Camp Nehirim for Nice Jewish Boys
About the Program
It’s the gayest Jewish summer camp ever! Nehirim’s newest program is five days of swimming, hiking, volleyball, river tubing, campfires, hot tubbing, cookouts, delicious food, inspiring workshops, and that special Nehirim ruach (spirit) of community and spirituality. Imagine the best of Jewish summer camp… but everyone’s gay!
Camp Nehirim for Nice Jewish Boys is coming up July 21-25, 2010, at the EastonMountain retreat center in upstate New York. Easton has a swimming pool, miles of hiking trails, sauna, hot tub, a gorgeous lakeside setting, and hotel-style accommodations. (Sure, it’s summer camp, but we’re not going to stay in bunks!) Camp Nehirim is a little “lighter” than the average Nehirim retreat — we’ll still be building warm & supportive community with one another, but we’ll have fewer workshops and more time outside, a little less organized spiritual practice and a little more sports, swimming, and free time. A tentative schedule is below.
Registration and Pricing
Registration is now online: CLICK HERE TO REGISTER NOW
Registration fees, including all room & board, are as follows:
| Accommodation | Full 5-day Program | Weekend Only |
| Camping /commuter | $250 | $200 |
| Dorm Cabin | $325 | $275 |
| Quad | $425 | $350 |
| Double | $500 | $425 |
| Single | $600 | $525 |
Schedule
Faculty
Jay Michaelson Jay Michaelson is the founder and executive director of Nehirim. For the last ten years, Jay has been a leading advocate for the inclusion of sexual minorities in religious communities, and writes and teaches frequently on issues of sexuality and religion. His work on the subject has appeared on NPR, and in Tikkun, the Jerusalem Post, the Duke Law Review, the Michigan Journal of Gender & Law, and anthologies including Mentsh: On Being Jewish and Queer (2004), Righteous Indignation: A Jewish Call for Justice(2007) and Jews and Sex (2008). Jay is a columnist for the Forward newspaper, Tikkun, and Reality Sandwich magazine, and a featured contributor to the Huffington Post. He is the author of God in Your Body: Kabbalah, Mindfulness, and Embodied Spiritual Practice (Jewish Lights, 2006), Another Word for Sky: Poems (Lethe Press, 2007), and Everything is God: The Radical Path of Nondual Judaism (Shambhala, 2009).
David Dunn Bauer
David Dunn Bauer served as rabbi of the Jewish Community of Amherst from 2003-2010 after a 15-year career as a stage manager and stage director of theater and opera in the U.S., Europe, and Israel. Prior to his ordination, Rabbi Bauer served for two years as the spiritual leader of Congregation Ahavath Shalom, a Reconstructionist congregation in Great Barrington, MA. As a student in Israel in 1999, led regular Torah study at the Jerusalem Open House. He was a 2000-2001 Cooperberg-Rittmaster intern at Congregation Beth Simchat Torah in NYC. Rabbi Bauer received training in pastoral counseling as a rabbinical intern at the Philadelphia Geriatric Center in 1998 and 1999. With life coach Michael J. Cohen, he created and led “Celebrating the Body Judaic: a Body Electric Shabbaton for Gay and Bisexual Jewish Men” in 2006 and 2007. Rabbi Bauer teaches on subjects ranging from opera and Jewish theatre to sexuality and images of the body in Jewish liturgy and sacred text.
Jonathan Comisar began his music career in his native Rochester, New York, where he studied piano in the preparatory department of the Eastman School of Music. At the age of 17, he won first prize in the Eastman Young Artists Award and performed as piano soloist with the Rochester Philharmonic Orchestra. Cantor Comisar continued to study piano and music theory at Oberlin and after graduation, studied composition with Pulitzer Prize winning composer David Del Tredici. A graduate of the Hebrew Union College School of Sacred Music in 2000, Cantor Comisar has served the Community Synagogue of Rye, New York for the past five years. Jonathan Comisar has been recently chosen to participate as a composer in the prestigious Lehman Engel BMI Musical Theatre Workshop.
Jonathan Vatner is a writing teacher, as well as a freelance writer and editor specializing in travel, interior design, food, books, music, and psychology. He is completing his MFA in Writing at Sarah Lawrence College. Jonathan was senior associate editor at O at Home, Oprah’s interior-design magazine, and for five years before that, a reporter and feature-writer at Meetings & Conventions magazine. He has written for The New York Times, O, The Oprah Magazine, Hemispheres, and The Advocate.
Mike Dreyden made his Nehirim teaching debut at the Men’s Retreat this year. From gogo boy to model to adult film star, Mike has become a star in the gay adult entertainment industry and continues on a trajectory toward superstardom. He has appeared and can be seen dancing at events such as Saint at Large parties including the Black Party as well as local NYC bars including The Eagle, The Cock and others. Mike won the coveted 2008 GLAMMY award for go-go boy of the year.
Zachary Wager Scholl is a queer artist, dancer, performer, and
community organizer. He is currently pursuing a degree in theater and performance from LaGuardia Community College, where he will graduate this fall. Most recent theatrics have been: The Artist is Absent; JFREJ/Workmen’s Circle Purimshpil; Between Two Worlds: Who Loved You Before You Were Mine; Boys in the Band; Angels in America; and a slew of others. Zachary also performs with Rude Mechanical Orchestra’s Tactical Spectacle dance/extravaganza crew, and is an active member of Jews for Racial and Economic Justice.
Special Information
Because this is a new program at a new facility, there are some new details that differ from past programs.
- The Easton Mountain kitchen is not kosher. At present, our plan is to provide vegetarian food most of the time, and a strictly kosher meat barbecue for two meals, with hechsher-kosher catered options available for all who request them in advance. However, if enough people request kosher food on their registration forms, we will kasher Easton’s kitchen (Orthodox mashgiach) and serve kosher food on new dishes. We will make this decision on July 1, so please register early if you’d like this option!
- Our current plan is to offer our usual parallel services, traditional and renewal, at all times. Please see our halachic information page for more detail about Nehirim’s halachic practice.
- Easton Mountain does not have an eruv, but if there is sufficient interest, we’ll have an eruv-building party on Friday morning.
- Massage and other healing services will be available for an additional fee.
- Easton Mountain’s swimming pool, hot tub, sauna, and outdoor showers are clothing-optional.
- We will be sharing space with Easton’s residential community, consisting of 15-20 residents and summer volunteers, all of whom are men who love other men. This is why our program is open to men only this year; next year, if there is sufficient demand, we will have either a co-ed camp or a women’s camp in addition.
Transportation. Easton is accessible by Amtrak train to Albany. Easton staff will arrange pickups at the train station Wednesday at 2:15pm (Depart New York Penn Station at 11:45am) and Friday at 3:15pm (Depart New York Penn Station at 12:45pm). Expensive taxis are available at other times. We will drop you off at the train station Sunday at 2:00pm (arrive NYC at 4:35pm). The cost of the train fare goes up with time — as of July 9, it is $37 each way. In our experience, there are always enough rides back to New York City, so we suggest buying one-way tickets only — but that’s up to you!
To offer or request rides to/from your area, please visit our rideboard at www.nehirim.org/board. Many people are coming from New York City — if you have space in your car, please do put your name on the ride board. It’s a mitzvah!
Questions? Ask us.