I guess the next chapter of my time abroad has begun. I'm beginning to settle in to Kibbutz Yagur, where I'll be studying Hebrew and working for the next three and a half months. I arrived yesterday evening, and it's a little strange because it feels like I've been running around the country (and Egypt!) so much that I haven't had the time to sit down and digest what I've been doing and what I'm about to do. Before I left, Brittany, a friend from school, told me to sit down and mentally prepare. And I didn't do this, and now it kind of feels like I'm a small particle in a rapidly moving stream of colors and faces and a different bed to sleep in every night (although I suppose things will be a little more permanent from now on). It's like, everything that was overwhelming didn't seem overwhelming before, because I had no time to think. But now it's all catching up to me.
But the Kibbutz seems really great. It's very close to Haifa, and today, two guys from the Ulpan and I caught a bus to to Haifa, walked around, saw the Bahai Gardens, which are absolutely gorgeous. Kibbutz Yagur is HUGE. I spent some time in the pool this morning, an olympic sized monstrocity. There is also a pub, a club (called the Discotheque, and apparently it attracts people from all over the area), a zoo, a small amusement park, a store--it's like a little town! The other ulpanists seem really cool. We're from all over the world--US, Canada, Columbia, Latvia, Russia, Turkey, Hungary, France, Brazil, England, Japan, Korea, and I'm sure a million other places I've forgotten. The languages being spoken around me are fantastic.
This morning we got tested to see which class we'll be in, and I got put into Kitah Gimel, the most advanced. Hopefully my Hebrew will really begin to improve! I have a small room in one of four ulpan dormitories. My roommate's name is Lillian, and I think she's from the US, but that's all I know about her as she hasn't arrived yet.
Anyway, there are people waiting to use the few computers available to us here, so I'm going to let somebody else have a go. (I've been hanging around these British girls...)
Wednesday, June 27, 2007
Tuesday, June 26, 2007
Egypt?!!
I had made a last minute decision at the end of birthright and decided to meet up with two friends from the Taglit trip and travel with them to Egypt. I didn't say anything about this before because I didn't want people telling me it was too dangerous to go.
On Thursday we met in the Tel Aviv centrel bus station and took a 5 hour bus from Tel Aviv all the way down south to Eilat. We grabbed a cab to the border, about a ten minute ride, and then walked across. On the Egyptian side, we booked a ride in a van with a representative of Nature Travels, some kind of travel agency based in Egypt. It's interesting how different the Egyptian border was from the Israeli or American borders. You can tell there is corruption here, things are more laid back, bribes are accepted. There was some money changing hands before we were able to get our visas.
The van ride was long, but not uncomfortable since we had a 12-passenger vehicle to ourselves. We were riding all through the night, so Zibby and Kym (my traveling companions) and I slept as much as we could. We stopped at a few rest stops to learn about Egyptian hospitality. This involves our drivers and body guard (oh, yes. We had a body guard) shaking us awake and forcing us out of the van to sit inside a rest stop where the walls are lined with so many hookahs ("shisha" in Arabic). Then they forced Egyptian tea on us and did their best to converse with us in their poor English.
Egyptian hospitality involves forcing your guest to drink tea at every possible opportunity. So by the time we arrived in Cairo at 7am on Friday, we were kind of high on caffeine. We found a cheap hotel in a sketchy building and they offered us tea before we settled in. We spoke with a tour guide there, and he arranged for a driver to take us around to the Papyrus Museum, where I bought two beautiful pieces of art and drank a glass of tea; and to a camel stable, where we drank some tea, rode camels through the Sahara Desert to see pyramids, went inside a pyramid, rode the camels past the Sphynx, and drank some more tea.
The pyramids were incredible. I will post pictures as soon as I have a chance, but they were so magnificent up close. I kept thinking, I'm in Egypt. I saw pyramids. I was inside of a pyramid!
After nightfall, we drank some tea and mounted these beautiful Arabian horses. We rode them into the desert and set up a camp. Our hosts, bedouins named Ismael and Gabriel, made us a delicious pasta dinner. We spent the night not sleeping, gazing up at the stars, learning Arabic from Gabriel and these two children that were with us, playing games, and galloping the horses through the desert. I really galloped. I don't often think of the desert as a beautiful place, but it is. The sky was deep and starry, everything quiet but the pounding of the horses' hooves into the sand. "Lose your body, leave it with the saddle!" Ismael told me. Nothing but white sand and stars as far as the eye can see, my body back somewhere with the saddle, and I am just a pair of eyes galloping through the desert so late at night, it's morning. The bedouins love the desert, you know. It's not so hard to understand why.
The next day we visited the Egypt Museum, something like a storehouse for all these incredible ancient Egyptian tombs, and slabs of stone covered in hieroglyphics. There is a room filled with mummies and another filled with all the treasures found in King Tut's pyramid. I saw his two outer caskets, his face mask, magnificent jewelry.
Egypt is very much Egypt, and not the United States or Israel. I'll tell you what I mean. I described the museum as a sort of warehouse for these treasures, and it was a lot like that. There weren't many labels on lots of things, no easy explanations; and when there were labels, they were often typed out on flimsy index cards and taped next to the exibit or something. There was no airconditioning, the bathrooms were Egypt bathrooms (dirty, no toilet paper). Egypt is Egypt. I took photos of faces in Egypt and people in Egypt that I will post as soon as I have a chance, and you will see what I mean. In Egypt, you can walk into a bathroom, have a woman in a headscarf shove a wad of toiletpaper into your unsuspecting hand, and then demand money. We went to the market, and a three-year-old tiny little girl tried selling us tissues by unrelentingly following us and pressing the tissues into our hips, the highest place she could reach. Men carry trays of pita bread on their heads and mount motorcycles and bicycles with them. You can buy a glass of mango juice that is so fresh, it feels like somebody just stuck a straw in the actual mango. Hookahs cost less than ten American dollars, and everybody smokes, everywhere. Sometimes Israel feels a little like the U.S., but Egypt didn't, not once.
Our last day was spent on the beach in Sinai, after a 12-hour filthy, crowded bus ride. It was so well worth it, there aren't even words. We slept on the beach, about twenty feet from the Red Sea. We went snorkling and saw all kinds of amazing fish and coral. Remember that children's book called "The Rainbow Fish"? I saw rainbow fish, and eel, and clown fish (like Nemo), and huge schools of tiny shimmering blue fish. I saw coral that looked like brain, and red and green and blue coral, and coral that punctured a hole in my left foot.
And now I'm back in Israel, in Chadera, staying with family friends. Later today I am moving into Kibbutz Yagur, where I'll be staying and learning and working for the next 3 and a half months.
Salaam!
On Thursday we met in the Tel Aviv centrel bus station and took a 5 hour bus from Tel Aviv all the way down south to Eilat. We grabbed a cab to the border, about a ten minute ride, and then walked across. On the Egyptian side, we booked a ride in a van with a representative of Nature Travels, some kind of travel agency based in Egypt. It's interesting how different the Egyptian border was from the Israeli or American borders. You can tell there is corruption here, things are more laid back, bribes are accepted. There was some money changing hands before we were able to get our visas.
The van ride was long, but not uncomfortable since we had a 12-passenger vehicle to ourselves. We were riding all through the night, so Zibby and Kym (my traveling companions) and I slept as much as we could. We stopped at a few rest stops to learn about Egyptian hospitality. This involves our drivers and body guard (oh, yes. We had a body guard) shaking us awake and forcing us out of the van to sit inside a rest stop where the walls are lined with so many hookahs ("shisha" in Arabic). Then they forced Egyptian tea on us and did their best to converse with us in their poor English.
Egyptian hospitality involves forcing your guest to drink tea at every possible opportunity. So by the time we arrived in Cairo at 7am on Friday, we were kind of high on caffeine. We found a cheap hotel in a sketchy building and they offered us tea before we settled in. We spoke with a tour guide there, and he arranged for a driver to take us around to the Papyrus Museum, where I bought two beautiful pieces of art and drank a glass of tea; and to a camel stable, where we drank some tea, rode camels through the Sahara Desert to see pyramids, went inside a pyramid, rode the camels past the Sphynx, and drank some more tea.
The pyramids were incredible. I will post pictures as soon as I have a chance, but they were so magnificent up close. I kept thinking, I'm in Egypt. I saw pyramids. I was inside of a pyramid!
After nightfall, we drank some tea and mounted these beautiful Arabian horses. We rode them into the desert and set up a camp. Our hosts, bedouins named Ismael and Gabriel, made us a delicious pasta dinner. We spent the night not sleeping, gazing up at the stars, learning Arabic from Gabriel and these two children that were with us, playing games, and galloping the horses through the desert. I really galloped. I don't often think of the desert as a beautiful place, but it is. The sky was deep and starry, everything quiet but the pounding of the horses' hooves into the sand. "Lose your body, leave it with the saddle!" Ismael told me. Nothing but white sand and stars as far as the eye can see, my body back somewhere with the saddle, and I am just a pair of eyes galloping through the desert so late at night, it's morning. The bedouins love the desert, you know. It's not so hard to understand why.
The next day we visited the Egypt Museum, something like a storehouse for all these incredible ancient Egyptian tombs, and slabs of stone covered in hieroglyphics. There is a room filled with mummies and another filled with all the treasures found in King Tut's pyramid. I saw his two outer caskets, his face mask, magnificent jewelry.
Egypt is very much Egypt, and not the United States or Israel. I'll tell you what I mean. I described the museum as a sort of warehouse for these treasures, and it was a lot like that. There weren't many labels on lots of things, no easy explanations; and when there were labels, they were often typed out on flimsy index cards and taped next to the exibit or something. There was no airconditioning, the bathrooms were Egypt bathrooms (dirty, no toilet paper). Egypt is Egypt. I took photos of faces in Egypt and people in Egypt that I will post as soon as I have a chance, and you will see what I mean. In Egypt, you can walk into a bathroom, have a woman in a headscarf shove a wad of toiletpaper into your unsuspecting hand, and then demand money. We went to the market, and a three-year-old tiny little girl tried selling us tissues by unrelentingly following us and pressing the tissues into our hips, the highest place she could reach. Men carry trays of pita bread on their heads and mount motorcycles and bicycles with them. You can buy a glass of mango juice that is so fresh, it feels like somebody just stuck a straw in the actual mango. Hookahs cost less than ten American dollars, and everybody smokes, everywhere. Sometimes Israel feels a little like the U.S., but Egypt didn't, not once.
Our last day was spent on the beach in Sinai, after a 12-hour filthy, crowded bus ride. It was so well worth it, there aren't even words. We slept on the beach, about twenty feet from the Red Sea. We went snorkling and saw all kinds of amazing fish and coral. Remember that children's book called "The Rainbow Fish"? I saw rainbow fish, and eel, and clown fish (like Nemo), and huge schools of tiny shimmering blue fish. I saw coral that looked like brain, and red and green and blue coral, and coral that punctured a hole in my left foot.
And now I'm back in Israel, in Chadera, staying with family friends. Later today I am moving into Kibbutz Yagur, where I'll be staying and learning and working for the next 3 and a half months.
Salaam!
Wednesday, June 20, 2007
Chapter One
So finally, hineini b'yisrael! I'm here in Israel! I'm sorry I haven't written sooner, but birthright turned out to be the ten most exhausting days I've ever had in my life, and this is the first opportunity I've had to breathe and sleep, let alone mail postcards or use the internet!
The trip was amazing, I'm really flying. It was a great, if touristy, way to start my year in Israel. We travelled from the Golan Heights to Jerusalem to the Negev to Tel Aviv; we hiked, kyaked, swam, toured, tasted wine.
We were a fantastic group of 38 American students from all over the country; 2 hilarious trip leaders, Jesse and Neela; 8 Israeli soldiers, who were actually 
officers; the smartest tour guide I've ever 
had, Maxi; our bus driver, Schneider, whom everybody fell in love with and who hardly spoke two words of English; and three medics with guns, Dror, Kofit, and Gil.
For those of you who are interested, I'll run through what we did in detail, but nobody should feel obligated to read this all!
I said goodbye to my sister and grandparents Sunday morning, and my parents brought me to JFK airport, where I checked in with Jesse and Neela, donned a classy name tag, checked my bags (which, thankfully, did not weigh in at more than the maximum weight), and walked with my parents to security. Whereas the other parents had stayed at home or said goodbye to their children from the car or by baggage check, mine proceeded to document t in great detail, through photo-taking, the process of my walking through the airport. I thought briefly about being embarrassed the second time a securtiy guard screamed at them for taking a picture ("Excuse ME, ma'am, but I don't want my photo taken!" when one was in the background), but then decided against it. After all, the other parents' children were coming home in ten days, or two weeks, or by the end of the summer, and I'm here for a good bit longer. Besides, we did a pretty cool photoshoot.
Security was no problem, then I sat at the gate for some hours and met a few people who would be on my trip and who I'd get to know much better. Also, to my surprise, I saw a girl from Vassar, Rebecca Ain, and discovered that she was doing the same trip that I was, for ages 22-26. It was strange to say goodbye to everybody at home and school, accept that I was leaving and wouldn't see familiar faces for quite a while, and then immediately run into somebody I know! But she was on my flight and we ran into each other a few more times during the ten days.
The flight went smoothly. I sat next to two girls (women?) from the University of Vermont, Lily and Julia, for ten uncomfortable hours. When we finally landed, I was exhausted from not having been able to sleep on the plane, but it was 7:50AM Israeli time, the night was already past, and we were starting a new day! We took a bus to Caesaria,
where we had a toast by the beach and explored the ruins of that fantastically old city. Then we took the bus to Kibbutz Merom Golan, where we stayed in these adorable kibbutz guest houses. The kibbutz was really cute and made me so excited to begin my ulpan on Kibbutz Yagur! It had a Chadar Ochel (dining hall) where we had breakfast and dinner for the three days that we stayed there, and it also had a little pub with a bar, cozy seats, and a small dance floor.
On Tuesday, we explored the city of Tzfat, an old and mystical place and one of the four holy
cities in Israel. I ate at "the best falafel place in Tzfat," according to Maxi, our tour guide, and then, walking around a little bit, ran into Jackie, who was standing in line at a falafel place that was clearly not the best falafel place in Tzfat. How strange to meet up with her in Israel! After catching up with Jackie, I bought a pair of sandals using only my awkward, rusty Hebrew. I'm so proud.
In the afternoon we went kayaking on the Jordon River, which is not as exciting as it sounds. It's actually a very calm and relaxed river.
On Wednesday we did a nature hike in Yehudiya Forest Nature Reserve. This was probably the top most amazing hike I've ever done. The trail was constantly taking us by, over, around, and through water until we got to a big waterfall and a wide pool of water, on the other side of which the path continued. There were only two ways to the other side: climb a ladder down the waterfall and swim across the pool of water; or rappel down the waterfall and swim across the pool of water. So we all rapelled down the waterfall, and there I was, wearing a helmet, harnessed to a rope, making my way down a steep cliff in a very perpendicular fashion, with a waterfall coming down on my head!
In the afternoon, we went to the Golan Heights winery where I downed four glasses of wine and scoffed at how pretentious the whole thing was. Seriously, though, it's one of the best wineries in the country, and it was really neat to get a tour of the place. I bought a bottle of wine which later broke. And we all got free wine glasses, but my glass broke as well. Go figure.
On Thursday we went swimming in the Sea of Galilee, or Yam HaKineret. We went to a waterpark built right on the sea (which isn't really a sea at all, it's actually very small). I've never been to a waterpark with such a fantastic view before. Afterward, we drove to Jerusalem, where we would be staying through Shabbat. At night, we went out clubbing. Thursday is a really big party night in Jerusalem.
On Friday we did another amazing walk, only this one was underground in Hezekiah's water tunnel. It was an ancient water system where water was carried from one place to another by these underground tunnels, which were built using the natural rock formation. We walked through these pitch-black underground tunnels, where there was still water pooled at the bottom.
We checked into our hotel, the Caesar, and met our Israeli soldiers! There were 
four men (Idan, Omri, Yanir, and Richie) and four women (Meital, Jordana, Imbal, and Michal). Then we all went to the shuk, the Jerusalem market, together. If you've never been to a shuk in Israel, you can't really understand what it's like. Streets packed with vendors selling everything from clothes to jewelry to spices to fish to smoothies to kippot 
to candy and chalvah. The entire street so thick with people you can hardly move. Smells, shouts, Hebrew, haggling. Men with black hats and beards and payis, women pushing strollers, young couples, secular men and women, tourists from all over the world, Israeli soldiers, young children. A strange and wonderful mix of people.
Next, we took a walking tour of the Jewish Quarter of the Old City. We went to the Kotel, the Wall, where I tried to pray ended up being so jostled by the myriad people who wanted to visit the Kotel before Shabbat. We returned to the hotel, lit Shabbat candles all together. Then we were allowed to celebrate Shabbat in whatever way we wished. Some people stayed in the hotel and slept, because we were all exhausted from all the touring (and partying at night) and none of the sleeping. Some people visited the Kotel again. A group of us, myself included, went to the neighborhood of Nachla'ot to see what Kabbalat Shabbat services are like in a synagogue there. I witnessed and participated in some of the most joyful and energetic prayer I could imagine. Then we returned to the hotel for the Shabbat meal, and it was really cool to see everybody eating and celebrating Shabbat in the hotel's Chadar Ochel. There were many groups there other than our own, including many religious people who broke out in loud and happy song.
On Shabbat, we had a day off to sleep late and do what we'd like. It was so wonderful to sleep, it really felt so much like Shabbat, like a day of rest. I've rarely needed Shabbat as badly as I did that day. In the afternoon, we walked around the Old City for a bit and did things in smaller groups. I had developed an excruciating tooth ache, so Gil, one of our medics, took me to a dentist who had to open his office specially to see me. He explained what he was going to do in bad English, and he did it. I don't know what. But he prescribed antibiotics and sent me on my way, and I feel a lot better now, although I may have to go back to the dentist in another few days just so he can check. It was awful timing, and I was really upset and in a lot of pain, but it turned out very alright in the end.
Anyway, Shabbat evening we did havdallah and then went out again, this time to Ben Yehuda street, which was crowded with all kinds of people and shops and falafel and drumming. I walked back to the hotel through Nachla'ot and we passed the shuk where we had been a day earlier, and it was eerie to see how different it looked. It was dark and quiet, asleep, none of the loud and colorful bustle from the day before. The street looked huge and wide when it was empty.
Sunday was a very difficult day. We went to Har Herzl, or Mount Herzl, Israel's national memorium. We saw the graves of many important figures in Israeli history, like Theodore Herzl and Yitzchak Rabin. I think Yitzchak Rabin's grave in particular means a lot to me, because I remember the day he was killed. I was a student at Ruben Gittleman Hebrew Day School.
Maxi, our tour guide, took us to the grave of somebody he used to be good friends with. Then Jordana, one of our soldiers, took us to the grave of one of her good friends who had been killed not too long ago. She talked to us about what an amazing person he had been, and you could tell that he was, just by the number of stones on his grave, all the pictures and things people had left. Everybody had on a pair of sunglasses, even though we were sitting in the shade, and you knew that everybody was crying behind those sunglasses.
Then we went to Yad Vashem, the Holocaust Museum. I'm not really sure what to say now.
But I will say that it's entirely different to go to Yad Vashem in Israel than it is to go to the Holocaust Museum in New York or Washington, D.C. It's so beautiful and moving to exit the darkness and pain of the museum and find yourself looking over Jerusalem with all its glimmering white stone.
After Yad Vashem we drove down south to the Negev and checked into a beautiful hostel at the foot of Masada. A few friends and I hiked for a few hours in the dark, up and down hills of sand and rock, all the way to the dead sea. Then, exhausted, we took the road back. It was after 1am, and we needed to get up at 4am in order to climb Masada, so I stumbled into bed. Not two minutes later there was a knock on my door. Two friends from a camp I had gone to five years ago. I was so shocked to see them there! Birthright is so strange. I had a chance to talk with people I hadn't seen in years--and we were together in Israel!
In the morning, functioning on two hours of sleep, I c
limbed Masada. From the top, we watched the sun rise over the Dead Sea, the Yam Hamelach. We hiked down, and then made our way to the Dead Sea. I bought a beer and drank it floating in the water. Really cool experience. The Dead Sea, by the way, is the lowest point on earth. It's a few hundred meters below sea level.
In the afternoon we went for a camel ride. And we slept in the middle of the desert, literally under the stars, without even a tent. The stars are clear, so numerous and beautiful.
Our last day we spent in Tel Aviv. First, we hiked to this giant crater. I tried to take pictures of it, but like so many other amazing things I saw on this trip, a camera just can't capture it. Then we checked into our hotel in Tel Aviv, which was a block from the beach. We walked to the Tel Aviv shuk, which includes an artist's market with so many beautiful things, including lots of gorgeous Judaica--mezuzot, shabbat candle holders, chanukiot, havdalah sets.
We went to the birthright Mega Event, where I saw Jackie again and said goodbye. Then I spent the night drinking wine, eating pita and humus, and smoking hookah on the beach.
Yesterday we all said goodbye to one another at the airport. I took the train to Bet Yehoshuah where my cousin Yossi picked me up and brought me to the hospital to see my Uncle Chaim. I spent the night at my cousins Sarah and Moti's house, and they have been so good to me, taking me out to eat and doing my disgusting laundry.
I'm sorry that was so long. I'm having a wonderful time!
The trip was amazing, I'm really flying. It was a great, if touristy, way to start my year in Israel. We travelled from the Golan Heights to Jerusalem to the Negev to Tel Aviv; we hiked, kyaked, swam, toured, tasted wine.
We were a fantastic group of 38 American students from all over the country; 2 hilarious trip leaders, Jesse and Neela; 8 Israeli soldiers, who were actually 
officers; the smartest tour guide I've ever 
had, Maxi; our bus driver, Schneider, whom everybody fell in love with and who hardly spoke two words of English; and three medics with guns, Dror, Kofit, and Gil.For those of you who are interested, I'll run through what we did in detail, but nobody should feel obligated to read this all!
I said goodbye to my sister and grandparents Sunday morning, and my parents brought me to JFK airport, where I checked in with Jesse and Neela, donned a classy name tag, checked my bags (which, thankfully, did not weigh in at more than the maximum weight), and walked with my parents to security. Whereas the other parents had stayed at home or said goodbye to their children from the car or by baggage check, mine proceeded to document t in great detail, through photo-taking, the process of my walking through the airport. I thought briefly about being embarrassed the second time a securtiy guard screamed at them for taking a picture ("Excuse ME, ma'am, but I don't want my photo taken!" when one was in the background), but then decided against it. After all, the other parents' children were coming home in ten days, or two weeks, or by the end of the summer, and I'm here for a good bit longer. Besides, we did a pretty cool photoshoot.
Security was no problem, then I sat at the gate for some hours and met a few people who would be on my trip and who I'd get to know much better. Also, to my surprise, I saw a girl from Vassar, Rebecca Ain, and discovered that she was doing the same trip that I was, for ages 22-26. It was strange to say goodbye to everybody at home and school, accept that I was leaving and wouldn't see familiar faces for quite a while, and then immediately run into somebody I know! But she was on my flight and we ran into each other a few more times during the ten days.
The flight went smoothly. I sat next to two girls (women?) from the University of Vermont, Lily and Julia, for ten uncomfortable hours. When we finally landed, I was exhausted from not having been able to sleep on the plane, but it was 7:50AM Israeli time, the night was already past, and we were starting a new day! We took a bus to Caesaria,
where we had a toast by the beach and explored the ruins of that fantastically old city. Then we took the bus to Kibbutz Merom Golan, where we stayed in these adorable kibbutz guest houses. The kibbutz was really cute and made me so excited to begin my ulpan on Kibbutz Yagur! It had a Chadar Ochel (dining hall) where we had breakfast and dinner for the three days that we stayed there, and it also had a little pub with a bar, cozy seats, and a small dance floor.On Tuesday, we explored the city of Tzfat, an old and mystical place and one of the four holy
cities in Israel. I ate at "the best falafel place in Tzfat," according to Maxi, our tour guide, and then, walking around a little bit, ran into Jackie, who was standing in line at a falafel place that was clearly not the best falafel place in Tzfat. How strange to meet up with her in Israel! After catching up with Jackie, I bought a pair of sandals using only my awkward, rusty Hebrew. I'm so proud.In the afternoon we went kayaking on the Jordon River, which is not as exciting as it sounds. It's actually a very calm and relaxed river.
On Wednesday we did a nature hike in Yehudiya Forest Nature Reserve. This was probably the top most amazing hike I've ever done. The trail was constantly taking us by, over, around, and through water until we got to a big waterfall and a wide pool of water, on the other side of which the path continued. There were only two ways to the other side: climb a ladder down the waterfall and swim across the pool of water; or rappel down the waterfall and swim across the pool of water. So we all rapelled down the waterfall, and there I was, wearing a helmet, harnessed to a rope, making my way down a steep cliff in a very perpendicular fashion, with a waterfall coming down on my head!
In the afternoon, we went to the Golan Heights winery where I downed four glasses of wine and scoffed at how pretentious the whole thing was. Seriously, though, it's one of the best wineries in the country, and it was really neat to get a tour of the place. I bought a bottle of wine which later broke. And we all got free wine glasses, but my glass broke as well. Go figure.
On Thursday we went swimming in the Sea of Galilee, or Yam HaKineret. We went to a waterpark built right on the sea (which isn't really a sea at all, it's actually very small). I've never been to a waterpark with such a fantastic view before. Afterward, we drove to Jerusalem, where we would be staying through Shabbat. At night, we went out clubbing. Thursday is a really big party night in Jerusalem.
On Friday we did another amazing walk, only this one was underground in Hezekiah's water tunnel. It was an ancient water system where water was carried from one place to another by these underground tunnels, which were built using the natural rock formation. We walked through these pitch-black underground tunnels, where there was still water pooled at the bottom.
We checked into our hotel, the Caesar, and met our Israeli soldiers! There were 
four men (Idan, Omri, Yanir, and Richie) and four women (Meital, Jordana, Imbal, and Michal). Then we all went to the shuk, the Jerusalem market, together. If you've never been to a shuk in Israel, you can't really understand what it's like. Streets packed with vendors selling everything from clothes to jewelry to spices to fish to smoothies to kippot 
to candy and chalvah. The entire street so thick with people you can hardly move. Smells, shouts, Hebrew, haggling. Men with black hats and beards and payis, women pushing strollers, young couples, secular men and women, tourists from all over the world, Israeli soldiers, young children. A strange and wonderful mix of people.Next, we took a walking tour of the Jewish Quarter of the Old City. We went to the Kotel, the Wall, where I tried to pray ended up being so jostled by the myriad people who wanted to visit the Kotel before Shabbat. We returned to the hotel, lit Shabbat candles all together. Then we were allowed to celebrate Shabbat in whatever way we wished. Some people stayed in the hotel and slept, because we were all exhausted from all the touring (and partying at night) and none of the sleeping. Some people visited the Kotel again. A group of us, myself included, went to the neighborhood of Nachla'ot to see what Kabbalat Shabbat services are like in a synagogue there. I witnessed and participated in some of the most joyful and energetic prayer I could imagine. Then we returned to the hotel for the Shabbat meal, and it was really cool to see everybody eating and celebrating Shabbat in the hotel's Chadar Ochel. There were many groups there other than our own, including many religious people who broke out in loud and happy song.
On Shabbat, we had a day off to sleep late and do what we'd like. It was so wonderful to sleep, it really felt so much like Shabbat, like a day of rest. I've rarely needed Shabbat as badly as I did that day. In the afternoon, we walked around the Old City for a bit and did things in smaller groups. I had developed an excruciating tooth ache, so Gil, one of our medics, took me to a dentist who had to open his office specially to see me. He explained what he was going to do in bad English, and he did it. I don't know what. But he prescribed antibiotics and sent me on my way, and I feel a lot better now, although I may have to go back to the dentist in another few days just so he can check. It was awful timing, and I was really upset and in a lot of pain, but it turned out very alright in the end.
Anyway, Shabbat evening we did havdallah and then went out again, this time to Ben Yehuda street, which was crowded with all kinds of people and shops and falafel and drumming. I walked back to the hotel through Nachla'ot and we passed the shuk where we had been a day earlier, and it was eerie to see how different it looked. It was dark and quiet, asleep, none of the loud and colorful bustle from the day before. The street looked huge and wide when it was empty.
Sunday was a very difficult day. We went to Har Herzl, or Mount Herzl, Israel's national memorium. We saw the graves of many important figures in Israeli history, like Theodore Herzl and Yitzchak Rabin. I think Yitzchak Rabin's grave in particular means a lot to me, because I remember the day he was killed. I was a student at Ruben Gittleman Hebrew Day School.
Maxi, our tour guide, took us to the grave of somebody he used to be good friends with. Then Jordana, one of our soldiers, took us to the grave of one of her good friends who had been killed not too long ago. She talked to us about what an amazing person he had been, and you could tell that he was, just by the number of stones on his grave, all the pictures and things people had left. Everybody had on a pair of sunglasses, even though we were sitting in the shade, and you knew that everybody was crying behind those sunglasses.
Then we went to Yad Vashem, the Holocaust Museum. I'm not really sure what to say now.
But I will say that it's entirely different to go to Yad Vashem in Israel than it is to go to the Holocaust Museum in New York or Washington, D.C. It's so beautiful and moving to exit the darkness and pain of the museum and find yourself looking over Jerusalem with all its glimmering white stone.
After Yad Vashem we drove down south to the Negev and checked into a beautiful hostel at the foot of Masada. A few friends and I hiked for a few hours in the dark, up and down hills of sand and rock, all the way to the dead sea. Then, exhausted, we took the road back. It was after 1am, and we needed to get up at 4am in order to climb Masada, so I stumbled into bed. Not two minutes later there was a knock on my door. Two friends from a camp I had gone to five years ago. I was so shocked to see them there! Birthright is so strange. I had a chance to talk with people I hadn't seen in years--and we were together in Israel!
In the morning, functioning on two hours of sleep, I c
limbed Masada. From the top, we watched the sun rise over the Dead Sea, the Yam Hamelach. We hiked down, and then made our way to the Dead Sea. I bought a beer and drank it floating in the water. Really cool experience. The Dead Sea, by the way, is the lowest point on earth. It's a few hundred meters below sea level.
In the afternoon we went for a camel ride. And we slept in the middle of the desert, literally under the stars, without even a tent. The stars are clear, so numerous and beautiful.Our last day we spent in Tel Aviv. First, we hiked to this giant crater. I tried to take pictures of it, but like so many other amazing things I saw on this trip, a camera just can't capture it. Then we checked into our hotel in Tel Aviv, which was a block from the beach. We walked to the Tel Aviv shuk, which includes an artist's market with so many beautiful things, including lots of gorgeous Judaica--mezuzot, shabbat candle holders, chanukiot, havdalah sets.
We went to the birthright Mega Event, where I saw Jackie again and said goodbye. Then I spent the night drinking wine, eating pita and humus, and smoking hookah on the beach.
Yesterday we all said goodbye to one another at the airport. I took the train to Bet Yehoshuah where my cousin Yossi picked me up and brought me to the hospital to see my Uncle Chaim. I spent the night at my cousins Sarah and Moti's house, and they have been so good to me, taking me out to eat and doing my disgusting laundry.
I'm sorry that was so long. I'm having a wonderful time!
Saturday, June 9, 2007
Joy
It's 1am as I'm writing this, which means I will be in the airport in 9 and a half hours. It's really hard to believe. I keep thinking, this is where my life thus far has led me; things have been leading up to this event, spending a year in Israel. This is an end, a beginning, the start of a wonderful journey.
My parents and grandparents threw me a going away party today. Everybody is so nice to me! A few people from Vassar came, and it was wonderful to see them. Also cousins, high school friends, family friends. I already feel so lucky to be able to go to Israel, but many people who came today brought me gifts. Gifts! I'm going away, I get to spend a fabulous year in Israel, and I get gifts for this!
Well, the real reason I decided to post--again--before I even got to Israel was to give everybody my address for the first few months:
Mariel Boyarsky
Ulpan
Kibbutz Yagur
Israel 30065
A closing thought. As Jackie was leaving my house today she made me promise I'd come back at the end of the year. She made me promise I wouldn't stay in Israel forever, promise that I'd be back by next fall to finish my senior year at Vassar. A promise not to fall in love with Israel too quickly and never come home. Imagine this. I'm going to a place that I will love so much, a country so fantastic that I might not want to come home to Vassar. And I am already in love with Vassar.
That's kind of powerful. It's going to be a great year.
My parents and grandparents threw me a going away party today. Everybody is so nice to me! A few people from Vassar came, and it was wonderful to see them. Also cousins, high school friends, family friends. I already feel so lucky to be able to go to Israel, but many people who came today brought me gifts. Gifts! I'm going away, I get to spend a fabulous year in Israel, and I get gifts for this!
Well, the real reason I decided to post--again--before I even got to Israel was to give everybody my address for the first few months:
Mariel Boyarsky
Ulpan
Kibbutz Yagur
Israel 30065
A closing thought. As Jackie was leaving my house today she made me promise I'd come back at the end of the year. She made me promise I wouldn't stay in Israel forever, promise that I'd be back by next fall to finish my senior year at Vassar. A promise not to fall in love with Israel too quickly and never come home. Imagine this. I'm going to a place that I will love so much, a country so fantastic that I might not want to come home to Vassar. And I am already in love with Vassar.
That's kind of powerful. It's going to be a great year.
Monday, June 4, 2007
Traveling is like flirting with life...
It's strange how events that you think are going to be a huge deal in your life never seem as important when the time for them actually comes. For me, these things loom larger in the distance than they do from up close. I thought saying goodbye to people before I left for Israel would be momentous, but for the most part, it's been remarkably similar to saying goodbye to people I'll see again in another day or week. It's been quite unlike how I'd imagined it would feel to say goodbye to somebody I won't see for over a year.
I leave on Sunday, in a bit less than a week, and this does not seem like a huge deal. Maybe it hasn't sunk in yet, maybe I'm too overwhelmed thinking about all the packing I haven't done yet. Or maybe I'm just ready to go.
I found this lovely quote today. "Traveling is like flirting with life. It's like saying, 'I would stay and love you, but I have to go; this is my station.'"
So, stay in touch! Here is where I'll be writing about goings on in my life in the mideast over the next year. You all should write (when I have an address), email (maboyarsky@vassar.edu), or post. My phone number in Israel is 052.312.6278. Go figure out how to dial that from the US, I have no idea.
Peace, love, and for everybody else traveling soon, niseyah tovah (bon voyage)!
I leave on Sunday, in a bit less than a week, and this does not seem like a huge deal. Maybe it hasn't sunk in yet, maybe I'm too overwhelmed thinking about all the packing I haven't done yet. Or maybe I'm just ready to go.
I found this lovely quote today. "Traveling is like flirting with life. It's like saying, 'I would stay and love you, but I have to go; this is my station.'"
So, stay in touch! Here is where I'll be writing about goings on in my life in the mideast over the next year. You all should write (when I have an address), email (maboyarsky@vassar.edu), or post. My phone number in Israel is 052.312.6278. Go figure out how to dial that from the US, I have no idea.
Peace, love, and for everybody else traveling soon, niseyah tovah (bon voyage)!
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