Mandi Kuran: creating a community of Jewish mothers

You founded the Jewish Mums & Bubs Melbourne (JMABS) Facebook group in 2017. How did it all begin?

My daughter was two at the time I started JMABS, and she's just about to turn nine. I got the idea from a friend who’s Greek. She started a group years ago called GMABS – Greek Mums and Bubs Melbourne. She always said that I should start one for the Jewish community.

I was invited into her group to see how it ran. The Greeks and the Jews are quite similar in terms of their culture, focus on charity and importance of having a lot of support. It can sometimes be hard to find a village as a new parent, so I decided that I would give it a go.

My first post was a live video about why I started the group, inviting all young mums to join. Slowly, over time, it's evolved into mother’s groups, fundraising events and promotion of businesses. People tell me all the time that they've made lifelong friends from JMABS, and their kids are friends too, which is so lovely.

Are there any rules to joining JMABS?

I am very adamant that I don't let people in who don't have young children. Growing up with a Jewish mum, they “always know best” – the nannas, bubbes and saftas always have an opinion – and sometimes you just want to get advice from people your own age who are going through the same thing in this generation. I've had a lot of bubbes be declined membership. It’s very structured, but has still managed to grow to include people from all over the community, with different backgrounds and beliefs, which is amazing.

Are dads allowed to be part of JMABS?

We just focus on the mums. We do have some dads who are part of same-sex couples and some solo dads, but they are very few.

I am mindful that there are sometimes very sensitive topics brought up that we don't necessarily want men commenting or engaging with. I’m also mindful about the group getting too big, because it’s just me running it. I’d be very supportive if a Jewish dad wanted to set up a group for other Jewish dads, but I don’t think my group has to be for everybody. There are lots of other Facebook groups out there already.

You mentioned that you're the sole administrator of JMABS. What’s that experience like?

I'm a solo parent. I work full time. I have two board positions, plus this role at JMABS, which is unpaid. It’s a lot!

I approve each post that comes through to make sure it's appropriate. Sometimes if somebody has a bad experience with a business, they want to post about it, and I filter that out. We’re a supportive community, so I don't want anything negative on there.

Have you ever encountered any challenges while running JMABS?

Sometimes people think they know a lot better than others and just argue for the sake of it. It’s the same on any mummy group on Facebook – everyone has opinions, you just need to monitor it. I remove a post if it's going to create conflict. There's enough conflict in the world, we don't need it in our own community of Jewish mums.

When October 7 happened, I became very vocal on my socials, and got into some arguments. I ended up being doxxed and I also had a stalker that I had to go to the police about. They emailed my workplace – I’m very lucky that my bosses are Jews and Israelis, so we're all in the same boat – but to be harassed like that by some stranger just because I was putting myself out there, it was scary.

After that, I think everybody online had a little bit of fatigue, so I slowed down. But over the last few months, I've really been feeling it again, so I've been more vocal.

You partnered with other Jewish mums to create a video about the impact of October 7 on the local Jewish community and it went viral, receiving almost 30,000 views across Instagram, Facebook and YouTube. Tell us more about this.

I remember first hearing about October 7: I was at my shul doing a kid’s event, and our office manager came and said, ‘there's something happening in Israel’. I was glued to my phone all night.

I never imagined what my grandparents went through during the Holocaust, and now I feel like I understand. I just thought we have a platform, as the Jewish mothers of Melbourne, what can we do? Everybody wanted to have a voice but many people didn’t know how to put the words together. I came up with this idea to create a video. It took me about three or four days to put it all together.

We wanted to share it with people within our network who weren't Jewish, so they could understand what we were going through. I had non-Jewish acquaintances and friends reaching out to me asking what they could do to support me, which is really lovely. I said, please just watch this video and share it. That's all we need. We need you to know how we're feeling.

We got a lot of positive feedback from it. I didn't expect it to reach the number of people that it did.

Are there parenting issues or topics that frequently arise in the group?

A lot of people seek recommendations about education and Jewish education specifically. I think that sets us apart from other parenting groups, because you can freely ask about Jewish topics without fear of being looked down upon or judged. People can post anonymously as well, which is great.

Questions around behavioural and parenting struggles often arise too. Parenting in the Jewish community is very different to parenting in other communities, because of our cultural and generational trauma. I'm a grandchild of Holocaust survivors and a lot of other people in Melbourne are too. There's a lot of psychological factors that have impacted how we were parented and how we want to parent our children.

Do you think Jewish mums receive as much support as they need?

Some mums have their own family support. I'm very lucky that my parents and both of my siblings, even though they've got their own children, help me out quite a bit.

A lot of mums struggle with the social aspect of parenting. When you become a mum, and I felt it as well, you have to find your new identity. It's a whole new part of you, and you have to find yourself again.

That’s why I decided that through JMABS, I would create Jewish mothers’ groups to help facilitate conversations between mums who are going through a similar experience. It’s different to the government-allotted groups, because it’s just for the Jewish community and is repeated for each child you have – it’s not just for your first baby. Sometimes mums have large age gaps between their kids, which can be a whole different lifetime in motherhood.

The groups are formed every month, so for example the December group is for babies born in October and November, and so on. I put them together and stick around for a week in case they have any questions, and then it’s up to them to decide how often and where they meet up.

Sometimes they’ll meet up for Jewish festivals or to celebrate their babies’ birthday month. Other times, the mums break out into smaller groups. I include people from all parts of the community too. We’ve got Chabad and liberal and Orthodox mums all meeting together. It’s so nice to meet people who you wouldn’t normally meet.

Did you have experience working in the parenting space before JMABS?

I wouldn't call myself a parenting expert or anything like that, it's just that I'm a mum.

I came up with this idea for a business when I was going away for my first holiday with my baby, who was just seven-months-old at the time. I needed one of those travel strollers that you could take onto the plane, but it was expensive to buy. As a parent, you already spend thousands of dollars on baby stuff, so I thought maybe I could hire one, but no one hired them out.

I've always been a little bit entrepreneurial, my mum and dad always had businesses growing up, and so First Class Baby was born. I bought a fleet of travel strollers and hired them out. It was successful and made life easier for people, which is what I’m all about.

Unfortunately, being in the travel industry, COVID killed my business. I now work at Flare Real Estate. It's a Jewish family-owned business, and we’re very community-minded. We help a lot of Israeli families who are relocating to find new homes, and support various Jewish charities. It’s important to me to have an employer who aligns with my own values.

What’s one of the biggest lessons you’ve learned about motherhood?

I became a single mum when my daughter was four, that was really difficult. It was during COVID, and I separated from my partner, went into lockdown and lost my business all within one week.

I always say this to my daughter, I haven't been a mum before, just like you haven’t been a kid before. We're learning together and we're a team. I'm very lucky, she's an amazing kid.

Through JMABS, I’ve got other mums with kids of a similar age to ask questions to. I think having people around you who are non-judgmental, and are happy to be there to support you is really important. Having your village.

What does your village – your connection to the Jewish community – look like?

I went to Mount Scopus my whole life. I'm so grateful to my parents for giving me a good Jewish education. My daughter goes there now too – she’s a third generation Scopus kid. I went to Hineni, which was politically non-partisan when I was growing up. That was important to me. I've never been very big on having to take a side.

I’ve grown up attending Elwood Shule. I'm the first female vice president and the first third-generation board member. I’m also communications manager of COSV [Council of Orthodox Synagogues of Victoria].

I've sat on a lot of boards and been part of a lot of different Jewish organisations run by people who have an average age of 65. To bring organisations into this era, we need to have more support from the younger generation. I would love to see more people of my generation be elected to boards and volunteer their time in community organisations. We need to keep up our traditions and culture. It's so important.

What does social impact mean to you?

You need to stand up for what you believe in, but at the same time, you must remember where you've come from. For me, that’s honouring my grandparent’s survival through the Holocaust and all the work that they and my parents have done for various Jewish communal organisations.

Everyone needs to do their bit to help make our community unique, supportive and special, and not just wait around and expect others to do it for us.