I first saw him when I arrived in Yerushalayim last month. He was sitting in front of his building on a small side street off Rechov Bar Ilan called HaRav Shimon Chacham. I said Boker tov and he nodded. When he opened his mouth to speak I saw he was missing at least half his teeth. It was difficult to understand him especially with his thick Moroccan accent.
As everyone rushed to and from the building they sidestepped him as if he were an inanimate object. A number of times I saw him attempt to speak to someone as they sped by but his attempts at communication were rebuffed. Once he began to reprimand a “big sister” for not holding her younger brother’s hand but before he finished she and the boy were long out of earshot.
I once watched as a young man exited the building with a large Gemara under his arm. The old man attempted to engage him in a Torah discussion. However the young man did not even remove the dangling cigarette from his mouth as he rushed off without uttering a word.
I approached him then and asked his name. I think he said “Naim ” but he may have said “Chaim” as it was hard to understand him. His last name sounded like “sauerkraut.” I would later find out it was Aboukrat a common Moroccan surname.
On the December Thursday afternoon the snow began to fall he was nowhere to be seen.
On Friday as I was preparing to trek to my son’s house I decided to knock on Naim (or was it Chaim’s?) door. Did he have food? Did he have a warm blanket? Perhaps I could go out and buy him food.
I knocked on the door and heard “Rak rega” (just one minute).
As he opened the door and welcomed me in I was surprised by what happened next. Naim offered me a piping hot bowl of soup! I’d figured I was going to shop for him and here he was offering me pre-Shabbos food!
If it hadn’t been Asarah B’Teves I may have obliged him and accepted his offer.
As I looked around I couldn’t help noticing the many disposable containers of food all over the kitchen. Before I could say anything Naim informed me that the food had been delivered by chesed organizations for Shabbos.
“I know what you are thinking ” he said “how wonderful it is that in the snow and cold people take care of me and bring me more soup than I could eat in a month. However chabibi (my friend) although this food is nice and wonderful; you should know that I’d rather eat stale matzah and cold chicken instead of this hot food if only I could have a person to talk to.
“I am in need of a warm person more than warm soup — I need Yerushalmi companionship not Yerushalmi kugel!”
Looking again at the stacked quarts of hot chicken soup I realized that loneliness is far colder than snow and feeling forgotten far more brutal than frigid weather.
That Motzaei Shabbos I once again visited Naim.
This time he warmed my bones with hot soup and my heart with tales of Jewish life in Morocco 50 years ago. He thanked me for coming and made me promise I would return the following week.
I tried to explain that I lived in America. “So what ” he kept saying. “So what? Just take a taxi. I cannot wait for the next snowstorm for someone to remember me….” —