POWAY, California (Press Release) — Table tennis champion Estee Ackerman of West Hempstead, New York, visited the Poway Chabad Day Camp, north of San Diego on Tuesday July 9.
She spoke to the campers about her ping pong career, her Shabbos challenges and her chance at the 2020 Olympics.
After all the campers and most staff got the chance to play her, especially Rebbetzin Goldstein, Estee took a tour of the shul and said a perek of tehillim in memory of Lori Kaye, who was murdered by a terrorist who had invaded the synagogue on the last day of Passover. As much as Ackerman tried to inspire the children she was more inspired by them.
The previous week, she had competed in the 2019 US Nationals Table Tennis Championship in Las Vegas where she won a gold medal in women’s hardbat singles (her 4th gold overall) and a bronze medal in Junior Girls Doubles teaming with Sarah Jalli of Ohio.
Overall she played in seven events finishing with a match record of 17-7. For Shabbos she was at the Ahavas Torah Center in Henderson, Nevada, when during Kabbalat Shabbat she felt the shul sway back and forth before realizing that it was an earthquake from California.
She felt it surreal as it was also parshat Korach, in which the earth swallows up Moses’ evil challenger. Ackerman will be a guest at the upcoming Shalom Task Force BBQ and ping pong tournament next week in the Five Towns.
*
Preceding provided by the Ackerman family.