It was a fun time at The Amish Experience today in Lancaster Country, Pennsylvania.
One and a half hour bus tour of Amish country.
45 Minute movie about Jacob, an Amish teen, trying to decide whether he wants to be in the outside world or in the Amish one.
And another hour of so tour of an Amish school house and home.
Felt like I learned a lot about their culture (including no TV, internet, electricity [just batteries and solar], and education only through 8th grade).
Honestly, it doesn't seem like they really have much a choice in whether to choose the church and become Amish or leave, because if they choose to leave they are shunned (i.e. excommunicated)!
So you either choose you family, church, community, and a wife (and there is no divorce) or you run off to G-d knows where completely alone and "divorced" from everything you know.
The video is when we stopped at an Amish farm and I went in to the big barn with all the cows.
After so much time on the bus, I needed to ham it up a little and have fun with:
"How now brown cow. It is so nice to eat you! You are beautiful animals. And thank you Hashem for making you!" ;-)
(Credit Video: Andy and Dossy Blumenthal)