Yiddish is an old language. Some say it is a dying - if not already dead - language. No room for technology and Yiddish? Not so fast...

Flo shared this story with me. Recently, she was in the Jewish Museum in New York for the opening of the Art Spiegelman exhibit when she overheard a group of "older" people asking "What is the Yiddish word for cake?" Given the place and the participants in the discussion, it was a strange question. One would have expected at least one of the people to know the Yiddish word. Flo knew it, although she didn't volunteer -- not wanting to disclose her eavesdropping, wanting to hear how the discussion would play itself out, and wanting to be sure that her recollection was not some word peculiar to her upbringing.

As I said, it seemed strange that no-one of that group would know the word. Yiddish is an out-dated and dying language, but it would not have been unreasonable to expect one of such a group to know the word. One offered the word "Babka" and was immediately corrected with the admonition that Babka was a type of cake but certainly not the Yiddish word for cake.

Meanwhile, Flo listened and was ready to relieve the tension by offering the answer. But first, she had to be sure. So she took out her iPhone and went to the translator app and confirmed that the Yiddish word for cake is "Kuchen".
A "dying" language revitalized by technology.