Melbourne Diller Teen Fellows

As the week came to a close and the weekend began to set in, on the lips of every member of  our cohort was excitement yet uncertainty. We all knew we started early at the Jewish Museum and would make our way to the city to embark on some form of scavenger hunt, nothing more. We arrived at the Jewish Museum of Australia at 10am on Sunday morning and were ushered into a small meeting room. After going around a circle and speaking about events in our lives since our last meeting (I’d be lying if I said the majority wasn’t about the US election), we briefed about our activity in the Jewish Museum. We began in the “Standing Up” exhibition, showcasing influential people who stood up for a cause and made a difference. Most were Jewish, others were not. We each chose an individual with whom we connected, whether it be the cause for they have dedicated themselves to or for their morals and beliefs. Above each individual was a quote of theirs, hinting further at their personality a...

Workshop 2 Today we, the second Diller cohort embarked on the journey that was workshop two. For many of us it had been over a month since we had seen each other and others, we were meeting for the first time.  We did the classic Jew shmooze for a bit then got stuck into the program. Our first activity was to go around the room and tell the group which emoji represented our past month best and why.We call this a ‘check-in’ and do it so that we as a group know where we are all coming from emotionally and so that we have a space to inform each other of any major life events that have occurred. This is an important part of the program that we will do every time we have a workshop. We moved on to a discussion about how we relate and connect to Israel and what it means to us. We learned a bit about Shimon Peres and his life and incredible stick-to-it-ness as a leader in his various roles.  Our next activity was a game (yay!) We each created an action with a sound and on the...