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Woman collects sheitlech to send to Israel

Sometimes people leave bags of wigs on her Van Houten Avenue doorstep.

Short hair, long hair, blond hair and streaked hair; mesh, synthetic, from Europe, China, Russia, you bring it, Rochel Shiffman will take it.

For the past year, the city resident has been collecting the wigs from Orthodox Jewish women as part of a charity that her younger sister, Shani Greenfield, runs out of her home in Musrara, a suburb of Jerusalem.

The charity, called Shani's Sheitel Gemach, which includes in its name the Yiddish word for wig or "sheitel" and Gemach, the acronym for the Hebrew phrase "bestowal of kindness," donates wigs to Orthodox Jewish women in Israel.

Under Jewish law, women are required to dress modestly and cover their heads in public after they are married.

"We want to show reverence that's in being modest and showing good character. Once women get married they have to wear their sheitel to remind her that she belongs to her husband and that her husband belongs to her," said Rabbi Shlomo Singer of the Passaic Torah Institute, a yeshiva on Passaic Avenue.

However, that can be a costly endeavor.

Sheitels can run anywhere from $700 for a synthetic wig, to $3,000 for a custom-made wig created from human hair, Shiffman said.

Because Israel has been ravaged by terrorism and war, many Orthodox women living there may not have the time to think about their appearance or the money to spend on buying a sheitel, Shiffman said.

"Food and staples are obviously the most important things to donate," she said as she sat with two friends in her dining room Monday. All three women were wearing their sheitels. "But someone who doesn't have a lot of money, this makes a huge difference and you make them feel great," Shiffman added.

In a telephone interview Monday from Israel, Shiffman's sister, Shani Greenfield, said she has collected about 300 wigs so far.

Some are sold and the proceeds go to charity; while others are simply donated. Once the wigs are sent to Israel, Greenfield sticks the wigs in a freezer for two days to disinfect them and then douses them with a heavy dose of shampoo.

Shiffman has plenty of donors in Passaic, which has about 1,300 Orthodox Jewish families and 16 synagogues, according to the Jewish Press, an independent weekly newspaper.

For many Orthodox Jewish women in Passaic, who raise large families, getting a new wig every few years is a special occasion.

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