highlights

I always have such good intentions of updating more often, but then life seems to get in the way. So here goes…

In last week’s trip, I think I skipped over my Hebrew field trip. Last Sunday, we went to the Hebrew Language Academy, which is basically what it sounds like. They make up new Hebrew words. The process is actually interesting if you’re a language geek; they often take words from the Bible and adapt them to a modern use. The word for “electricity” is from a biblical word that appears once or twice and refers to some sort of bizarre fire. They also try to come up with new words to replace the foreign (read: English) words that keep creeping into the language, mainly in technology, but a little bit of everywhere. “Zeh lo beeg deel” is one of our favorite “Hebrew” phrases. (Zeh lo = It’s no. Read it out loud.) I think the most interesting part of the visit was that I understood most of what the speaker was talking about. Yay me!

We went to the Ethiopian immigrant absorption center again (every Tuesday), and had another fun evening with our family. This week, Karen and I brought a bunch of coloring pages that I had printed from the internet (and some blank paper), crayons, and markers. We did have some other backup activities, but we really didn’t need them. The kids were thrilled to color for an hour and a half! The oldest child (the 11-year-old) didn’t arrive home until toward the end of our visit, so we just had the younger four. In talking to them, it became clear that while the oldest’s Hebrew is decent, the rest of them have a long way to go. (Well, the 2-year-old has a really long way. She hardly talks at all.) But we communicated effectively, and since I could name all of the marker colors except two, I promised to learn pink and orange by this week. It was a lot of fun, and I’m thrilled that I’m really looking forward to the project every week!

This past Wednesday, I got to meet up with Rabbi Luxemburg for a few hours! It was great to see such a friendly face from home. We had hot chocolate with another rabbi-friend of his, and then went to meet the rest of their group for dinner and a speaker. The food was delicious, and the night was definitely really interesting. The room was me and 20 rabbis. The speaker was talking about strengthening connections between Israeli Jews and American Jews, except that the path his organization had chosen to take to do this strengthening was through facilitating American Jews getting married in Israel. It’s a great idea, except that…only Orthodox Jews can get married in Israel. So it’s outreach, but to a very specific subgroup. It definitely sparked some interesting discussion among the rabbis from Orthodox, Conservative, Reform, and Reconstructionist Judaism. I sat quietly and took it all in and actually really enjoyed talking to the people who were sitting around me.

On Friday afternoon, I had an incredibly interesting experience. One of my classmates has a Palestinian family friend, and he stayed in the friend’s guest house for the first six weeks he was here. This friend, Ibrahim, is a Moslem who wants nothing more than peace, and he has basically devoted his retired life to making peace just through relationships. He invited the HUC class to his house for lunch on Friday. About 35 of us went. We first arrived on the Mount of Olives at an overlook. The Mount of Olives is definitely part of East Jerusalem which is the part of the city where the Arabs live; Jerusalem is incredibly segregated. It also is above the Old City, with an amazing view of what was the Temple Mount, and is now home to two sacred Islamic mosques, Al Aqsa and the Dome of the Rock. The view is breathtaking, and as soon as my friends post pictures, I will take them and post them as well. (I forgot my camera…) From the overlook we went a short distance to Ibrahim’s house. His family has lived on the Mount of Olives for 1400 years, and he operates a guest house next to his home, where he welcomes people of all religions to stay, and that’s where we had lunch. He talked to us about some of the amazing experiences he has had, the people he has met, and his dream of peace. He told us how he is not a citizen of any country, because Israel does not grant citizenship to those living in East Jerusalem (which was not part of Israel until 1967), but he has a travel permit of some kind and travels extensively. It’s an interesting issue that I don’t think any of us had ever really considered. He is generally not allowed into certain Arab countries, because he is traveling from Israel, even though he is Arab. Because of his type of travel permit and lack of passport and citizenship, if he stays outside of Israel for over a year, he is not allowed to return. He is not so happy about the situation; two of his (eight) children studied abroad and are no longer allowed to come home. I don’t know the answer; it’s pretty clear nobody has figured out a good one yet. In addition to all his talk of peace, though, we were allowed to ask him questions. We did notice that he did not directly answer them all. When questioned about how his neighbors felt about his multicultural visitors, he said his family supported his efforts fully, but he did not tell us how his neighbors felt. It got a little bit frustrating, but it was definitely worth the trip. Most of us realized only on the way home that while we have all learned about the Israeli-Palestinian conflict, we have not had much (or any) contact with any Palestinians. Now we have, and it was a little old man who wants nothing more than love and friendship and peace.

Shabbat evening, we were required to attend services at HUC, because a couple of students were leading services. Some people were not super-excited to have to break out of the usual Shabbat routine, but it was really nice. It was actually really nice to see the whole class together outside of school, dressed up nice and everything! And a lot of the professors, rabbis, and staff came as well, many of them with their families. I really enjoyed getting glimpses into their real, outside-of-HUC lives, and seeing that some of them have really adorable children! I was asked to lead Kiddush at the student potluck dinner afterwards. I had to finally learn the first paragraph that I always meant to learn but hadn’t gotten around to learning so well yet. I was sort of glad to have the excuse to finally learn it, but it is always intimidating to sing in front of a big group of people, especially the cantorial students and rabbinical students who sing really well! I got through it, and I am glad I finally had to put in the effort to learn it.

Saturday morning I got up early and went to services at Kol Haneshamah with a friend. I don’t always make it to services on Saturday mornings, because it’s often the only morning when I can sleep in. But I want to make an effort to get to services more often, and the potluck ended really early the night before, so I actually got ten hours of sleep even with getting up early to go to services! That was exciting for me. Obviously, I lead an exciting, although sleep deprived life.

Last night I went out with some friends to celebrate. One of my classmates, Cassi, got engaged over Sukkot, but her now-fiancé is not here for the year, he was just visiting. So a whole group of us who are involved in the long-distance thing took her out to dinner to celebrate! As part of the bargain, I got to try a new restaurant that turns out to be delicious and spend an evening with a fun group of girls!

Ira and Allison, congratulations!! I so much wish I could have been there to celebrate with you, and I can’t wait to hear about it and see pictures!
Becky, see how long you delayed me? This would have been posted before football started today otherwise. It was good to talk to you finally:)
Debbie, I’m still encouraging it. We’ll do fun things and eat good food and play!
Mom and Dad, thanks for sending the forms. All is here and turned in.
Alex, now that I know you’re reading, you get your own note! Which wouldn’t be complete without a woooooooooooosh!
Michael, let me know if there were any surprises. If there were, I’ll do better next time!

It's now cold and on-and-off rainy in Jerusalem. I miss the sun and flip-flops.

Also, it’s way past my bedtime. Goodnight!