Sukkah bicycle brings the mitzvah to the people

TALI FEINBERG

This year, a pedi-sukkah was cycled around Jameson Plaza at the University of Cape Town, and drew crowds of students, both Jewish and not, to learn about this chag and enact its mitzvot.

“Pedi-sukkah comes from ‘peddle sukkah’ as it’s peddled around on a bicycle,” says Rabbi Nissen Goldman of Chabad on Campus, who decided to make the sukkah more accessible to Jewish students this year.

“It was ideal, as we didn’t have permission to erect a seven-day structure on campus, and no cars can access Jammie Plaza, which is the most densely populated social space on campus. So a pedi-sukkah was quite literally a way to make Judaism and Sukkot accessible to Jewish students, and it was the only way for us to access Jammie Plaza,” he says.

Rabbi Goldman personally cycled the sukkah from the nearby Samson Student House (the Chabad campus house sponsored by the Eric and Sheila Samson Foundation) to upper campus over a highway bridge. “It was very well received. As soon as we entered campus, students started whipping out phones and videoing this crazy spectacle. The Jewish students in particular couldn’t believe their eyes. They’d never seen such a thing before!

David Levin, a past Herzlia pupil, UCT engineering graduate, and Chabad on Campus alumnus, designed and built the structure pro bono.