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Hanukkah
Appears in
By Jayne Cohen
Published 2000
An eight-day festival beginning 25 Kislev (late November or December)
The wicks in the potatoes, our Hanukkah candles, smoked and sputtered and finally extinguished. My mother said to me, “Go wash up and we’ll eat potatoes with goose fat. In honor of Hanukkah, I splurged and bought a jar of goose fat–fresh, delicious goose fat.”
—
SHOLOM ALEICHEM , “BENNY’S LUCK”
This black and nearly moonless night will be long and chilled with winter’s breath.
Against this darkness, Jews will light a candle. And at sunset every evening, they will add yet another candle, until eight days later, at Hanukkah’s end, their ritual lamps, or menorahs, are ablaze with orange-gold flames.