female descendant of the Myer family in my generation. And I've reconnected with our Jewish identity and adopting Jewish practices. So when my fourth son, Joshua was born, he had some motor delays and I brought him to a neurologist who recommended that we do DNA testing and that we have Joshua's DNA sequenced and his dad's DNA sequenced and my DNA sequenced. And we learned that both Joshua's dad and I are carriers of a single point mutation, a G2NA at E375K and Joshua had unfortunately inherited

7:14both mutated copies of this recessive gene and had a genetic mitochondrial disease. And it's known fact that for two individuals to have the exact same point mutation in their DNA, they must share a common ancestor. So somehow with mixed with the Puerto Rican and Anglican and Jewish ancestry, I found my long lost Ashkenazi Jewish cousin Atabar on the Upper West Side. And fortunately my faith and my Judaism has helped me to deal with Joshua's diagnosis and I pray for him every day. I'm grateful to Warner. It was the first place that I ever had heard that I might be Jewish and it was where I met both the father of my children and my distant Ashkenazi Jewish cousin. That was Gwendolin Lopez Cohen. Dr. Lopez Cohen is a child at a lesson to an adult

8:24psychiatrist. She has over 20 years of experience working with children and families as a physician, educator and apparent. We asked her how her son Joshua was doing and she told us that Joshua has done better than expected and while his prognosis is guarded, he is 11 years old and in better health than many children with mitochondrial disease. So bad news is not always as bad as expected. We are so happy to hear that. Like Gwendolin, I am ethnically Jewish. Unlike Gwendolin, I was also raised Jewish or rather culturally Jewish. I observed the major holidays understood the broad strokes of Jewish history and fried a mean lotka. But I had no formal Jewish education. My family wasn't religious nor did we attend synagogue. Regardless, I was proudly Jewish despite having only a cursory understanding of what that even meant. As I witnessed the rise in anti-Semitism over the past several years, I became more committed to educating myself about Jewish beliefs and history. To my surprise and delight, I found that I already held many Jewish values. I just hadn't known they were Jewish. The more I learned, the more connected I

9:29feel to Judaism, the more it feels like a part of me and I a part of it. It's been inspiring and enlightening to say the least and I have no intention of stopping. Life-long learning is, after all, a core Jewish value. After the break, a story about language and coming home. Today's episode is brought to you by Alma. What if the small things actually felt small, like getting out of bed when you said you would? Or replying to a text right when it came in? Therapy can help you bridge the gap between where you are and where you want to be. And Alma can help you find a great therapist. The search can be the hardest part of getting started, right? Well, Alma has simplified it. Alma has a directory of over 26,000 quality therapists, with different specialties, life experiences and identities, and 98% of them take insurance. Answer a few quick questions and they'll help you find a match. And most people find their match on their first try. Clients with insurance pay $20 on average and most people find their match on their first try. If you're hoping to improve your mental health, try searching for a

10:33provider through Alma. Get started now at helloalma.com. That's helloalma.com. Welcome back. Our next story is from Iris Hernandez, who told the set of Twin Cities Stories, Lam. Here's Iris live at the mall. So in October of 2019, my parents planned a family trip to Puerto Rico. Now I was absolutely thrilled for this opportunity. I already loved all of my Puerto Rican family in the States, so for me, the idea of going on a trip with them, plus meeting my extended family that lived on the island was beyond thrilling. At my school, I'm the only Latin on my grade. I have this sort of virtual monopoly on Hispanic-ness. I can say a few phrases in Spanish and show up at the potluck with some rice and beans and the kids are like, wow, she's really cool. So this going to Puerto Rico was

11:35going to be my opportunity to spread my wings to explore my identity. So fast forward a few months and it's Christmas Eve. We've just flown in. We're unpacking at my aunt's house and I hear my parents talking about a Christmas Eve party that's happening that night or nocehluna, which if you don't know is a Puerto Rican festivity that sort of culminates all the hard work of the year into a night of festivity. So as soon as I hear that this party is happening, I grab my party dress, I grab my makeup and I run to the bathroom, slam the door and I start getting ready. Now I am going the full nine yards. I have penciled in my eyebrows. I am doing dark eye shadow. There is rouge. There is a red lip. The waterline is perfect. And my party dress is this little knee length, flowy number covered in huge two cans across the front, which I thought was very apropos for Puerto Rico. So as I'm putting the finishing touches on my look, I hear the doorbell ring. I hear people start to

12:35enter, talking to each other, snatches of conversation. I hear the music start playing. I'm hearing bombai, blana. And I'm just so glad to hear the sounds of what I think is my people. So I open the bathroom door a little bit and I peer out and I am bored to see how many people manage to pack themselves into that tiny living room. So I take a deep breath and I open the door all the way and I sort of I strut my way down the hallway. And I'm looking for a particular cousin that I've heard of from my parents. I know that she's around my age and we both like theater and I think great we're going to hit it off. So I'm sort of squeezing my way between the crowds and I make eye contact with her and I smile and start walking towards her and she smiles back at me and she opens her mouth and starts speaking in rapid fire Spanish. And I just stare at her with my mouth sort of open because somehow throughout the entire process of repairing for this trip I had forgotten the

13:39important fact that my family in Puerto Rico would speak Spanish. Like Spanish Spanish. I mean I got prima and Navidad and hola but nothing that was going to give me any actual clue to what she was saying to me. So I kind of collect myself and I go I prima. I immediately whirl around and crash into my mom who's coming out of the back bedroom and when she looks at my face she can see that something is wrong because the perfect waterline from before has migrated to somewhere slightly north of my nostrils. So I of course you know she's been speaking Spanish the entire time she's here so when she goes to ask me how I'm doing it comes out as I get for me high stars being and that was the last Spanish straw for me. I start to sob and I go

14:39mom can you please speak in English. And then I rushed past her back into the bathroom that I was in not five minutes before. And I sit on the counter and I look at myself in the mirror and all the things I've done to get myself ready feel stupid. I was putting myself together to look the perfect Puerto Rican daughter. Nice cousin what have you and I couldn't even speak the language of my country. I was a poser. So the party continues and eventually I leave the bathroom. I come out I serve myself some food I sit in the corner and I listen to my family sing karaoke songs that I don't know the lyrics too. While this moment certainly didn't ruin the rest of my trip I had similar hiccups along the way. For instance I'd go to a restaurant and I tried ordering Spanish but I'd make some mistake that would let the waiter or waitress know that oh she doesn't speak Spanish will speak to her in English and I appreciated their empathy but every time it happened it was another blow that I couldn't speak my native language enough to even order myself food. I would look around

15:44and I would see tourists with their sunburned foreheads with their tropical shirts not so unlike my own two-can dress. And I just every time it felt like I was defeated yet another time. So when I came back to Minnesota I decided that that would be no more. I pulled out of Latin 4 at my school and I went to Spanish 1 and I worked through that and I took accelerated courses and I worked with my dad over the summer and I took AP Spanish and while today I would not say I'm fluent I'm certainly proficient and I'm very glad to be here. And while I haven't been back to Puerto Rico since that time four years ago I hope that soon I can return to the island and I can show my family all the language that they motivated me to learn for their sake but mostly for mine because now when someone asks me I can say yeah I am but there's actually substance to back up that statement. Thank you.

17:00That was Iris Hernandez. A curious driven college junior with a love of learning, Iris is committed to connection and growth through writing, community service, and stories like these. She's excited to share this close snapshot of her culture and personal vulnerability. Iris is lying about being asked if she's Puerto Rican and being able to say yes with quote actual substance to back up that statement really resonated with me because it is also very much how I feel about my relationship to Judaism. Like Iris I grew up being the only person of a given heritage in so many spaces so much so that I felt profoundly Jewish but then when I started looking to connect to the Jewish community as an adult I realized how little I knew about my own culture which definitely deepened my commitment to educating myself so that I too could back up my Judaism with some actual substance. Also like Iris that included some language learning I've been teaching myself a little Hebrew so on that note toadarabaw for listening today and from all of us here at the Moth we hope you have a story worthy week. Emily Kouch is a producer on the Moths artistic team.

18:08She loves to work behind the scenes to spread the beauty of true personal stories to listeners around the world. Iris Hernandez's story was originally developed from the Moths education program thanks to unlikely collaborators for their support. Windalyn Lopez Cohen's story was directed by Michelle Jolowski. This episode on the Moth podcast was produced by Sarah Austin Janess, Sarah Jane Johnson and me Mark Salinger. The rest of the Moths leadership team includes Gina Duncan, Marina Klucci, Jennifer Hickson, Jordan Cardinale, Caledonia Cairns, Kate Tellers, Suzanne Rust, and Patricia Urna. The Moth podcast is presented by Odyssey, special thanks to their executive producer Leah Restennis. All Moths stories are true as remembered by their story tellers. For more about our podcast information on pitching your own story and everything else go to our website TheMoth.org