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The Unspeakeasy With Meghan Daum

Who Were The Hottest World Leaders and Despots? Yael Bar-tur and ChayaLeah Sufrin on The Unspeakable

The Unspeakeasy With Meghan Daum

Meghan Daum

Society & Culture

4.7855 Ratings

🗓️ 18 September 2023

⏱️ 79 minutes

🧾️ Download transcript

Summary

The ladies from Ask A Jew are back for their biannual visit. This time for the Jewish New Year! In this episode, we talk about the meaning of Rosh Hashanah, Yom Kippur and (since we apparently have to go over it again) why Orthodox Jews have to get their cars detailed before Passover. (It's true.)

We also talk about mikvehs. Because you know you were wondering. If you only ever listen to one conversation about mikvehs, let it be this one.

Most importantly, we revisit our evergreen topic: the world's hottest dictators, despots and garden-variety world leaders. Who was hotter? Stalin or Gadaffi? Is Bibi Netanyahu more your type? Or George H.W. Bush?

In the bonus, I do a solocast where I answer AMA questions and share more of my existential crisis about how to pronounce my last name. Paying subscribers who have questions for me can put them in the comments.

Guest Bio

The Ask a Jew podcast is where Yael Bar Tur, a secular Israeli living in New York, and ChayaLeah Sufrin, a Hasidic mother in Los Angeles, discuss everything from Torah to Tinder, no topics are off-limits.

Yael Bar Tur is a digital communications consultant with over 15 years of experience in social media, government, law enforcement and crisis communications. She served as the Director of Social Media and Digital Strategy for the New York City Police Department (NYPD).

Born and raised in Israel, Yael served in the Israeli Army as a foreign press liaison in the height of two wars, as well as volunteering for reserve duty at the Israeli field hospital in Haiti immediately following the 2010 earthquake.  She holds a Master's Degree from the Harvard Kennedy School of Government.

Yael lives in NYC where she has been granted lifetime approval to pet all police K9s.

ChayaLeah Sufrin is the Executive Director at Beach Hillel. Prior to Hillel, she spent 15 years teaching high school Jewish history and was the Education Director of Shul by the Shore.

ChayaLeah has been married to her husband Boruch for 18 years and together they have 4 sons. Jewish education and building community are ChayaLeah's two main passions - she also loves the New England Patriots. She was recently named one of Hadassah's 18 American Zionist Women You Should Know.

HOUSEKEEPING

🔥 Follow my other podcast, A Special Place in Hell.

🥂 Join The Unspeakeasy, my community for freethinking women.

🎉 Can't make it to the one-day retreat on September 30th in Denver? Join us for a co-ed party that same evening!

🧖‍♀️ Join me at our sanity/real spa retreat in the Poconos with guest speaker Kat Rosenfield.

Transcript

Click on a timestamp to play from that location

0:00.0

Marriage is hard and intimacy is very important in a marriage and it's not only very important,

0:10.0

it's probably the most important thing between a husband and a wife, physical intimacy

0:14.8

and emotional intimacy, both. And when you're married for any amount of time, you know,

0:19.4

that that is challenging, right?

0:21.1

And some people have a harder time with the physical part.

0:23.5

Some people have a harder time with the emotional part.

0:25.2

She's talking about sex for people who can read between the lines.

0:30.4

Welcome to the unspeakable podcast.

0:32.4

I'm your host, Megan Dowm?

0:35.9

Dom.

0:36.9

We're going to get to that.

0:38.4

We're going to examine this once and for all.

0:41.2

So just stay tuned for that.

0:43.2

In the meantime, my guests, they are back for their fourth visit to this podcast.

0:48.9

They are AIL, Bartour, and Hialeah Suffren.

0:52.2

They are the co-hosts of the podcast, Ask a Jew. I like to bring these

0:56.8

girls in twice a year to discuss the Jewish holidays. So they come in for Passover and this week

1:04.3

they are here for Yom Kippur and Rosh Hashanah. Chayla was born and raised in an Orthodox Hasidic community. She's still part of that

1:13.3

community in Southern California. Yael is a secular Israeli who now lives in New York City.

1:19.2

And together they have this remarkable podcast. I'm not Jewish, which may surprise you. I've actually

1:25.1

gone on their podcast. They have a little segment called

1:28.3

people we thought were Jewish who are not. And I believe I was one of their first guests,

...

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