Kiwi claims AUJS chair
WHEN he takes the mantle on January 1 next year, Jono Lazarus will make history as the first-ever Australasian Union of Jewish Students (AUJS) chairperson from New Zealand.
WHEN he takes the mantle on January 1 next year, Jono Lazarus will make history as the first-ever Australasian Union of Jewish Students (AUJS) chairperson from New Zealand.
While his small Jewish community functions just like the other AUJS regions of Victoria, NSW and Western Australia, there is a lot for the  Aucklander to get used to.
“I was at a birthday party last night and I was amazed to see 40 Jews in a room,” he said from Melbourne, where he was attending the Zionist Federation of Australia’s biennial meeting.
The current AUJS NZ president, who will move across the Tasman to take up his new job, said he was pleased if just a few dozen participants attended functions in his hometown, so to go to an informal event with twice as many young Jews was a bit overwhelming.
Rather than being a trial, the 24-year-old thinks his outsider’s perspective will stand the student organisation in good stead for two key reasons.
“Coming from a small place like New Zealand, I’ve had to think outside the box,” he said, explaining that the whole student branch functions on $500 per year so being creative with resources is a necessity.
“I think I’m very objective,” the commerce and health sciences graduate added. “Not coming from NSW or Victoria, I can sit in a conversation and be open-minded.”
Top of Lazarus’ to-do list is a trip Israel — a country that, despite his staunch Zionism, he has never visited. With very limited funding, the Kiwi community struggles to subsidise student programs to Israel, similar to those that run in Australia.
Settling into a much larger Jewish community is also high on Lazarus’ list.
“If I didn’t take up this position, if I didn’t run for this, I would really have nowhere to go in terms of the Zionist community next year,” he said.
“New Zealand is too small and I want a big community.”
After that, he will be targeting the students he calls “pups” — the younger Jewish university students who are struggling to find their way around.
NAOMI LEVIN
comments