The Pope and the WB

I was awoken this morning to the lovely sounds of police men and IDF soldiers shouting directions over a mega phone and a helicopter roaring above. The Pope has officially come to town. There is currently a ceremony (tekes in hebrew) at Yad Vashem, the new Holocaust memorial museum with Shimon Peres, the current president of Israel. He was greeted by three "children of Israel" a girl with an australian accent, a boy who spoke in Hebrew and a girl from Nazareth who welcomed the Pope in Arabic. It's interesting to witness this kind of ceremony because it is evident that it is very much a presentation, a staging of sorts. It is conducted in a manner much like a performance, but I suppose that's the way when any influential political or religious figure visits. Pope Benedict visiting Israel is very important because of his stand against anti-semitism, although he allowed an excommunicate Bishop who does not believe in the Holocaust to re-enter the church. I know he is controversial on many topics but it is still interesting to see interactions like this between the Catholic church and Israel.

In other news, on Saturday, Rachel, Talia and I went on a day trip to the West Bank. I hadn't gone in with any expectations and I came out with a bit of a new perspective of the situation in Israel. We took one of the Arab buses to Ramallah, as they are the only mode of public transportation you can find on Saturday until Shabbat is over. I had never seen the "Green Line" before, the wall that separates Israel from the West Bank, from Palestine, and as we rode up to it I realized how massive it was. Once on the other side, one could see that the graffiti stretched for miles. Most of it right near the checkpoint was absolutely exquisite. I remember one large section was painted with "David Copperfield Was Here." I'm not sure what it was referring to, but it took up a large section of the wall, sticking out amongst the smaller signs painted around it. There were portraits of various leaders as well as phrases in Arabic. WOW.
Ramallah is a huge city, one of the most affluent in the West Bank. Some of the houses were grand one family houses that looked like they had come out of some of the more affluent areas of Israel. Downtown was bustling with people, but for some reason, the bus station was shut down, so we took a shuttle the hour ride to the checkpoint in Nablus; from there we took a cab to the Old City. Once in Nablus, we wandered around for a bit in the Old City trying to find Jacob's well and the church that was associated with it. We had no idea what the church was called, and although Rachel's Arabic was pretty good, she didn't know the name for well. We asked directions from two women who pointed us in one direction, telling us to go straight for a long time and then when the road curved to the right the church would be on the left. 15 minutes of walking later, we figured we weren't getting anywhere and should find our way back downtown to another church. The next church we found ourselves at was an old Anglican Church, still in use. The owner of the church let us in and, although Rachel tried to get across what we were looking for, he didn't understand Jacob fromt he bible, the well, or a church that we were looking for. He did, however, find us someone who spoke English who told us where we could find a map. We were on the search for the tourist center. Now, when you think of a tourist center, I would imagine the first thing that comes to mind is not a small kiosk in the middle of a busy intersection in the city center. Well, that's what we got. We were about to walk past it when I noticed the peeling red letters on the top of the kiosk. We didn't end up getting a map, but we did end up finding the "only tour guide in Nablus" complete with an ID card that stated just this. He wanted 200 nis for the tour for the three of us, about three hours, but we got him down to 40 nis each, which was well worth it. The tour that we were about to embark upon would definitely open up my eyes to the situation in the West Bank, in Palestine, and how those citizens see their situation. He spoke as if he were reading from a script. He would repeat himself when we asked him questions, not quite answering them, but giving us information nonetheless. He studied at the University in Jordan for four years and was asked to be an English teacher back in Nablus, after which he retired and became a tour guide.
Our first stop was a soap factory, one of the 12 in Nablus, but it was not working anymore. There are only two working soap factories because of the lack of interest in the soap and the fact that it cannot be exported to neighboring Arab countries (which we were told many times, a result of the "occupation" of the West Bank by Israel). As you walked across the room with the soap on the floor, you slid on the slippery surface. He showed us how the soap was cut into blocks and then showed us the room where the soap was stored; there were stacks of soap everywhere, stacks that could not be sold. He took us through a lot of the Old City, pointing out Churches and Mosques that had changed hands, surving one purpose during Roman times, then another during the Byzantine Era, Turkish rule, etc. It was all fascinating information, but the most interesting part of the trip, for me at least, was hearing him talk about the occupation and what it had done to Nablus. One of the first things he told us was that Israeli media will try to protray Nablus as a very dangerous city full of terrorists, warning tourists not to come (which he attributed to Israel wanting to destroy their economy), when, as he reinforced many times, the people in Nablus are very friendly and welcoming, and we were safe especially with him as our tourguide. It's true that we didn't run into any problems with anyone and everyone Rachel asked directions for was very helpful.
He took us to a few noteable places: a Turkish bath, a center for herbs and coffee, where we had strong, bitter Bedouin tea, and a few places that are representative of the struggle that has been going on for many decades. One of these places was a house that was completely blown up in 2002, killing every family member inside. He told us the Israeli army had given no warning beforehand as to their intentions and the sign that commemorated the act was called a "massacre committed by the Israeli army" with a heading that said "never forgive, never forget." I don't know the details of the situation, but I do know that there was most likely a good reason for blowing up the house, not to say that it was either wrong nor right. It's just very interesting how both sides portray the same thing.
We also got to see the site we had come for: Jacob's well, which was right outside of a refugee camp on the edge of the city. The church the stands over the well was seriously damaged during an earthquake in 2005, so the church that we saw was newly renovated and gorgeous. The Well itself was pretty cool to see; we even got to drink some water from it, which is supposed to bring good health.
All in all it was a great trip, definitely eye opening. The West Bank, from what I observed, works and operates as an autonomous country, despite the fact that it is occupied. A two state solution, from how I see it, is the only real answer to the issue at hand, but it all depends on what each side is willing to give up, and at this point, I know Israel does not want to give up East Jerusalem (where I currently am studying) to Palestine for their capital.
I'm looking forward to going back to the West Bank at least once more before I go, preferably to Ramallah to actually explore and to Bethlehem.

A Weekend By the Kinneret

I've realized that I'm not that good at keeping up this blog thing. I thought I'd want to sit down and write about everything that's been happening, but I guess I'm almost to busy doing to remember to write a bit here and there. There's a lot (as always) to catch up on and I don't want to sit here for hours recounting everything that's been happening so I'll break it up (as usual) and hope that those who have been waiting for the following posts will enjoy reading them!

Yesterday, Emfish, Amit (an Israeli counselor from camp who lives in Jerusalem) and I drove up to the North near the Kinneret to visit Ruvik, the head of the aquatics program at camp. He had been bugging us to come visit him the whole semester and we finally made time to do it, and I'm really happy I did because I think it's been one of the best experiences I've had since I've been here. Of course it's always enjoyable to visit places in and around Israel, to go hiking, to see the cities and experience the nightlife, but it's another experience entirely to be with people who know the history of the area and who have lived there their whole lives. When we got up to the north at around 1 in the afternoon, we met Ruvik on the Kibbutz and followed him as he dropped off his eldest granddaughter to his son's house on a nearby Moshav. Moshavim and Kibbutzim used to be very different villages, but it has become harder to distinguish between the two aas kibbutzim have shifted from totally socialist/communal areas to more independent ones when it comes to the people who live on them.
After meeting his son Ofir, Ruvik took us to a place on the Jordan River where you can rent canoes. Of course, he knew the owner and along the way ran into a lot of other community members he knew. We took two canoes, Emily and Ruvik in one, Amit and I in the other, and had a very nice, relaxing time, canoeing up and down a part of the Jordan. All along the banks you could see garbage left behind by the people who had celebrated Yom Ha'atzmaut (Independence Day) there along with campsites, people fishing, and just lounging around. As we turned around and headed back to the banks of the river, we were welcomed by the beautiful sounds of a band. It was a mixture of jazz, folk, rock, and almost rap, with one guy singing and playing the flute, another singer, a woman who sang and played tuba and trombone, a guitarist, drummer and bassist. We sat, listening the music, while enjoying a cup of tea that was steeping on a nearby fire. There were kids running around all over the place, one who was naked especially caught my attention. He was definitely enjoying himself running around without a care in the world, hopping from rock to rock. It seemed like a great communal place to come enjoy the banks of the river, go for a swim, use the swinging rope to jump into the water, listen to music and just chat.
After we left, Ruvik drove us to the place where he teaches sailing on the Kinneret. He is a PE teacher for the local, private school that all the Kibbutzim in the area send their kids to. He has been teaching there for over thirty years. The grounds of the school itself are gorgeous. There are flowers all over the place and as you walk along the paths, you pass one-level buildings that serve as classrooms. There's a bomb-shelter, but, as he explained to us, when he was in school there, there was only a bunker that they used to jump into every time there was an air raid. It's so amazing that he went to the school and now teaches there. When we returned to the kibbutz, we met his wife, after which we took a bunch of communal bikes and rode around the Kibbutz. I'm forgetting something- an explanation of the Kibbutz we were staying on. Kibbutz Degania Bet is one of the oldest Kibbutzim in Israel. It is right next to Kibbutz Degania Aleph which is the oldest, I believe. Degania Bet turns 90 next year, Aleph 100. Ruvik's great grandfather was one of the first people to build the kibbutz. His grandparenet, parents, and he were all born on the kibbutz. Thus, the best place to observe the generations of the kibbutz, to get a feel of who lived there, was to visit the cemetary. He brought us to the graves of his great grandmother and grandfather to show us the difference between the two graves because his great grandfather was one of the first founders and his great grandmother came half a year later. The graves are labeled differently- the grave of his great grandfather said "one of the first founders of the kibbutz" and his great grandmother's just referred to the group of Halutzim (pioneers). We then showed us the grave of his father. It was amazing seeing three generations in the same place, which, I must say, is placed where you can see the most spectacular view of the valley where the Jordan used to run, which is now green, lush, and fertile. We continued biking through the kibbutz to the cow barn. He tried to give us a taste of fresh milk but the spout wasn't working. It's ok though, I got to see the cows being mechanically milked. They manually attach metal suckers to the udders and when the cows are done they follow a path along the barn by themselves because they know there is food awaiting them at the end.
Outside of the barn, we picked these delicious berries called "etz tutim" (tree strawberries) which look a bit like blackberries/raspberries but don't taste quite the same. We continued on, seeing the different houses of the kibbutz, passing through one of them where new houses are being built for people who want to live on the kibbutz but not become members. Apparently it's a new way for kibbutzim to make money because they can't make enough themselves. Times are definitely changing for kibbutzim.
We went back to Ruvik's house and relaxed until 7 and then walked over to the dining hall to have Shabbat dinner. We sat at a table with Ruvik's sister, her husband, her daughter and son-in law, their baby, and Ruvik's mother. Four generations at the same table! WOW. We enjoyed a good meal, chatting, after which we returned back to his house, relaxed a bit more, and then went to a local bar/restaurant on the Jordan, close to where we had been that afternoon to grab some drinks and talk. That was pretty much the rest of the night. We returned back to the kibbutz and I stayed up until 12:30 to register for classes (5:30 pm EST) and then hit the hay.
Today, Emily and I woked up at 11:30 and about fifteen minutes later we were on the road to the Golan Heights. Ruvik took us, with Amit at the wheel, through the Golan to the Golan heights where we got to see some of the most spectacular views of the Kinneret, Israel and Syria. Accompanying everything we passed and every lookout point we stopped at was an explanation of the history of the area and how it connected to the fight for the land. We passed by a valley in Syria where Ruvik pointed out one of the seven bridges that Hagana and the other groups who fought for the independence of Israel blew up so that no one could come in or out of Israel during the war of independence. They never repaired it. It's an interesting feeling driving on a winding road right next to the border of a country like Syria. There isn't a neon-colored line separating the two countries, no big tanks or men with guns, just a barbed wire fence with a bit of no-man's land in between. On the other side of the road were hills that are still covered in land mines.
It was getting late in the afternoon and we were getting hungry so Ruvik took us to his favorite falafel place in Masadeh, about an hour from where we were. The place was swamped with people but the food was delicious! Falafel, Lebaneh (soft goat cheese), pita, hummus, tehina, fulla beans, salad, and pickles. Mmmmmm Israeli food. Our next stop was a place I had been on birthright, which was an army base in the Golan heights from which you could see a large part of Syria. Ruvik and Amit pointed out the place where 12 Israeli tanks had defeated over 400 Syrian tanks during the Yom Kippur war. It was so important to defeat them where they had, because if they had failed, the Syrians had a direct route right down to the Galil with nothing to stop them. Amit pointed out one of the nearby Hills called Avital, which is the base for a lot of Israeli intelligence, but no one knows what goes on there. We continued on our little trip, Emily and I fell asleep in the car for a bit, and were woken up when we came to our last stop- the Northern part of the Jordan. After we got out and walked around a bit, we headed back to the Kibbutz and stopped at Glidat, the chocolaterie, named for the woman who started making chocolate on the Kibbutz. She learned in Belgium and brought it back to Israel. Emily and I got ice cream and I bought a sampling of chocolates to bring back to share with my friends here. I haven't tried any but I'm sure they're going to be delicious.
Over all it was a fantastic trip. Relaxing. Informational. I got to see a lot of what I'd seen before but from a new perspective. I would not mind coming to live on the kibbutz for a couple months, working, biking around, hiking, and just being with Ruvik and his family. It was nice meeting them and realizing who he is and where he comes from. It made me think of him differently.

That's all for now. My next update will be going back about a month now to Ultimate Peace. Mom, I know you're waiting for it. I promise, it's coming! (along with my Greece update)

Experiencing A Day in the Life

Last week I went on trip organized through OSA (the student activities group in Rothberg) to a museum in Holon that allowed people to experience an hour-hour and half of complete darkness and perhaps getting a glimpse into the life of the blind. A few weeks ago I had gone to the museum right next door called "Invitation to Silence" which was based on the same concept but instead of experiencing being blind, people were invited to experience what it feels like to be deaf. Both were great experiences, but the blind museum was something like I've never experienced before. We were lead into a maze, where our blind guide, Liran, awaited us to take us on a journey through different activities in complete darkness. From the beginning, I knew that Liran was a fantastic guide. The first thing he did was pretend like he was far away with a booming voice, projecting it with what I had to assume were his hands. He was a bit sarcastic and very funny and never ceased to tease. The first room we went into turned out to be a park or a forest of some sort. I felt my way around, making sure I wouldn't bang into anything and to my surprise, found a bench to rest on for a few minutes. Little did I know that there was a tree right next to the edge of the bench, so when I tried to stand up, I banged my forehead. Better luck next time?
A market was our next stop where we were able to feel and sometimes smell the different produce. I couldn't tell if the fruit and vegetables were real, but they definitely felt real enough to be able to identify.
Our journey continued across a shaky bridge and into someone's cabin. Every time I correctly identified an object I felt proud of myself. In kitchen area I was able to feel around the silverware and imagine in my head exactly the object I was touching with my hands. Liran asked us where we thought we were, as we listened to the sounds of the ocean outside the cabin window. It turned out that we were on a desert island and were being chased by some chief who realized we were on the island. Let's think... what would you do if you were being chased by a crazy chief on a desert island who wants to you kill you? Find a boat of course! But not just any boat- the chief's boat. We were lead out of the cabin and into a boat and off we went, with the water spritzing up at us as we made our getaway. Unfortunately for us, the chief found out we stole his boat, but fortunately was unable to catch up. We were safe on the mainland and right by a city. The city was interesting, with a road we had to cross (which just included stepping down off the sidewalk, crossing it, and stepping up again) but there was a telephone booth, motorcycle and a few other things on the other side. Our next destination was the sound room. Probably one of my favorite parts because we got to lie down on our backs on the floor and not only listen to the music but feel it as well. We listened to music with heavy beats that vibrated through our bodies along with news and some classical music. Liran asked if anyone knew the classical piece and who it was composed by. I squeezed my eyes shut, for what reason I'm not sure, because I couldn't see anything anyway, and I said the first thing that came to my mind- The William Tell Overture. Low and behold- that was the piece but I couldn't remember that Roussini was the composer. Liran was excited because, according to him, in the three years that he'd been working there, no one had been able to correctly identify the piece. I made him very happy. One point for me!
Our final stop was a cafeteria, where we were able to make small purchases of chips, various candy bars, juices, and beer. I chose a pesek zman for 5 nis and sat down at the table with the rest of our group. Here we got to talk to Liran, ask him questions, and listen as he told us what he thought of our experience. He asked us how we felt then as opposed to in the beginning of the tour, and I realized how comfortable I felt. I was definitely expecting to feel more unease but it only took me a little while to adjust to not being able to see anything. He emphasized that what we experienced wasn't really being blind, because those who are blind since birth don't know what it means to conjure and image in one's mind. Their brain can't do that so every time we felt something and imagined it, we were relying on past memories to reconstruct an image. Liran had gone blind 4 years before due to a degenerative eye condition. He said the first two weeks he was upset, feeling sorry for himself, but he realized he could and wanted to lead a normal life, and it took him the rest of the month to learn what he needed, but was then able to cook, clean, and do everything else for himself. He teaches English and is getting his teaching degree this year in addition to working at the museum. His conversation with us was very deep and very open. As we were waiting to leave, he had some more time, so he showed us his talking phone and the video his mother took of him spinning fire on his birthday- something he had been learning for over a month at the time- proving he really could do anything he wanted.

I wish we had something like that in the US. I really think that people could learn a lot from that type of experience- not just about being blind and being able to understand/relate to people, but just to realize that you can do anything you want if you really try and that everyone has their issues. Liran pointed out that even blind people have their prejudices. No one is perfect, but if you sit around moping all day- what good is that going to get you? Live your life because you can.

Bahai Gardens Recap

As per Amy's request, I'm going to keep my posts shorter and more frequent (hopefully!). So, to continue on my quest to recap the past couple of weeks, I'm moving on to my trip to Haifa with my friends Keenan, Josh, and Talia. This was early February, before the Eilat trip, but the day we chose to go up proved to be perfect weather. We went up on Thursday and Talia and I stayed with two of her friends at Haifa university (in the Talia dorms! =) ). We got up really early the next morning to get to the bottom half of the gardens early enough to see the Temple and the Shrine of the Bab, one of the leaders of the Bahai religion. The gardens were nothing like I'd seen before. They were absolutely exquisite, with an array of flowers, cacti, and trees. The Shrine itself was beautiful, although we were only allowed into one of the rooms. Going into the garden, I didn't know much at all about the Bahai religion, but I soon learned on the later portion of our tour that there were Bahai all over the world and that it stemmed from Islam but was originated in Iran (Persia) so all of the sacred texts and writings of the Bab were written in Farsi. In order to tour the part of the garden that ran down the mountain, we had to walk up a really long and steep hill. Along the way we came across a sculpture garden with sculptures of women and children at play. I don't know who the artist is or what the inspiration was but it was a nice place to relax and wander around, and all of the sculptures were beautiful. We continued along our way and stopped off once more before reaching the top of the gardens to look at some sculptures in the walkway of someone's house. They were all metal sculptures, some with Hebrew written on them. Although I didn't know what most of them said (according to Josh's cousin who was with us, there was something going on with a play on words in Hebrew) they were beautiful works of art.
The walk down the garden was tiring but definitely worth it. There are over 900 steps and 7 tiers to walk down until you once again reach the Temple and shrine where we started earlier that morning. There are 7 additional tiers below the Temple. During pilgrimage, the Bahai walk all the way from the top of the gardens, past the temple, to the bottom by the port. Our tourguide told us more about the Bahai as we made our way down, pointing out the long rectangular building with a teal/seafoam green room as the archives, where all of the texts are kept and translated into 100s of different languages, and one other round building with the same color roof of which I forget the purpose.
The trip to Haifa was a nice getaway, but it made me realize how much I enjoy living in Jerusalem. There is a much smaller international population (american) at Haifa University, and it is much further away from everything else that is going on. Granted, it is beautiful up there and closer to other places in Israel I want to visit, but I am quite content where I am.
Here's a slideshow of a few of the pictures I took at Haifa (I took over 150 in total). If you want to see all of them, and all of the pictures I've taken so far, feel free: http://picasaweb.google.com/reezespiezes

Playing Catch Up on the Last Few Weeks

Unfortunately (or perhaps not) I have seemingly had no time to recount what has happened in the past few weeks. Since my trip to the Golan and the election on the 10th, I have traveled to both Petra and Eilat, Haifa, and experienced Purim in Israel, not to mention classes started about two and a half weeks ago. A big group of kids from Rothberg went to Eilat for the weekend between the end of Ulpan and the beginning of class because we had a long weekend and the weather was supposed to be beautiful. Eilat, for those who don't know, is in the southern part of Israel, right next to Jordan, which sits on the Gulf of Aqaba, thus providing some beautiful beach areas. We arrived Thursday night and because we were getting up extremely early the next morning to make it to the border, we didn't have time to do much. The Yitzak Rabin border crossing is open from 8 am to 8 pm on Fridays but in order to beat the rush of the tour groups (who go straight to passport control), according to all the research I did online, it was advisable to get to the border around 7 am. We were one of the first groups of people there, but that didn't make crossing time any less because, while we crossed first, we had to go exchange money to Jordanian dinar while all the tour groups passed up to wait in line for their passports. Crossing the border was very much an experience in and of itself. After getting my passport checked on the Israeli side, we had to go through one gate, walk through what was basically no-man's-land (the walkway between exiting Israel and entering Jordan), and then go through the checkpoint and wait to get my passport checked and stamped on the other side. The Jordanian soldiers hassled most of the girls, taking my passport and pretending to rip it, and refusing to give it back until I demanded it. We waited for about twenty more minutes waiting to get our passports stamped, and after our whole group (all thirteen of us) finally made it through, we met our drivers in the parking lot. Josh had arranged ahead of time to have a van and a car meet us for the meager priced of 23 US Dollars round trip, which is about 17 Jordanian Dinar, pretty good deal, especially because the trip to Petra is about 2 hrs and 15 mins. The drive was fantastic. As soon as we left the border, we drove through Aqaba and straight towards the mountains. There seemed to be one major road heading in the direction we were going because we were traveling with a pack of about 50 or so 18-wheelers carrying goods to different parts of Jordan. It's a very different country in terms of layout. Dispersed amongst the mountains were villages small and far between. The villages we drove past seemed to be sparsley populated and very simple. On the way back, we drove along a different road, because we drove through a much more highly populated city that seemed much more modern, but the way up was a different story. We got to Petra around 12, and since the border closed at 8 pm and we wanted to make sure we got back in time, that left us around 5 hours to see what we could in Petra.
Petra was unlike anything I'd ever seen before. We entered the park walking down a dirt road, split into two by a divider, the other side being the path for horses. Along the sides of the road were what looked like houses carved into the stone and other structures. As we were walking, a group of three men on horses were riding up in the other direction holding up a 100 shekel bill. They stopped us and asked if we could make change for it in either dinar or US dollars, which we didn't think we had, but before we could refuse any more, they had gotten off their horses and offered us free rides to the top of the siq if we would make the change. Josh ended up finding enough to make change and we got to ride horses down to where we were heading. It wasn't a very long way, probably 4 minutes by horse. The men were very interested in Talia and I, not surprisingly as most foreign men I have met in these situations seem to be interested in foreign women especially if they are from the States. My rider ended up asking if there was any way he could get me to come back to Jordan, if I had an address, or a phone number. I smiled politely, looked down at my phone in my pocket of my backpack and said no. Free rides are one thing, giving out any information to anyone unknown was something completely different. It was nice to ride the horse though so I didn't mind much.
We made it to the top of the siq where we paused for a few pictures and then began our descent through the gorge. The siq is a long stone path leading down to the Treasury that runs through high walls of stone, much like a canyon. Along the sides of the siq you could sea busts of statues carved into the stone and a waterway along the edge carved into the stone, which is how they transported water downwards. We didn't have a tourguide so I don't know much about the siq other than the little that I read up on, but it was breathtaking. As we neared the end of the siq, I began to catch glimpses of something at the "end of the tunnel." As we continued walking, slowly but surely, the Treasury seemed to emerge out of nowhere. Anyone who has seen Indiana Jones knows what the Treasury is and how amazing it is to see it appear at the end of this long gorge/canyon walk. The Treasury is built into a huge rockface. Unfortunately you can't go in anymore but you can go up and see the inside. There isn't much to see inside, so I've been told, but the outside is truly amazing to look at. We mulled around for a bit, but decided that if we wanted to get up to the Monastery with enough time to spend time up there, we'd better start heading up. We knew we wanted to take donkeys up and walk down, but we had to find the donkeys first. The guy who ended up taking us up ripped us off big time (we paid 10 dinar when we should have gotten it for 4 tops, probably even 1) but in many ways it was worth it because he was fantastic, pointing various things along the way, including what looked like an elephant carved in the stone siding, and a lion at the top of a mountain in stone, and being very hospitable, although I would be too if I made 10 dinar a person for taking 4 people up on donkeys. Riding donkeys is MUCH more difficult than I had imagined, especially when they are taking you up 900+ stone steps to the top of a mountain. My donkey's name was Alex and liked to travel along the edge. I kept being reassured that he wouldn't walk off the edge, I just need to stay centered on the donkey. Easier said than done. Talia's donkey, perhaps appropriately named Bob Marley, took her for a ride. He not only ran her into a tree, from which she still has the remnants of a bruise from, but he rode her so close to one of the tables that the local women have set up to sell jewelry, that he ripped her pants leg on nails sticking out of one of the tables. From that close call she came out unscathed physicially, but her pants fared worse. On the way back down, the woman whose table ripped her pants recognized her and invited us into her little cave area where she was sitting with her daughter to drink tea and spend some time. Also along the way we saw a group of mountain goats making their way up. I had never seen mountain goats up close and personal before so needless to say I did my best to take pictures while struggling to keep myself on my donkey. In the end I was successful and have some pretty cool pictures to show for it.
When we finally made it up to the top where the Monastery and lookout points were, I was ready to get off of my camel. With the donkey it was about a 35/40 minute trek. It probably would've taken us about 50+ minutes by foot, so it saved us a bit of time. The Monastery, as the Treasury, was huge and fantastic. Again, there wasn't much to look at inside, but the structure itself was incredible and towered over everything else. From there we decided to find the lookout points, of which there were two. Both were referred to as the "View from the end of the world" because you could see so far from the top. The views were breathtaking. I didn't quite know what I was looking at, but I was told you could see Israel from where we were looking and since the visibility was great that day, I guess I was looking at Jordan and Israel. We spent a long time walking around, looking down from the different viewpoints and enjoying the beautiful, albeit a bit chilly, day. We even had time to make our own stone sculpture, mimicking many of the piled stone structures we saw on the paths up to the viewpoints. We also made our way over to one of the viewpoints where a group of Jordanians were sitting outside of a tent playing music.
We left with enough time just to make it back to the entrance to meet up with our driver and head back. On the way back down we got to look at all the tables of jewelry we had passed without stopping on the way up, but I wasn't really prepared to buy anything. All of the women at these tables were selling basically the same things and charging much more than they were worth. I didn't know if they were as poor as the looked or if they used their disheveled looking kids to try to get people to buy the stuff, but I tended to want to think they weren't doing that. I was used to being hassled by people to buy things, but I was still fascinated every time I passed one of these tables. The woman who invited is in for tea said that she lived in Petra, or right outside of Petra, and came here every day to sell her jewelry to tourists.
Before we got back to the Treasury and the Siq, we stopped to explore the Brown University Excavation site. As soon as we got up the stairs, Josh looks at me, motioning for me to take out my frisbee. Of course I have it because I carry it everywhere, on every trip, so I get it out and he makes his way back down the stairs to the other side of the platform, which is separated by a big drop. I throw it to him, so far so good. He returns the throw, but instead of going anywhere near me, it flies past me and lands in a large stone pit. My one frisbee I bring to Israel gets lost in Petra. Well, not exactly lost. We could see it, and if I had really wanted to, I could have climbed down the very shaky sides of the stone pit and retrieved it but I wasn't willing to risk my life for it just yet. Thus, my Sparkle Motion disc is sitting at the bottom of a pit in Petra. But it makes for a good story, right?
We were all exhausted from a very long day spent driving and walking around so most of us slept on the ride back. I couldn't sleep for very long, but it was very dark so I couldn't see much for most of the ride, especially because the major roads aren't as well lit as they are in the States. In fact, there weren't reflectors on the road for most of the time and lits were few and far between. Every time our driver went over 120 km/h his car would ding and a light would start flashing. In order to pass anyone, or to let them know he was coming up behind them, he would flash his brights at them. Driving in Jordan, much like Israel, is a very different experience from back home. People are more aggressive and there seem to be more exceptions to driving rules, rules of the road really created by the people who are driving and less by what is taught to them. Needless to say we arrived back to the border safely. We ended up crossing right in time and making it over at 8 pm on the dot. Why did it take us so long? Because our friend Aran's father is Israeli, so they questioned him twice about his family, if he spoke Hebrew, why he wasn't in the army, etc. We also had to get our bags checked through machines coming back on the Israeli side, which was much more than we had going in. But we made it through fine, got back to our Hostel, relaxed for a bit, and went out, though it was a pretty early night because we were all extremely tired. The next day was spent lounging at the beach, walking along the boardwalk, which was similar in many ways to Wildwood or down the Jersey shore, and just had a relaxing day. That night we went out, ended up eating at this russian restaurant for Joe's birthday where Talia and I split a mixed grill dish for 95 shekels (the equivalent of about $15 each) for the most mead I've had in a really long. It was accompanied by rounds of pita and different spreads and dips, more than any of us could handle, but well worth it. They brought Joe out a bowl of ice cream with a sparkler, but what was funny was that he couldn't eat it because it was dairy and he had just had a meat meal. Oh well, guess it's the thought that counts!
The next morning a few of us got up really early to catch the 7 am bus back to Jerusalem because we had class at 12:30 and it takes about 4 hours to drive back. It had rained a lot back in Jerusalem, which flows down towards the dead sea and floods the roads. Fortunately for us, it had been long enough since the rain that we only had to drive through 3 spots where the road was still a bit flooded and it didn't prevent us from getting back on time. Along the way, driving past the dead sea, we passed the plants where they extract magnesium and other minerals from the water. We passed mounds and mounds of what I later realized was salt from the plant. I didn't know exactly what to think of it. One of Jordan's main sources of income is the magnesium from the dead sea, and Israel definitely benefits from it as well. But at the rate that the Dead Sea is shrinking, something needs to be done. But what do you tell a country who is so dependent upon this one thing, that they have to stop cultivating it and find a different means of subsistence? Just something to do think about.
Check out the slide show of pictures of everything I just described!



So that was my trip to Eilat/Petra. The weekend took a lot out of me but it was definitely worth it! I think this is it for now. The next chunk of time I get, I'll continue on with my weekend spent up in Haifa, and from there classes and Purim. Hope all is well with everyone!

Bibi and a Relaxing Weekend in the Golan

We've just started our second to last week of Ulpan today. It's amazing how much I've done in the past three weeks and how quickly time seems to be going by. This past Thursday a bunch of friends and I went to hear Benjamin Netanyahu speak at the Crowne Plaza Hotel near the Tachanat Mercazit (Central Bus Station) downtown.(Getting read for the panel)

For those of you who don't know, general elections are coming up on Tuesday to elect members to the Kinneset. Whichever party gets the highest percentage of votes and thus the most members of Kinneset gets to choose the new Prime Minister. When I came, I had little to no knowledge of the political atmosphere in Israel. Now, I have a slightly better idea of what is at stake, what the parties hope to accomplish, and who is the choice for each party for the seat of Prime Minister. Likud, the party which Netanyahu represents, is more conservative. Kadima is Tzipi Livni's party, Barak belongs to the Labor party, and Lieberman I'm not quite sure. I still don't have the strongest grasp on the whole situation nor what all the different parties have to say, because I haven't been to rallies for all of them nor have I read up on all of them unfortunately. Nonetheless, being at the Likud rally was pretty exciting. Rachel and I got interviewed by a lady with an eyepatch who writes for a British publication called the Sunday Times as to why we were there to get a better feel for who was at the rally. It was part of a last minute attempt to gain support from the Anglos in the country, as there are approximately 250,000 English speakers in Israel. I would venture out to say that about 75% of the people at the rally were 50 or over which doesn't really surprise me. The couple sitting behind us were from Scotland, another man behind us from Toronto and there were at least twenty Hebrew University students there as well. The mistress of ceremonies (whose name I don't recall) spoke about how important it is Israel votes for Likud and therefore for Netanyahu. Netanyahu's main points dealt with areas such as Gaza and education (advocating more Jewish education as, he argues, this is our land and we must continue to educate our children on their heritage and traditions). He argued that any of the other parties would not help the economy as he promised to do. He promised to create more jobs like he did back before he was prime minister in the late 90's and to help the economy get out of the global crunch faster than other countries. His policies on the Arab-Isreali conflict struck me as the most interesting. He seemed to be more conservative than some of the other parties in terms of what he said he was willing to give up and what he wasn't. He spoke to never going back to pre-1967 borders and not wanting to split Jerusalem. He attacked Livni arguing that her policies would only aid Hamas to continue what it was doing. The longer I'm here the more I'm learning about what really goes on in Gaza and the territories from either soldiers I know who have fought there or from reading the newspapers online every day. The more I read and speak with Israelis the more I find myself stuck in the middle on so much of what is going on. On one hand, there is obvious humanitarian distress occuring in Gaza, but at the same time much of it is self inflicted. A lot of the PR that Israel receives is skewed; at first one story goes out that is not always the whole truth, and when the whole truth does come out, it makes the 16th page of the newspaper and is completely overlooked. But there is also definite tension within Israel itself between Arab-Israelis and Jews. There doesn't seem to be any right or wrong within any of this, and I feel that so many people are looking to blame rather than to truly figure out a solution that can work. If Hamas was democratically elected by the Palestinians in Gaza, shouldn't that say something about how the Palestinians feel towards Israel? But at the same time, Hamas has been creating schools and hospitals, so it would make sense that Palestinians would want to vote for them. The good that Hamas does doesn't nearly outweigh the destruction the group causes and the ideologies of death it puts forth, but it something to take into consideration. I'm not quite sure where I'm going with all of this, but it's given me a lot to think about while I've been here, especially because I don't feel directly connected to a lot of what is going on. I feel, for the most part, simply an observer and not a participant as perhaps many of the Israelis feel.

On a completely different note, I spent the weekend in the Golan, a beautiful area in the North of Israel on the Kinneret. We left here at 6:30 am on Friday and our first stop was to go repelling, on an omega (a zip line) and to take the country's longest cable car. The day turned out to be perfect for everything we did. We got to choose between the omega and repelling, but only three of us ended up repelling. We repelled down a 42 meter cliff and then took a ten minute hike back up to the top to meet the group. I'd been repelling before but not on a real rock face. While it wasn't the most exciting thing I've ever done, it was definitely exhilirating. There's something to be said for walking over the edge of the cliff, letting go of your body, and trusting that what you're strapped into while hold you the whole way down. You get to control how far you bounce and how fast you go depending on how much slack or tension you give yourself. It felt great to be back in a harness and tied into the belay system, definitely made me miss the ropes course at camp :-). After we took the cable car back down, we were off to our second location: ATVing.(The leader of our caravan, one of the instructors who happened to have failed basically everyone he tested. He turned out to be a really cool guy) (I'm driving the second ATV from the front)
I realized once I got there that I had never actually seen an ATV before. It took a really long time for every took take the driving test and to be put into caravans and sent off. Not everyone got to drive the ATVs, so they got to drive these small off-roading Jeeps instead. A lot of kids failed for various reasons, but fortunately I passed and was able to take a passenger. It's really difficult to steer one of those things! The gas is controled by a little thumb lever on the right handle and the break is on the left handle In order to turn you really need to put all of your strenght into turning the handle bars. We were the second to last caravan to go out which lead to some craziness later, but the trip itself was fantastic. We began by weaving in and out of vineyards and then set off to the top of one of the Naftali mountains, which turned out to be about a 45 minute trip in all. (View from the Naftali Mountains)
When we were driving on the road we got to step on the gas and let ourselves go; it felt fantastic. The view from the top of the mountain was also something I will never forget. Spectacular. When we returned, we found out that the bus had already left with most of the kids to go eat lunch because we were running so late. We had to wait for the last caravan to return before we were bussed to the restaurant, only to find out that we couldn't sit down and eat and had to take the food to go because the restaurant was closed for shabbat and it was already almost shabbat. Unfortunately, we later found out, we missed the amazing hummus and guacamole in addition to salads, but the food we did have was really good. It was a little cold, but delicious. The only problem was we ate at around 3:30, 4, stuffed ourselves cause we hadn't eaten much other than chocolate rugelach, chocolate, and drank shock (chocolate milk in a bag) the whole morning, and we were supposed to eat dinner again 2 hours later at the hotel. That part of the day was extremely rushed between eating on the bus and not having a ton of time once we got to the hotel to relax and change for shabbat. Kabbalat shabbat was nice, different than I was used to because the men and women were separated, as the hotel was shomer shabbat and catered to an orthodox crowd. Dinner was amazing. It consisted of at least 4 different courses and lots of little things. Basically I ate enough the whole weekend to sustain me for the week but unfortunately food doesn't work like that :-). It was a relaxing weekend- we went out to the Kinneret and hung out on the beach for about two hours, looking at what stars we could see, and just chatting about various things. Shabbat morning we all slept in, did some more beach walking, a lot more eating, singing, praying, and at 7 pm we were back on the bus headed to Jerusalem. It was a short getaway but definitely worth it. A bunch of us want to all pitch in for a tent and go back to the Golan where there is great hiking and camping. It's the most lush and green part of the country because it's right next to the only fresh water source.

Right now, I'm getting ready to go the student center where I go every week, but this week is Tu B'shvat, one of the major agricultural holidays, so they are doing a seder with nuts, fruits, chocolate and apparently sushi, after which I have my learning session with Tsipora, an orthodox woman in the community (part of a dollars for learning program-i get paid to learn). After that it's back to finish some homework and crash because I am exhausted! I'm hoping to go to the zoo this week, so we'll see how that goes. Again, Tuesday is election day, so we don't have classes (but we do on friday the 13th to make up for it). A bunch of us might go early to Gan Sacher to play frisbee, but it might be raining. Don't have any definite plans right now and that's ok with me. I like being spontaneous especially here. Hope all is well in the states. I'd love to hear from you!

P.S. Kristen- you should comment so I know you're alive :-)

Winding My Way Through the Old City

I'm currently sitting in my apartment looking out the window at a very abysmal night. In the past hour it's been freezing rain and hailing. It was the first time I've seen any type of percipitation since getting here let alone hearing any thunder. Thus, it's the perfect time to recount my wonderful exploration of the Old City yesterday and today. Our grand plan was to go to the Old City after going to the Shuk Friday morning to go to this amazing hummus place called Lina's that my friend Anna had told me I needed to go to, after which we were going to the Kotel to experience shabbat and try to get invited back to dinner with an Orthodox family. We got to the Kotel probably an hour and a half before sunset, but most of the shops were closing down. It was weird walking through the different quarters, not really knowing which one you were in because all of the doors were closed and locked and it just felt like an empty stone alley-way. Lina's was unfortunately closed but at least I knew where it was. We wove our way up and down on the stone "streets" and eventually made it to the Jewish quarter and the Kotel. There were a bunch of birthright groups at the Kotel, one particular group was from Argentina. They boys were in one large circle and the girls in the other, dancing around and singing basically every song in Hebrew they knew. Our group consisted of four girls and one boy so we designated a meeting time (because you can't use your phones at the Kotel) and went our separate ways. The wall was basically as I had remembered it from my trip two years ago. The women's side was probably 1/4 the size of the men's. Most of the women were wearing black although there were a lot of tourists dressed in pants, but moderately dressed. There was a group of women from somewhere in Africa along with some high school groups from within Israel. One of the women who was at the wall was dressed completely in white. I presume she was dressed as the "sabbath bride" or it was just the way she dressed when she came to the wall. We were probably there for about an hour. The women didn't really pray together, they mostly did their own thing, but the men on the other side were in large groups dancing around together and singing the same prayer loudly together. I've never really liked the idea of the mehitzah (the wall that separates the women's side from that of the men's), but then again I don't feel at home with most of the more religious groups so perhaps it was better for me to just be with the people I came with. I sang a few songs with my friends but for the most part I just watched and observed. I had forgotten that when walking away from the wall it was appropriate to walk backwards in order not to turn your back until you were a fair distance away. I obliged and followed suit with what most of the women were doing in order to be respectful. It was unfortunately a chilly Shabbat so we left earlier than we wanted and didn't end up finding anyway to take us back for a meal, but I came back and made a delicious Shabbat dinner with two of my friends here so it all worked out in the end.

Today was a lazy day which started at 11:30 with french toast with the roommates and then we went with our Arab-Israeli roommate, Nardin, to the Old City. (Nardin and her boyfriend while we were waiting for the Arab bus) Because it was Shabbat, none of the regular buses were running, so we took one of the Arab buses (much cheaper than the normal buses!) to the central Arab bus terminal right by the Damscus gate (one of the entrances to the Old City). It was so hectic with all of the vendors on the street that I almost forgot it was the sabbath in one of the holiest cities in the world. As we were walking down towards the gate we saw a group of Arab-Israelis demonstrating with signs that said "Free Gaza" and we passed by a little boy hanging over a railing holding a cap gun in his hand. I wanted to take a picture but we were winding in and out of crowds and I didn't think it would have been the most appropriate thing to do. We made our way through the Muslim quarter on Via Delarosa to the border of the Christian quarter and Lina's were we walked up a small set of stairs and settled ourselves in. The food was absolutley incredible!
The 8th station of the tour where Jesus supposedly fell down the second time with the cross


The place specializes in all kinds of hummus. Between five of us, we ordered masabaha (hummus with chick peans, tahina, olive oil, and corn), hummus with pine nuts and hummus ful (with fava beans). We also got an Arabic salad, which really just turned out to be the same as an Israeli salad which consists of diced up tomatoes, cucumbers, and onion. They brough piles of pita and we dug in. We ended up taking a container home for us to share. It was definitely well worth the find and will be on the list of places to go back. Right after we ordered, a man came bounding up the stairs and made his way towards our table. He was a dark man dressed in a heavy sweater and jacket. He was introduced as Nardin's friend (our Arab Israeli roommate) and our tourguide. His name was Abed and he is fantastic. He took us from station 8 of where Jesus walked with the cross through what is now the Arab quarter all the way back to the Church of the Holy Sepulcher, which is the holy site for many sects of Christianity. On the way to the Church we stopped off at the place where Jesus was held while awaiting his trial, where he supposedly fell the first and second time on his walk through the city, where he met his mother, and ending of course where he was crucified, his body anointed, and buried. One of the stops was what is now a hostel/hotel. The destination at this stop lay at the top of many flights of stairs but it was well worth the climb. From the roof you could see from the Mountain of Olives to the Dome of the Rock and the mosque to the Church and the Jordan Valley. The groupof us on top of the roof of the Austrian Hospice of the Holy Family (the hotel/hostel)
Views from the roof

It was a spectacular view and Abed gave us the most detailed overview of the history of the city from the time of Jesus to the present day. He was the best tour guide I have ever had the pleasure of meeting. Not only is he fluent in English, Arabic, French, Spanish, and Hebrew (and I think Russian as well) but he never falters when he makes a stop and points something out. He knows every detail inside and out and he has a great sense of humor. The best part of this tour was that it was free because Nardin knows him. He offered to lead us around the Jewish Quarter when it wasn't Shabbat, because it deserved a day in and of itself. Nardin also told us that he may be willing to take us to the Dead Sea and give us a tour there as well. It's been great living with her, not just because of these opportunities, but because it's nice to have a different perspective from that of our collective western ideals.
Today I was led through parts of the Old City I don't think I would have ever had the opportunity to explore otherwise. At one point Abed took us through some back passages through the Arab area to get to a coffee and tea place that he wanted to take us to. On Shabbat there are more armed soldiers than usual and they block off particular parts of the Arab quarters to Israelis and Tourists. The coffee place was in one of these areas, so we had to take a back way to get around them. It was well worth the detour.

We had tea with nana (a type of mint leaf), which was the sweetest most delicious drink I've had. Another thing about Abed is that he knows EVERYONE in the city. It seemed like every shop owner we passed by, every guard or person sitting at the entrance to a site of interest, knew Abed and he would stop and say his hellos as we went by. I'm looking forward to going on another tour with him. Apparently he's the tour guide everyone asks for :-). Eastern Orthodox part of the Church of the Holy Sepulchre. Not a very good shot but it was goreous.
Nardin's boyfriend decided to play soccer with some kids in the street

The rest of the day was spent lounging around, eating and recovering from 3 1/2 hours of walking. Tomorrow is going to be a lot of the same: resting, homework, and hopefully I'll get myself out at some point. I need to make sure to get everything done before tomorrow night because we're going to watch the Super Bowl over at the student center at 1 am. I don't know if I'll stay the whole time, but I feel like I owe it to myself to go watch the beginning. Monday I have a session to sign up for my classes with my advisor, which I'm both nervous and excited about. I need to take a minimum of four classes, one being Hebrew, and the other I really want to and need to take for my major at home is Archaeology of Jerusalem. Other than that, I'm thinking of doing some kind of academic internship- although I'm not sure where I'd want to do it- so that leaves me with one class to choose. There are a lot of options but right now I'm leaning towards one called Iran: Its formation and Reformation. It's a topic I've never really explored before so it might be interesting to take. We shall see what I decide on Monday.
Next weekend is the ski trip to Mt. Hermon, although it hasn't snowed much there. Tentatively, our schedule is to go rock climbing, ATV'ing, and repelling along with visiting a winery before shabbat starts, after which its relaxing and mingling. I'm highly looking forward to it. It's getting late so I better turn in. Hope everyone is doing well!

P.S. Kristen אני עדיין פה I'll try to let you figure that one out :-)

An Inauguration Overseas and Some Pretty Awesome Scenery

It's been pretty busy and low-key here these past few days so this entry about the inauguration is coming a bit late. We went over to the local student center which is right around the corner from the student village where I live to watch it. They had two tvs showing the CNN coverage of the inauguration. It was amazing to be surrounded by Americans...and some Canadians who had in interest in American politics... to watch what turned out to be a fantastic representation of, hopefully, the change to come. First off, Aretha Franklin singing was great, as was the quarter that played the piece composed by John Williams. Obama's speech was breathtaking, powerful, and everything that it needed to be- not to mention the shema made it into the speech somehow! There's something about the way he speaks, the way he pronounces every word, the emotion he evokes when he talks. He is not over the top, nor does he take what he says lightly. He says everything with vibrance and strength and I am greatly looking forward to what is to come for the US in the next few months. I haven't been checking up on the daily news but probably should get accustomed to browsing through NYt.com if I have any hope of really knowing what's going on. I'm also not quite up to speed with what's going on here, but the last time I heard, the soldiers in Gaza had pulled out to just surrounding the borders and there had been no fire back and forth. Hopefully this will keep up as I want to travel to the south to visit friends and because there are some pretty great places in Israel that around Gaza and further south from Gaza.

Yesterday two friends of mine and I ended up in downtown Jerusalem hoping to join the practical tour that had been filled, but we ended up doing our own thing and just wandering around Ben Yehuda street, walking all the way to where we could see the temple mount and the old city, then all the way towards Talpiot and Emek Refaim. We were probably out for about 3 hours or so but it was a great experience just wandering around, finding some of the cool hidden shops, eating amazing crepes, and getting a sense of where I am in relation to everywhere else. We stumbled upon an old Russian church by the police station that was unfortunately closed, but looked as if the architecture inside was promising. We also ended up finding a playground and a great park/sculpture park with a few basketball courts, soccer "courts", shesh besh tables (which is like backgammon), an amphitheater, and a great sculpture of a half-submerged alligator with half of its snout and head, back, and feet coming out of the ground. Definitely a place worth returning to, that is if I can find it again. After coming back last night, I made some food with a friend, throwing together what we had and producing a random assortment of foods to munch on. Tonight we're going out to celebrate a friend's 21st birthday and tomorrow to celebrate another (both are on the same day but we're celebrating one as it turns to Friday and the other one tomorrow evening). Emily, whose birthday we're celebrating tomorrow night, and I are getting together with a lot of our Israeli friends from camp, which is really exciting because I haven't seen a lot of them for a year or two. Tomorrow we're going back to the shuk for our weekly shopping trip which I desperately need. My pita molded after a few days so perhaps I'll buy less this time but I think I might buy some meat and Josh, a friend of mine, and I are going in together to buy sweet potatoes for sweet potatoe fries and the big cartons of eggs that they sell- I think about 36 for 22 shekels (equivalent to about $5.70)- because everything is cheaper on Friday at the shuk right before Shabbat starts.
Here are a few pictures that I've taken in the past couple of days. I keep forgetting to take my camera places but I assure you all there will be more pictures to come in the future. Hope everyone is well! If any of you have skype (and if you don't you should get it!) search for me and we should skype some time :-). Until next time!

P.S. Kristen I'm still alive :-)
The view from my apartment window

A few pictures from my walk around campus with my friend Josh today. Great weather, clear blue skies...

Another Chilly Day in Jerusalem

I'm starting to feel as if I'm getting the hang of things around here. I'm slowly getting acquainted with my surroundings, how to get places, where I am physically in East Jerusalem. I started ulpan this morning bright and early at 8:15, but got up an hour earlier to make sure I was on time. It wasn't as hard as I thought it would be to force myself to get up that early, but I was definitely tired walking to class. It doesn't really feel as if I'm a college student here. It's more like I'm on a vacation, hanging out with college kids my own age, and taking hebrew classes a few days a week... that is until real classes start the 3rd week of February.
It's been pretty chilly here, probably around the lower to mid fifties, maybe hitting 60 a couple of times. At least it's warmer than home. On Shabbat we went to the Regency hotel for dinner which was nice but nothing spectacular. I think I'm either going to be travelling on most fridays or exploring different Shabbat opportunities around Jerusalem but also with friends who are in Israel. I've also decided to take every opportunity I'm offered to travel somewhere. So far I've signed up for a ski trip in February on Mt. Hermon in the very north of Israel, despite my dislike for skiing. Bunny slopes here I come! I've also planned to do a sea to sea hike some time in the future, travel to Tel Aviv, and get to Haifa by doing couch surfing. I've got an amazing country at my fingertips and definitely don't want its resources to go to waste. For the time being though I've just been getting acclimated, going, playing a lot of card games with some pretty great people, and getting excited for when I can travel.
Hope all is well in the states. Let me know how you guys are doing! :-)

P.S. Kristen I'm still alive

It's only been 48 hours?

It's still hard to realize I've only been in Israel for about two days. The first flight I took from Newark to London was fine, but when I arrived in London everything began to fall apart. We were delayed a bit in landing because the whole ground was covered in fog. It was gorgeous to look at from the sky but it made what followed extremely aggravating. I followed the signs in Heathrow to transfers for Virgin Atlantic (what I had flown to London) and when I got there and tried to get my boarding pass, I was told that Virgin doesn't fly to Tel Aviv and that I was actually taking a bmi plane (British Midland International) which was one of their associate airlines, so I had to take a bus all the way from terminal three to one. The first trip wasn't so bad but when I got to the bmi desk, they told me that Virgin had canceled my reservation and I wasn't even in the system. They informed me there was nothing they could do about it because I had been booked through Virgin so I needed to go back to Virgin and have them fix it. By this time I was getting pretty frustrated not to mention I was exhausted from jetlag and just wanted to be on my plane. It's pretty annoying going through security each time and having to take my shoes off, unload everything, wait in line, and put everything back on. When I approached the woman at Virgin again and told her what bmi had told me, she looked in the system, made a few phone calls, and it turned out I was still reserved to fly and she told me to hurry as fast as I could to get back to the other terminal. Trip number four was the worst. By the time I got back to the bmi counter I just wanted to be done with the running around. I relayed the information and the woman still told me my reservation was canceled but I pushed further and told her that someone from the Virgin desk had just called. After about 10 minutes of her speaking to someone in the back, she returned with a boarding pass, proceeded to give me a 5 pound food voucher, and told me the plane was delayed until 3 from 11:55. I ended up picking a spot on the benches in the main area with the gate board and fell asleep for about an hour and a half. By the time I had woken up, my gate was posted so I picked up my food and headed to the gate. Long story short, the plane was extremely delayed and we ended up not taking off until about 4:30 London time, which got me in around 11 pm Israel time. The pilot told us the reason for the delay was both the fog and the fact that the plane had been delayed in Tel Aviv before and they needed to do 2 1/2 hours of ground work before they could let us fly. Rumors were flying around that the original pilot hadn't wanted to fly the plane so we were wasting time waiting for a new one. It all seemed a bit fishy to me but it was nice to be on the plane and finally on my way. I ended up sitting near someone who was going on the program as well, from Muhlenberg (Joe if you're reading this his name is Ira and apparently he once called you for help on a paper) and a student from London who missed going to his cousin's wedding because of the delay. The flight was uneventful except for the fact that my tv screen didn't work so I ended up finishing the Nicholas Sparks novel I picked out to read on the plane. I snoozed for a bit but woke up as we were ascending into Tel Aviv. Flying into any city at night is beautiful and it was particularly breathtaking because we had just been flying over water so the view from my window went from complete darkness to the twinkling lights of Tel Aviv. (fuzzy but still cool) The next thing to go wrong, which I should have seen coming, was that only one of my bags had made it to Tel Aviv and it wasn't the one with all of my clothes. I filed a report with the lost baggage claim and took a Shirut to the student village (kfar studentim) where I met up with a friend of a friend of mine who had been here last semester. By that time I was completely out of it, angry about my luggage, and just wanted to go to sleep. That was two days ago. Yesterday I got up pretty early to walk with her to the campus so I could find my own way later on and registered, came back to the kfar studentim to get my room. Yesterday was great. I met a ton of people who have connections to people I know and most of them have been from New Jersey (go figure that's who I end up hanging out with). Last night we went to downtown Jerusalem to a bar and a dance club with Shoshi (the girl who I stayed with who has been here for a semester already) leading the way. It was nice because the bar wasn't full of Americans. I found it interesting that they served chickpeas instead of salty peanuts but other than that it was great. We stayed out pretty late and I was woken up this morning by a phone call from the airport saying that my bag had come on the next flight from London to Tel Aviv and the driver would drop it off. It came about about 11:15, perfect timing before Shabbat, because everything stops running at around 2-3. A group of us went to the Shuk today (Mahaneh Yehudah) to buy groceries because it's the cheapest place in the area. It's such a fascinating alley to wander down. You have store owners yelling at you from all directions trying to get you to buy what they have. Everything is cheaper on Fridays right before Shabbat because they want to get rid of what they have before things close down. There was everything from towels, pots and pans, dried fruits of all sorts, nuts, cheese, hummus, pita, fruits and vegetables, chocolates, candies, you name it they had it. On the way back to the bus stop we stopped by the famous Marzapan place that has the best chocolate ruggelah in town. Since we got back I've just unpacked and been lounging around becuase it's pretty chilly and dreary out. Tonight we're going to the Regency hotel for Shabbat dinner which I'm looking forward too. Over the course of the past two days, I've also found a bunch of other people interested in playing Ultimate while they're here which makes me happy to know I'm not the only one. We'll see how that ends up turning out. For now that's all. Shabbat Shalom.

P.S. Kristen, I'm still alive :-)

Peace in the Middle East Through Ultimate Frisbee

My trip to Israel just got a little more exciting. I recently found out through a friend about a program called Ultimate Peace that's going to hold it's first major event in Tel Aviv in April of this year. I got in contact with the woman who is helping to facilitate the program and it looks like I'm going to be able to help out by getting sponsors, maybe assisting with coaches, and even getting a chance to play in the HAT tournament with some of the best players in the world. I don't know how well I match up to them, but even if I don't play, I'm definitely going to go watch. According to their website, http://www.ultimatepeace.org/about/, their mission is to build bridges of friendship, understanding and fun for youth from different social and cultural backgrounds around the world. What an incredible opportunity for Palestinian and Israeli youth to be able to play not just any game together, but a game that is built on principles of Spirit of the Game, where each and every player is a referee and is responsible for maintaining the true spirit of frisbee on the field. It's like a microcosm of the world right on the field, but instead of using weapons and throwing words of hate back and forth across battle lines, words are used to work things out and the game goes on. I'm really excited Ezra told me about this because I think it's going to make my experience that much more interesting now that I have something to work on and really look forward to while I'm there.
I still haven't begun packing yet and it's getting close to departure time. Knowing my luck, the weather tomorrow is going to delay my flight and I'll miss my connecting flight. Ah well, such is life. I'll just hope for the best and whatever happens happens.

4 Days and Counting

And thus begins my journey into the world of blogging. One of the few things I took away with me from the information session Hebrew University held in NYC was to document my trip, whether it be through a journal, blog, or photographs... so here it is. A blog. About my 4 1/2 month trip of a lifetime to Jerusalem. Not much to detail now. I leave on Tuesday the 13th at about 6 pm and will be crashing at a friend of a friend's in the student village. Then I get to find my own way to registration the next day and thus will begin my semester abroad. I must say, I'm pretty excited to leave and know I will enjoy every moment of my trip. Especially when babka will be involved.