Old Woman vs. Jew

Here's a story that happened in Brooklyn.

A bit of background: Jews don't proselytize much. Apparently the Talmud forbids it. But here in Brooklyn, the ultra-religious (black hats, black coats, beards) can't help themselves. The loophole is that they feel it's ok to try to get people who are already Jews to be more Jewy. So every now and again, especially around holidays, if you look a kind of Jewish (and who doesn't?) you'll be approached by a Lubavicher and he'll ask you "Are you Jewish?" If the answer is yes, you'll be invited to take part in some Jewish ritual or something.

Ok then. So the other night, I'm walking home; I turn onto the residential block that I live on. I see what appears to be some sort of altercation. It takes a few moments for me to figure out what's going on. There's an old woman, maybe 60 years old, with a cane, and a young Hasidic Jew, about 20 years old, I think. (With a scraggly but nicely grown beard.) The young Jew seems to be trying to evade the old woman. He's not running away, but he's moving around cars, walking briskly, but not in one direction, it looks like he's trying to wait her out, so he can get back to his post. But she's sticking with him. She's yelling at him. She feels he's racist because he only asks Jewy-looking people if they're Jews. (No Blacks, no Hispanics) She's also angry that he asked her if she's Jewish. So she's determined that as long as he's going to do his bit, she's going to heckle him, so to speak. There's another guy walking down the street watching this as well, but we figure that as long as it's an old woman chasing a young man, and not the other way around, that there's little damage of actual bodily harm.

It's not clear whether she's offended at being asked about her Jewishness because she doesn't like Jews, or because she is Jewish. (Or because she is Judith Regan.)

Finally, he decides to take off in one direction, toward Eastern Parkway (Not quite Williamsburg, but people wear a lot of black there.) As I enter my apartment, she's still chasing after him.