Shabbat hospitality

A Friday night table, and someone expecting you at it. If you don’t know a soul in San Jose, this is the page to use.

If you need somewhere to go

Tell us which Shabbat you’re here for and we’ll match you with a family. You do not need to know anyone, know any Hebrew, keep Shabbat, or be able to explain your situation. People come to us because they’ve just moved, because they’re here for work, because they’re between things, or because eating alone on Friday night had gone on long enough. All of those are ordinary reasons and none of them need explaining.

Say how many of you there are, whether there are children, and anything we should pass on — a food allergy, a wheelchair, that you’d rather a quiet table than a loud one. We pass it on and nobody makes anything of it.

Ask early in the week if you can. Friday afternoon is still worth asking — we’ll do what we can — but a Tuesday email finds you a better seat than a Friday one.

If you can host

Hosting means setting two or three more places than you meant to. It doesn’t mean a bigger house, a fancier meal, or a table where everyone knows the words. Most guests are more nervous than you are, and the thing that makes a good host is opening the door, not the menu.

Let us know roughly how many people you can seat and which weeks tend to work, and we’ll be in touch when a guest needs a table. You are never obliged to say yes to a given week — nobody keeps score.

Get in touch

Use the form below for either one — write “guest” or “host” in the topic line so it reaches the right person. If it’s close to Shabbat, call instead: 408-910-2034, or write to Info@chabadalmaden.com.

Coming for Shabbat anyway

Services are Shabbat morning — see the schedule — and there is a Kiddush lunch afterwards that nobody needs an invitation to. Candle lighting and Shabbat end times for San Jose are on the times page.

If you’re visiting rather than staying, the visitors page has kosher food, a mikvah and a weekday minyan in one place, and if you’re staying somewhere else in the Bay Area our local centers list will find you a table closer to where you’re sleeping.

Chabad of Silicon Valley · 5580 Almaden Expressway, San Jose, CA 95118