Linka – ‘String’ in Polish.
Macher – Important person or big shot.
Mazel tov – Of Hebrew origin, an expression that means ‘I’m thrilled for your good fortune’, ‘Good for you’ or simply ‘Congratulations!’
Meshugene – Crazy.
Meiskeit – Very ugly person, sometimes used with affection, as when applied to a child so ugly only its mother could love it.
Mitzvah – Hebrew word for commandment. It generally refers any one to the 613 duties of each and every Jew, as enumerated in the Torah. By extension, any good deed.
Noc – ‘Night’ in Polish.
Noc die Zweite – Night the Second (as the name of a dog in the text).
Payot – The sidelocks of hair (often ringlets by the temple) worn by Hasidic Jews and others.
Petzl – pee-pee, as in a young boy’s penis. From putz, a vulgar term for penis.
Piskorz – ‘Small fish’ or ‘minnow’ in Polish.
Reb Yid – A traditional and polite form of address.
Schmaltz – Chicken fat used in cooking.
Schul – School and, by extension, synagogue services.
Sheygets – An elongated pastry stuffed with poppy seeds and glazed with honey. From its resemblance to the uncircumcised member of a sheygets – a gentile boy.
Sheyn Vi Di Levone – ‘Beautiful is the Moon’ (the name of a Yiddish lullaby).
Shiva – The week of mourning for the dead prescribed by Jewish law.
Shmekele – Little penis.
Shtetl – A small Jewish town or village.
Sitra Ahra – The Other Side (from the Aramaic term used in kabbalistic literature to designate the demonic sphere or domain of evil).
Tsibele – Onion.
Tzitzit – Hebrew word for the tassels or fringes at the corners of a prayer shawl. They are to remind us of the commandments of Deuteronomy 22:12 and Numbers 15:37-41.
Ver mir di kapore – Literally, ‘become my sacrificial hen’ and by extension, ‘drop dead!’ An expression taken from the religious practice in which a sacrificial chicken (kapore- hun) is waved around the head of a Jew on the eve of Yom Kippur (the Day of Atonement) and then slaughtered as a ‘scapegoat’ for the sins of the chicken’s owner.
Zydoweczka – Little Jew-girl in Polish.
