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Looking back at the life of the late Rabbi Peretz Weitzman
This story originally appeared in our paper in 2010: Lodz-born rabbi celebrating 90th birthday
By PAUL LUNGEN TORONTO – When Rabbi Peretz Weizman used to go on his customary walks down Main Street in Winnipeg,
he often sang an unusual song that puzzled the shopkeepers he had come to know.“What is that tune and why are you always singing it?,” they asked him.
Weizman kept mum about it but in an interview with The CJN last week, he explained the origins of that unusual melody that had puzzled his friends in the prairie city.
It was an old tune sung by a cantor that he had heard as a youth in his native city, Lodz. As a boy, he loved to attend Kabalat Shabbat services at the city’s famous Altshtot, Old City Shul. Although his family attended a simple shtibl, he used to sneak out on Friday night to the ornate and beautiful synagogue, where he was awed by the splendour of the building, the solemnity of the service and the stature of the cantor.
He remembered the cantor’s song welcoming the Sabbath and kept it alive. “That was the song I sang on Main Street,” he said. “I never walked alone. I saved something from the Old City Shul. I rescued the melody. This Hitler could not destroy.”
Rabbi Weizman, who has moved to Toronto to be closer to his family, will celebrate his 90th birthday on Nov. 23. A man of the old school, he recalls vividly the life he led in Lodz before the Nazi invasion of September 1939, as well as the subsequent destruction.
The memory of his beloved synagogue going up in flames in November 1939 is burned into his consciousness. It was so beautiful, “I didn’t believe the Temple was nicer than this shul,” he said.
“When I saw the synagogue going up in flames, the entire sky was covered in sparks – a remnant. When I say that, I feel that I was one of the sparks.”
Like other survivors of the Holocaust, Rabbi Weizman represents one of the ever-declining number of Yiddish-speaking European Jews. Surprisingly, he eschews use of the word “survivor” when describing himself, even though he alone from his parents, brothers, sisters, nieces, nephews, cousins – more than 60 people in all – escaped the Nazis.
“I am not a survivor,” he said. “Let me explain. I was a nephew, I was a son, a brother. All these titles gone. Only the naked Peretz survived. All the titles are gone. Only a fraction survived, the naked “I” survived… I felt naked, unprotected.”
Rabbi Weizman had three brothers and two sisters. His father, Shmuel, was a successful businessman who manufactured and sold chemicals and some pharmaceuticals. At age three, Rabbi Weizman began to attend cheder at the Yeshiva Yesodai HaTorah, where he learned traditional Jewish subjects along with secular material, which was compulsory. The school days were long, beginning at 8 a.m. and going until 8:30 p.m., with a break for dinner.
At age 15, his family arranged for a private tutor. “In Poland, in my circle, you didn’t study to become a rabbi. If you wanted to be a Jew and respected in the community, you had to be a scholar.”
He didn’t decide to become a rabbi until after the creation of the Lodz ghetto by the Nazis.
“I felt I should contribute to the Jews, that Judaism will need me, if I survive,” he said.
Remembering the cantor’s rendition of Kabalat Shabbat was part of that and later, when he met the cantor in the ghetto, Rabbi Weizman recalled that the man, who had seemed so tall and grand in the synagogue, was “shrunken” and beaten down.
“I sang for the chazzan, Kabalat Shabbat, and tears welled in his eyes and he said, ‘preserve it.’”
Preserve the song, he did, though all around him was starvation, misery, death and destruction. He managed to survive the war as a labourer in a laundry. “We laundered the garments of the Jews who were gassed and sent it back, cleaned, to Germany. We didn’t know they were gassed then, but we noticed five shirts, one over the other, and found diamonds in brassieres, and dollars.”
Rabbi Weizman was liberated by Soviet forces and met his future wife, Riva, after the war. After a few years in Europe, they moved to Israel where she had family, but Rabbi Weizman couldn’t cope with the hot Mediterranean climate. When he learned of an opening at a synagogue in Winnipeg, they left for Canada, arriving in 1953.
In 1960, he became rabbi at the newly formed Bnay Abraham Congregation, and he served there for almost 40 years.
“I love Winnipeg,” he said. “I feel very comfortable there. It has a very nice, comfortable element there. It’s heimishe, a cold climate, but warm people.”
In 1999, he spent a year in Toronto as a replacement rabbi at the Beth Emeth BaisYehuda Synagogue after he received a good response when he delivered a dvar Torah.
He enjoyed the experience at the shul. “We had a common language, and a common expectation and a common past. They could appreciate a newcomer. They appreciated my sense of humour. It’s a Jewishly-intelligent congregation… They like European sechoireh [merchandise].”
Last year, the Winnipeg Jewish community honoured Rabbi Weizman with a tribute dinner and the establishment of the Rabbi Peretz Weizman Holocaust Education Trust fund, housed at the Jewish Foundation of Manitoba. More than $40,000 was raised to support the establishment and maintenance of a Holocaust education display showcase as a lasting legacy.
Today, Rabbi Weizman is a Torontonian. His wife is a resident at Baycrest, and his nine grandchildren and six great-grandchildren live here.
He still studies every day or two at a local yeshiva where the young people “look at me like someone from a different age.”
“I’m a true believer that God has blessed me with a long life. I believe my brothers and sisters and parents gave me their years. I lived their lives, and I must confess that the less future I have, the more the past is taking a hold of me. As the past is taking a hold of me, it robs me of my present. I have such a desire to be with them, to see them. I have this longing. I miss them more than I missed them 50 years ago. They say time cures: no.”
As this reporter takes leave of Rabbi Weizman – I confess that I’ve known him a long time; he “bar-mitzvahed” me years ago – there’s always one more story, one more parable for him to tell, one more mishnaic interpretation to impart.
Like the old shul burning, Rabbi Weizman continues to give off sparks, hoping that a new generation will preserve and pass along the wisdom and flavour of the nearly destroyed Old World.
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Volatility, Hit Frequency, and RTP: Why the Number Casinos Advertise Is the Least Useful One
The return to player percentage looks clean as a casino data point. It gives players a neat number, usually around 94% to 97% for many online slots, and that number feels easy to compare. A 96.5% game appears better than a 95.2% game. The problem starts when players treat RTP as a forecast for their next 50 spins or one evening.
You may find the RTP listed on slot pages on a leading online casino in Ontario, but the number only tells part of the story. Two games can share the same RTP and create different sessions: one may return small wins often, while the other may drain a balance before one bonus round changes everything.
The RTP Trap
Return to player (RTP) measures the theoretical share of total wagers a game returns across a very large number of rounds. In plain terms, a 96% RTP slot returns about $96 for every $100 wagered in the long run. That does not mean one player who deposits $100 should expect $96 back.
The trap sits in the word “theoretical.” RTP comes from the game’s math model. It works across huge samples, not personal sessions. A player can finish far above that percentage, far below it, or with nothing left after a short run of poor results.
Is it useless then? No, RTP can still help. It gives a baseline cost of play. Lower-RTP games cost more on average than higher-RTP games. Still, once a game passes a reasonable threshold, the next question matters more: how does it distribute that return?
Hit Frequency: The Number That Shapes Session Feel
Hit frequency tells you how often a game produces a winning outcome. This often misleads players because any win can count. A spin that returns $0.10 on a $1 bet may still count as a hit, even though the player lost $0.90 in real terms.
A game can feel active because symbols connect often, sounds play, and the screen keeps celebrating small returns. The balance may still fall. In many modern slots, “win” does not always mean profit on the spin.
Hit frequency answers one practical question: how much silence can you tolerate? Some players dislike long dry spells. Others accept quieter sessions because they chase bonus rounds or larger payouts.
The educational site Get Gambling Facts gives a useful distinction: RTP concerns the percentage of money returned over time, while hit frequency concerns how often a machine stops on a winning combination.
Volatility: The Risk Label Players Need More Often
Volatility, also called variance, describes how unevenly a game pays. Low-volatility games tend to return smaller amounts more often. High-volatility games hold more value in rare events: bonus rounds, premium symbols, multipliers, or jackpots.
Here is where RTP becomes less useful on its own:
- A 96% low-volatility slot may give modest returns and longer play from the same balance.
- A 96% high-volatility slot may burn through funds quickly unless the player hits a strong feature.
- A progressive jackpot game may look exciting, but it often places more value on rare top prizes.
The same RTP can hide very different risk profiles. Players who ignore volatility often blame the casino or the game when the session follows its math design.
Why the Same RTP Can Feel So Different
Picture two slots with 96% RTP. Slot A pays small wins on many spins, has a modest top prize, and rarely creates dramatic balance swings. Slot B pays less often but offers a large max win and volatile bonus rounds. The advertised return matches, but the experience does not.
Slot A may suit a player who wants a slower bankroll drop and more regular feedback. Slot B suits someone who accepts sharper losses in exchange for a shot at a heavier payout.
A Better Way to Read a Slot Page
Most slot pages give players more clues than they notice. The trick is to read the details together rather than chase the highest percentage.
Start with RTP. If two games look similar, the higher number has better long-term value. Then check volatility. If the game uses terms such as high, very high, or extreme variance, lower your bet size or expect shorter sessions. Next, look at the paytable. A huge max win usually means the game saves a lot of its value for rare outcomes.
A sensible pre-play check looks like this:
- RTP: What is the average long-term return?
- Volatility: How rough can the session become?
- Hit frequency: How often will the game show any wins?
- Paytable: Where does most value sit?
To Conclude
Casinos advertise RTP because it looks objective, tidy, and easy to rank. Players should read it, but they should not give it more authority than it deserves. For long sessions, volatility may matter more than a small RTP difference. For comfort, hit frequency may explain the feel better than the payback rate.
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The Popularity of Simpler Slot Games in 2026: Review From Casino Online CrazyTower Experts
Online casinos now fill their libraries with numerous video slots that have dozens of functions, long bonus rounds, complex mechanics, and so on. Interestingly, despite this huge range of modern options, many Canadian visitors at sites like Casino Online CrazyTower here https://crazytower.com/ca/ no longer want complicated gameplay that requires constant attention and long explanations.
Simpler slots now attract a wider audience because they save time and create faster sessions. So, let’s figure out why this change happened and reasons for the popularity of simpler machines.
Why Many Players Are Returning to Basic Gameplay
Modern websites like Casino Online CrazyTower pushed complex video slots for years, but many people now prefer classic formats again. Simple gameplay has fewer interruptions and is simpler in terms of budgeting, which is important when you gamble for fun.
These are a few potential reasons explain why simpler slots became popular again in 2026:
- Faster rounds. Symbols appear quickly, and rounds continue without long animations or extended bonus sequences.
- Easier controls. Most classic slots have simple menus and familiar layouts that don’t confuse new visitors.
- Smaller feature lists. Simple slots usually have standard wilds, scatters, and multipliers instead of dozens of random mechanics.
- Better session flow. People spend more time on gameplay instead of reading explanations about symbols and special functions.
- Lower visual pressure. Simpler slots use calmer designs and shorter effects that don’t overload attention.
Classic gameplay also suits mobile devices better because shorter rounds work well on smaller screens. Plus, many visitors now prefer games that start instantly and explain their mechanics within seconds.
Features That Make Simpler Slots Appealing
Simple machines at Casino Online CrazyTower and similar websites continue to attract attention because they have a high gameplay speed. Many classic titles also replicate older casino machines that people already know from physical casinos.
However, these aren’t the only factors that attract gamblers. So, check out this list:
- Short bonus rounds. Free spins and multipliers finish quickly instead of interrupting gameplay for several minutes.
- Common and standard paylines. Traditional layouts help people understand payouts without long explanations.
- Faster loading times. Simpler graphics reduce waiting time on phones, tablets, and older computers.
- Stable gameplay pace. Long cutscenes and constant pop-up notifications don’t interrupt the session.
- Traditional themes. Fruit symbols, bars, sevens, and classic casino designs still attract large audiences.
- Smaller menus. Important information appears immediately without complicated tabs or hidden sections.
Modern video slots often contain too many mechanics in a single game. Developers now combine expanding reels, random modifiers, mission systems, tournaments, and multiple bonus levels in one title. Many visitors lose interest because gameplay turns repetitive and overloaded with constant interruptions.
Compare this to a session when you get results immediately and aren’t interrupted. These still have free spins and even mini risk games, but not as loaded as innovative titles.
Conclusion
Simple slots usually create better replay value because people understand the mechanics immediately. Common and standard gameplay doesn’t cause frustration and allows faster decisions during casino sessions.
Many classic slots also function better during short breaks because rounds finish quickly without long bonus interruptions. That’s why simpler slots became popular again at many casinos, including Casino Online CrazyTower and such.
