On Friday after class, I travelled to Rehovot to visit Meital, a friend I met on birthright. She was one of the soldiers who met up with our trip for about five days, and one of the sweetest and most outgoing people I've ever known. She reminds me a lot of Rayna.
During class, our teacher had talked to us extensively about public transportation in Israel and how best to use it. In fact, she went around the room and asked each of us if we were planning to travel that day. For those of us who said yes, she explained to us exactly how to get where we needed to go. She explained to me in great detail how to get from Kibbutz Yagur to Rehovot.
At home, I have absolutely no sense of direction. I always get lost. In Israel, as it turns out, I'm the same way.
So in the end, it took several hours, a train, and far too many buses--and a lot of questions--before I made it to Rehovot. But very luckily, I managed to catch the last bus from Tel Aviv to Rehovot, and Meital met me at the mall I managed to get dropped off near.
It's nice to get away from the Kibbutz on weekends. While I'm here, everybody has such similar schedules, and students from the ulpan are together so much of the time that it can be a little stifling. It's a lot of fun, and these are people I'm going to be very close with by the time I leave, but sometimes I feel suffocated hanging out with the same people all day, every day. Also, I hadn't seen Meital since the end of my birthright trip, so it was excellent spending time with her.
She really likes art a lot, and her artwork is displayed all over her house--in her living room, her bedroom. She took me to see scultpures in two different places. I liked visiting these scultpures with somebody who loves art so much, because she made me feel really excited about what we were seeing, and she also had some interesting insights on a lot of the pieces.
On Saturday night, we went to the live earth festival in Tel Aviv (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Live_earth). It was a lot of fun. There were all these booths on environmentalism, and environmentally friendly products and foods being sold. Meital and I decorated pinecones. There was also a big concert featuring lots of Israeli bands I had never heard of. I was glad to be at a Live Earth festival; it reminded me a lot of home, of Vassar. I'm so conscious of sustainability and environmentalism there, because it's so easy to be--everybody around me is like that. But I'm beginning to realize how much easier it is to be focused on something when everybody is focused on that thing, when you have a support structure like that. And how much of our identities are affected by our environment and by the people we surround ourselves with.
Maybe Mariel in Israel is more different from Mariel in Poughkeepsie than I at first realized.
3 comments:
What a great Shabbat! I am your faithful reader, and Dad, and we love finding out in detail what you are doing.
Yesterday, we dropped off your huge duffel with Rosa at her twin Aunts' house (they were 79 I think) where we met up with her, in Orange,Ct. Rosa'll bring it back w/her to Israel on the 20th. Please bring her some nice present (wine, flowers) when you go to pick it up! We told her she has her place in heaven waiting for her because of this huge mitzvah she did for you. To make it weigh less than 23 kilos we had to take out some hair stuff (we sent some, and Dad'll bring the rest in Nov.) and one or two other heavyish things. It was quite a production getting Dad or me on the scale to weigh ourselves first without it, and then with it, to determine the weight. (Rosa was adamant that it not be over 23 kilos, the limit on the flights).But your laptop and things you really needed are there. We leave this Fri. the 13th for our Quebec trip, until Sun. the 29th, and won't have daily access to computer. If you need us, we'll have our cell phones with us.
Love,
Ima
You are such a good writer. It is always a pleasure to read your blog.
Your comment about how great an effect one's environment has reminds me of one of my favorite Yiddish expressions: "Azoy die Zeiten. azoy die Leiten" - as times are, so people are".
I trust that you got back to the Kibbutz with much less trouble than going to Rehovot.
Meital sounds wonderful.
Love, Abba
Mariel,
I was very happy to read your post.
It's easy to be outgoing when you're around because you are so excited about new things you see.
I'm glad I had the chance to meet you.
Don't forget to practice the new words. :)
p.s (In hebrew it's "nun beit")
You said you're use to do more for earth in vassar. We should do more in Israel. I thought about your Ulpan class- You can suggest to speak about earth and the environment for a lesson. The teacher van teach the words that relevant for this subject. What do you think?
Shavua tov,
Ohevet,
Meital.
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