Wedding Held Despite Hurricane

By COLlive reporter

A few months ago, the date was set for the wedding of Moishy Wolff, son of Rabbi Eli Wolf of Moscow, and Devorah Spalter, daughter of Rabbi Yisroel Spalter, Shliach in Weston, Florida.

The date was set for Tuesday, September 12, and it was to take place at the Bonaventure Resort and Club in Weston, Florida, the Kallah’s hometown.

However, plans changed this week, with the arrival of Hurricane Irma over the weekend, which brought flooding, destruction and power outages to the entire state of Florida.

Suddenly, the wedding plans faced numerous challenges, Rabbi Moshe Rabin, Executive Director of Rohr Bais Chaya in Coral Springs, FL and an uncle of the Chosson, told COLlive.

The planned wedding venue had lost power during the storm, so a new location had to be found. When another one was finally found, it had to be cancelled again, since the caterer would not be able to obtain access to the kitchen to Kasher it in time, Rabin said.

A third venue was finally found that was available in time and still had power, the Benny Rok Campus in Aventura.

Executive caterer Eric Kaufman said the manager of the venue asked him, “why would anyone be making a wedding in this mess, and why would you take on the job?” to which Kaufman replied, “Because I can.”

This can-do spirit was seen among all those who came together to help make sure the wedding took place on time.

“We had to locate Lubavitch Shechita meat for all the guests, which was scarce with all businesses without power, and we also had to find new sleeping accommodations for the guests and family members who were able to make it since hotels were either closed or full,” Rabin said. “Things we take for granted, such as water bottles to be served at the wedding, had to be obtained with great difficulty as well.”

Due to all the flight cancellations and airport closures, many guests arrived at 10 pm, many hours after Chuppah, and after traveling for many hours.

Even with all the obstacles, all the details came together, with new vendors found to take the place of those who had been originally hired and were no longer available.

“The wedding was a living example of the true achdus among Chabad Shluchim who came out of their homes even when they don’t have power, hot water, and basic necessities, to help the Chosson and Kallah rejoice,” said Rabbi Rabin.