Ulpan is over, and as of Thursday afternoon, I have been academically oriented for the year. And what a year it looks like it will be! I’m going to be pretty busy. We’re in class from 8:30 in the morning until 4:10 or 5:30 in the afternoon, depending on the day. We get 20 minute breaks between classes and just over an hour for lunch. I’ll be taking lots and lots of Hebrew (8 hours a week), plus Rabbinics, Liturgy, Biblical Grammar, Modern Jewish history, Rabbinic professional forum, and hopefully a class on Reform Judaism. Those classes are Sunday, Monday, Tuesday, and Thursday. All of those classes, except for History and one Rabbinics lecture, including the two other rabbinics classes, are conducted almost entirely in Hebrew. It should be interesting! Wednesdays we have an Israel seminar, which looks at Israeli society, I think through lots of trips and things, but I’ll let you know. It’s a good thing I have a week off before the year starts for real!
Earlier in the week, I got a special treat. A family friend was in town from London, and even though I had never met him before, Nigel wanted to meet me and take me and a friend to dinner! Mara and I were incredibly excited to visit this steakhouse that we had heard was amazing, but had yet visited. It was really fun to finally meet someone I have heard so much about, and we all had a really good time sitting and talking for a couple of hours, and eating some of the best food I have had since arriving in Jerusalem.
This was the last week of Hebrew. I had to do a presentation last week, and I talked about what my family does on snow days at home. My parents had sent me some pictures of Becky and Debbie and I playing in the snow lots of years ago, and I made chocolate chip cookies for the class, since after (or instead of) playing in the snow, we also always bake on snow days. The cookies were much appreciated, and hopefully they blocked out any bad memories of my Hebrew skills! I am starting to learn my Hebrew limitations, and I am trying to figure out ways to really work on it. Back in middle school, I did a science project on learning styles, and I learned that while most people have a preference for visual or auditory learning, they are fairly balanced between the two. I am almost completely visual. This means that while I can take a test and do very well on it, when I have to listen to a radio program in Hebrew or listen and respond to a supermarket clerk, I have a lot of trouble. So my friends assume that my Hebrew is really good, and the truth is that I have a lot of work to do. I am trying to find good ways to work on it, aside from being immersed in classes conducted in Hebrew for a lot of hours a day, without overwhelming myself too much. But first, I have a week in Spain!
For the last day of ulpan, HUC took us all to dinner. Rather than going somewhere in Jerusalem, we went to a restaurant about a half hour away (on private buses) that was attached to a spice farm. Yes, you read that right. Spice farms exist! Which is a weird concept, but it makes for some really delicious and (shockingly) flavorful food. Dinner was outstanding: they kept bringing out plates of food for the table, so we got to taste something like a dozen different dishes, just a few bites of each. Wow. I ate well this week!
I also led the optional morning services with a friend this week. We led Monday morning, which meant that there was also a full Torah service. It was really fun to be able to lead an entire Torah service, and feel like I knew what I was doing! (Yes, it was fun. And this is why I’m in rabbinic school.)
We are now in the middle of Rosh Chodesh, a celebration of the new month. I love that on the Hebrew calendar, there is a celebration for every single week (Shabbat) and every single month. It’s a great reminder that every single day is really special, and that all time can really be holy. (This rabbinic school moment brought to you by….) Because the Hebrew calendar goes on a lunar cycle, Rosh Chodesh is traditionally accompanied by women’s celebrations. A couple of girls in my class decided to organize one last night, and I am so glad that I went. We did actually talk about the holiday itself for a while, but we ended up just talking. About 10 of us were there, and it was not a group where everyone was really good friends with one another. Somehow, though, we ended up having some very personal, very open conversations for several hours. It was sort of amazing, and it felt so good to connect with people I had not talked to very much before.
A few hours after Shabbat, I am getting on an airport shuttle! I will be in Barcelona from Sunday until Friday morning, and I can’t wait! It does mean I won’t be updating for a week, but rest assured that when I return, there will be lots and lots of pictures and some fun stories to share. I’m posting some new and random pictures this afternoon as well. Should you feel the urge, even though I’m on email, it’s sort of like camp in at least one way: it’s really fun to get real-mail here. It’s easiest to get at HUC: 13 King David Street, 94101 Jerusalem, ISRAEL. Write Israel nice and big. I’ll try to write snail mail back, but ask Michael: I’m not very good at it. I’m a little slow, but I’ll get back to you eventually.
Have a wonderful week, and I’ll talk to you soon!
Friday, August 25, 2006
Saturday, August 19, 2006
Somehow, another long one
Another few days, and since it’s Shabbat today, I have some time to write another update. Last night was yet another somewhat different, but fun Shabbat experience. Someone in the class with an amazingly huge porch decided to host a big group for Shabbat, and also that instead of going to one of the zillions of synagogues around Jerusalem, we would have our own services. We all brought blankets and sat on the porch in a circle and had our own Shabbat service. It was so comforting and comfortable to have a service in the style many of us grew up with or went to camp with and is often hard to find in Jerusalem. After services, we stayed for dinner, picnic style on the porch. It was a really nice, laid back Shabbat evening.
Thursday we started to get slightly more of a feel for what the year will bring. Our actual academic orientation is next Thursday, before vacation, but this week we had some workshops. All morning we had a Reform Practices workshop. We were split into five groups and rotated around five stations. Unfortunately, each of the stations could have merited hours of study, and we got a very rushed 20 minutes. My group started with tallit, and while it had promise, including the ability to tie some tzitzit, we ran out of time very quickly, dwelling instead on how to put on a tallit, when to say the blessing, and interactions people have with their tallit during prayer service…all of which is printed in the bottom margin of the prayer book we use daily. The next station was about Aliyah, being called to the Torah. We learned the traditional phrasing used to call people to the Torah, and another version of the post-Torah-reading blessing. This one was possibly the only station where I thought they tried to give us the right amount of material for the amount of time we had. Our next stop was movement: standing, sitting, bowing during services. Again, there was not enough time to begin touching on the issues, so we discussed everything in a very superficial way: we were presented with the “correct” way to stand/sit/bow for about the first half of the service. We ran out of time before we got to the rest of the service, and there was no time to talk about alternative traditions or reasons behind anything. That was not exactly my favorite station. After that one, we moved to the tefillin room. I put on tefillin for the first time, which was an interesting experience, except that we did not have time to do anything more than put them on. We had no time to pray while wearing them, no time to discuss why they are worn, what’s inside the boxes, different traditions surrounding them, or anything else. It was interesting to wear them, if only for 3 or 4 minutes, but I have so many questions, and I really hope we return to the issue during the year. My final station was in the sanctuary, lifting and moving the Torah. Everyone in the group had to take a turn doing Hagbah, the lifting of the Torah scroll while it’s open. People who do it well make it look effortless, and have it open so that 3-5 columns of text are visible. I do not do it so well. Torahs are heavy. They are awkward when open. And when they are in Deuteronomy, as we are right now, they are very heavily weighted to the right arm, which is somewhat unfortunate for lefties like myself. But I did it! I had about a column in the middle and fractions of columns on both sides, I did a full circle, and I didn’t drop it. I’ll work on that. We also had to each take the Torah out of the ark, hold it, and put it back in. The challenge here is that the HUC ark is really high up. The ledge where the Torah scrolls sit is probably at or just above my shoulder height, which is not the easiest height at which to lift a heavy, awkwardly shaped object. The rabbi leading this station told us we had to lift and hold and return the Torah in a very particular, somewhat awkward manner, but it’s apparently what works for her. Many people struggled with her method. When it was my turn, I told her I was going to do it differently, because I’m left-handed and her method just was not going to work for me. I did it well! This is exciting.
After a lunch break, we had our Introduction to Reform Liturgy Workshop. Apparently during the year, we each have to lead one (1) service. A weekday morning Torah service. (Like the one I’m leading on Monday, except with more restrictions and a larger audience.) We lead with another rabbinic student and a cantorial student. (The cantorial students have to lead 3-4 times.) We also have to do one D’var Torah, giving an interpretation of the week’s portion. We have to chant or read Torah one time (over the summer and in optional services doesn’t count). We have to do Hagbah, lifting the Torah, one time. Many of us are a little surprised that these requirements are for only one time in the entire year, but we only have required weekday morning services once a week, which is when we all take turns doing these things. I plan to continue going to the optional services, which have an amazing community of people who are some of my closest friends here, are much looser about required melodies and things, and where I get many, many more opportunities to practice leading, chanting Torah, and participating with the community. I do plan to sign up for my Torah-lifting week though for sometime in February or March, when we should be right in the middle of the Torah and therefore have a more evenly weighted Torah. It also gives me a long time to make sure I can do it more effectively than I did on Thursday! In spite of my many complaints though, it was a very interesting day and I am looking forward to learning a lot this year.
Thursday night, I ended up hanging out with a great group of people, just walking around stores and going out for dessert. It was all people who I have spent fairly limited time with, and would love to hang out with more, because they’re all really fun and just great people. It was a very laidback night, but exactly what I needed and so much fun.
Friday’s lunch was another experience. A member of the Board of Directors from the LA campus was in Israel, and first said she was taking any LA-bound students to lunch, but then she amended that and said any interested students were welcome. Lunch was at the David Citadel hotel, probably the nicest hotel in Jerusalem. (Also, it’s where Condoleezza Rice stays when she’s here.) It’s next door to our campus. I think about two-thirds of the class showed up for lunch. It was amazing. Tables and tables of delicious buffets, with lots and lots of different options. So much delicious food. All greatly appreciated by 40 students.
Tomorrow I enter the final stretch of Ulpan: I have one week left, and then a week of vacation! In the last few weeks, many of us have gone to various student travel agencies and found package-deal vacations, where the price includes airfare and hotel and several hotel meals. There are groups going to Turkey, Cos (Greece), Rhodes (Greece), and I’m going with a group of friends to Barcelona. I’m very excited to see the city, lay on the beach, sleep a lot, and spend some time outside of Jerusalem. Because while it’s a great place, I’m ready for a vacation. One more week to go!
On a personal note…
Lisa: I am the tallest in the apartment, but I was wearing little (one-inch) heels in that picture. We’re not a tall bunch. We are a curly bunch. Good company for me.
NFTY MAR Crew: Have so much fun at Summer Kallah! I’ll miss you guys a ton and I’ll be thinking of you. Hugs to my Beasty kids for me, and feel free to call my Skype number and leave messages:)
Grandma: I hope you had a great trip to New York. I’m looking forward to hearing about Becky’s new place!
Becky, Debbie, Lev: Thanks for the article (twice) and voicemail. Did you think of anything? Keep trying, eventually I'll be here when you call:)
Michael: The flowers are gorgeous. Thank you thank you thank you! October isn’t so far away.
Mom: HAPPY BIRTHDAY! Have an extra piece of cake for me.
I’m forgetting lots of people. Email me and I’ll give you a note next time:)
Thursday we started to get slightly more of a feel for what the year will bring. Our actual academic orientation is next Thursday, before vacation, but this week we had some workshops. All morning we had a Reform Practices workshop. We were split into five groups and rotated around five stations. Unfortunately, each of the stations could have merited hours of study, and we got a very rushed 20 minutes. My group started with tallit, and while it had promise, including the ability to tie some tzitzit, we ran out of time very quickly, dwelling instead on how to put on a tallit, when to say the blessing, and interactions people have with their tallit during prayer service…all of which is printed in the bottom margin of the prayer book we use daily. The next station was about Aliyah, being called to the Torah. We learned the traditional phrasing used to call people to the Torah, and another version of the post-Torah-reading blessing. This one was possibly the only station where I thought they tried to give us the right amount of material for the amount of time we had. Our next stop was movement: standing, sitting, bowing during services. Again, there was not enough time to begin touching on the issues, so we discussed everything in a very superficial way: we were presented with the “correct” way to stand/sit/bow for about the first half of the service. We ran out of time before we got to the rest of the service, and there was no time to talk about alternative traditions or reasons behind anything. That was not exactly my favorite station. After that one, we moved to the tefillin room. I put on tefillin for the first time, which was an interesting experience, except that we did not have time to do anything more than put them on. We had no time to pray while wearing them, no time to discuss why they are worn, what’s inside the boxes, different traditions surrounding them, or anything else. It was interesting to wear them, if only for 3 or 4 minutes, but I have so many questions, and I really hope we return to the issue during the year. My final station was in the sanctuary, lifting and moving the Torah. Everyone in the group had to take a turn doing Hagbah, the lifting of the Torah scroll while it’s open. People who do it well make it look effortless, and have it open so that 3-5 columns of text are visible. I do not do it so well. Torahs are heavy. They are awkward when open. And when they are in Deuteronomy, as we are right now, they are very heavily weighted to the right arm, which is somewhat unfortunate for lefties like myself. But I did it! I had about a column in the middle and fractions of columns on both sides, I did a full circle, and I didn’t drop it. I’ll work on that. We also had to each take the Torah out of the ark, hold it, and put it back in. The challenge here is that the HUC ark is really high up. The ledge where the Torah scrolls sit is probably at or just above my shoulder height, which is not the easiest height at which to lift a heavy, awkwardly shaped object. The rabbi leading this station told us we had to lift and hold and return the Torah in a very particular, somewhat awkward manner, but it’s apparently what works for her. Many people struggled with her method. When it was my turn, I told her I was going to do it differently, because I’m left-handed and her method just was not going to work for me. I did it well! This is exciting.
After a lunch break, we had our Introduction to Reform Liturgy Workshop. Apparently during the year, we each have to lead one (1) service. A weekday morning Torah service. (Like the one I’m leading on Monday, except with more restrictions and a larger audience.) We lead with another rabbinic student and a cantorial student. (The cantorial students have to lead 3-4 times.) We also have to do one D’var Torah, giving an interpretation of the week’s portion. We have to chant or read Torah one time (over the summer and in optional services doesn’t count). We have to do Hagbah, lifting the Torah, one time. Many of us are a little surprised that these requirements are for only one time in the entire year, but we only have required weekday morning services once a week, which is when we all take turns doing these things. I plan to continue going to the optional services, which have an amazing community of people who are some of my closest friends here, are much looser about required melodies and things, and where I get many, many more opportunities to practice leading, chanting Torah, and participating with the community. I do plan to sign up for my Torah-lifting week though for sometime in February or March, when we should be right in the middle of the Torah and therefore have a more evenly weighted Torah. It also gives me a long time to make sure I can do it more effectively than I did on Thursday! In spite of my many complaints though, it was a very interesting day and I am looking forward to learning a lot this year.
Thursday night, I ended up hanging out with a great group of people, just walking around stores and going out for dessert. It was all people who I have spent fairly limited time with, and would love to hang out with more, because they’re all really fun and just great people. It was a very laidback night, but exactly what I needed and so much fun.
Friday’s lunch was another experience. A member of the Board of Directors from the LA campus was in Israel, and first said she was taking any LA-bound students to lunch, but then she amended that and said any interested students were welcome. Lunch was at the David Citadel hotel, probably the nicest hotel in Jerusalem. (Also, it’s where Condoleezza Rice stays when she’s here.) It’s next door to our campus. I think about two-thirds of the class showed up for lunch. It was amazing. Tables and tables of delicious buffets, with lots and lots of different options. So much delicious food. All greatly appreciated by 40 students.
Tomorrow I enter the final stretch of Ulpan: I have one week left, and then a week of vacation! In the last few weeks, many of us have gone to various student travel agencies and found package-deal vacations, where the price includes airfare and hotel and several hotel meals. There are groups going to Turkey, Cos (Greece), Rhodes (Greece), and I’m going with a group of friends to Barcelona. I’m very excited to see the city, lay on the beach, sleep a lot, and spend some time outside of Jerusalem. Because while it’s a great place, I’m ready for a vacation. One more week to go!
On a personal note…
Lisa: I am the tallest in the apartment, but I was wearing little (one-inch) heels in that picture. We’re not a tall bunch. We are a curly bunch. Good company for me.
NFTY MAR Crew: Have so much fun at Summer Kallah! I’ll miss you guys a ton and I’ll be thinking of you. Hugs to my Beasty kids for me, and feel free to call my Skype number and leave messages:)
Grandma: I hope you had a great trip to New York. I’m looking forward to hearing about Becky’s new place!
Becky, Debbie, Lev: Thanks for the article (twice) and voicemail. Did you think of anything? Keep trying, eventually I'll be here when you call:)
Michael: The flowers are gorgeous. Thank you thank you thank you! October isn’t so far away.
Mom: HAPPY BIRTHDAY! Have an extra piece of cake for me.
I’m forgetting lots of people. Email me and I’ll give you a note next time:)
Wednesday, August 16, 2006
Highlights
It’s been a really long time since I posted anything! See if you can understand that as a good thing, like when you didn’t get letters from camp (mom) and saw that as a sign that I was busy and having fun.
I’ve been busy and having fun! I don’t think I could even remember everything that’s gone on the last week and a half, nor would you want to read about it. Some highlights:
1. Our “Jerusalem Days” program last Thursday was in the Old City. We were right next to the Kotel, at the southern retaining wall excavations for much of the day. (The Kotel is the western retaining wall, more of a prayer site simply because it was closer to the Holy of Holies in the Temple.) Some of my recently posted pictures are from this day. The new (long) skirt I bought the day before was great and I love it, but the dye is less than permanent, and my legs were very blue by the end of the day. It was impressive. In the late afternoon, we also walked through the Western Wall tunnels, which are currently under the Arab quarter, but run next to currently-buried parts of the Western Wall that have been excavated. In spite of my not-love for tunnels, it was an interesting place to be. There were even people sitting and reciting psalms at the place believed to be the closest point to the Holy of Holies. When we emerged from the tunnel and made it back to the Kotel, we were surprised to see a very interesting sight: approximately zillions of Chasidic Jews, in their black suits and black hats, praying very loudly at the wall. It was war-related, but our professor couldn’t enlighten us more than that. It was a very long, but looking back, very interesting day.
2. I was chopping vegetables all day Friday, and couldn’t possibly be ready in time for services at HUC where most of my friends were going. So I called my friend Rebecca and asked her to let me know when services were over, and I’d head to dinner then. Instead, I got a call from her about 45 minutes into services, telling me that she hadn’t gone either. She came over with her guitar, and the two of us had a service in my bedroom. It was beautiful. We enjoyed each other’s company and voices, picked our melodies, prayed at our own pace, and really welcomed Shabbat. (Also: our service ran about a half hour, with some singing afterwards. The HUC service went about 2 hours.) Her roommate called us after the other service, and we went to meet the group. Someone in the class had decided that a progressive dinner would be fun, so we went over to house number one. Somewhere between 40 and 50 people participated, and we stopped at 6 different houses. The apartments in Jerusalem mostly don’t have elevators. It was a LOT of stairs by the end of the night! My house was stop number 3, salads. (Before were the Kiddush/Hamotzi house and the appetizer house. After us were the main course house, dessert house, and hang out house.) My roommates and I put together about 7 different salads. I made a delicious bean salad and an Israeli salad—hence the chopping. The food all night was great, and while many of us were nervous about the logistics of moving that many people so many times, it went really smoothly. We sang Shabbat songs as we walked from house to house and had a wonderful time.
3. I am a fan of cease-fire, and I hope it holds. War is no fun. Even though I am not near it.
4. I led (optional) Shacharit services with Rebecca. I’ve been going to the optional services most mornings, mostly because I love them. It’s a great community of about 15 regulars plus some people who come sometimes, and I have really been enjoying it at the beginning of my day. It’s all student led, at least for the summer, so I decided I should take a turn, and we led one. On Monday another friend and I are in charge, and that one has a Torah service as well, which is a part of a service I have never led. Now seems like a good time to start!
5. I got a Hebrew test back on Sunday and did really well on it. That was exciting! I tend to get frustrated a lot during class, because the oral part of Hebrew is really difficult for me, but I do very well with homework, reading, and writing. My teacher promises me it all balances out, and it does seem to, so I just have to keep reminding myself that I’m doing fine, and go over things again at home. I love that I am capable of reading stories (ok, page-long stories) in Hebrew and discussing them!
6. I crashed boys-night yesterday afternoon. (It was a boys’ night, but given our schedule, it was late afternoon so we could get to an evening program.) A couple of my friends found a (kosher!) restaurant with an all-you-can-eat meat special. The lunch special is fairly reasonable (although the dinner one, less so). Basically, you get six different courses of meat: chicken wings, chorizo sausage (except, kosher), turkey, empanadas, entrecote steak, and roast beef. They bring out small amounts of each one, one at a time, to ensure that you get to taste everything. (Also, the pace makes sure you fill up, because there’s a good amount of waiting time.) After you’ve had some of everything, they’ll bring more of anything and everything that you want. A group of guys decided it would be a lot of fun, but I was sitting there at the time, and I was invited as well. It eventually became a boys’ night activity, but I was already invited, so I crashed the party. I kept pace with them pretty well! Apparently they were impressed with my meat-eating abilities. It was a lot of fun, and then we all more or less rolled into our program. I’m working on finding a group of girls who would go back with me eventually.
7. Herb and Karen: Mazel Tov!! He’s adorable:)
That’s about all I can think of right now. It’s been a long week! I will update again soon, for real this time! There are also some new-ish pictures on my Flicker site, which will probably make more sense now that I’ve told you where I’ve been. Most of them are from the night of the progressive dinner. (Mom, Dad, Debbie, Michael: I know you’ve seen them already. I’ll work on taking more!)
I’ve been busy and having fun! I don’t think I could even remember everything that’s gone on the last week and a half, nor would you want to read about it. Some highlights:
1. Our “Jerusalem Days” program last Thursday was in the Old City. We were right next to the Kotel, at the southern retaining wall excavations for much of the day. (The Kotel is the western retaining wall, more of a prayer site simply because it was closer to the Holy of Holies in the Temple.) Some of my recently posted pictures are from this day. The new (long) skirt I bought the day before was great and I love it, but the dye is less than permanent, and my legs were very blue by the end of the day. It was impressive. In the late afternoon, we also walked through the Western Wall tunnels, which are currently under the Arab quarter, but run next to currently-buried parts of the Western Wall that have been excavated. In spite of my not-love for tunnels, it was an interesting place to be. There were even people sitting and reciting psalms at the place believed to be the closest point to the Holy of Holies. When we emerged from the tunnel and made it back to the Kotel, we were surprised to see a very interesting sight: approximately zillions of Chasidic Jews, in their black suits and black hats, praying very loudly at the wall. It was war-related, but our professor couldn’t enlighten us more than that. It was a very long, but looking back, very interesting day.
2. I was chopping vegetables all day Friday, and couldn’t possibly be ready in time for services at HUC where most of my friends were going. So I called my friend Rebecca and asked her to let me know when services were over, and I’d head to dinner then. Instead, I got a call from her about 45 minutes into services, telling me that she hadn’t gone either. She came over with her guitar, and the two of us had a service in my bedroom. It was beautiful. We enjoyed each other’s company and voices, picked our melodies, prayed at our own pace, and really welcomed Shabbat. (Also: our service ran about a half hour, with some singing afterwards. The HUC service went about 2 hours.) Her roommate called us after the other service, and we went to meet the group. Someone in the class had decided that a progressive dinner would be fun, so we went over to house number one. Somewhere between 40 and 50 people participated, and we stopped at 6 different houses. The apartments in Jerusalem mostly don’t have elevators. It was a LOT of stairs by the end of the night! My house was stop number 3, salads. (Before were the Kiddush/Hamotzi house and the appetizer house. After us were the main course house, dessert house, and hang out house.) My roommates and I put together about 7 different salads. I made a delicious bean salad and an Israeli salad—hence the chopping. The food all night was great, and while many of us were nervous about the logistics of moving that many people so many times, it went really smoothly. We sang Shabbat songs as we walked from house to house and had a wonderful time.
3. I am a fan of cease-fire, and I hope it holds. War is no fun. Even though I am not near it.
4. I led (optional) Shacharit services with Rebecca. I’ve been going to the optional services most mornings, mostly because I love them. It’s a great community of about 15 regulars plus some people who come sometimes, and I have really been enjoying it at the beginning of my day. It’s all student led, at least for the summer, so I decided I should take a turn, and we led one. On Monday another friend and I are in charge, and that one has a Torah service as well, which is a part of a service I have never led. Now seems like a good time to start!
5. I got a Hebrew test back on Sunday and did really well on it. That was exciting! I tend to get frustrated a lot during class, because the oral part of Hebrew is really difficult for me, but I do very well with homework, reading, and writing. My teacher promises me it all balances out, and it does seem to, so I just have to keep reminding myself that I’m doing fine, and go over things again at home. I love that I am capable of reading stories (ok, page-long stories) in Hebrew and discussing them!
6. I crashed boys-night yesterday afternoon. (It was a boys’ night, but given our schedule, it was late afternoon so we could get to an evening program.) A couple of my friends found a (kosher!) restaurant with an all-you-can-eat meat special. The lunch special is fairly reasonable (although the dinner one, less so). Basically, you get six different courses of meat: chicken wings, chorizo sausage (except, kosher), turkey, empanadas, entrecote steak, and roast beef. They bring out small amounts of each one, one at a time, to ensure that you get to taste everything. (Also, the pace makes sure you fill up, because there’s a good amount of waiting time.) After you’ve had some of everything, they’ll bring more of anything and everything that you want. A group of guys decided it would be a lot of fun, but I was sitting there at the time, and I was invited as well. It eventually became a boys’ night activity, but I was already invited, so I crashed the party. I kept pace with them pretty well! Apparently they were impressed with my meat-eating abilities. It was a lot of fun, and then we all more or less rolled into our program. I’m working on finding a group of girls who would go back with me eventually.
7. Herb and Karen: Mazel Tov!! He’s adorable:)
That’s about all I can think of right now. It’s been a long week! I will update again soon, for real this time! There are also some new-ish pictures on my Flicker site, which will probably make more sense now that I’ve told you where I’ve been. Most of them are from the night of the progressive dinner. (Mom, Dad, Debbie, Michael: I know you’ve seen them already. I’ll work on taking more!)
Saturday, August 05, 2006
at the Kotel
It’s been a busy few days, but I guess I should be used to that by now.
Wednesday night started Tisha B’Av. I decided I would get more out of the day if I didn’t fast, so I ate less, and more boring food than usual, but I did eat. The class met in a garden behind HUC for a service by candlelight (and later in the service, by flashlight light). It was a beautiful service, with some nice, sad melodies, some chanting of Eicha, the book of Lamentations, traditionally read on Tisha B’Av. Possibly the most amazing part of the service was that from our seats on the grass, we could see, all lit up, the walls of the Old City of Jerusalem. So during our service commemorating the destruction of the Temple and the city of Jerusalem, we could see its walls, alive and well.
After the service, we screened a movie put together locally about a family member of hers who is a Holocaust survivor. The movie was about his story and the family’s trip back to his hometown. It was a fascinating story, as they all tend to be, and then we had a long discussion about whether commemoration of the Holocaust belongs with Tisha B’Av or where it is, on its own separate holiday.
By this point in the night, it was about 11:00, and the most moving part of the night was still to come. This was the end of the required portion of the evening, but an HUC professor was going to walk into the Old City, to the Kotel, with whoever wanted to come. A good half the class went along, myself included. When we got near the gates to the Old City, traffic increased. It was crowded. We sat down on benches just outside a gate and learned a beautiful tune to the Hebrew words of “On the shores of Babylon.” We just sat there singing for a few minutes, with lots of people streaming past us into the walls. Eventually we went within the walls, but rather than take the direct route to the Kotel, he walked us around a much emptier route, along the walls, past some modern day playgrounds and basketball courts, to show us how alive and vibrant the city is right now.
We got to the Kotel area, and it was PACKED. It was a bit frightening how thick the crowds were to just get through the tight security—metal detectors—to get into the Kotel plaza. Even the metal detectors are separated by gender, although everyone comes back together as soon as they are through security. A friend and I stuck together to try to get up to the wall itself, which was not an easy task. Tradition teaches that both the first and second Temples were destroyed on Tisha B’Av, and the Kotel, a piece of the western retaining wall, is all that is left of the Temple. As a result, it is packed on this holiday, and many people spend all night there, so even at midnight, there were so many people, some standing, some sitting, and a few already laying down. These human obstacles made it far more complicated to get all the way up to the wall, as did another tradition, not to turn one’s back to the wall. Because of this tradition, many people back away from the wall. On Tisha B’Av, this is not a good idea. There are so many people trying to go towards it, so many people backing away from it, and so many people sitting on the ground. It makes for an interesting environment for sure. My friend Rebecca and I eventually got up through the crowd to the wall itself, but once up there, we were basically pushed against it, so I got up close and personal with the wall. It was really nice. I hadn’t been there for nine years, since I went on my NFTY trip, and I was almost surprised at how moved I was to be there and to be connected to so much history and so many people who had been there before me and would be there after me. I thoroughly enjoyed my few minutes at the wall, and I also was not looking forward to getting back out through the crowd! Once I did, we met up with a small group of friends, and chose to stay longer and study rather than heading back with the rest of the HUC group. Six of us had a copy of the Tanakh and read through all of Lamentations in English, stopping every few sentences to discuss it and comment on things and just talk about the text. It was great. We were surrounded by so many people doing more or less the same thing, and it was so wonderful to be with other people in my class who just wanted to learn for the sake of learning. I look forward to many such experiences in the future. I finally got home around 1:30 in the morning and collapsed into bed.
On Thursday, we did not have to be at school until noon, which was generous of them after the late night. We did group text study of some stories about Tisha B’Av, and had an afternoon service, and then a break before we met up at the Israel Museum that evening. Behind the Israel Museum is a model of Jerusalem in the time of the second Temple. It is a huge model put together with a combination of textual sources and archeological finds, and we studied second Temple Jerusalem while looking at the model of what it might have looked like. Some friends and I took a loooooooong walk home (it would have been shorter, but we took a “shortcut” hoping to find restaurants sooner, and instead we found ourselves very far away from home), got some falafel, and went to hang out and play cards.
Friday was a day of errands and cooking, as it usually is. The biggest challenge was baking brownies. It turns out that unsweetened chocolate is not available in Israel. So in addition to figuring out how much butter to use from my 200 gram block, I had to figure out how to convert a recipe with unsweetened chocolate to one with sweetened chocolate. I did a good job, and they were delicious! Friday evening, some friends and I went to check out a synagogue that none of us had been to yet. It is a Reform (“Progressive”) synagogue, but I was a little skeptical, since I haven’t really loved services at the other local Progressive synagogue. This one was actually great. The congregation skewed somewhat older, which was interesting, but the service itself felt very homey and very comfortable. The cantor had a guitar, many of the melodies were familiar, and the service included the very long Kabbalat Shabbat service that I have grown to love here. The cantor even stopped us on our way out to ask where we were from, since he had noticed a whole group of us sitting together. I am sure I will be returning there again!
Today (Saturday) someone in the class had volunteered to host a Shabbat potluck lunch, so I was at their apartment for a few hours enjoying that many of my classmates seem to be great cooks. I relaxed for the rest of the afternoon, alternately reading a book and dozing off on my bed. It was nice to not have to do anything else! This evening we had a group Havdalah service, which I enjoyed, and an impromptu song session in the park, which was fun and made us all feel like we were back in NFTY again. Then it was back to the grind, and home to do Hebrew homework and get ready for the week.
I haven’t taken many pictures recently, but as I take them from friends’ websites, I will post them on flikr. Talk to you soon!
Wednesday night started Tisha B’Av. I decided I would get more out of the day if I didn’t fast, so I ate less, and more boring food than usual, but I did eat. The class met in a garden behind HUC for a service by candlelight (and later in the service, by flashlight light). It was a beautiful service, with some nice, sad melodies, some chanting of Eicha, the book of Lamentations, traditionally read on Tisha B’Av. Possibly the most amazing part of the service was that from our seats on the grass, we could see, all lit up, the walls of the Old City of Jerusalem. So during our service commemorating the destruction of the Temple and the city of Jerusalem, we could see its walls, alive and well.
After the service, we screened a movie put together locally about a family member of hers who is a Holocaust survivor. The movie was about his story and the family’s trip back to his hometown. It was a fascinating story, as they all tend to be, and then we had a long discussion about whether commemoration of the Holocaust belongs with Tisha B’Av or where it is, on its own separate holiday.
By this point in the night, it was about 11:00, and the most moving part of the night was still to come. This was the end of the required portion of the evening, but an HUC professor was going to walk into the Old City, to the Kotel, with whoever wanted to come. A good half the class went along, myself included. When we got near the gates to the Old City, traffic increased. It was crowded. We sat down on benches just outside a gate and learned a beautiful tune to the Hebrew words of “On the shores of Babylon.” We just sat there singing for a few minutes, with lots of people streaming past us into the walls. Eventually we went within the walls, but rather than take the direct route to the Kotel, he walked us around a much emptier route, along the walls, past some modern day playgrounds and basketball courts, to show us how alive and vibrant the city is right now.
We got to the Kotel area, and it was PACKED. It was a bit frightening how thick the crowds were to just get through the tight security—metal detectors—to get into the Kotel plaza. Even the metal detectors are separated by gender, although everyone comes back together as soon as they are through security. A friend and I stuck together to try to get up to the wall itself, which was not an easy task. Tradition teaches that both the first and second Temples were destroyed on Tisha B’Av, and the Kotel, a piece of the western retaining wall, is all that is left of the Temple. As a result, it is packed on this holiday, and many people spend all night there, so even at midnight, there were so many people, some standing, some sitting, and a few already laying down. These human obstacles made it far more complicated to get all the way up to the wall, as did another tradition, not to turn one’s back to the wall. Because of this tradition, many people back away from the wall. On Tisha B’Av, this is not a good idea. There are so many people trying to go towards it, so many people backing away from it, and so many people sitting on the ground. It makes for an interesting environment for sure. My friend Rebecca and I eventually got up through the crowd to the wall itself, but once up there, we were basically pushed against it, so I got up close and personal with the wall. It was really nice. I hadn’t been there for nine years, since I went on my NFTY trip, and I was almost surprised at how moved I was to be there and to be connected to so much history and so many people who had been there before me and would be there after me. I thoroughly enjoyed my few minutes at the wall, and I also was not looking forward to getting back out through the crowd! Once I did, we met up with a small group of friends, and chose to stay longer and study rather than heading back with the rest of the HUC group. Six of us had a copy of the Tanakh and read through all of Lamentations in English, stopping every few sentences to discuss it and comment on things and just talk about the text. It was great. We were surrounded by so many people doing more or less the same thing, and it was so wonderful to be with other people in my class who just wanted to learn for the sake of learning. I look forward to many such experiences in the future. I finally got home around 1:30 in the morning and collapsed into bed.
On Thursday, we did not have to be at school until noon, which was generous of them after the late night. We did group text study of some stories about Tisha B’Av, and had an afternoon service, and then a break before we met up at the Israel Museum that evening. Behind the Israel Museum is a model of Jerusalem in the time of the second Temple. It is a huge model put together with a combination of textual sources and archeological finds, and we studied second Temple Jerusalem while looking at the model of what it might have looked like. Some friends and I took a loooooooong walk home (it would have been shorter, but we took a “shortcut” hoping to find restaurants sooner, and instead we found ourselves very far away from home), got some falafel, and went to hang out and play cards.
Friday was a day of errands and cooking, as it usually is. The biggest challenge was baking brownies. It turns out that unsweetened chocolate is not available in Israel. So in addition to figuring out how much butter to use from my 200 gram block, I had to figure out how to convert a recipe with unsweetened chocolate to one with sweetened chocolate. I did a good job, and they were delicious! Friday evening, some friends and I went to check out a synagogue that none of us had been to yet. It is a Reform (“Progressive”) synagogue, but I was a little skeptical, since I haven’t really loved services at the other local Progressive synagogue. This one was actually great. The congregation skewed somewhat older, which was interesting, but the service itself felt very homey and very comfortable. The cantor had a guitar, many of the melodies were familiar, and the service included the very long Kabbalat Shabbat service that I have grown to love here. The cantor even stopped us on our way out to ask where we were from, since he had noticed a whole group of us sitting together. I am sure I will be returning there again!
Today (Saturday) someone in the class had volunteered to host a Shabbat potluck lunch, so I was at their apartment for a few hours enjoying that many of my classmates seem to be great cooks. I relaxed for the rest of the afternoon, alternately reading a book and dozing off on my bed. It was nice to not have to do anything else! This evening we had a group Havdalah service, which I enjoyed, and an impromptu song session in the park, which was fun and made us all feel like we were back in NFTY again. Then it was back to the grind, and home to do Hebrew homework and get ready for the week.
I haven’t taken many pictures recently, but as I take them from friends’ websites, I will post them on flikr. Talk to you soon!
Tuesday, August 01, 2006
Mid-week update!
It's been a long night of Hebrew homework, so I need a break in English! Apologies in advance...my English grammar seems to suffer when I've been working in Hebrew for a while!
I had another great Shabbat here over the weekend. Friday night a small group of us went to Yikar, a modern Orthodox synagogue with a service using mostly Carlebach tunes. I enjoyed the singing itself, but the room was really crowded, and many of the people attending services were much younger than us, probably around 18, which made for an odd environment. Also, because it was an Orthodox synagogue, there was a mechitza separating the men and women. I don't generally like praying that way, because the women's side always feels like more of a social gathering than a place to pray. It was an interesting experience though, and I was proud of myself for being able to (mostly) keep up and follow along with the all-Hebrew service! After dinner I went to a friend's for dinner and it was delicious, and as usual, went long into the night. I slept in Saturday morning, went to a friend's for lunch with a big group, stayed there for a lot of the afternoon, and then came home for a relaxing late-afternoon and a Hebrew-homework-filled evening.
This week, in addition to Hebrew class, we had our first committee meetings on Sunday. We're all "strongly encouraged" to join one of several committees to help plan events. The committees are: sports, fun, prayer, caring (to acknowledge birthdays and help sick people), tzedakah, and something else I can't remember right now. I joined the prayer committee, in part because I really want the experience, and in part because I knew several other people who would be joining that committee, and I realize that these groups really function 95% based on who else is in them. I didn't know core groups joining any of the other committees, so I went with what I knew! I have also really been enjoying the optional morning services several times a week. They are usually attended by between 10 and 20 of us, and it's just a good group and a great way to start the day before class. I even chanted Torah on Monday morning! Many of the optional service regulars joined the prayer committee. It looks like a great group, and I'm looking forward to many debates and much learning among us.
Today after Ulpan we had a tzedakah presentation by Danny Siegel, who is somewhat well known (and from Rockville) for running an enormous conglomeration of social action projects. I wasn't so excited about the presentation going in, but he turned out to be fairly inspiring, and I'm looking forward to choosing a project to get involved with! (We are actually required to do social action projects, several hours per week, for the year. I'll keep you posted on what I choose.)
After the presentation, the school had, at students' requests, organized a blood drive with Magen David Adom, the Israeli Red Cross. They came to the school to run the drive. Between being terrified of needles and having had trouble in the past with people finding my veins in my arms, I decided it was a bad idea to donate blood today, but I really wanted to help. I ended up staying for the whole three hours of the drive and just walking around, holding hands when needles went in, talking to people as they squeezed the little ball to make the blood flow, and getting juice and cookies when they finished. I was really upset with myself at the beginning for not being able to actually donate, but by the end, I felt like I had really taken part in the drive.
Tonight's other accomplishment was getting through a very long Hebrew story that we had to read for homework. I looked up a rather embarrassingly large number of words in the dictionary, but I'm feeling good that I understand the story! It's a good feeling, and I'm almost looking forward to going over it in class tomorrow.
I'm currently having a debate with myself. Wednesday night and Thursday this week are Tisha B'Av, a commemeration of a multitude of bad things that have happened to the Jews, theoretically all on this day, including the destructions of the Temples. Traditionally, it is a fast day. But I'm living in a desert, there is an optional walk to the Kotel Wednesday night (which I won't do if I fast), and there is a day of services and studying, followed by a trip to the Israel museum on Thursday. I'm trying to decide whether I should fast. (I know, I have to decide...fast.) Right now I'm leaning toward not fasting, because I may have a more meaningful day if I can pay attention to it and be alert all day, but I also feel like I'm in a city where a huge portion of the city will be fasting, so I might feel weird by not doing so. Although I'm in a smaller community where fasting would probably put me in the minority. Clearly, I'm not sure. Thoughts?
Off to make some flashcards and then to bed... I hope everyone is having a good week!
I had another great Shabbat here over the weekend. Friday night a small group of us went to Yikar, a modern Orthodox synagogue with a service using mostly Carlebach tunes. I enjoyed the singing itself, but the room was really crowded, and many of the people attending services were much younger than us, probably around 18, which made for an odd environment. Also, because it was an Orthodox synagogue, there was a mechitza separating the men and women. I don't generally like praying that way, because the women's side always feels like more of a social gathering than a place to pray. It was an interesting experience though, and I was proud of myself for being able to (mostly) keep up and follow along with the all-Hebrew service! After dinner I went to a friend's for dinner and it was delicious, and as usual, went long into the night. I slept in Saturday morning, went to a friend's for lunch with a big group, stayed there for a lot of the afternoon, and then came home for a relaxing late-afternoon and a Hebrew-homework-filled evening.
This week, in addition to Hebrew class, we had our first committee meetings on Sunday. We're all "strongly encouraged" to join one of several committees to help plan events. The committees are: sports, fun, prayer, caring (to acknowledge birthdays and help sick people), tzedakah, and something else I can't remember right now. I joined the prayer committee, in part because I really want the experience, and in part because I knew several other people who would be joining that committee, and I realize that these groups really function 95% based on who else is in them. I didn't know core groups joining any of the other committees, so I went with what I knew! I have also really been enjoying the optional morning services several times a week. They are usually attended by between 10 and 20 of us, and it's just a good group and a great way to start the day before class. I even chanted Torah on Monday morning! Many of the optional service regulars joined the prayer committee. It looks like a great group, and I'm looking forward to many debates and much learning among us.
Today after Ulpan we had a tzedakah presentation by Danny Siegel, who is somewhat well known (and from Rockville) for running an enormous conglomeration of social action projects. I wasn't so excited about the presentation going in, but he turned out to be fairly inspiring, and I'm looking forward to choosing a project to get involved with! (We are actually required to do social action projects, several hours per week, for the year. I'll keep you posted on what I choose.)
After the presentation, the school had, at students' requests, organized a blood drive with Magen David Adom, the Israeli Red Cross. They came to the school to run the drive. Between being terrified of needles and having had trouble in the past with people finding my veins in my arms, I decided it was a bad idea to donate blood today, but I really wanted to help. I ended up staying for the whole three hours of the drive and just walking around, holding hands when needles went in, talking to people as they squeezed the little ball to make the blood flow, and getting juice and cookies when they finished. I was really upset with myself at the beginning for not being able to actually donate, but by the end, I felt like I had really taken part in the drive.
Tonight's other accomplishment was getting through a very long Hebrew story that we had to read for homework. I looked up a rather embarrassingly large number of words in the dictionary, but I'm feeling good that I understand the story! It's a good feeling, and I'm almost looking forward to going over it in class tomorrow.
I'm currently having a debate with myself. Wednesday night and Thursday this week are Tisha B'Av, a commemeration of a multitude of bad things that have happened to the Jews, theoretically all on this day, including the destructions of the Temples. Traditionally, it is a fast day. But I'm living in a desert, there is an optional walk to the Kotel Wednesday night (which I won't do if I fast), and there is a day of services and studying, followed by a trip to the Israel museum on Thursday. I'm trying to decide whether I should fast. (I know, I have to decide...fast.) Right now I'm leaning toward not fasting, because I may have a more meaningful day if I can pay attention to it and be alert all day, but I also feel like I'm in a city where a huge portion of the city will be fasting, so I might feel weird by not doing so. Although I'm in a smaller community where fasting would probably put me in the minority. Clearly, I'm not sure. Thoughts?
Off to make some flashcards and then to bed... I hope everyone is having a good week!
Saturday, July 29, 2006
Week in Review
I know it’s been a whole week since I wrote, but it’s because things have been so busy, not because I don’t love you!
Several people have mentioned security concerns, especially with my trips to the Machane Yehuda shuk. To do my best to address these concerns: After September 11, people in the US continued going to work every day, even in high rise office buildings. After the London subway bombing, people got up and took the subway to work. Here, if someone avoided places that had been bombed in the past, there would be nowhere to go. I understand that the shuk has been a center for bombing before. While there are many of us in my class here who avoid taking buses, we all go to the shuk. Most of us avoid the Old City on Friday mornings, when there are crowded prayer services on the Temple Mount. I try to avoid crazy crowds in general. I try to avoid the shuk during its peak times; I go on weekday afternoons after class, and never on Friday mornings when it’s packed with pre-Shabbat shoppers. Security here really has increased recently, especially with the current situation in Lebanon. Please understand that it is almost impossible to live here without going to certain places, and while I am always cautious and I do pay attention, I also want to live and experience Israeli culture this year, and not spend all my time in my apartment or at school worried about walking down the street. I do appreciate your concerns, but please try to appreciate that I am living here, not visiting for a week or two, and that I have to live.
It has been a very busy week though, which is why I haven’t had time to write. I can’t believe I’m already a third of the way through ulpan! I keep trying to use Hebrew when I talk to Israelis, but most of the time they hear my American accent and respond to me in English. It’s really hard to keep talking to them in Hebrew after that! Ulpan is going well though. I’m understanding a lot of what goes on in class, which is always nice, and we’re focusing more on grammar recently, which is great for me, because I am better at grammar than at vocabulary or speaking, so I’ve been feeling better about the class. We had a test on Wednesday, which I did not think was too bad, although we haven’t gotten it back yet. There were a couple people who thought it was horrible, so maybe I’m doing better than I thought! The teacher also keeps telling me to stop looking so worried, because I’m doing well. She recognizes that people in the class have very different strengths, and she promised me that she’s taught this class before, and it always evens out in the end. Yay:)
Classes end by 1:30 every day, which always seems like I have so much time to get things done. But then there are always programs to take up my time. This past week, we had two separate “ritual seminars,” a personalized tour of another part of Jerusalem, text study and field study of the first Temple period, and probably a couple of other things that I’m forgetting. The ritual seminars seem to be a taste of the liturgy classes we’ll be taking during the year. One afternoon we studied Birkat Hamazon, the prayer after meals, and the other afternoon we studied Kiddush, the wine/sanctification blessing, and Havdalah, the ceremony separating Shabbat from the rest of the week. At each of the seminars, we studied the text of the prayer, discussed its origins and differences between different versions of it, and at least started to learn the traditional chant for each of them. There are a lot of tone deaf people here! That said, there are also many, many people with beautiful voices. It all balances out.
The tour of Jerusalem was part of the same series as the one I went to last Tuesday. One of the Israeli rabbinic students is telling us, a week at a time, about his family’s history in Jerusalem, where they have lived for about 150 years. This week, we were talking about the history of his family around the time of Israeli independence. We sat in a classroom first, while he told us an amazing family story about a lost (and then found) family member, and then we walked to the part of the city where it happened, and he pointed things out along the way, like, “this is where my mother used to play every afternoon.” It was actually really cool. We ended up at a building about a 30 minute walk from campus where his mother grew up. He had talked to the people who now own the building and run their business out of it, and they let us come inside and look around. There is so much history here!
Wednesday night we had a text study looking at the first Temple period of Jewish history. On Thursday, we walked around Jerusalem, walking through the Valley of Gehinnom, the Hebrew name for hell. It was apparently a place where child sacrifices used to be offered, making the name much more appropriate. Now it’s a beautiful valley with a nice green park. Then we walked through parts of the Old City, looked in detail at a model of Jerusalem during that time period, and saw a still surviving “broad wall” that was part of the fortifications of the city. I think you could have driven a car across the top of the wall it was so wide. We’re divided into three groups for our Jerusalem Days Thursdays, and I lucked out and got a great group, so we have a great time no matter what, even if we’re sitting in a brief movie poking each other to wake up!
Thursday afternoon I went up to the shuk with a friend. Just on the walk there, I think we ran into a half dozen other HUC people on their way back from the shuk or another shopping trip, and then we ran into another 8 people or so once we were there. It’s a big city, and an enormous market, so I’m not sure why that always happens. Friends showed us which of the several cheese vendors is the “good cheese guy” who speaks English and is very friendly. I went into his booth to get some cheese, and ended up tasting a whole bunch of samples, which was really fun. I also found tomatoes for 1.8 shekels per kilogram. I haven’t done the whole conversion to dollars and pounds, but those are some cheap tomatoes. I also have a newfound appreciation now for the shuk cart, which is basically reusable shopping bag on wheels. I bought a half of a watermelon (in addition to a whole lot of other produce) and it was really easy to transport back on the 25 minute walk home!
Yesterday (Friday) I found a good bakery to buy challah for dinner, and spent much of the afternoon chopping vegetables for gazpacho. That’s right, at home I make it in a food processor. Here, I am the food processor. It looks and smells great, but I haven’t had any yet. It’s dinner tonight…and hopefully for more or less the rest of the week.
In between programs and errands, there have also been plenty of social gatherings. A friend and I made a delicious dinner, one of the best meals I’ve had since being here, of just a chicken with a good sauce and rice, and an Israeli salad. (Yes, mom, your recipe. I use your cookbook a lot and have even had requests for copies!) I was at a game/cards night at another friend’s place, which was a great time, and have had some other nights of just sitting and hanging out and having lots of random conversations about any topic. There have been Hebrew class study sessions, with several of us sitting together to get our homework done or study for a test, which is always more fun than doing it alone, if not always more productive. I’m definitely feeling more comfortable here every day, and recently came to the realization that I’ve been here for a whole month already! Wow.
On the note of the “situation,” my roommate just came into my room to tell me that Hezbollah is considering a cease-fire. I’ll believe it when it happens, but this is a nice step. If you’re looking for better-than-American coverage, try looking at http://www.haaretz.com/. It’s an Israeli paper online in English, and gives more information, less negatively toward Israel, than what you’ll see at home. It’s a nice change. Also, for more websites if you’re still reading, go to http://www.flickr.com/photos/jkarpay/. If you don’t have a yahoo id, you might need to register for one, but that’s where I’m posting my Israel pictures now. It takes a really long time to load them on the blog, and I can only put up a few at a time. On Flikr I can put up lots of them, and quickly, and with fun captions! Only the HUC folder is from since I’ve been in Jerusalem.
I’m trying to personally answer emails, but there are many, and as my parents can tell you, it’s nothing personal! I’ll get there eventually, and I really do love getting them! Have a wonderful weekend, and I’m working on trying to update more often!
Several people have mentioned security concerns, especially with my trips to the Machane Yehuda shuk. To do my best to address these concerns: After September 11, people in the US continued going to work every day, even in high rise office buildings. After the London subway bombing, people got up and took the subway to work. Here, if someone avoided places that had been bombed in the past, there would be nowhere to go. I understand that the shuk has been a center for bombing before. While there are many of us in my class here who avoid taking buses, we all go to the shuk. Most of us avoid the Old City on Friday mornings, when there are crowded prayer services on the Temple Mount. I try to avoid crazy crowds in general. I try to avoid the shuk during its peak times; I go on weekday afternoons after class, and never on Friday mornings when it’s packed with pre-Shabbat shoppers. Security here really has increased recently, especially with the current situation in Lebanon. Please understand that it is almost impossible to live here without going to certain places, and while I am always cautious and I do pay attention, I also want to live and experience Israeli culture this year, and not spend all my time in my apartment or at school worried about walking down the street. I do appreciate your concerns, but please try to appreciate that I am living here, not visiting for a week or two, and that I have to live.
It has been a very busy week though, which is why I haven’t had time to write. I can’t believe I’m already a third of the way through ulpan! I keep trying to use Hebrew when I talk to Israelis, but most of the time they hear my American accent and respond to me in English. It’s really hard to keep talking to them in Hebrew after that! Ulpan is going well though. I’m understanding a lot of what goes on in class, which is always nice, and we’re focusing more on grammar recently, which is great for me, because I am better at grammar than at vocabulary or speaking, so I’ve been feeling better about the class. We had a test on Wednesday, which I did not think was too bad, although we haven’t gotten it back yet. There were a couple people who thought it was horrible, so maybe I’m doing better than I thought! The teacher also keeps telling me to stop looking so worried, because I’m doing well. She recognizes that people in the class have very different strengths, and she promised me that she’s taught this class before, and it always evens out in the end. Yay:)
Classes end by 1:30 every day, which always seems like I have so much time to get things done. But then there are always programs to take up my time. This past week, we had two separate “ritual seminars,” a personalized tour of another part of Jerusalem, text study and field study of the first Temple period, and probably a couple of other things that I’m forgetting. The ritual seminars seem to be a taste of the liturgy classes we’ll be taking during the year. One afternoon we studied Birkat Hamazon, the prayer after meals, and the other afternoon we studied Kiddush, the wine/sanctification blessing, and Havdalah, the ceremony separating Shabbat from the rest of the week. At each of the seminars, we studied the text of the prayer, discussed its origins and differences between different versions of it, and at least started to learn the traditional chant for each of them. There are a lot of tone deaf people here! That said, there are also many, many people with beautiful voices. It all balances out.
The tour of Jerusalem was part of the same series as the one I went to last Tuesday. One of the Israeli rabbinic students is telling us, a week at a time, about his family’s history in Jerusalem, where they have lived for about 150 years. This week, we were talking about the history of his family around the time of Israeli independence. We sat in a classroom first, while he told us an amazing family story about a lost (and then found) family member, and then we walked to the part of the city where it happened, and he pointed things out along the way, like, “this is where my mother used to play every afternoon.” It was actually really cool. We ended up at a building about a 30 minute walk from campus where his mother grew up. He had talked to the people who now own the building and run their business out of it, and they let us come inside and look around. There is so much history here!
Wednesday night we had a text study looking at the first Temple period of Jewish history. On Thursday, we walked around Jerusalem, walking through the Valley of Gehinnom, the Hebrew name for hell. It was apparently a place where child sacrifices used to be offered, making the name much more appropriate. Now it’s a beautiful valley with a nice green park. Then we walked through parts of the Old City, looked in detail at a model of Jerusalem during that time period, and saw a still surviving “broad wall” that was part of the fortifications of the city. I think you could have driven a car across the top of the wall it was so wide. We’re divided into three groups for our Jerusalem Days Thursdays, and I lucked out and got a great group, so we have a great time no matter what, even if we’re sitting in a brief movie poking each other to wake up!
Thursday afternoon I went up to the shuk with a friend. Just on the walk there, I think we ran into a half dozen other HUC people on their way back from the shuk or another shopping trip, and then we ran into another 8 people or so once we were there. It’s a big city, and an enormous market, so I’m not sure why that always happens. Friends showed us which of the several cheese vendors is the “good cheese guy” who speaks English and is very friendly. I went into his booth to get some cheese, and ended up tasting a whole bunch of samples, which was really fun. I also found tomatoes for 1.8 shekels per kilogram. I haven’t done the whole conversion to dollars and pounds, but those are some cheap tomatoes. I also have a newfound appreciation now for the shuk cart, which is basically reusable shopping bag on wheels. I bought a half of a watermelon (in addition to a whole lot of other produce) and it was really easy to transport back on the 25 minute walk home!
Yesterday (Friday) I found a good bakery to buy challah for dinner, and spent much of the afternoon chopping vegetables for gazpacho. That’s right, at home I make it in a food processor. Here, I am the food processor. It looks and smells great, but I haven’t had any yet. It’s dinner tonight…and hopefully for more or less the rest of the week.
In between programs and errands, there have also been plenty of social gatherings. A friend and I made a delicious dinner, one of the best meals I’ve had since being here, of just a chicken with a good sauce and rice, and an Israeli salad. (Yes, mom, your recipe. I use your cookbook a lot and have even had requests for copies!) I was at a game/cards night at another friend’s place, which was a great time, and have had some other nights of just sitting and hanging out and having lots of random conversations about any topic. There have been Hebrew class study sessions, with several of us sitting together to get our homework done or study for a test, which is always more fun than doing it alone, if not always more productive. I’m definitely feeling more comfortable here every day, and recently came to the realization that I’ve been here for a whole month already! Wow.
On the note of the “situation,” my roommate just came into my room to tell me that Hezbollah is considering a cease-fire. I’ll believe it when it happens, but this is a nice step. If you’re looking for better-than-American coverage, try looking at http://www.haaretz.com/. It’s an Israeli paper online in English, and gives more information, less negatively toward Israel, than what you’ll see at home. It’s a nice change. Also, for more websites if you’re still reading, go to http://www.flickr.com/photos/jkarpay/. If you don’t have a yahoo id, you might need to register for one, but that’s where I’m posting my Israel pictures now. It takes a really long time to load them on the blog, and I can only put up a few at a time. On Flikr I can put up lots of them, and quickly, and with fun captions! Only the HUC folder is from since I’ve been in Jerusalem.
I’m trying to personally answer emails, but there are many, and as my parents can tell you, it’s nothing personal! I’ll get there eventually, and I really do love getting them! Have a wonderful weekend, and I’m working on trying to update more often!
Sunday, July 23, 2006
Shabbat, again
Over the weekend, I had yet another great Shabbat. Please tell me if you get tired of reading about them! To me, each Shabbat here has been different and amazing in a variety of ways, and so different from anything I experience at home, which makes them more interesting, at least to me, to write about. If you have questions about anything I'm doing that I haven't mentioned, please let me know!
Fridays in Jerusalem are still so funny to me. I don't think the grocery store in Maryland before a snowstorm can compare to a grocery store in Jerusalem on a Friday. Everyone is stocking up for their Shabbat dinners, and also has to plan ahead a little bit. The stores close around 2 or 3 in the afternoon, and they don't reopen until Saturday evening or Sunday morning! Needless to say, aisles are crowded, lines are long, and Israelis are...well, Israeli. I succeeded in preventing a pushy one from taking my place in the checkout line! I met up with a couple of friends to brave the crowds. I've found grocery shopping in a group to be more effective: it's more people to figure out what's on a label or whether what you're buying is really what you think it is. (It usually isn't. I have yet to find out whether my intended tomato paste really is. I'm hoping.) In addition to the three of us who went together, I think we ran into another 8 or 10 HUC people inside the supermarket, and that was just in the 45 minutes we were there, and only at the one supermarket! It's always nice though for making last minute plans and getting extra recommendations on food. Then it was back home to get ready for Shabbat.
I had decided for Shabbat to meet up with a group of people who I haven't spent much time with, but really had fun with during our Jerusalem Days trip on Thursday. A few of us met up before services to walk to Kol HaNishamah, where I had been on my first Shabbat but the later arrivals had not yet experienced. About 8 of us walked down there together, a leisurely 30 minute walk away. We were slightly worried about finding seats together, knowing that this synagogue tends to fill up, but we also have to keep reminding ourselves that early for an Israeli is the published start time. Needless to say, arriving 10 minutes before services were scheduled to start, we had no problem finding seats. And then we watched the door as more and more HUC people walked in. There was a good sized group of us by the time we got started. I liked the service there more this time than I had when I went a few weeks ago, possibly because it felt like a more authentic experience and less like they were performing for so many guests, and possibly because I appreciate the looser form more after having been to a few fairly classical Reform HUC services. I was also excited because the announcements and D'var Torah were given only in Hebrew, and I understood some of what was said!
After services, we went to one of the few restaurants that's open on Shabbat. We had agreed that none of us felt like doing all the work necessary for hosting, and that therefore we were really going to rest, and let someone serve us. Yes, that was the rationalization for going out to eat on Shabbat. It was enough. We ran into two other groups of HUC people there as well. Their food is really yummy, and a great Shabbat dinner was had by all...and I even had leftovers! Shabbats get late though. Services run from about 6:30 until 8, so we didn't get to dinner until almost 8:30. The restaurant is not speedy, so we left there around 10 or 10:30. It just doesn't matter though, because we really have nothing else to do for 25 hours aside from eating, sleeping, and socializing! And some services.
After dinner, we hiked (really...another half hour walk) to Emily's apartment in a part of the city I had not yet visited. Her apartment is beautiful though, and the night was worth the walk! A bigger group, probably about 10-15 of us, got together there for dessert and fun. We hung out, ate some more, played cards, and just enjoyed each other's company for a couple of hours until our exhaustion caught up with us and we all decided to call it a night. A lot of us were walking back in the same direction though, so we took a shortcut through a park. And stopped to play on the playground for a few minutes. (Yes, it was after 1 am. Playgrounds are more fun that way.)
Saturday morning services were not in the cards this Shabbat. I slept until I had to get up to get ready for lunch. Another classmate had invited my roommates and I over, so we went to her place. It turned out that in addition to the three of us, also there were her roommate, a friend from outside HUC, and two other non-HUC friends. The food was really good, and it was one of those long Shabbat lunches that covers almost every topic you can think of. I had a great time! I think we left around 4, all intending to go home and nap. I got around to the nap eventually, after some reading, some laundry, and some phone calls. It was shorter than I would have liked, but it gave me enough energy to get through the rest of the day.
We had another group Havdalah this week. I think Havdalah is one of my most favorite services. It always sounds good and starts the week off right. Unfortunately I couldn't linger for the post-Havdalah jam session that generally occurs, because I had a Hebrew essay to write.
And so the week began. Bonus: today in Hebrew, the teacher told me to stop looking so worried all the time; I was doing great! I thought that was encouraging:) That, and I really understood everything that happened in class today. It was a nice change!
More soon...keep the emails and comments coming:)
Fridays in Jerusalem are still so funny to me. I don't think the grocery store in Maryland before a snowstorm can compare to a grocery store in Jerusalem on a Friday. Everyone is stocking up for their Shabbat dinners, and also has to plan ahead a little bit. The stores close around 2 or 3 in the afternoon, and they don't reopen until Saturday evening or Sunday morning! Needless to say, aisles are crowded, lines are long, and Israelis are...well, Israeli. I succeeded in preventing a pushy one from taking my place in the checkout line! I met up with a couple of friends to brave the crowds. I've found grocery shopping in a group to be more effective: it's more people to figure out what's on a label or whether what you're buying is really what you think it is. (It usually isn't. I have yet to find out whether my intended tomato paste really is. I'm hoping.) In addition to the three of us who went together, I think we ran into another 8 or 10 HUC people inside the supermarket, and that was just in the 45 minutes we were there, and only at the one supermarket! It's always nice though for making last minute plans and getting extra recommendations on food. Then it was back home to get ready for Shabbat.
I had decided for Shabbat to meet up with a group of people who I haven't spent much time with, but really had fun with during our Jerusalem Days trip on Thursday. A few of us met up before services to walk to Kol HaNishamah, where I had been on my first Shabbat but the later arrivals had not yet experienced. About 8 of us walked down there together, a leisurely 30 minute walk away. We were slightly worried about finding seats together, knowing that this synagogue tends to fill up, but we also have to keep reminding ourselves that early for an Israeli is the published start time. Needless to say, arriving 10 minutes before services were scheduled to start, we had no problem finding seats. And then we watched the door as more and more HUC people walked in. There was a good sized group of us by the time we got started. I liked the service there more this time than I had when I went a few weeks ago, possibly because it felt like a more authentic experience and less like they were performing for so many guests, and possibly because I appreciate the looser form more after having been to a few fairly classical Reform HUC services. I was also excited because the announcements and D'var Torah were given only in Hebrew, and I understood some of what was said!
After services, we went to one of the few restaurants that's open on Shabbat. We had agreed that none of us felt like doing all the work necessary for hosting, and that therefore we were really going to rest, and let someone serve us. Yes, that was the rationalization for going out to eat on Shabbat. It was enough. We ran into two other groups of HUC people there as well. Their food is really yummy, and a great Shabbat dinner was had by all...and I even had leftovers! Shabbats get late though. Services run from about 6:30 until 8, so we didn't get to dinner until almost 8:30. The restaurant is not speedy, so we left there around 10 or 10:30. It just doesn't matter though, because we really have nothing else to do for 25 hours aside from eating, sleeping, and socializing! And some services.
After dinner, we hiked (really...another half hour walk) to Emily's apartment in a part of the city I had not yet visited. Her apartment is beautiful though, and the night was worth the walk! A bigger group, probably about 10-15 of us, got together there for dessert and fun. We hung out, ate some more, played cards, and just enjoyed each other's company for a couple of hours until our exhaustion caught up with us and we all decided to call it a night. A lot of us were walking back in the same direction though, so we took a shortcut through a park. And stopped to play on the playground for a few minutes. (Yes, it was after 1 am. Playgrounds are more fun that way.)
Saturday morning services were not in the cards this Shabbat. I slept until I had to get up to get ready for lunch. Another classmate had invited my roommates and I over, so we went to her place. It turned out that in addition to the three of us, also there were her roommate, a friend from outside HUC, and two other non-HUC friends. The food was really good, and it was one of those long Shabbat lunches that covers almost every topic you can think of. I had a great time! I think we left around 4, all intending to go home and nap. I got around to the nap eventually, after some reading, some laundry, and some phone calls. It was shorter than I would have liked, but it gave me enough energy to get through the rest of the day.
We had another group Havdalah this week. I think Havdalah is one of my most favorite services. It always sounds good and starts the week off right. Unfortunately I couldn't linger for the post-Havdalah jam session that generally occurs, because I had a Hebrew essay to write.
And so the week began. Bonus: today in Hebrew, the teacher told me to stop looking so worried all the time; I was doing great! I thought that was encouraging:) That, and I really understood everything that happened in class today. It was a nice change!
More soon...keep the emails and comments coming:)
Friday, July 21, 2006
Jerusalem, City of David
Yesterday was our first day trip to really explore Jewish history hands on. Wednesday night we met in smaller groups to do some text study about David and the origins of the city of Jerusalem. They divided our class into three, and the group I ended up with is great! That is always exciting. We met bright and early Thursday morning to head "into the field" to study history. First we went to a series of promenades that overlook the whole city. We had shacharit services outside under some trees overlooking Jerusalem. It was beautiful. (Need proof? In the middle of our service, a small group came past us. A short way down the path from where we were praying, they were setting up for a Bar Mitzvah service.) We then sat under trees to do some more informal study of the city, which was amazing, because rather than point to a map, the professor could point to a specific hill and tell us events that happened right there.
We walked all along a ridge with ever-changing views of the city, and then got back on the buses to head to the city of David. King David was before the first Temple and didn't actually settle the area inside what we think of as the Old City, but rather just outside of it. We looked at some buildings and caves that were probably burial places from thousands of years ago. We were standing on the site where David probably had his palace. We were overlooking buildings below us on the hill and giggling about his view of the city, where, as the story goes, people bathed on their roofs. The king was at the top of the hill. He could see it all, even if he wasn't trying. We then went on to explore the water system, which is how legend (although not history) tells that David conquered the city. This was the part of the day I was the most nervous about. To protect their water sources from potential conquerors, ancient cities used to bury their springs and divert them, sometimes via long tunnels, to somewhere within the middle of the city. We were going to walk through the tunnel built a couple of kings after David, but through his city. Hezekiah's Tunnel is narrow. In most parts, standing with my arms at my sides, both arms were lightly touching the walls to my left and right. In parts I could stand up straight without a problem, but in parts I had to duck down some. I'm not very tall. My 6 foot 5 inch friend who was right behind me had few times when he could stand up straight. We were in the tunnel for about 40 minutes. Also, because it used to be the water source, there is water running through the whole thing. At the deepest, it was about thigh-deep (on me), but for most of the way it was a few inches below my knees. There are no lights. We all held flashlights. There is a big sign at the beginning cautioning anyone claustrophobic about going through. It's also an underground tunnel and underground water source. The air is cold. So is the water. But I made it! In single file (obviously) we all waded our way through, talking and singing as we trudged through. I did not, however, take any pictures, as I was trying my hardest to focus simply on walking through without noticing how small and enclosed the tunnel was. If you google "Hezekiah's tunnel" you can find pictures if you want them, and I will stalk my friends' blogs to see if I can "borrow" any pictures to post here. Nobody walking near me was taking any though.
Once we got back from the field trip, the rest of the afternoon was free, and I did some relaxing, reading, emailing, and other equally productive time-sucking activities. It was nice:) Some friends were making dinner, so I went over there, and we ended up staying there and talking for hours, as seems to happen a lot. Topics ranged from the current situation over here to our Hebrew classes to what else we want to study to gender differences and age differences, to several other fairly heavy topics...but with plenty of fun comments and side conversations thrown in. I came home and collapsed into bed, excited that for the first time in over a week, I didn't have to set an alarm clock this morning!
On the rest of today's program: laundry, Hebrew, grocery store. I know you're jealous. But then it's Shabbat:)
Shabbat Shalom!
We walked all along a ridge with ever-changing views of the city, and then got back on the buses to head to the city of David. King David was before the first Temple and didn't actually settle the area inside what we think of as the Old City, but rather just outside of it. We looked at some buildings and caves that were probably burial places from thousands of years ago. We were standing on the site where David probably had his palace. We were overlooking buildings below us on the hill and giggling about his view of the city, where, as the story goes, people bathed on their roofs. The king was at the top of the hill. He could see it all, even if he wasn't trying. We then went on to explore the water system, which is how legend (although not history) tells that David conquered the city. This was the part of the day I was the most nervous about. To protect their water sources from potential conquerors, ancient cities used to bury their springs and divert them, sometimes via long tunnels, to somewhere within the middle of the city. We were going to walk through the tunnel built a couple of kings after David, but through his city. Hezekiah's Tunnel is narrow. In most parts, standing with my arms at my sides, both arms were lightly touching the walls to my left and right. In parts I could stand up straight without a problem, but in parts I had to duck down some. I'm not very tall. My 6 foot 5 inch friend who was right behind me had few times when he could stand up straight. We were in the tunnel for about 40 minutes. Also, because it used to be the water source, there is water running through the whole thing. At the deepest, it was about thigh-deep (on me), but for most of the way it was a few inches below my knees. There are no lights. We all held flashlights. There is a big sign at the beginning cautioning anyone claustrophobic about going through. It's also an underground tunnel and underground water source. The air is cold. So is the water. But I made it! In single file (obviously) we all waded our way through, talking and singing as we trudged through. I did not, however, take any pictures, as I was trying my hardest to focus simply on walking through without noticing how small and enclosed the tunnel was. If you google "Hezekiah's tunnel" you can find pictures if you want them, and I will stalk my friends' blogs to see if I can "borrow" any pictures to post here. Nobody walking near me was taking any though.
Once we got back from the field trip, the rest of the afternoon was free, and I did some relaxing, reading, emailing, and other equally productive time-sucking activities. It was nice:) Some friends were making dinner, so I went over there, and we ended up staying there and talking for hours, as seems to happen a lot. Topics ranged from the current situation over here to our Hebrew classes to what else we want to study to gender differences and age differences, to several other fairly heavy topics...but with plenty of fun comments and side conversations thrown in. I came home and collapsed into bed, excited that for the first time in over a week, I didn't have to set an alarm clock this morning!
On the rest of today's program: laundry, Hebrew, grocery store. I know you're jealous. But then it's Shabbat:)
Shabbat Shalom!
Wednesday, July 19, 2006
Kitah Hey, Week 1
A week of Hebrew class under my belt! This doesn't mean my Hebrew's much better. But I have put in a lot of hours of class time.
The summer is going to be exhausting. Hebrew runs from 8:30-10, 10:30-12, and 12:15-1:00, Sunday through Wednesday (with slight schedule changes on days when we have to go to morning services). In addition, we have Wednesday evening seminars about Israeli history (in English), day trips around Jerusalem on Thursdays, and various other required and optional programs all summer long. And plenty of Hebrew homework in between.
I was placed into Kitah Hey, which is the highest of the five levels. Having not done much Hebrew since sophomore year of college, I was surprised (ok, shocked) that I placed so high, and a little terrified to start class. The class is about 12 people, although the number keeps changing as people switch up and down levels. Between half to two-thirds of the class has not spent significant time in Israel, meaning that the remainder has decided to make Aliyah, or has been here studying for a year already, and/or is dating someone Israeli, or served in the Israeli Army for over a year. It's a little intimidating. But while some of their speaking skills and vocabularies are far superior to mine, I understand most of what goes on in class, and I have heard that the class one level lower is doing much easier work. The people who have been switching between Hey and Dalet say that for several of them, Dalet is fairly easy, and Hey is somewhat difficult. I think I'm going to stick it out, and work to keep up with the class. I'm sort of looking forward to the challenge.
What do we do in Hebrew class? It's feeling somewhat similar to a high school English class right now. Part of the time we spend working on grammar, but there's always vocabulary included. Some of the time we're reading stories, also always with new vocabulary. We read the stories, talk about them, answer questions, and write an essay. Just like high school. We read the newspaper, with lots and lots of new vocabulary. I think the teacher is trying to prove that we really can follow what's going on in the world, as long as we have patience...and a dictionary! Yesterday and today we read an excerpt from a story by Amos Oz. Since people read him in English translation at home, I thought it was pretty cool to read the original...and learn that his writing is not too hard to understand! I have to write a (short) essay about that reading this weekend though. I'm not sure how much I'll like him by Sunday.
Tuesday afternoon we had an optional activity, the beginning of a five-part walking tour of the city led by one of the students in HUC's Israeli rabbinic program, Nir. Tuesday's tour was to show where his family first settled in Jerusalem something like 150 years ago, and then where they moved when they left the old city. The walk through the Old City was really cool. His great grandfather (great, great? I don't remember) had a store in the Christian quarter, so that's where we were walking, and we stopped right in front of his former store to talk about it. The current store owners were outside hanging out, and listened to everything he said to us, and then actually stopped him to talk for a minute afterwards. Then we went to the "Austrian Hospice," but apparently it was built as what we would think of as more like a Hostel, right on Via Delarosa, which Christians believe was Jesus's path before crucifixion. We did pass a big group of Brazilian pilgrims following that path. Possibly the highlight of the afternoon was on the roof of the hospice. We had to climb a LOT of steps, but the view was incredibly worth it. The pictures are from the roof. The first one is the Mount of Olives, where tradition teaches the Messiah will come first. If you can't tell, the hill is covered in graves, because since it's supposed to be the Messiah's first "stop," it's a popular burial place. The others are pictures in various directions from the roof. The Jewish Quarter is somewhat downhill, so it's hard to see.
Tomorrow we're going to many more historical sites, so hopefully I'll manage to make good use of camera then as well!
The summer is going to be exhausting. Hebrew runs from 8:30-10, 10:30-12, and 12:15-1:00, Sunday through Wednesday (with slight schedule changes on days when we have to go to morning services). In addition, we have Wednesday evening seminars about Israeli history (in English), day trips around Jerusalem on Thursdays, and various other required and optional programs all summer long. And plenty of Hebrew homework in between.
I was placed into Kitah Hey, which is the highest of the five levels. Having not done much Hebrew since sophomore year of college, I was surprised (ok, shocked) that I placed so high, and a little terrified to start class. The class is about 12 people, although the number keeps changing as people switch up and down levels. Between half to two-thirds of the class has not spent significant time in Israel, meaning that the remainder has decided to make Aliyah, or has been here studying for a year already, and/or is dating someone Israeli, or served in the Israeli Army for over a year. It's a little intimidating. But while some of their speaking skills and vocabularies are far superior to mine, I understand most of what goes on in class, and I have heard that the class one level lower is doing much easier work. The people who have been switching between Hey and Dalet say that for several of them, Dalet is fairly easy, and Hey is somewhat difficult. I think I'm going to stick it out, and work to keep up with the class. I'm sort of looking forward to the challenge.
What do we do in Hebrew class? It's feeling somewhat similar to a high school English class right now. Part of the time we spend working on grammar, but there's always vocabulary included. Some of the time we're reading stories, also always with new vocabulary. We read the stories, talk about them, answer questions, and write an essay. Just like high school. We read the newspaper, with lots and lots of new vocabulary. I think the teacher is trying to prove that we really can follow what's going on in the world, as long as we have patience...and a dictionary! Yesterday and today we read an excerpt from a story by Amos Oz. Since people read him in English translation at home, I thought it was pretty cool to read the original...and learn that his writing is not too hard to understand! I have to write a (short) essay about that reading this weekend though. I'm not sure how much I'll like him by Sunday.
Tuesday afternoon we had an optional activity, the beginning of a five-part walking tour of the city led by one of the students in HUC's Israeli rabbinic program, Nir. Tuesday's tour was to show where his family first settled in Jerusalem something like 150 years ago, and then where they moved when they left the old city. The walk through the Old City was really cool. His great grandfather (great, great? I don't remember) had a store in the Christian quarter, so that's where we were walking, and we stopped right in front of his former store to talk about it. The current store owners were outside hanging out, and listened to everything he said to us, and then actually stopped him to talk for a minute afterwards. Then we went to the "Austrian Hospice," but apparently it was built as what we would think of as more like a Hostel, right on Via Delarosa, which Christians believe was Jesus's path before crucifixion. We did pass a big group of Brazilian pilgrims following that path. Possibly the highlight of the afternoon was on the roof of the hospice. We had to climb a LOT of steps, but the view was incredibly worth it. The pictures are from the roof. The first one is the Mount of Olives, where tradition teaches the Messiah will come first. If you can't tell, the hill is covered in graves, because since it's supposed to be the Messiah's first "stop," it's a popular burial place. The others are pictures in various directions from the roof. The Jewish Quarter is somewhat downhill, so it's hard to see.
Tomorrow we're going to many more historical sites, so hopefully I'll manage to make good use of camera then as well!
Saturday, July 15, 2006
Shabbat Peace
You may not believe it, but I just finished the most peaceful Shabbat I've had here, and one of the best in a long, long time.
Late Friday afternoon, the whole incoming HUC class was asked to be at school an hour and a half before services. We did a Torah study about Shabbat in the Torah, just working in partners and small groups, and it made me look forward, even more, to classes starting for real in September. Just before services started, I was thrilled to see Rabbi Perlin walk into the sanctuary, and even more thrilled to get a great big hug. Hugs from home are definitely needed and appreciated over here! Services, led again by the interns, were one of the most comfortable I've been to since being here, which was great. After services, we had dinner with a visiting alumni group, so I sat at a table with a bunch of students and Rabbi Perlin. It was great to catch up with news from Temple B'nai Shalom and such a friendly face! No, we didn't plan to match.
Saturday morning services were in a different sanctuary, one added much later, which has an entire glass front overlooking the Old City. It's beautiful! The services weren't exactly in my favorite style, but they were nice, and there was a good view to make up for it! All of this weekend's sermons and speakers referenced the "situation," but things really haven't changed here in Jerusalem. It's hard to believe, but we're pretty removed from everything. I spent the afternoon quietly, just hanging out with friends.
Saturday evening, about 20-25 of us got together for Havdalah. We met up on a patio overlooking the Old City. When we first got there, there was another group already doing their own Havdalah, so we waited until they were done. By the time we were ready to get started, another group had arrived to do Havdalah. Apparently it's a good spot! We invited them to join us, but they declined, so since they started first, we sang some other songs and waited until they were finished. There was another couple watching us and clearly enjoying our three-guitar service, which was really nice. After Havdalah, we stayed there and just sang a whole bunch of (Hebrew) songs for peace for a good half hour. While we were singing, another (clearly foreign) group showed up, and when we didn't show signs of finishing, they went elsewhere. But as they were leaving, several people took pictures of our group. So I have now been part of a tourist attraction in Israel! It was only about an hour total, but it was an amazing evening.
Shavuah Tov...have a good week!
Late Friday afternoon, the whole incoming HUC class was asked to be at school an hour and a half before services. We did a Torah study about Shabbat in the Torah, just working in partners and small groups, and it made me look forward, even more, to classes starting for real in September. Just before services started, I was thrilled to see Rabbi Perlin walk into the sanctuary, and even more thrilled to get a great big hug. Hugs from home are definitely needed and appreciated over here! Services, led again by the interns, were one of the most comfortable I've been to since being here, which was great. After services, we had dinner with a visiting alumni group, so I sat at a table with a bunch of students and Rabbi Perlin. It was great to catch up with news from Temple B'nai Shalom and such a friendly face! No, we didn't plan to match.
Saturday morning services were in a different sanctuary, one added much later, which has an entire glass front overlooking the Old City. It's beautiful! The services weren't exactly in my favorite style, but they were nice, and there was a good view to make up for it! All of this weekend's sermons and speakers referenced the "situation," but things really haven't changed here in Jerusalem. It's hard to believe, but we're pretty removed from everything. I spent the afternoon quietly, just hanging out with friends.
Saturday evening, about 20-25 of us got together for Havdalah. We met up on a patio overlooking the Old City. When we first got there, there was another group already doing their own Havdalah, so we waited until they were done. By the time we were ready to get started, another group had arrived to do Havdalah. Apparently it's a good spot! We invited them to join us, but they declined, so since they started first, we sang some other songs and waited until they were finished. There was another couple watching us and clearly enjoying our three-guitar service, which was really nice. After Havdalah, we stayed there and just sang a whole bunch of (Hebrew) songs for peace for a good half hour. While we were singing, another (clearly foreign) group showed up, and when we didn't show signs of finishing, they went elsewhere. But as they were leaving, several people took pictures of our group. So I have now been part of a tourist attraction in Israel! It was only about an hour total, but it was an amazing evening.
Shavuah Tov...have a good week!
Thursday, July 13, 2006
Orientation
My two weeks of freely roaming Jerusalem are over, I've had some orientation, and classes start Sunday!
Monday (the day after the Tel Aviv trip) was our last full day off. Some friends and I went down a fun shopping street after lunch, just looking in all the random stores. Amy and I stayed behind at a coffee shop to put in some good long work on our Hebrew placement tests, a take home test they gave us a week and a half to do, but which was due, of course, on Tuesday morning. We met up with a big group for dinner, finding a good housewares/hardware store on the way, as well as another supermarket! We spent the evening playing cards and hanging out, not the early-to-bed night as planned. As usual.
Tuesday was fairly uneventful, but the first day (sort of) of orientation. We had a session with our health insurance provider, where he gave us all the details of the plan. The session basically repeated the point that if it's a pre-existing condition, it's not covered. If there's nothing wrong with you, like a check-up, it's not covered. Otherwise it is. Except it took a while to go over all that... I took a trip to the shuk after that, more as a social event than as a shopping trip, but I couldn't go and buy nothing! So I went to the cheese guy and pointed to one and bought some. Israeli cheese is amazing, and I still haven't met a cheese I didn't like. This new one's good too, although I still don't know exactly what it is. That evening, we had a get-to-know-you session with the interns, which I'm not sure anyone was really looking forward to, since most of us have been here getting to know each other for at least a week. But it wasn't too painful:)
Yesterday was the first real day of orientation: a morning service, welcome speeches by everyone, and the like. I was pleasantly surprised though. Although the service was far more traditional than I expected, the speakers during the day were all good! They were interesting and didn't all repeat each other, which can be rare during an orientation! I felt welcomed and overwhelmed and excited to start and a lot of other things.
Today was more orientation, but slightly less well done than yesterday. This morning's service was more upbeat, which was nice. But our first speaker of the day was talking to us about culture shock, and her basic point seemed to be that we'll never quite fit in with Israelis, so we shouldn't really try. Which I don't think was the point she was trying to make, but clearly she wasn't so effective. The rest of the morning was similarly exciting. After lunch we had an "Israel Update," where the Israel professor talked to us about the current situation. Given the craziness of what's going on, he was surprisingly reassuring. The main point: Jerusalem is not close to either Gaza or the Lebanon border. Life is going on as normal here, just with a little more security than the usual, which is already more than at home. Then we had our Security Briefing. For the record, both events have been on the schedule for a while, and it just turned out to be interesting timing. The security briefing was less focused on the current situation and more on emergency procedures and traveling around Israel in general. I think I'll be staying put in Jerusalem for now, thanks:)
The excitement of the day was when our Hebrew classes were posted this morning. They divide us into five levels, based on the placement test and also, apparently, on the proficiency exam we took at the interview. The levels are not broken at pre-determined points, but instead split up by numbers, so approximately the bottom 20% is in Alef, the next 20% in Bet, and so on, up through level Hey. I was guessing I'd be in about Gimel (3) or Dalet (4) if I was lucky. Somehow I ended up in Hey! I'm excited to be in the highest class, but also shocked, since I don't think my Hebrew is that good, and a little terrified, since there are several people in the class who have been living in Israel already for 6 months and a lot longer. I guess I'll be working hard this summer! Starting Sunday, we have Hebrew for about 5 hours a day, 4 days a week, and then some other seminars and trips around the city in the afternoons and on Thursdays. I'll let you know how it all goes once I get started!
Monday (the day after the Tel Aviv trip) was our last full day off. Some friends and I went down a fun shopping street after lunch, just looking in all the random stores. Amy and I stayed behind at a coffee shop to put in some good long work on our Hebrew placement tests, a take home test they gave us a week and a half to do, but which was due, of course, on Tuesday morning. We met up with a big group for dinner, finding a good housewares/hardware store on the way, as well as another supermarket! We spent the evening playing cards and hanging out, not the early-to-bed night as planned. As usual.
Tuesday was fairly uneventful, but the first day (sort of) of orientation. We had a session with our health insurance provider, where he gave us all the details of the plan. The session basically repeated the point that if it's a pre-existing condition, it's not covered. If there's nothing wrong with you, like a check-up, it's not covered. Otherwise it is. Except it took a while to go over all that... I took a trip to the shuk after that, more as a social event than as a shopping trip, but I couldn't go and buy nothing! So I went to the cheese guy and pointed to one and bought some. Israeli cheese is amazing, and I still haven't met a cheese I didn't like. This new one's good too, although I still don't know exactly what it is. That evening, we had a get-to-know-you session with the interns, which I'm not sure anyone was really looking forward to, since most of us have been here getting to know each other for at least a week. But it wasn't too painful:)
Yesterday was the first real day of orientation: a morning service, welcome speeches by everyone, and the like. I was pleasantly surprised though. Although the service was far more traditional than I expected, the speakers during the day were all good! They were interesting and didn't all repeat each other, which can be rare during an orientation! I felt welcomed and overwhelmed and excited to start and a lot of other things.
Today was more orientation, but slightly less well done than yesterday. This morning's service was more upbeat, which was nice. But our first speaker of the day was talking to us about culture shock, and her basic point seemed to be that we'll never quite fit in with Israelis, so we shouldn't really try. Which I don't think was the point she was trying to make, but clearly she wasn't so effective. The rest of the morning was similarly exciting. After lunch we had an "Israel Update," where the Israel professor talked to us about the current situation. Given the craziness of what's going on, he was surprisingly reassuring. The main point: Jerusalem is not close to either Gaza or the Lebanon border. Life is going on as normal here, just with a little more security than the usual, which is already more than at home. Then we had our Security Briefing. For the record, both events have been on the schedule for a while, and it just turned out to be interesting timing. The security briefing was less focused on the current situation and more on emergency procedures and traveling around Israel in general. I think I'll be staying put in Jerusalem for now, thanks:)
The excitement of the day was when our Hebrew classes were posted this morning. They divide us into five levels, based on the placement test and also, apparently, on the proficiency exam we took at the interview. The levels are not broken at pre-determined points, but instead split up by numbers, so approximately the bottom 20% is in Alef, the next 20% in Bet, and so on, up through level Hey. I was guessing I'd be in about Gimel (3) or Dalet (4) if I was lucky. Somehow I ended up in Hey! I'm excited to be in the highest class, but also shocked, since I don't think my Hebrew is that good, and a little terrified, since there are several people in the class who have been living in Israel already for 6 months and a lot longer. I guess I'll be working hard this summer! Starting Sunday, we have Hebrew for about 5 hours a day, 4 days a week, and then some other seminars and trips around the city in the afternoons and on Thursdays. I'll let you know how it all goes once I get started!
Sunday, July 09, 2006
A few more days
It's been an eventful couple of days, and thinking back, I can't believe how long ago yesterday afternoon seems!
Friday is part of the weekend here, giving us time to prepare for Shabbat. HUC asked people who were more settled to host the more recent arrivals for Shabbat dinner, so my apartment volunteered to be a host. Then, I got invited to Shabbat dinner at my friend Minda's, a friend from Princeton who is in the middle of her two-year program in Jerusalem. So for much of the day Friday, I helped my roommates make dinner. I was disappointed to not be able to participate in our first hosting night, but I know there will be many more, and I thought a night with non-HUC people would be more rare. I found my way over to Minda's in the evening, again marveling at how this city shuts down on Friday afternoons and how many other people I saw, all going to Shabbat dinners all over the city. A few minutes away from Minda's, I heard what sounded like a long shofar blast. It turns out it's the Shabbat warning, reminding the city that it's time to light candles. I'm sometimes amazed that this city finds a balance, as shaky as it might be, between being a religious Jewish city and a modern, functioning city. I was proud when I got to Minda's and found out that people seldom find their way there the first time. I was a good navigator:) There were 6 of us at dinner, and it is always nice to spend an evening with an entirely different group of people, even when you like the ones you're usually surrounded by. We all hung out and talked for a couple hours after dinner, because nobody really had anything else to do that night or anywhere else to be. It was really nice. I also found out after the fact that the dinner proved yet again how teeny the world really is. It turned out that one of the other girls at dinner is a good friend of Michael's, but nobody figured out that connection until the next day.
On Saturday, one of our classmates had invited the class over for a potluck Shabbat lunch. I'm not sure he realized at the time that he had volunteered to host, in his one-bedroom apartment, a lunch for 40-50 people! It was pretty crowded for a while, but a lot of fun. A lot more people came in during the week, so it was a great afternoon of just getting to know a lot of new people and figuring out who we know in common. There's always someone, and often a few people.
Saturday evening we were invited to an alumni Havdalah at HUC, and then a group of us headed downtown. We walked around the stores, many of which reopen Saturday night after Shabbat, and then sat at a bar for a little while. All of the hanging out is fun, but I'm starting to be ready for classes to start and a real schedule to develop.
Today, the interns had organized a trip to the beach in Tel Aviv, so that we would know how to get out of Jerusalem when we wanted to do so. The picture is the group that headed to the beach, in Jerusalem right before we left. It's an easy shuttle van (not a bus) for a little less than $5 each way. The cities are about an hour apart. The beach in Tel Aviv is amazing and beautiful. The sky is perfectly blue, and so is the water. The water is also really warm, which would be even better if it weren't jellyfish season. I didn't go in past my feet. A group of us went shopping when we got bored on the beach, but didn't get anything. We found nothing in Tel Aviv we couldn't get in Jerusalem, and we weren't that impressed. I'll give it another try sometime when I'm not quite as worn out from the beach, although it would be hard to go there without spending some time on the beach.
Tomorrow is our last totally free day, and then orientation starts. I think I'm ready though. I hope so!
Also, I'll work on making the pictures lay out more neatly. Keep the emails coming:)
Friday is part of the weekend here, giving us time to prepare for Shabbat. HUC asked people who were more settled to host the more recent arrivals for Shabbat dinner, so my apartment volunteered to be a host. Then, I got invited to Shabbat dinner at my friend Minda's, a friend from Princeton who is in the middle of her two-year program in Jerusalem. So for much of the day Friday, I helped my roommates make dinner. I was disappointed to not be able to participate in our first hosting night, but I know there will be many more, and I thought a night with non-HUC people would be more rare. I found my way over to Minda's in the evening, again marveling at how this city shuts down on Friday afternoons and how many other people I saw, all going to Shabbat dinners all over the city. A few minutes away from Minda's, I heard what sounded like a long shofar blast. It turns out it's the Shabbat warning, reminding the city that it's time to light candles. I'm sometimes amazed that this city finds a balance, as shaky as it might be, between being a religious Jewish city and a modern, functioning city. I was proud when I got to Minda's and found out that people seldom find their way there the first time. I was a good navigator:) There were 6 of us at dinner, and it is always nice to spend an evening with an entirely different group of people, even when you like the ones you're usually surrounded by. We all hung out and talked for a couple hours after dinner, because nobody really had anything else to do that night or anywhere else to be. It was really nice. I also found out after the fact that the dinner proved yet again how teeny the world really is. It turned out that one of the other girls at dinner is a good friend of Michael's, but nobody figured out that connection until the next day.
On Saturday, one of our classmates had invited the class over for a potluck Shabbat lunch. I'm not sure he realized at the time that he had volunteered to host, in his one-bedroom apartment, a lunch for 40-50 people! It was pretty crowded for a while, but a lot of fun. A lot more people came in during the week, so it was a great afternoon of just getting to know a lot of new people and figuring out who we know in common. There's always someone, and often a few people.
Saturday evening we were invited to an alumni Havdalah at HUC, and then a group of us headed downtown. We walked around the stores, many of which reopen Saturday night after Shabbat, and then sat at a bar for a little while. All of the hanging out is fun, but I'm starting to be ready for classes to start and a real schedule to develop.
Today, the interns had organized a trip to the beach in Tel Aviv, so that we would know how to get out of Jerusalem when we wanted to do so. The picture is the group that headed to the beach, in Jerusalem right before we left. It's an easy shuttle van (not a bus) for a little less than $5 each way. The cities are about an hour apart. The beach in Tel Aviv is amazing and beautiful. The sky is perfectly blue, and so is the water. The water is also really warm, which would be even better if it weren't jellyfish season. I didn't go in past my feet. A group of us went shopping when we got bored on the beach, but didn't get anything. We found nothing in Tel Aviv we couldn't get in Jerusalem, and we weren't that impressed. I'll give it another try sometime when I'm not quite as worn out from the beach, although it would be hard to go there without spending some time on the beach.
Tomorrow is our last totally free day, and then orientation starts. I think I'm ready though. I hope so!Also, I'll work on making the pictures lay out more neatly. Keep the emails coming:)
Thursday, July 06, 2006
Getting used to it?
I've been here just over a week now. I wouldn't say I'm fully settled; I still need a lot of things to make my room feel like home, and there are still a bunch of administrative things that need finishing. But it's definitely feeling far more comfortable now than it did a week ago. I know my way around, in about a 15 minute walk radius, as long as there aren't too many side streets around. Those of us who have been here a week have even caught ourselves giving advice to the people who have only been here a day or two! It feels like it's been much longer. Also, I haven't posted anything for several days, so this one might go long...
I'm not always sure where the day goes. I've been spending parts of days out, shopping a little, exploring, finding new places, and asking silly questions at HUC. We've done a lot of errands. The greatest accomplishment so far was that Amy, Karen, and I had to set up what is basically a property tax in our name. In Israel, this tax is usually paid by the renters, not the owner. Our landlord had told us what street the office was on that we had to visit, and that it was near the big post office. Except that Israeli English usually confuses conjunctions (to be fair, I do the same in Hebrew), so we weren't sure whether the office we needed was near the post office, in the post office, across from the post office, or anything. We also didn't know where on Jaffa street the post office was located. We set out and asked several people along the way how to get to the post office. We only had to turn around once. We didn't see any other official looking buildings nearby, so we went into the post office. We asked a couple people simply "arnona?" (the name of the tax), and they pointed to the long line. So we stood in line. It went faster than we thought it would. Once we got to our window, we explained in a combination of English and Hebrew, that we needed to change the names on the account. She told us we had to go to a different building to do that, and said it was across the street. We went outside, and found very little across the street, except a security guard who didn't speak English. I managed to explain to her in Hebrew what we needed, and she told us where to go. (When someone points you to the building with all the people waiting outside, that's not usually a good sign.) It turns out the crowd outside was just the line to get through security. Once we were inside, and found our way to the massive room where we needed to be, we checked in at the information desk and were handed a number (#106). The board showed they were currently on #92. It was an impressively efficient system. There were somewhere between 8 and 15 desks open, and an electronic sign posted which number was next and which desk they should go to. It didn't take all that long before it was our turn. We learned fast that the first question to ask anyone is "Do you speak English?" This one didn't. So again in the not-so-impressive Hebrew we explained what we needed to do. This time we were in the right place, and got it taken care of! I'm sure the Israelis were amused to see the three of us walking out giving each other high fives and giggling. But we were proud of ourselves!!
The fourth of July was another experience. The HUC interns organized a dinner for us at Norman's, an American-style burger place...but kosher! One of my classmates had been told by a friend to try the kilo-burger. He didn't even look at the menu after he came in late, just told the waitress what he wanted. He also didn't realize that was 2.2 pounds of meat. Needless to say, it was rather large. And he got help from other late people, to whom he passed off a portion of the burger. I think he ate a third to half of it though, which is still sickeningly impressive. I enjoyed my normal-sized burger immensely:) After dinner, we all went to the same synagogue where we had been for Shabbat services. They were hosting a band to celebrate the fourth of July for the Americans in the city. It was...a Simon and Garfunkel cover band. Let me tell you, you've never heard a Simon with an Israeli accent. It was a lot of fun though, and really funny to watch some of the Israelis get SO into it. They were actually pretty good, and it was a fun way to spend the 4th. We then all headed downtown to a bar to celebrate a classmate's birthday. The bars and streets were PACKED with people watching the World Cup, which, sadly, nobody in the program has any interest in. We got a back room all to ourselves. We had no TV. It's been so much fun though, hanging out with my classmates and getting to know everyone in such an informal setting, knowing that orientation and then classes will be starting before too much longer. There are some great people in the class, and I'm looking forward to spending the year together! The picture is a bunch of us before the July 4th concert. Top row, left to right: Mary, Matt, Josh, Karen, Matt, Jesse. Bottom row: Courtney, Amy, Me, Carla, Cassi, Sarah, Sarah. There really are more guys in the class than that.
One more thing I'll put into this very long post...I've now taken my first (two) trips to the shuk, a gigantic Israeli market. Take the biggest outdoor market you can think of, and then triple it and slash the prices. And then do it again. It's an experience, and if I feel like playing tourist, one of the next times I go there, I'll try to remember a camera. It's stand after stand after stand, with aisles going off to the side and all the way around, selling produce, meat, fish, olives, nuts, seeds, spices, cheeses, and anything else you can think of. And it's higher quality and so much less expensive than the supermarkets. It's a 20-25 minute walk, but probably a place we'll be going every week or two this year!
That's all for now...please keep in touch! Comment, send me email, call my skype, I want to hear from everyone! I'm feeling very far away, and I'm not really sure who's still reading this...
Talk to you soon!
I'm not always sure where the day goes. I've been spending parts of days out, shopping a little, exploring, finding new places, and asking silly questions at HUC. We've done a lot of errands. The greatest accomplishment so far was that Amy, Karen, and I had to set up what is basically a property tax in our name. In Israel, this tax is usually paid by the renters, not the owner. Our landlord had told us what street the office was on that we had to visit, and that it was near the big post office. Except that Israeli English usually confuses conjunctions (to be fair, I do the same in Hebrew), so we weren't sure whether the office we needed was near the post office, in the post office, across from the post office, or anything. We also didn't know where on Jaffa street the post office was located. We set out and asked several people along the way how to get to the post office. We only had to turn around once. We didn't see any other official looking buildings nearby, so we went into the post office. We asked a couple people simply "arnona?" (the name of the tax), and they pointed to the long line. So we stood in line. It went faster than we thought it would. Once we got to our window, we explained in a combination of English and Hebrew, that we needed to change the names on the account. She told us we had to go to a different building to do that, and said it was across the street. We went outside, and found very little across the street, except a security guard who didn't speak English. I managed to explain to her in Hebrew what we needed, and she told us where to go. (When someone points you to the building with all the people waiting outside, that's not usually a good sign.) It turns out the crowd outside was just the line to get through security. Once we were inside, and found our way to the massive room where we needed to be, we checked in at the information desk and were handed a number (#106). The board showed they were currently on #92. It was an impressively efficient system. There were somewhere between 8 and 15 desks open, and an electronic sign posted which number was next and which desk they should go to. It didn't take all that long before it was our turn. We learned fast that the first question to ask anyone is "Do you speak English?" This one didn't. So again in the not-so-impressive Hebrew we explained what we needed to do. This time we were in the right place, and got it taken care of! I'm sure the Israelis were amused to see the three of us walking out giving each other high fives and giggling. But we were proud of ourselves!!
The fourth of July was another experience. The HUC interns organized a dinner for us at Norman's, an American-style burger place...but kosher! One of my classmates had been told by a friend to try the kilo-burger. He didn't even look at the menu after he came in late, just told the waitress what he wanted. He also didn't realize that was 2.2 pounds of meat. Needless to say, it was rather large. And he got help from other late people, to whom he passed off a portion of the burger. I think he ate a third to half of it though, which is still sickeningly impressive. I enjoyed my normal-sized burger immensely:) After dinner, we all went to the same synagogue where we had been for Shabbat services. They were hosting a band to celebrate the fourth of July for the Americans in the city. It was...a Simon and Garfunkel cover band. Let me tell you, you've never heard a Simon with an Israeli accent. It was a lot of fun though, and really funny to watch some of the Israelis get SO into it. They were actually pretty good, and it was a fun way to spend the 4th. We then all headed downtown to a bar to celebrate a classmate's birthday. The bars and streets were PACKED with people watching the World Cup, which, sadly, nobody in the program has any interest in. We got a back room all to ourselves. We had no TV. It's been so much fun though, hanging out with my classmates and getting to know everyone in such an informal setting, knowing that orientation and then classes will be starting before too much longer. There are some great people in the class, and I'm looking forward to spending the year together! The picture is a bunch of us before the July 4th concert. Top row, left to right: Mary, Matt, Josh, Karen, Matt, Jesse. Bottom row: Courtney, Amy, Me, Carla, Cassi, Sarah, Sarah. There really are more guys in the class than that.
One more thing I'll put into this very long post...I've now taken my first (two) trips to the shuk, a gigantic Israeli market. Take the biggest outdoor market you can think of, and then triple it and slash the prices. And then do it again. It's an experience, and if I feel like playing tourist, one of the next times I go there, I'll try to remember a camera. It's stand after stand after stand, with aisles going off to the side and all the way around, selling produce, meat, fish, olives, nuts, seeds, spices, cheeses, and anything else you can think of. And it's higher quality and so much less expensive than the supermarkets. It's a 20-25 minute walk, but probably a place we'll be going every week or two this year!
That's all for now...please keep in touch! Comment, send me email, call my skype, I want to hear from everyone! I'm feeling very far away, and I'm not really sure who's still reading this...
Talk to you soon!
Sunday, July 02, 2006
Jerusalem Shabbat
Shabbat in Jerusalem is unlike anything you've ever experienced.
Most of the HUC group that's here already (about 25 of us, plus some spouses, out of 55ish) met up and walked over to Kol HaNeshamah, a Progressive synangogue about a 20 minute walk from where a lot of us live. The walk was in a direction most of us hadn't tried yet, so it was nice to see that there are a whole bunch of stores and restaurants in that direction as well. The service was nice. I'm not sure what I was expecting, but this wasn't it. The congregation is made up mainly of people who have immigrated to Israel over the last 20 or 30 years and their families. Many of them are fluent in English as well as in Hebrew. The whole introduction was done in English, although I'm told this is also becuase there were a lot of visitors this week. There was a long kabbalat Shabbat, with lots of singing, all in Hebrew. The rest of the service followed the general Reform service, but in places there were some extra paragraphs. We skipped nothing. I was highly entertained when to hear one or two tunes we use in youth group thrown in with the otherwise very traditional melodies. There was no sermon, only a relatively short D'var Torah, although that was done in Hebrew with a little bit of English paraphrasing thrown in, so I didn't get a lot of it. The closing songs was one of my favorites, and another song I know from youth group and camp, Gesher Tsar Meod. It was really nice to hear a some familiar words and songs in the middle of this new experience! The picture is my roommates, Karen, me, and Amy, dressed for our first Shabbat here.
After services, we all walked back to HUC, where the interns had organized a mostly-potluck dinner for us. We sat and ate and talked for a while, and then did the longest Birkat Hamazon I've probably ever heard done fully aloud, without any muttering through it on your own. It was actually pretty funny, because most of us all know the same version, and this one had a bunch of extra paragraphs, so the whole group would get louder and quieter at once, and we would be left with just the interns singing a paragraph or two, and then the whole group would join in full force once again. I'm sure I'll learn it before too much longer.
After dinner, a few friends came back to our apartment. (Since three of us live here, we have one of the biggest places, with a great living room and lots of seating. I'll post pictures once we're all set up.) We all sat around and played cards and just hung out for a couple hours. On the way up our stairs (we're on the third floor), we could hear a group of people in another apartment singing Shabbat songs for a while.
Since we were up late, we all slept in and got up for our HUC picnic at lunch time. The picnic was really fun, and it was great to talk to some people I hadn't spent much time with yet. We all just sat and talked, threw around a frisbee for a while, and just enjoyed the afternoon. The park the interns had chosen was beautiful!
After the picnic, I went with a group over to one of the cafes that's actually open on Shabbat. (I had gotten to the picnic towards the beginning and eaten plenty, but not everyone did apparently.) This cafe is about a block from my apartment and really good, although in addition to being open on Shabbat, it's apparently one of the relatively few places in the city where you can get a cheeseburger....or a bacon cheeseburger. They make really good salads and vegetarian stuff too though.
After my second lunch, I borrowed hangers from a friend with extras, and finally finished unpacking. It feels great to not have a packed duffel sitting in the middle of my floor! With that finally out of the way, now I can focus on making it really feel like home: getting all the little things to make the room mine and cover up the blank white walls. I'm looking forward to it:)
In the evening, one of my classmates had invited us all over to his balcony for Havdalah. The balcony is amazing! We all sat in a circle on the ground, and there was plenty of space! Two people had guitars, and we just had a really relaxed, camp-like havdalah. It's amazing to look around this group of people, which is really only half of the class. Some of the people I've met and can see them right away as future rabbis. A few of the others...much less so. I'm sure I'll see it eventually, but so far, I'm a little puzzled by some people. Havdalah was great though.
After that, a small group of us (me, my roommates Amy and Karen, and our friend Stephanie) went out to an Italian place, also down the street from our apartment, that reopened after Shabbat for dinner. It was really good!! We'll have to go back to try more different things. We each had something different and tried everyone else's, and they were all delicious. Who knew we'd find good Italian in Israel?! We came back to our place after that, and a few other friends came over as well, and we hung out a little longer. Everyone really wants to get to know everyone else, play another round of Jewish geography, and just enjoy our time together while we're all still figuring out our way around. It's been really fun, but not so good for a regular sleep schedule!
I was blown away by the transformation the city undergoes for Shabbat. Israeli drivers are mostly fairly insane. They do (usually) stop for crosswalks, but not until their front bumpers are within a couple inches (one way or the other) of the edge of the crosswalk. On Shabbat, there's hardly any traffic. As the night wore on yesterday, I heard the city come back to life. This morning I can hear traffic whizzing by as usual. I liked it better quiet:)
Today is back to the craziness of getting settled. (The workweek in Israel is Sunday-Thursday. The weekend is Friday-Saturday.) I still have just over a week until orientation, and I plan to use it and enjoy it! My other goal today is to set up my Skype-In number, where you can call me from the states!
I miss you all, and I'm looking forward to talking to you soon!
Most of the HUC group that's here already (about 25 of us, plus some spouses, out of 55ish) met up and walked over to Kol HaNeshamah, a Progressive synangogue about a 20 minute walk from where a lot of us live. The walk was in a direction most of us hadn't tried yet, so it was nice to see that there are a whole bunch of stores and restaurants in that direction as well. The service was nice. I'm not sure what I was expecting, but this wasn't it. The congregation is made up mainly of people who have immigrated to Israel over the last 20 or 30 years and their families. Many of them are fluent in English as well as in Hebrew. The whole introduction was done in English, although I'm told this is also becuase there were a lot of visitors this week. There was a long kabbalat Shabbat, with lots of singing, all in Hebrew. The rest of the service followed the general Reform service, but in places there were some extra paragraphs. We skipped nothing. I was highly entertained when to hear one or two tunes we use in youth group thrown in with the otherwise very traditional melodies. There was no sermon, only a relatively short D'var Torah, although that was done in Hebrew with a little bit of English paraphrasing thrown in, so I didn't get a lot of it. The closing songs was one of my favorites, and another song I know from youth group and camp, Gesher Tsar Meod. It was really nice to hear a some familiar words and songs in the middle of this new experience! The picture is my roommates, Karen, me, and Amy, dressed for our first Shabbat here.
After services, we all walked back to HUC, where the interns had organized a mostly-potluck dinner for us. We sat and ate and talked for a while, and then did the longest Birkat Hamazon I've probably ever heard done fully aloud, without any muttering through it on your own. It was actually pretty funny, because most of us all know the same version, and this one had a bunch of extra paragraphs, so the whole group would get louder and quieter at once, and we would be left with just the interns singing a paragraph or two, and then the whole group would join in full force once again. I'm sure I'll learn it before too much longer.
After dinner, a few friends came back to our apartment. (Since three of us live here, we have one of the biggest places, with a great living room and lots of seating. I'll post pictures once we're all set up.) We all sat around and played cards and just hung out for a couple hours. On the way up our stairs (we're on the third floor), we could hear a group of people in another apartment singing Shabbat songs for a while.
Since we were up late, we all slept in and got up for our HUC picnic at lunch time. The picnic was really fun, and it was great to talk to some people I hadn't spent much time with yet. We all just sat and talked, threw around a frisbee for a while, and just enjoyed the afternoon. The park the interns had chosen was beautiful!
After the picnic, I went with a group over to one of the cafes that's actually open on Shabbat. (I had gotten to the picnic towards the beginning and eaten plenty, but not everyone did apparently.) This cafe is about a block from my apartment and really good, although in addition to being open on Shabbat, it's apparently one of the relatively few places in the city where you can get a cheeseburger....or a bacon cheeseburger. They make really good salads and vegetarian stuff too though.
After my second lunch, I borrowed hangers from a friend with extras, and finally finished unpacking. It feels great to not have a packed duffel sitting in the middle of my floor! With that finally out of the way, now I can focus on making it really feel like home: getting all the little things to make the room mine and cover up the blank white walls. I'm looking forward to it:)
In the evening, one of my classmates had invited us all over to his balcony for Havdalah. The balcony is amazing! We all sat in a circle on the ground, and there was plenty of space! Two people had guitars, and we just had a really relaxed, camp-like havdalah. It's amazing to look around this group of people, which is really only half of the class. Some of the people I've met and can see them right away as future rabbis. A few of the others...much less so. I'm sure I'll see it eventually, but so far, I'm a little puzzled by some people. Havdalah was great though.
After that, a small group of us (me, my roommates Amy and Karen, and our friend Stephanie) went out to an Italian place, also down the street from our apartment, that reopened after Shabbat for dinner. It was really good!! We'll have to go back to try more different things. We each had something different and tried everyone else's, and they were all delicious. Who knew we'd find good Italian in Israel?! We came back to our place after that, and a few other friends came over as well, and we hung out a little longer. Everyone really wants to get to know everyone else, play another round of Jewish geography, and just enjoy our time together while we're all still figuring out our way around. It's been really fun, but not so good for a regular sleep schedule!
I was blown away by the transformation the city undergoes for Shabbat. Israeli drivers are mostly fairly insane. They do (usually) stop for crosswalks, but not until their front bumpers are within a couple inches (one way or the other) of the edge of the crosswalk. On Shabbat, there's hardly any traffic. As the night wore on yesterday, I heard the city come back to life. This morning I can hear traffic whizzing by as usual. I liked it better quiet:)
Today is back to the craziness of getting settled. (The workweek in Israel is Sunday-Thursday. The weekend is Friday-Saturday.) I still have just over a week until orientation, and I plan to use it and enjoy it! My other goal today is to set up my Skype-In number, where you can call me from the states!
I miss you all, and I'm looking forward to talking to you soon!
Saturday, July 01, 2006
Settling In
Every day, it's getting more comfortable and homey here! Since orientation doesn't start until the 11th, we've all been just trying to get settled, learn our way around, and get all the things we didn't realize we needed or couldn't fit. There has been a shopping trip almost every day, and who knew just going to the grocery store could be such an adventure? You're going to have to trust me that it is. Apparently, you can't get cheddar cheese in this country. This might be a problem for me. I am slowly learning my way to various places. I've mastered the route to HUC and several friends' apartments. All of them are within a 7 minute walk. The Ben Yehudah/Yafo street shopping area...I'm getting better. And me and my Streetwise map are better friends than ever.
All the extra people who had been in the apartment left yesterday, so it was finally just me, Amy, and Karen. We spent the afternoon cleaning and unpacking. Things are looking much better, but my room is severly lacking in homey things, so I'm going to work on that before I post a picture. But it's been huge progress in the last 24 hours, when my bags were still just about fully packed.
I've met probably about half the class, and people are great. We're all still getting to know each other, but there are definitely people I've been hanging out with since the plane ride and our arrival in Jerusalem, and we're having a good time together! Lots of them are also headed to Cincinnati with me after our year here, which is really nice. The roommates are fun, and I think we'll all have a fun and peaceful apartment for the year:) Everyone who has come over has been really impressed with our place, so apparently our online apartment hunt was very successful! The daylight picture is me, my friend Stephanie, and one of my roommates Karen at a cafe down the street from our apartment. The one at night is (left to right) Helayne, Jaimee, and my roommates Amy, Karen, and me, at a bar outing organized by the HUC summer interns.
I know it's the middle of Shabbat, but I'm going to wait until tonight or tomorrow to post about my whole first Shabbat at once. For now, I have more things to find a home for, and it's almost lunch time!
Missing you all!
Wednesday, June 28, 2006
Airport Adventures
I'm in Israel! That one is sinking in really, really slowly. Hopefully my comprehension will improve with some sleep. That said, I take little responsibility for what's written here...
I got up at 5 am Tuesday to get ready to head up to Newark Liberty International Airport. (New fancy name, same old EWR.) Already in a sleep deficit, I got there at 10:30 and met then-future-roommate Amy. We went to check in, where before check-in, they ask you all kinds of personal questions: where are you from? Why are you going to Israel? How long are you staying? What's your Hebrew name? Where do you go to synagogue? How often? Amy also got hassled by the guy cross examining her for being a future female rabbi. My check in girl left me alone about that. Once we finally got to the front of the real check in line, the adventure began. I was told that my ticket wasn't valid. I had been booked twice, on different dates (huh?), and when this happens, El-Al automatically cancels the reservation. And apparently doesn't tell you. Or your travel agent. Needless to say, I was not a happy camper. Nothing could be done, so all of a sudden I was flying to Israel on Standby. They don't start taking standbys until 1:30. At the same time they start boarding. Except standbys are not allowed through security, since we have no boarding passes. Nor can we check bags. So for the first hour or so, I hung out with my overly full luggage cart and some other HUC people who had met up. Then we realized it was dumb for all of us to stay outside security, so they went in and I stayed by the door. About 1:50, they started to take standbys. I had been told I was first on the standby list. I was the last one handed a ticket. NOT HAPPY! In any case, the flight was scheduled for 2:30, and I still had to check bags and get through security, all of which was surprisingly uneventful. Then I got on the plane...
I found my seat, amazingly it was on the aisle and at the front of a section, with extra leg room. Yay! But since I was one of the last ones on the flight and my carryon was not exactly little, it didn't fit in the overhead compartment. So they took it to check it, and gave me a gate check tag, meaning it should reappear after the flight, at the gate, with the pile of strollers. (Side note. There were SO MANY babies on this flight! Wow.) El-Al, possibly because of the large number of babies, also has what amount to wall-mounted temporary cribs in about 5 rows. The ones at the front of a section with extra legroom. Needless to say, I was in a mom-with-baby seat. So once we had taken off, a flight attendant came over to me to see if I would switch to a different front-of-section aisle seat that apparently was missing the hooks for the crib. I did. So I moved forward 20 rows. (Another side note: we took off about an hour and a half late...and nobody seemed to mind.)
The rest of the ride was fairly uneventful. I slept for some short periods of time, but mostly kept fidgeting. The HUC people, 5 of us and all over the plane, kept visiting each other's seats and annoying people who were sleeping more successfully. Not a bad ride.
We arrived in Tel Aviv! On El-Al, everyone applauds when the plane touches down. That's pretty cool. I got off the plane and went to the pile of strollers to grab my carry-on, and, of course, it's not there. I'm not such a happy camper at this point. Then we had to go through passport control (more lines) and then on to baggage claim. After a flight with at least 600 people, the crowds are, to say the least, pushy and large. Happily and, apparently, amazingly, all five of us found all of our bags! (Yes, that includes the one that was supposed to be gate checked.) After that, customs was easy, and then we took a group van to Jerusalem. Basically, anyone going to Jerusalem piles in, with luggage (a fun challenge) and then it drops everyone off wherever they're going. We were last. So we got a tour of alllllll of Jerusalem. (For the record, the flight landed around 8:45 am local time, and we got to our apartment around noon.)
The afternoon has been visiting the campus (it's beautiful) and hanging out with some other HUC people and exploring a little bit. It's fun so far, but weird to be so far away.
This is a long post. I think it's time for dinner/shower/sleep. Mmmmm sleep.
Talk to you soon!!
I got up at 5 am Tuesday to get ready to head up to Newark Liberty International Airport. (New fancy name, same old EWR.) Already in a sleep deficit, I got there at 10:30 and met then-future-roommate Amy. We went to check in, where before check-in, they ask you all kinds of personal questions: where are you from? Why are you going to Israel? How long are you staying? What's your Hebrew name? Where do you go to synagogue? How often? Amy also got hassled by the guy cross examining her for being a future female rabbi. My check in girl left me alone about that. Once we finally got to the front of the real check in line, the adventure began. I was told that my ticket wasn't valid. I had been booked twice, on different dates (huh?), and when this happens, El-Al automatically cancels the reservation. And apparently doesn't tell you. Or your travel agent. Needless to say, I was not a happy camper. Nothing could be done, so all of a sudden I was flying to Israel on Standby. They don't start taking standbys until 1:30. At the same time they start boarding. Except standbys are not allowed through security, since we have no boarding passes. Nor can we check bags. So for the first hour or so, I hung out with my overly full luggage cart and some other HUC people who had met up. Then we realized it was dumb for all of us to stay outside security, so they went in and I stayed by the door. About 1:50, they started to take standbys. I had been told I was first on the standby list. I was the last one handed a ticket. NOT HAPPY! In any case, the flight was scheduled for 2:30, and I still had to check bags and get through security, all of which was surprisingly uneventful. Then I got on the plane...
I found my seat, amazingly it was on the aisle and at the front of a section, with extra leg room. Yay! But since I was one of the last ones on the flight and my carryon was not exactly little, it didn't fit in the overhead compartment. So they took it to check it, and gave me a gate check tag, meaning it should reappear after the flight, at the gate, with the pile of strollers. (Side note. There were SO MANY babies on this flight! Wow.) El-Al, possibly because of the large number of babies, also has what amount to wall-mounted temporary cribs in about 5 rows. The ones at the front of a section with extra legroom. Needless to say, I was in a mom-with-baby seat. So once we had taken off, a flight attendant came over to me to see if I would switch to a different front-of-section aisle seat that apparently was missing the hooks for the crib. I did. So I moved forward 20 rows. (Another side note: we took off about an hour and a half late...and nobody seemed to mind.)
The rest of the ride was fairly uneventful. I slept for some short periods of time, but mostly kept fidgeting. The HUC people, 5 of us and all over the plane, kept visiting each other's seats and annoying people who were sleeping more successfully. Not a bad ride.
We arrived in Tel Aviv! On El-Al, everyone applauds when the plane touches down. That's pretty cool. I got off the plane and went to the pile of strollers to grab my carry-on, and, of course, it's not there. I'm not such a happy camper at this point. Then we had to go through passport control (more lines) and then on to baggage claim. After a flight with at least 600 people, the crowds are, to say the least, pushy and large. Happily and, apparently, amazingly, all five of us found all of our bags! (Yes, that includes the one that was supposed to be gate checked.) After that, customs was easy, and then we took a group van to Jerusalem. Basically, anyone going to Jerusalem piles in, with luggage (a fun challenge) and then it drops everyone off wherever they're going. We were last. So we got a tour of alllllll of Jerusalem. (For the record, the flight landed around 8:45 am local time, and we got to our apartment around noon.)
The afternoon has been visiting the campus (it's beautiful) and hanging out with some other HUC people and exploring a little bit. It's fun so far, but weird to be so far away.
This is a long post. I think it's time for dinner/shower/sleep. Mmmmm sleep.
Talk to you soon!!
Monday, June 26, 2006
Packing, slowly
Clearly, I'm not making much progress on the (too?) large piles on Becky's bed. It seems I haven't forgotten everything I learned in Procrastination 101 after all. It should serve me well in the next five years.
I'm leaving for Israel on Tuesday morning, and I'm excited to start my new adventure, but also not so excited about leaving all my friends and family for so long. Come visit me:) But tell my mom first. She'll give you a bottle of hair gel to bring me.
Hopefully I'll have something more interesting to write once I get to Jerusalem and get internet up and running. Actually, from what I've heard, just getting internet up and running might be story-worthy.
Don't forget the seven hour time difference. When your cell phone is free at 9 pm, I'll be sound asleep...hopefully...at 4 am. Find another time to call. Once I have a phone number. And a phone.
Goodnight.
I'm leaving for Israel on Tuesday morning, and I'm excited to start my new adventure, but also not so excited about leaving all my friends and family for so long. Come visit me:) But tell my mom first. She'll give you a bottle of hair gel to bring me.
Hopefully I'll have something more interesting to write once I get to Jerusalem and get internet up and running. Actually, from what I've heard, just getting internet up and running might be story-worthy.
Don't forget the seven hour time difference. When your cell phone is free at 9 pm, I'll be sound asleep...hopefully...at 4 am. Find another time to call. Once I have a phone number. And a phone.
Goodnight.
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