San Diegan Records Chanukah Music Video in Ladino

By Donald H. Harrison

SAN DIEGO — Brazilian-born San Diegan Carla Berg has issued a music video in Ladino, with English subtitles, in which she teaches that we can make our own Chanukah miracles by bringing light to other people’s lives.

Alternating between scenes of Berg singing and dancing joyfully at the beach, we see her bringing food to a homeless man sitting on a sidewalk; offering companionship to an elderly woman alone in her home;  aiding a man in a wheelchair who wants to board the San Diego Trolley;  showing compassion to a young woman who has received bad news via her iPhone; and providing motherly affection for a young child alone with her stuffed bunny.

Entitled “Nes” for “Miracle,” and composed with Richard Miller, the song asks (in translation):
Whom can we ask?
On Whom can we lean?
What makes this darkness?
Where is the light?
When can I open my eyes?
I can only see night.

Berg then goes on to offer some uplifting advice:

So let’s light a candle
And watch the light that keeps on shining
Let’s keep on singing
Take me to peace.
Take my hand and we will heal

The chorus relates:
The mystery was revealed
In the sweetness of the creator
So that we can see the value
After all the pain

Next, her song transitions into Chanukah:

Consider the miracle that happened there
The earth, the fire, the water and air
So let’s keep on singing
Deep in our souls
Miracles take us to happiness

A big miracle happened there
A big miracle happened here

Berg related to San Diego Jewish World that during the coronavirus pandemic, she wanted to record a message of hope in Ladino (Judeo-Spanish), which she confessed is a language she has not fully mastered.  The intent of the song was to show that “we are what we sow, from the moment we plant good deeds, we certainly will reap good fruit.  The miracle begins in our actions.”

Singing in Ladino “attracts me because I am a Sephardic Jew,” Berg said.  To many people Ladino sounds like Spanish, she commented,  “but it isn’t.”  In 2018, on a trip sponsored by the Jewish Joint Distribution Committee to Greece and Bulgaria, “I met a lady who spoke Ladino.  She inspired me to get to know the Sephardic community much more deeply.  It was my first contact with individuals who spoke Ladino.”

Before arriving in Brazil, generations of her Sephardic family lived in Lebanon, Syria, and Israel.  Her grandfather subsequently served as a cantor in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, and Berg recalls listening to him with fascination as he gave bar mitzvah lessons.

“One morning, I woke up with a melody in my head and put words to it, and that became the chorus of the song,” she said.  “That brought me a feeling of faith/ hope.”

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Donald H. Harrison is editor of San Diego Jewish World.  He may be contacted via donald.harrison@sdjewishworld.com