What We Are:
The After Life Podcast is a bi-weekly podcast that explores the experiences that are unique to those living the new life that is to be discovered after being raised in the insular world of Ultra-Orthodox Judaism and leaving it behind. Topics range from getting an education with no high school diploma, catching up on pop culture references (and how to pretend you get it when you reall
y don’t), media portrayals of orthodox jews (can’t Hollywood find someone who can curl these actors’ peyos correctly?), Chassidic music (Why even though we are never, ever, ever, getting back together. We still listen to Lipa and Avraham Fried), first cheeseburgers and last kugel (How overrated the former is and how underrated is the later), talking to friends from the past (don’t bother trying to explain why someone studying medicine needs to know math, we tried, it’s impossible), and the wonderful moments when we realize that all the agony and struggle it took to get to “The After Life” was totally worth it. What We Aren’t:
We are not a podcast about God or religion, or whether faith is true, moral, or good. There are a lot of podcasts out there about that and they do a better job than any of us can. We are also not trying to criticize Orthodox Judaism, or argue for or against living within that lifestyle. We are only trying to understand and share the cultural experiences that we, the hosts, had as part of our journeys. Who We Are:
Ushy Katz went to Satmar Yeshiva till his Bar Mitzvah, then attended Yeshivas Mateh Efraim after which he went to Israel to study at the Slabodka Yeshiva in Bnei Barak. After two years in Israel he returned to the United Stated and earned his GED at The Door in Manhattan. He is currently a senior at Stony Brook University majoring in Biochemistry and Theatre Arts. You may know him from his interview on NPR’s All Things Considered, his writings on Unpious, his Op-Ed in The Jewish Week, or the It Gets Besser video. Sol Feuerwerker went to more Yeshivas than he can count - including a few in Europe. He is currently a Junior at Hunter College studying Pre-Medical Sciences and Sociology. He is also an undergraduate researcher with the Ohlstein Lab at Columbia University Medical Center.
