If You Like Him... (2)

To make things a bit simpler, I'll henceforth refer to the woman as Mrs. D and her mom as Senior D.

So, Mrs. D led me into her her mother's apartment, and directed me to sit in a dirty, worn chair. I sat there, as she explained to me what her mom does, along with visual aids (meaning, there was a couple going through the initiation ceremony just then).

Senior D spoke to the irreligious couple for a few minutes, and then placed a towel over the young man's head. She took a pot from her stove, raised it above his head and spooned led into the water. It sizzled, and she gazed inside.

"Ahhh! Yesh ayin hara! Yesh harbeh. Mah asita?"

She poured the led again, going through similar words immediately following the gazing. She called her daughter over to look at the interesting shapes that had formed, in a kind of frenzy.
"Zeh loh tov. Loh tov..."

She gave him some mussar about living with his girlfriend without marrying her, gave him some perakim of tehillim to say and a couple other practices, and without much ado, went on to the next person in line.

Mrs. D turned to me. "My mom, she very good. Many people come, even from America, to get her advice and to take away ayin harah." (this was true - she got about five phone calls while I was there asking advice on shidduchim and the like...)

I squirmed. This was soooo not my kind of thing.

Mrs D. continued. "You know, I make shidduch."

"That's nice" I commented.

"I make many shidduch. Sometimes not my idea, but I help." She then went on a litany of shidduchim she had helped with, mentioning one or two names I recognized.

Very nice. So what?

Then she decided to make a phone call.

"Allo, Chananel? Yes, my mom, she not so busy now. You want come now? Ok. One minute."

She handed the phone to me and asked me to direct him to the apartment.

I took the phone. "Hello. Where are you?"

"At the Mir."

Gulp.

"Umm, ok." I gave him directions to the place, wondering what on earth was going on...

to be continued.... (don't worry - won't take as long as last time. report card marks are in.)