Naples, Sorrento and Florence!

On Monday night we left our hostel around 9:30 and boarded a Metro for the edge of town. After transferring to a bus, we arrived at the Olympic Stadium. There, we met the girls (Adina, Rachel, Ariella and Debbie). It was good to see them. We walked for about 20 minutes down a large street and then turned off to a smaller street with a gelateria. There I had my first ever canoli.
Now, brought on by my thoughts of canoli, I hope my readers will allow me a brief tangent on those foods that I believe all tourists should get while in Italy (aka, the best stuff I’ve had so far):

1. Pizza all over the place – the best pizzas I’ve had so far have come at the Irish pub in Rome where we watched the football game, the little restaurant after the botanical garden break-in/out and a restaurant just outside of Pompeii (you may think I listed all the places I’ve had pizza. You’d be wrong. So wrong. So much pizza). I didn’t love the pizza I got in Napoli, but that was the one time I departed from my usual margherita pizza, so that my have been the problem, after all, Napoli is the birthplace of pizza, how could it be bad?
2. Gnocci alla Sorentino (Sorrento-style gnocci) at English Inn in Sorrento – we found this place without the help of Rick and it was a spectacular discovery. The waiters are friendly and funny, with good English, and the food is delicious. The people who got pizza here loved it too, but the gnocci was the best thing any of us ordered. We ate here two nights, and the second night I got fagotini instead (more to be able to say I ate fagotini than because I didn’t want gnocci again). The fagotini was good, but the best part of the meal was when they made us extra gnocci and gave half plates to all of us for free.
3. Gelato from Gelateria Della Palma – This is a big gelateria two blocks in front of the Pantheon, and probably more worth going to this part of Rome than the Pantheon itself. They have over 150 flavors, and the all look delicious. In particular, I loved the mango and the mascarpone. The most exciting part of eating there may have been examining my cup and noticing that they seem to have a store in NYC. Something to look into.
4. Hot chocolate from Illy – Illy is a European coffee chain, sorta. They also sell alcohol, candy and, most importantly, hot chocolate. On a tip from another Nativer a bunch of us had our eyes peeled all trip for an Illy and we finally found one. The guy who made it for us slaved over the pot for about five minutes, including one point where he called over the store manager to help him – they are serious about their hot chocolate.

We left shortly after and took a taxi home because the public transportation system ends early. The next morning we got to the Termini early and boarded our train to Napoli (Naples). Before the Rome portion of my blog ends I want to mention one interesting thing I discovered there. The letters SPQR are everywhere – on buildings, on manhole covers, on street signs. We spent some time trying to guess what they stood for, but finally I resorted to Wikipedia. SPQR stands for Senatus Populusque Romanus - the Senate and the People of Rome. The acronym refers to the ancient Roman government, but is used today as well.
The train was long, but I passed the time by reading Rick Steves on Napoli and Sorrento by watching Mr. and Mrs. Smith and, of course, by looking out the window as often as possible. We arrived in Napoli (which Rick Steves, the Arbibs, and everyone we met said was a very dangerous city) and bought the Arte Card. With that, we would have unlimited public transportation for three days, as well as free admission to two sites (same basic idea as the Roma Pass). We headed right down to the Circumvesuviana commuter train (absolutely COVERED in graffiti like everything here) and boarded the line which terminates in Sorrento. We were on the train for about 35 minutes before we got to the stop Pompei: Villa dei Misterei.
When we disembarked, we went right to the ticket booth to get our tickets (free with the Arte Card) and store our luggage. Then we went back to the row of pizza places we’d seen earlier. We walked along each store checking prices until we got to the largest one. The guy there pulled us aside (when European shop owners see seven Americans walking, they REALLY want to make a sale) and asked us where there was room for a pizza kitchen in the other stores we passed. He had a point; they were really tiny. We went in and he gave us a pretty good discount. We each got a personal pizza (that seems to be the way they sell pizza here) and we bought lemoncello for the table. Lemoncello is a product of Sorrento, which is known for its lemons and other citrus fruit. It’s a dessert liquor, but we had it with lunch – it was pretty awful, but apparently it’s supposed to be served chilled and ours was warm.
After lunch, we went in to Pompeii which was really cool. We walked all over the city, with Adam guiding us with Rick’s tour. Many pieces of the city were closed off for renovations, and parts of the site had been converted to a cafeteria and gift shop. This was all a little annoying, but we still had fun exploring and climbing over walls and ancient ovens and things. I was especially struck by the size of the city. All other ancient cities I’ve been to (with the obvious exception of Rome and Jerusalem) have been little more than towns, Pompeii is HUGE. We finished our tour in the city’s amphitheatre, and took a nap on the grass in the sun in the middle of it. We did some last illegal climbing there and then hightailed it back to the exit.
Back on the Circumvesuviana we enjoyed the beautiful views of the Bay of Napoli on one side and Mt. Vesuvius on the other. The presence of mountains is an impressive feature in the backdrop, one to which I am unaccustomed. I am consistently feeling the tug of a heretofore-undiscovered desire to hike all the time – I think it has to do with these mountains in the not-so-distance. We arrived in Sorrento about 35 minutes later and schlepped our stuff to our hostel. The sign said “Deluxe Hostel,” and they were actually being serious. The lobby was beautiful as were our rooms and best of all there was free WiFi. We hung around for a while and then walked down the street in search of a place to eat. The first place we saw looked good, a place called English Inn. Dinner was absolutely wonderful. After we finished, we were exhausted and went straight back to the hostel. We went to bed early for a good night’s sleep.
In the morning we got up and went back to the Circumvesuviana and took the hour-ish long ride back to Napoli. We spent about and hour arguing over how to reserve tickets for the ride to Lecce and the night train from Lecce to Venice. Finally, we bought tickets and went for pizza. The argument was pretty mean-spirited and exhausting and totally unnecessary, but I guess this is what happens when seven 18-19 year-olds travel together. From the train station we walked a while to what Rick Steves described as the best pizza in Napoli. They had a line out the door so, consulting Rick, we walked around the corner to the best pizza’s rival. They had much more room inside, and their pizza was still very good. From there, we walked to the Napoli Archaeological museum, where all the really cool stuff from Pompeii and Ercolano (Herculaneum, a city nearby, also destroyed by Vesuvius), as well as other stuff, is now located. We had fun running through the museum and posing next to statues. Statues have gotten kind of old for many of us, though the big ones are still really cool. We tend to really enjoy frescoes and mosaics. Once we finished at the museum we were tired and still a little crazed, so we went right back to our hostel instead of climbing Vesuvius.
Once back in Sorrento we spent some time exploring the town (pop ~12,000). The place is really beautiful, with storefronts painted in bright colors, and tiny streets weaving their way through the town. The orange and lemon trees all over the place add even more color. We walked the streets of the town pretty aimlessly, stopping off every few stores. We finally ended up back at English Inn for dinner which was good again. I went to bed pretty early, because we knew we needed to get up at 6:00 a.m. to make it to the Napoli train station for an 8:50 train.
Everything seemed to be going right in the morning. We were out of the hostel by ten to seven and we made the right Circumvesuviana train to Napoli, projected to get in at 8:25. Only the train took forever, stopping for several minutes at several of the stops for no apparent reason. It became evident that the only way we were going to make out train was if we ran as soon as we got to the station. We jumped off the train at exactly 8:50, praying for our train to Lecce to leave late (our train from Rome to Napoli left 15 mins late) and sprinted. For about ten feet. Then we hit a solid wall of people and were forced to slow down to a crawl. We made it to the platforms at 8:54 – and the train was gone. After a pretty contentious powwow, we decided to ditch the idea of Lecce and instead take a train to Florence. We grabbed breakfast and boarded our train without a problem.
I'm finishing this post in my hostel room in Florence. We're staying in the same place as the girls. Hopefully everyone will get over their sulkiness enough so that we can do some sightseeing.

Talk to you soon,

Seffi

Archaeological Dig and Shabbat in Roma!

I’m gonna start with Israel Experience Week because so much good stuff has happened that I’m just not sure I can remember what I did in between my last blog post and then. On Sunday, January 10^th, we woke up early and all davened together. The three groups (volunteering in Haifa, Gadna, and Archaeological Dig) got on three different buses. I was really quite excited. I sat with Adina and caught up to her in Lost. When we got to Teveriah we went directly to the site and got showed around by our guide Gilad who is an archaeologist at the site. The theatre is pretty cool, part of old Teveriah from Roman times, 2,000 years ago. After a pretty brief look around, we went into the city of Teveriah and explored a bit before heading back to the hostel for (an absolutely delicious!) dinner. Joe, Joey, Gabe and I (room Joe Joe Joe Gabe) spent some time hanging out in our room and then went to bed early.

The next day, we woke up, and davened. I read torah (Vaera, the first reading I ever learned), we went back to the theatre, Judah and I volunteered for some work that Gilad specified needed guys while everyone else brushed the theatre to prep it for birds eye view pictures being taken by a hot air balloon later in the day. It turned out that Judah and I were hauling buckets of dirt for some archaeologist who was clearing out the floor of a room. It was boring and not fun because the guy wasn’t friendly. After about an hour of that, we went to Migdal and saw a recently excavated Beit Knesset from Second Temple times. I hesitate to use the term synagogue because of its modern meaning. The Israelis telling us about it always think Beit Knesset (literally house of congregation) and translate that as synagogue. The problem with that is that it wasn’t a house of worship, that was the Temple in Jerusalem. It was a place for studying torah Ezra and Nehemia style. We dug there for a little and then headed back to the hostel. The boys gathered in our room to watch Zach and Miri and then we went to bed.

In the morning we woke up, davened and went to the theatre. My digging group, Joey, Adina, Seth and I, dug really productively. We were in a hole which was probably the foundations of the building, surrounded by four roman walls (better built that Arab walls). Our task was to level out the floor and pick out pottery that we found. After the dig we went to Nahal Tabor in the Golan (I think) for a hike. It was a very easy hike for about 2 1/2 hours and then the last 30 minute stretch was about a 70 degree incline - brutal. Joe and I freestyled to the tune of Eishet Chayil, it was pretty cool. Once we got home we had dinner (the food at Karei Deshe is really good) and then I watched Notting Hill with Adina, Ally, LeeAnn and Judah

The next day we woke up, davened, packed up and went to the theatre. The group was much less productive than the day before. We spent several hours evening out the hole. When we left the dig we went to gamla which was so cool! Gamla is an ancient town that was destroyed by the romans 1900 years ago, and was never rebuilt so it never became a tel. Our tour guide, Dani, is the guy who first discovered it and dug it up, so he had a lot to say. The hike back to the top was hard as the day before, made harder because it was raining. In the evening we got to the new hotel, which was pretty nice with delicious food. My room was the joes, me joey and joe - such fun. A bunch of boys got together and watched the movie Role Models.

On the last day of the dig we woke up, davened, and had an incredible breakfast at the hotel. We went to theatre and dug for a few hours had pizza for lunch and then it was time for the bus home.

On Friday morning at 2 a.m Jlem time, seven of us – Joey, Joshy, Nadav, Adam, Seth, Gabe Ci and I got into a sheirut along with another group of three who were also going to the airport. The driver asked us if we were in a hurry. We said yes, even though our flight wasn’t until 6:00. We got to Ben Gurion exactly 28 minutes later. Pretty impressive driving. Some of you know how much I was freaking out about going to Italy, and how stressful it was for me. When I got to the airport that feeling of apprehension didn’t go away entirely, but it began to melt away a bit. We made out way through security and all that, bought the requisite Ben Gurion McDonald’s, and went to our gate. At the gate, I started reading The Five People You Meet in Heaven by Mitch Albom. Strangely, I’ve never read anything by him before. When Navah was in Israel, she finished Have a Little Faith, his latest book, which Auntie had given her for Hanukkah, and lent it to me. I found Five People lying around Beit Nativ and figured I should read the one first. I alternated between reading and dozing off until 5:50, when we began boarding. We took our seats on the plane, and passed out. I woke up for breakfast, and then sporadically throughout the flight.

We landed in Rome at around 9:00 a.m. Rome time. We made our way through the airport, took out Euros from ATMs and did lots of little things. On the plane, I began to familiarize myself with Rick Steves’ Guide to Italy, specifically the Rome section. He highly recommends (and I guess now I do too) purchasing the Roma Pass. For 22 Euro (I think), you get two passes, one for sightseeing and one for transportation. Each is good for three days from the first use. The sightseeing one allows free entry to two sights and discounted entry for certain sites after that. The transport one provides free train and bus rides for three days. We took a shuttle to the Termini, the main train station in Rome, and walked to our hostel from there. Along the way, we lost Joshy and Gabe. It was frustrating trying to find them, and frustrating that they got lost and I was worried that this difficulty was indicative of what was to come. We found them quickly enough and went to our first hostel, Freestyle. We met Philippe, the manager of the hostel and he let us leave our stuff in his room while they got our rooms ready. We went back towards the Termini to a pizza place we’d seen earlier and got our first taste of what is sure to be LOTS of Italian pizza, and it did not disappoint. Kari had told me about a pizza place to look for, but I couldn’t find it…the pizza we had was incredible anyway.

After lunch we went back to our hostel and moved into our room. We had a seven-person room, which was lucky as we expected to be split up. It was weird that the room was actually around the block from the hostel office in an apartment building. Weirder still was that the common room of the apartment (which has thee hostel bedrooms attached to it) is also where one hostel employee, Yusuf, lives. Yusuf sleeps on the couch and makes free breakfast and dinner for his guests. He also loves me because I told him that my name was also Yusuf – sorta. We threw our stuff down, and headed out to the Coliseum. When you get near the Coliseum, you KNOW it. It is so massive and just dominates the view. We took lots of pictures overlooking it before we even approached. I know, Navah, you don’t want me to go because it’s $50 and just filled with trash inside. Well, we got in free because of the Roma Passes, and inside was REALLY cool. I’m not sure if it’s because I had just come from an archaeological dig, or because I had seen Gladiator somewhat recently, because I’m a guy or just because a lot can change in five years, but the Coliseum is awesome. Sure, it’s missing the floor, so you can just walk around it in a ring on the inside (and up one floor also), and sure, it was build by Jewish slaves, but this 50,000 seat stadium is a crazy testament to Roman barbarism and brilliance all in one (I’m talking like Rick Steves’. Weird.)

With the Coliseum behind us, we went back to the hostel and discovered that Judah, Adam and Ben were also staying in our apartment. I was spending much of the day making final arrangements for Shabbat dinner. What I finally got worked out with the Chabad rabbi was that he could put up the four of us who are Shomer Shabbat for dinner, but the other three would have to eat at the hostel – they were cool with that so that’s what we did. The four of us went to shul and sat through a crazy service. Everything was said out loud and most of what I think of as Kabbalat Shabbat was left out. I’m not sure if that was local Italian tradition or Sfardi. I was told to seek out the Arbib family, Vito and his son David. The rabbi of the shul told me that he was an Arbib, but I was looking for his brother. He gave me the address, and we found the house – eventually. It was nothing like what I was expecting. The Arbibs own the penthouse of a six floor apartment building. It was the most beautiful home I had ever seen. We figured that it was probably worth significantly more than any of our lives. We met a man, Rahamim Tshuva, who was a friend of the family’s, also there for dinner, but we sat for about 30 minutes before we finally met Mr. and Mrs. Arbib and their 16-year-old son David. Their older son is studying at IDC after a year at HaKotel. Dinner was delicious. The wine at the beginning for Kiddush was even good, and I don’t like wine. Vito told us that he makes all the food himself (it was actually brought to the table by a servant) and that he is Libyan, and that is the style of cuisine. They were very generous and nice, but there were awkward moments when they were all speaking Italian and we just spoke quietly amongst ourselves. David gave a Dvar Torah and we did a little singing. During dessert, Mrs. Arbib insisted that we come back for lunch and there was no way we were turning her down. We asked and she said we could bring our friends as well. We went back home and fell asleep quickly.

On Shabbat morning we woke up and showered and got dressed and left around ten a.m. We went to the National Museum (free for us with the Roma Pass, so I deemed it Shabbat appropriate – in hindsight, maybe I should have gone to Shut, but I didn’t really enjoy the place we went to Friday night and we didn’t know of any other options) and walked through all of the galleries. They have statues of Agustus Caesar and Socrates, one of the statues of The Discus Thrower, great mosaics and frescoes, ancient Roman coins and ornaments – it was awesome.

After we finished at the museum we killed some time just walking around until we ended up at the Arbibs’ again. Imagine our surprise when we walked into the dining room and saw the other guys group (Aaron, Max, Jonny, Asaf, Brian and Jesse) seated around the table. We had fun talking with them and singing zmirot, which Vito loved (Especially the more Sfardi sounding tune for Dror Yikra). He was so happy with our singing that he gave us all a little bit of his 21-year-old whiskey – it was pretty cool, especially the way it annihilates your sinuses. We did Mincha with the Arbibs, and then it was time to check out their bathrooms and hit the road.

After lunch, we walked over to a sports bar on Via Nazzionale and some of the boys went in to see if they would show the Vikings/Cowboys game on Sunday night (7 p.m. here, 1 p.m. in America). They told us they would. After that was settled, we walked toward the Roman Forum, intending to follow Ricky Stee’s (my pet name for Rick Steves, because it reminds me of my favorite place to eat, the Frankie Si cafeteria at Heb U) walking tour there. I read some cool facts on the way over, and Rick really set the stage, writing about where Marc Antony offered Caesar the crown and where great orators would address the people of Rome.

We spent a few hours walking all around the Forum, but we couldn’t get in because it closes at 3:30 p.m. That was a let-down, but we saw most of it. From there we walked around Palatine Hill and Capitol Hill and saw lots of beautiful buildings. Once we finished that, we walked home, and had the great free dinner that was waiting for us at the hostel. Yusuf had made penne vodka and it was great. After dinner, Joshy, Joey, Gabe and Nadav went out to buy beer, but they came home with a 5-liter jug of white wine instead, intending to split it between the four of them. It was a pretty hysterical moment because of the sheer size of the jug. They finished it and then we headed out. A few people had wanted to go on a pub crawl, but instead we went to the Spanish Steps and hung out with the girls (Adina, Rachel, Ariella, Debbie and Jordana).

(In this next paragraph, names are changed, with Italian flair, due to privacy considerations) We hung out there for a bit, and then went to the McDonald’s nearby, apparently one of the largest, and by far the classiest in the world. Rachel and I were splitting a McFlury and then we turned around and saw Giuseppe throwing up. A lot. After a few minutes, we got him to stop and Joey took him outside while Debbie, Jordana and I cleaned up. While in the bathroom washing my hands after cleaning, I spotted one sink filled with regurgitated pasta. I knew then that this was going to be a difficult night. I found Napoleon sitting out front with Debbie and he confessed to me that it was he who had thrown up in the sink. Meanwhile, Giuseppe was sitting outside with Joey, still throwing up. Joey was trying to get him to drink water, but he was refusing and when he did drink, he threw it up about five minutes later. The other boys group showed up at that point and started taking videos and pictures of the whole thing. Paolo, Benedetto and Fabio went home, because the Metro allegedly stops running at 11 and we wanted to make sure that they had a way home. Giuseppe told us, in perhaps his only clear thinking moment of the night, that he would pay for a cab. Joey, Napoleon, Giuseppe and I got into a cab, but had to quickly get back out because Giuseppe wasn’t done throwing up. We sat at the curbside for another half an hour or so before we finally were able to get in a taxi. We made it home, and as soon as we walked into Yusuf’s room, Giuseppe bent over and started retching. He was running on empty though, so we gave him a garbage can for good luck and put him to bed, same deal with Napoleon. It was a very crazy night, but fun to look back on now.

On Sunday morning we got up and had breakfast and then went back towards the forum on out way to the Jewish Ghetto. We went in – for free because it’s the same admission as our free Coliseum admission – and saw the Arch of Titus up close. One interesting fact that you may not have known is that apparently the vast majority of costumed gladiators who charge for pictures with them outside of the Coliseum are Jewish. One of them, spotting my kipa, grabbed us and pulled us aside. He pointed to us and said “You Jewish! I Jewish too!” He pulled out a Jewish Star necklace and showed it around. He then said “You want picture with gladiator? For you, picture free.” And then, “I have a message for all the goyim f*** you!” He made us take pictures with our middle fingers extended, cursing non-Jews. It was pretty weird. After that experience, we made our way over to the Jewish Ghetto and walked past the Great Synagogue, in search of the Kosher Deli that cousin Ronit had told me about. We found it and had lunch. It was no Kosher Nosh, but it was ok.

After lunch, we wanted to go to the Great Synagogue, but it turns out that that was actually when the Pope was speaking so we couldn’t get in. We went back towards the Pantheon to get gelato from gelateria Della Palma, heavily recommended by both Navah and Rick Steves. It hadn’t yet been three hours so Nadav, Joey, Seth and I figured we would wait it out. We all went to the Pantheon and then the Trevi fountain. The Pantheon is very ugly from the outside and very pretty on the inside, very large, with a very wide dome. The Trevi is more impressive, with water cascading around a depiction of Neptune. Aftet the Trevi we split up with the four of us plus Joshy going to the Four Rivers fountain and Adam and Gabe going back to the hostel. The Four Rivers was less cool that the Trevi but still pretty awesome. The four rivers are the Danube, the Ganges, the Nile and the Ria de la Plata, representing the four known continents at the time of construction. Each is depicted in human form which is pretty cool.

After our fountain tour, it had just about been three hours, so we went back to Della Palma. I got Kit-Kat and milk chocolate (not very creative, I know). From there we went to our new hostel, Mosaic, just down the block from our old one. While Freestyle had a homey feel, Mosaic feels much more structured, but it also has better accommodations. We napped a little and then went over to the sports bar for dinner and the football game. We had pizza dinner while we waited for the game to start (great pizza) and Brian and Asaf showed up from the other guys group. After we’d watched the game a little, the girls showed up and I moved to a booth with Adina, Rachel and Ariella. We had fun talking and paying a little attention to the game (Vikings/Cowboys doesn’t interest me too much, as long as the Cowboys lose), and it was nice to hang out with them. From the bar, Joey, Joshy, Seth, Gabe and I joined the girls and walked to the Trevi Fountain again to see it lit up at night and eat Gelato there. I went slightly more adventurous that time and got nutella and mango (the mango was out of this world). We all stood by the Trevi for a bit and then Adina, Rachel and Jordana went home. The rest of us went back to the Spanish Steps and walked/ran to the top, which provided a beautiful vista of Rome laid out before us. A great way to end the night.

Today we woke up and boarded the Metro for Vatican City. Once inside the Museums (8 Euro instead of 15 with a student ID), we split up into two groups – I walked with Joey, Joshy and Nadav. We went though the whole museum, and saw a lot of cool Egyptian and Mesopotamian artifacts, as well as Roman and Greek statues. After those exhibits, you enter the maze of rooms, many of which are painted, I believe, by Rafael, which ultimately leads to the Capella Sistina, the Sistine Chapel. The paintings on the ceilings and walls were unbelievable, really impressive. The final several rooms before the Sistine Chapel are filled with Christian modern art. It was weird, because I generally love modern art and there were definitely some good pieces, but on the whole I only like Christian art when it is old, because I appreciate it for its age. The Sistine Chapel really is magnificent though, and its beauty grows the more you stare into the ceiling.

Following a tip from Ricky Stee, we left from an exit in the corner which is only for tour groups and let us right out to just outside of St. Peter’s Basilica, which we entered straightaway. Talk about impressive. The sheer size of antique churches is usually what impresses me the most and this puts all other churches to shame. According to Rick, the floor plan of the Basilica covers 4 acres, and fits 95,000 worshippers. The place was just beautiful and baroque and BIG. Once we finished walking through the Basilica, we went out to St. Peter’s Square and looked around there too. Also really, really cool and pretty – a breathtaking display of architecture.

The group of three had skipped the Basilica and raced through the Museum and were already on their way home so we started walking in what seemed to be the right direction. It wasn’t. We wandered for about an hour, finally leaving the road and following a wooded path down in what looked to be the right direction. We hopped a fence and ran into a couple who told us that we were in the Rome Botanical Gardens. Realizing that we shouldn’t have broken into the gardens, we got out quickly and kept moving. We eventually got to a pizzeria named Miraggio where we had probably the best pizza on our trip so far. We were so far away from the touristy areas of Rome that the people at the pizzeria spoke no English and I needed to used my Italian (thank God for Spanish cognates) to order and pay. After lunch, we made our way back to areas we knew, and I insisted on another stop at Gelateria Della Palma. This time I really went crazy and got mango, chocolate caramel and (because the guy said they go well together) mascarpone. It was so delicious. From there we got on a bus back to the Termini and headed back to the hostel. Tonight we plan on hanging out with the girls, grabbing dinner and walking around, and tomorrow we have a train to Sorrento for the next leg of our journey. Should be fun.

Talk to you soon,

Seffi

P.S. I'll add pictures later

New Years and Visitors!

Sunday night was the last of our Beit Midrash classes. Jordana and I showed up an hour late because the staff wrote the wrong time in the weekly email but it was ok because Yonina was ok with staying late and going over what we'd missed and then just talking about stuff.

On Monday I had Isaacs and Talmud (no Hebrew because that's over!). I spent all of Monday night working on college stuff for applications due on 1/1/2010.

On Tuesday I had no school and again spent much of the day (sleeping and) working on college stuff. Tuesday evening was the Nativ formal, but I went to the Old City instead to hang out with Navah and Raffi and Alex by the Kotel

It was great to see Navah. Alex and I walked to the Old City from Beit Nativ together, but Navah was at a pharmacy getting meds for her kids so we had some time to kill. We walked up and down Mamilla and went into a bunch of stores. When we finally went into the Old City we saw Navah's group immediately but not her. We sketchily tailed them to a spot overlooking the Kotel right next to the Muslim quarter and then broke off on our own when we saw Navah down below. We ran and gave each other a hug and it was lovely. Navah brought me a goody-bag of stuff from home with pumpkin bread, twix bars, SI (see above for my Kotel reading material of choice) and two tshirts from Navah (the UNChallenged 100 years of UNC basketball one and the State Radio one she got me at the concert they played at UF). We davened maariv at the Kotel then she and her group went on the tunnel tours and Raffi, Alex and I sat in the cold and rainy grossness outside. Then Navah came out and we said goodbye and went home.

Wednesday was my last day of classes. I had double Isaacs as a makeup for an earlier class that he needed to cancel. During Talmud I gave my presentation on Metatron (an angel in Jewish mystical literature who is pretty cool/crazy and often equated with Hanoch, the minor character in Genesis). A brief digression into the realm of Jewish text: The book of 3 Enoch, also known as the Hebrew Book of Enoch or Sefer Heichalot (Heichalot literature is a whole rabbinic genre that talks about the efforts of various rabbis of the Talmud to get to Heaven to learn secrets from God) is an apocryphal work about Rabbi Ishmael ben Elisha's ascension to heaven with the angel Metatron. The book describes Metatron thusly: Metatron is the size of the world and made out of fire, he has 72 wings, 36 on each side, with each wing also the size of the whole world, he has 365 eyes, each eye like the sun, with eyelashes of lightning. I once knew a girl like that (alternate line: what was Rabbi Ishmael ben Elisha smoking?!)

On Wednesday night we had Erev Nativ (it was moved to Wednesday because that's the date that worked for our speaker) with Adina's dad! Rabbi Allen is the founder of Hechsher/Magen Tzedek, the justice certification that came out of the whole Rubashkin's/Agriprocessors balagan. Basically they are working to put a certification on products of companies with fair workers practices. They aren't really up and running yet, but look they are doing good work. Look for their symbol in the coming months:

Thursday was New Years Eve. We spent the day hanging around (I was working on college apps) and then we all went out. Sorta. The bar that we usually go to had a cover that night, but since Gabe and I don't drink we weren't going to waste our money there. We went with Ariella and Britty (a friend of mine from Schechter and of Ariella's from Nyack who is at seminary) to get ice cream and then went for a walk through Mamilla to right outside the Jaffa Gate. We talked (Ariella did most of that) about the New Year and about life in general. The intellectual atmosphere was fun and we were all happy with how we spent New Years.

On Friday I submitted a college app and then I went to Shira Hadasha with Navah. After services we talked to Rachel Immerman for a few minutes and then Navah, Joshy and I headed off to Navah's friends from Columbia, Michael and Adina. They are a lovely couple and dinner (with them and four other friends of Navah's including Yael Steiner who I know) was delicious and fun.

On Shabbat morning Navah and I couldn't amicably decide where to go to shul, so we ended up just walking a little and then hanging out in the room. For lunch we went to Navah's friend Sylvie's apartment. Lunch was with a bunch of people Navah's age but it was fun. After lunch, Navah and I walked down to meet Bentzi and we walked with him for a while. When we got back to the room we hung around a bit and then did maariv and havdallah/walked around for a while trying to find Nativ maariv and havdallah, failed, and went and sat in my room again. On Saturday night Adina's parents and sister took Ariella, Josh, Jesse, Debbie, Jonny, Shara and me out to dinner at River Noodle Bar. Dinner was great and Adina's parents are really nice (surprising, right?) In all seriousness, Adina is one of my close friends here and it was great to meet her family.

On Sunday we had our Silicon Wadi final which went well, I think. That night I spent time studying and working on Isaacs stuff.

On Monday I had my Isaacs final which also, hopefully, went well. After that final I went back to bae and hung around for a bit. At night, Raffi, Alex, Elan, David, Gabe Co, Navah and I went out to dinner...sorta. We were going to go out together, but Japanika sushi had a long wait for big groups. Navah and I went there and had a lovely dinner. After that I went out with Raffi, Alex and Elan for a few hours.

Today Gabe, Jesse, Jonny and I went out to lunch at Yummi's with Peter, our 45-year-old friend from our Talmud class. We had a great time hanging out and then we came back to base. Tonight our Erev Nativ Speaker was Rabbi Steven Wernick, new CEO and Executive VP of USCJ and son of the great Rebbe Wernick, my teacher through high school and fearless leader of the Men's Minyan. He spoke about his vision for the Movement and values that he feels the Movement needs to adopt in order to achieve his vision. I'm still digesting so I have no clear opinion on him yet, but I generally liked what I heard.

That's all for now - the internet is down in Beit Nativ so I'm freezing my fingers off to get this to you sitting outside the Yeshiva.

Talk to you soon,

Seffi

Christmas in Jerusalem

Sunday night we had Beit Midrash for the first time in a few weeks. It was fun learning with Yonina. This program has been a very successful one, and it's nice to have Sunday dinner covered by Nativ.

Monday was its usual long day. When I got home, however, a number of us decided to go to see Avatar. Gabe Co, Joshy, Miles, Gelb, Joe and I went to Talpiot, to the Rav Chen cinema where we saw the movie. Avatar is one of the most incredible movies I have ever seen. The movie is a 3D epic about coexistence between enterprising, colonizing humans and the locals of a planet called Pandora. The basic idea is similar to that of the marginalization of Indians by the United States in the 19th century. The 3D in this movie is not a gimmick that is needlessly employed; the audience's immersion in the beauty of the planet Pandora is critical to the development of the film. There are some pretty cool fight scenes too. Avatar is the most expensive movie ever made with a budget of around $300 million. To date, it has grossed over $400 million - it deserves every penny; it's well worth seeing.

I woke up Tuesday still marveling about how good Avatar was. After Hebrew I went back to the room and watched an episode or two of lost with Adina. We also went to the Mister Zol down the street to buy stuff for one of her friends. I also picked up another bottle of apple juice. So far this year I had chosen to forego apple juice because in Israel it always lets me down. A few weeks ago I was out shopping with Brian at that same Mister Zol and he bought a bottle of a kind I'd never tried before so I figured I'd buy one too. It's the most similar to American apple juice that I've found. It is great to have real apple juice again, hopefully I'll be able to find it once we're down in Yerucham. Tuesday night was Erev Nativ. We did a program when we went around the circle answering questions asked by our staff. People were encouraged to be respectful to others and truthful in their answers. After we all answered questions the staff asked who people thought was most truthful, who we were most similar/different to, who loves life the most, who would be the best leader. I think that the program was very interesting. After the program Rachel, Adina, Debbie and I discussed everything in my room. There were definitely some problems with the program, but there were also some very good aspects.

On Wednesday we had the first part of our Hebrew final, the oral exam. I spoke for about three minutes on one of the stories that we read before my teachers cut me off and told me I'd done fine. It was a good feeling to know that the oral went well, especially since I wasn't sure what to expect with the written exam on Friday. On our way into Alick's class, there was a group of Christians singing carols. I got there a little too late to hear them, which was a let-down, but once he got there Alick said "I dare anyone to name a Hanukkah song that is even half as good as Silent Night." Not sure if that's the Christmas song I would have picked, but they certainly are wonderful. Another one of Alick's gems was when class discussion turned to the (quickly overturned) arrest warrant in the UK for Tzipi Livni for war crimes. "War crimes?" Alick scoffed, "I've committed more war crimes that Tzipi Livni." A lot of the class laughed, but then he reminded them that 18 years of combat duty (reserves included), including both Lebanon wars, adds up. A rather sobering realization that this funny, sweet, learned man is also a battle-hardened warrior - Israel makes for some very interesting people.

Thursday is a day off. I woke up at 1:30 PM and hung around the room working for a while. Thursday night Gabe and I headed over to Lev Yerushalayim to see Raffi, Alex and Elan. It was great to see them (and not just because Alex had a bag with pumpkin bread in it for me) and I'm excited to spend the next couple weeks hanging out with them. I got back to my room a little bit after midnight and was able to fall asleep pretty quickly, despite having only been awake for 12 hours.

On Friday we had our Hebrew final. Josh Goldberg pointed out that you know Israel is a special country when it seems weirder to you that you're coming in to school on a Friday than on Christmas. I think the final went well, but it's always hard to tell with these things. For sure, my essay was really good, and so was the oral, I'm not sure about some of the finer grammatical exercises but we'll see. Friday afternoon I spent some time in the Shuk walking around with Raffi, Alex, Elan, Gabe and others. While I was waiting to buy Marzipan, the guy behind the counter handed me one steaming hot, right out of the oven. It was the most delicious thing I have ever tasted. After I got home and got dressed for Shabbat, Tyler, the Gabes, Joe and I headed over to Josh apartment for davening and Shabbat dinner. We had a wonderful time with wonderful food and cool people. After dinner, we played Settlers and sung zmirot and then we headed home. Raffi and Alex came to base and Gabe and I hung out with them for an hour or so, catching up.

On Saturday I slept through a wake-up knock from Adina, and slept until 12:40. I made it down to lunch just in time to grab something. I hung out with Joe for a while and then Joe, Gabe Co, Tyler and I headed back to Josh's for wiffleball. I had a lot of hand trouble, but it was still fun. Saturday night a lot of us went out to celebrate Shara's birthday. A lot of visitors joined us a Herzl and all over downtown having a good time.

This morning the Silicon Seven (minus Joey, who isn't feeling well) had our usual lunch followed by class. This is the start of finals week, so we'll see how things go. Navah is here in addition to Alex and Raffi, so I'm looking forward to spending lots of time with them in between studying. That's all for now.

Talk to you soon,

Seffi

G-ma and Uncle Danny Come to Visit!

This week was the beginning of a long string of visits. Grandma and Uncle Danny were in Jerusalem for the week and I spent a lot of time with them. In the last post I talked about dinner with them on Monday at Hashipudiah. On Tuesday after Hebrew at Heb U I went out to lunch at Hashamen (a schwarma place that I mentioned here) with Grandma and Uncle Danny. I think Uncle Danny really enjoyed the schwarma there which was good because he was the person who first took me to Moshiko's to share one of his favorite places with me. Tuesday night was Erev Nativ which was the Nativ Hanukkah party. It was a pretty fun program planned and run by fellow Nativers (great job Gabe, LeeAnn and Ilana!). We started off with announcements from Yossi and then split up. My group played a "How Well Do You Know Your Fellow Nativers" Jeopardy-style game which was fun and funny. Once that was over, we went back to the auditorium and watched the Rugrats Hanukkah episode. I had forgotten/never realized just how clever it is. After that it was time for the sufganiyiot eating contest. I wasn't feeling well so I didn't even put my name forward to compete. The performance was a little weak, and I felt like I was letting my family down by not taking up Greta's mantle and dominating the eating contest. Oh well. After the program ended we went to the -3 hallway to pick up gifts from our Nativ gift exchange. I got a lovely dreidel from Yad Lakashish that I later found out came from Ariella.

On Wednesday I had my usual long day of classes. I picked up my Freshman Writing paper and was quite pleases with my grade - if anyone wants to see this opus of mine, just let me know and I'll be glad to send it to you. After school, I had the honor of going out to dinner with Grandma, Uncle Danny and Uncle Danny's friend Ralph Goldman. Ralph was instrumental in the founding of the State of Israel, working hand-in-hand with people like David Ben-Gurion and Teddy Kollek. Where the two of them decided to go into Israeli politics, Ralph instead turned to international Jewish non-profit, working for the JDC (the Joint) for decades. Now, at age 95, he is still a working man, Blackberry and all. He has known every Israeli Prime Minister personally and is just such an incredible man, filled with incredible stories. The four of us ate at Beit Ticho, part-museum (part of the Israel Museum; Ralph is on their board) part-restaurant. I had good french onion soup and gnochi.

On Thursday I had lunch with Alexis and her three boys, Shemer, Meitav and Osher. Alexis was my babysitter when I was a baby and now she and her husband Charlie live in Jlem. It was fun playing with the boys, and Alexis made latkes, which are very hard to find in Israel for some reason. Thursday evening we had a social action program. Kibbutz went to an old age home in Me'ah Shearim and Kehillah went to Shalva. We got a tour of the facilities and then spent a little time working with the disabled children. The building is beautiful, but despite that they are moving to a new center so that they can accomodate more children. We sung Hanukkah songs with the kids and they did Kabbalat Shabbat and lit candles (Shalva is closed on Fridays, so in order for the kids to get a chance to celebrate Shabbat they do a little something on Fridays. Shalva also has occasional Shabbatonim). It was really rewarding to talk to some of the kids (not all of them talk) and clap along to the songs with them. I had yet to give the $30ish I had been given to give as tzedakah in Israel and I decided to give it to Shalva. One of the beauties of Shalva is that its services are provided free of charge to all kids in the program. As such they depend on government funding and donations to fund the program. I felt that it was very very deserving place for the money.

One of my Shalva friends and me

On Friday I hung out all morning, working on my Silicon Wadi presentation. Joshy and I lit candles for the last night of Hanukkah and Shabbat and then walked down to the Dan Panorama to pick up Uncle Danny and head over to Shira Hadasha. Services were good, and Uncle Danny enjoyed them and saw three or four people who he knew. Joshy joined Grandma, Uncle Danny and me for dinner at the Dan Panorama. The food was good, as was the company and we all had a good time.

On Saturday, Josh and I picked up Uncle Danny and went to the Sefardi shul in Yemin Moshe. It was great to see Benyamin and Menashe and to see the shul. The building is beautiful and very unusual for a shul in Jlem. Benyamin and Menashe were overjoyed to see me, as was I to see them. I had an aliyah which was pretty cool and Menashe led Musaf. Once davening ended (at 10:14), Joshy and I headed back to the room for a little Shabbat nap, and then I went back down to the Dan Panorama for a big lunch. I spent a little more time with Grandma and Uncle Danny and then Uncle Danny walked me back to my building on his way to visit Ralph.

It was great having them here. Hanuakkah is a family time to me, so it was nice to be with some actual family in addition to my Nativ family.

After Shabbat ended we went out to celebrate Brian's birthday! We had a good (but cold) time hanging out downtown. Today is Brian's actual birthday so it's not too late to say Happy Birthday Brian!

Today we had a make-up Hebrew class so we needed to be at school at 10:30. Hebrew went fine and then the Silicon Seven had lunch and went to Silicon Wadi. Today was presentation day for our projects and I think that it went well for Joey and me - time will tell.

That gets me caught up to the minute, talk to you soon,
Seffi

Hamshushalayim, Yeruham and Hanukkah - The Most Guttural Week Ever

Again, I've let a week go by without blogging, and for that I apologize. So much has happened that I'm excited to tell you all about. The beginning of the week was pretty normal, but the end gets exciting. Monday was a fairly regular day. Lots of classes, then I came home and we hung out and watched LOST a lot. On Tuesday I only have Ulpan in the morning and after that my day is free. I think this week I will crash some classes at the Yeshiva, but last week I just hung around base and did a little work. Tuesday evening was Erev Nativ, and we spent a little time learning about Hanukkah in breakout groups and then we all came together to decorate Hanukkiot (pictures of mine to follow). On Wednesday I had a lot of classes and then came home for my final Mark Lazar JET session. We had fun learning about the constant balance a teacher needs to maintain between remaining task-oriented and maintaining their relationship with their students. Jordana and I now point out task/maintenance situations to each other when they arise. On Thursday I had no class and loved having a day to laze around. Thursday night was the start of the last of the three weekends of Hamshushalayim. Hamshushalayim is a portmanteau of Hamishi (fifth), Shishi (sixth) and Yerushalayim - it is basically Hebrew (or Yerushalmi) slang for a 3-day weekend. Starting last year (I think as an initiative of new Jlem mayor Nir Barkat) the three weekends leading up to Hanukkah are a special cultural celebration in Jlem. There are free concerts and art festivals and many of the museums are open late for free, lots of good stuff. A bunch of us - Josh, Joey, Rachel, Aaron, Ariella, Gabe, LeeAnn, Jesse and I - decided to go see an a cappella concert in the Shrine of the Book. We got there with about 45 minutes to look around before we took seats around the room for the concert. I knew something was wrong when a man with a guitar went up on stage...there are no instruments in a cappella! The music was pretty awful - the language of the words was indistinguishable, the sopranos were too shrill and the men not powerful enough. Still, the experience was pretty fun because we all had fun being together and taking advantage of Jerusalem experiences.



Check out the Shrine of the Book in the background.

Once we got home, everybody split up. Gabe and I went up to our rooms and then realized that we were hungry. We decided on a walk and eventually ended up at Sushi Rehavia on Emek Refaim. It was a nice nighttime snack and Gabe and I always enjoy our one-on-one reminiscing sessions.

On Friday morning I had to wake up earlier than usual for a Friday because even though it was a closed Shabbat, my track was going as a group to Yeruham. We got on a bus for the ride down (or up, as Ben Gurion would have said) into the Negev. We got to Yeruham around lunchtime and ate in a small forest by the lake. I know that "forest" and "lake" aren't words usually associated with deserts, but there they were. Many of you many be aware of my love for JNF, well this is just one more area where the work that they do really has a lasting effect on the Land of Israel. After lunch we met our Yeruham guide (Yoram from Yeruham) and were given a look at the lake (fit for swimming by next year), and Be'er Rahma (Well of Mercy), the well that some believe is the same one from which Hagar drew water after she and Yishmael were sent away by Avraham. We headed into town then and it was already really upsetting to hear the groans of people who thought that Yeruham was simply too small for them (pop. 9,500). It would be an overstatement to say that I had fallen in love with the town, but it is very cute and I didn't want to hear people complaining about it. We got into our rooms at the hostel and got ready for Shabbat. I stayed with Joshy, Joey and Tyler this Shabbat. The hostel is not where we'll be staying next semester, we'll have apartments, but for now it was an ok place for Shabbat. We lit Hanukkah candles and then I led Kabbalat Shabbat and then we did Maariv and had Shabbat dinner (the first of a series of awful meals, courtesy of the Yeruham hostel). After dinner, Joey and I shot around on the basketball court for a little bit (he made shots and I put up my best effort). Then we needed to go back to our group room for a limud session with some famous woman from Yeruham. She made a big deal of winning a Supreme Court case to force the town council to appoint her to the religious council. She was a little annoying and insane and loquacious, but I paid attention as best I could. Once she left, a local rabbi came in and led our tisch (his yiddish accent made everything a little weird). He was extremely impressed that we knew all of the songs he led and he told a few stories - I think most of us would have preferred he told fewer stories and we sung more, but it was what it was - a pretty ridiculous change of pace. Our staff for some reason deemed it impractical to get marzipan rugelach or sufganiot for the tisch and we found this egregious breech of protocol to be unforgivable. Once we got to our room, the four of us got ready for bed and then spent some time talking about Shabbat and God and lots of deep discussion. The four of us come from very different places religiously, but we are all either already quite observant and knowledgeable or trending in that direction. Everyone had a lot to say and it was pretty interesting.

In the morning we woke up and headed off to shul. Even though the shul was basically down the street, our staff got horribly lost leading us there. It was ok in the end though, because we got an impromptu tour of the town. We showed up at shul in time for the seventh aliyah. The shul seemed nice and there was a lot of sefardi going around - it made me feel right at home. The building itself was pretty and it should be a nice place to spend a little time when we're in Yeruham on Shabbat. After davening, we went to an all girls school down the street to have a session with a woman named Debbie who runs an NGO (with Yoram from Yeruham) to promote something or other in Yeruham. She taught about Tikun Olam with a specific but subtle emphasis on the importance of moving to the Negev. Lunch was a little better than dinner, but not by much. We had a few hours to chill, and then Yoram from Yeruham took us on a walking tour around town. We saw a number of interesting things - some of the 27 synagogues in town, the young adult center that JNF is building, several schools, and two of the places we'll be staying next semester. I'm gonna focus on a few of the places we saw. One of the apartments was actually a small freestanding house that looks fairly decrepit, but would be lots of fun to clean up and decorate together. The other was an apartment on the third floor of a walk-up. It was pretty small and there was a hobbit hole inside - if you know Lord of the Rings, you'll know what I'm talking about. We passed by Eli Cohen neighborhood. Yoram from Yeruham said this with no additional information but as Eli Cohen is one of my favorite modern Jewish heroes I walked with YfY for a little bit to learn more. He told me that Eli Cohen has no particular connection to Yeruham, but because he was Moroccan (like many of the Yeruhamites) they were very proud to have an Israeli hero of their own (someone not Ashkenazi). We walked to the top of a hill and saw the white towers of Yeruham. These tall, thin, pointless towers, are a piece of art to help give some personality to Yeruham. They are spaced about three feet apart, with stairs and a slide in between to make them less menacing. The spacing in between, also forces the eye to look out at the forest, hills and lake, which the artist described as the true art of Yeruham. For some reason the Negev has never gotten proper credit for being the playground capital of the world. Everywhere settled that I've been in the Negev has simply incredible playgrounds - Yeruham has at least four. Tanni should love it here.

After the tour, we came back the hostel and davened maariv and did a little singing. We made Havdallah and had dinner. There was some extra time, so I spent about half an hour having a catch with Joey and Noah. Noah is a lefty and so we traded gloves and he got to test out being a righty and I got to work on throwing lefty. We then got ready to head over to the community center. There, in their brand new facilities (theater/concert hall, cafe, maybe other stuff), we listened to an Indian band perform and watched a young girls Indian dance troupe. The performance was lovely. I talked to a few residents and they seem so nice and I just can't wait to get to Yeruham for real.

On Sunday we got up and davened (I read Torah), and then had breakfast, made lunch and got on our bus. The bus took us to Sde Boker where we did stuff about Ben Gurion. It was pretty comical. Our guide greeted us and asked how many of us had been to Sde Boker before - all but two or three hands went up. The rest of our time there was pretty useless, except we watched the movie which I like. Our guide pulled me aside as we were walking between places and told me that she had noticed my accent and wondered if I had any British in me. I guess maybe she meant that I spoke intelligently, because I certainly don't have a British accent!

We got back on our bus (without actually going to the graves of David and Paula, which was weird) and traveled to Ein Ovdat for a short hike. It was really more of a walkabout - there was nothing strenuous about the hike at all. I guess it was a little pretty, but I like hikes to be challenging and climbing, not just walking. It was still pleasant, the weather was lovely.



Our bus driver home decided that it was so pleasant that we didn't need air conditioning on the way home - he was wrong. Jordana slept on my shoulder the whole time (just as she did on the way down) and the bus got uncomfortably hot. It was great to get home, especially since I needed to get to work on an Isaacs essay. When I got to my room, I was too antsy to get down to work, so I went with Joshy, Jesse, Joey, Asaf and Jordana on a sufganiyot tour of Jlem. We went all around the shuk and that general area looking for a custard-filled (Boston Creme) donut. I packed away five sufganiyot during our search (two jelly, one vanilla, one caramel and one glorious custard filled one), and in total, the five guys ate 21 1/2 sufganiyot in the hour or so that we were out. We also restocked on gummies.

Today It was off to class (Heb U was closed yesterday for Hanukkah vacation). Classes went as usual, and then I got home, lit candles, and headed over to the Dan Panorama to see Grandma and Uncle Danny! They are here for the week, and I'm so excited to spend time with them. They gave me some Hanukkah presents and then we went out to dinner at Hashipudiah. Hashipudiah is a skewer place that they both like a lot and now I do too! Dinner was lovely and we had a great time talking and eating. It will be really nice seeing them many times this week.

That's all for now, talk to you soon
Seffi Kogen

Intel, LOST, Whiffleball, Chimps, and a Hot Tub

It's been over a week since my last post and so much has happened! I last posted on Thanksgiving. That was a Thursday (obviously), so on Friday I woke up around 11:30, the usual Friday hour, just in time for lunch. I went downstairs and had a little lunch and then walked with Brian over to a brand new Mister Zol's supermarket that opened up a couple of blocks down RaMBa''N street - not as close as Supersol (Shufersal) right across the street, but significantly closer than the Mister Zol's across from Ben Yehuda in the shadow of Lev Yerushalayim. The prices there are great, especially compared to those at Supersol. Shabbat came quickly (after a lovely Skype session with the fam) and I headed to Shira Hadasha with a number of people. We played Risk and went to the Tisch and then a bunch of us (Gabe Co, Aaron, Nadav, Adam, Jonny and I) hung out for a few hours. Saturday morning I went with Gabe Co and Nadav to Yemin Moshe (wonderful kiddush) and then to Josh's apartment for lunch. We had a delicious meal and then we played Settlers (Gabe and I decided to buy one for Yerucham) and, with our initial group joined by fellow Nativers Gabe Ci, Meir (and his brother David and David's girlfriend Yael) and Aaron as well as several of Josh's friends, I davened Mincha. A bunch of us then headed down to the vacant lot by Josh's apartment for a game of Whiffleball. Over the course of the game, I had WAY too many strikeouts relative to skill level, pitched some good innings and some not-so-good ones, and the ball got cracked and then destroyed. There aren't too many places to buy whiffleballs in Israel, but we may try and find somewhere that sells bats and balls because it would be a good way to pass the time in Yerucham.

After Shabbat was over, there was a big rally, organized by the Masorti movement (for most intents and purposes, the branch of the Conservative movement that operates abroad) protesting the Haredi control of Jerusalem. The papers the next morning generally labeled it a protest of Hilonim (secular Jews), which I found rather offensive. There were over 2,000 people there, ranging from totally secular to what Americans would call Modern Orthodox. We marched from Kikar Pariz (Paris Square), across from Beit Nativ, down Rehov Keren HaYesod, made a right to go down Ben Yehuda and then ended at Kikar Zion (Zion Square) at the bottom of Ben Yehuda. Aaron, Jonny, Gabe Co and I peeled off a little bit early to go get dinner, but we got in lots of rallying before we left.



Back row: Asaf and Jonny, Front row: Marc, Jesse, me, Gabe
(Best part of the rally - free tshirts! The front says "HaKotel LeKulam/n" meaning the Kotel is for everyone, but the ending of m/n emphasizes that they are referring to men and women)

The four of us went to Thailandi for dinner (good, but not great) and then went home by way of Kikar Zion to check out the rally. It looked like there was still cool stuff going by as we walked past.

Sunday was our Silicon Wadi class trip to Intel in Kiryat Gat. We had a really fun time with two presentations from people who work there and Q&A sessions as well as a general tour of the factory. Intel exports $5 million per day from Israel and much of the money that the Israeli government invests in Intel ends up right back in the Israeli economy. One really interesting thing about the Intel factory was that there was a Mezzuzah on every doorpost. It was one of those only-in-Israel moments. After the trip we came back to school and the Silicon Seven grabbed lunch at the Frank before heading back to Beit Nativ. Sunday night I again went to Beit Midrash and had fun with free pizza and good learning. Sometimes I feel like I'm monopolizing the discussion, but no one else seems to be jumping in so I think it's ok. After Beit Midrash we watched an episode of LOST (when this post went to print we were two episodes into season 3!!!)

On Monday morning I woke up feeling sick and I ended up staying home. That gave me plenty of time to start getting better and to work on my Freshman Writing essay on Conservative Judaism.

On Tuesday I only had Hebrew (among other things, we read an article about the rally I had been at). During lunch Aaron announced that he wanted to go to the zoo and so Aaron, Jesse, Joey and I hopped on the 26 bus and made our way to Jerusalem's Biblical Zoo. Among the highlights were the lions, tigers, leopards, cheetahs, parrots, red pandas and, most of all, the chimps. We stood by the chimps for at least half an hour just watching them play and fight with each other. We left in total agreement that zoos rock. When I got home, my favorite teacher, Alick Isaacs, gchatted me to see how I was feeling! For Erev Nativ we watched the movie Trembling Before God. This is a documentary made about homosexual Orthodox Jews. After watching the movie, we spent some time examining two of the four teshuvot accepted by the Conservative movement - Dorff/Nevins/Reisner and Roth. Dorff says that homosexual couples should be welcomed into Conservative communities, ordained/trained as rabbis/cantors, and that Conservative rabbis can perform commitment ceremonies. From a social justice standpoint, I may side more with this teshuvah, but from a purely halachic standpoint, it seems to me that Dorff makes a mockery of Halacha. The entire argument is based on the fact that "men don't have vaginas" (direct quote from his teshuvah). To me, that is just not a halachic argument of the caliber necessary to overturn a prohibition from the Torah. I was bothered that the program set up these two teshuvot as opposites, because, though Dorff's is the furthest to the left, Roth's actually is in the middle. The furthest to the right says that homosexuality is a choice and that we should offer reconditioning courses to fix homosexual Jews - obviously an idiotic position. Roth says that we should welcome homosexual Jews into our communities, just not as couples. He also does not allow for the ordination/training of homosexual rabbis/cantors. I think that this is an issue that very few people my age have a concrete and informed opinion on, because it is such a loaded issue where Judaism and the natural social progressiveness of being a college student seem to clash. I think everything right now boils down to the fact that all people should be treated with respect, and that it is not up to humans to decide whether a person has sinned.

Wednesday was a long day. We found out in the morning that one of our fellow Nativers would be going home that evening so there was gossip flying like crazy. When we got home, it was Mark Lazar time and that was fun as usual, though Jordana was out with her dad so she was missed. After J.E.T. I was up late finishing my paper on Conservative Judaism which I think turned out pretty well.

Since Freshman Writing is now over, this Thursday was my first Thursday since the beginning of the semester without class - its going to be nice having the day off. Thursday afternoon I took a bus to Hadassah Ein Kerem for an appointment with a neurologist. I didn't really find out anything new, which is frustrating but what I expected. We had Kol Nativ, which is getting pretty frustrating, but it'll all be over soon (I have a plan for a four-man Yerucham a capella group, should be pretty awesome). Thursday night I really wasn't feeling well so I only went out for about an hour and I only went out at all because it was Jordana's birthday and I would have felt bad not going out at all. Happy Birthday Jordana!!!!

On Friday we had a make-up Hebrew class because Ulpan ends before the semester ends so that we have more time for finals. Shifi knew that it was a big hassle for us to wake up on a Friday morning so she decided to make it more fun for us. We had about an hour of learning and then took a break, followed by a big brunch. We all brought in food (Shifi included) and had a HUGE meal - marzipan rugelach, pita, cheese, chips, burekas, juice, shoko, tea and all sorts of goodies. Don't worry that I missed out on lots of learning during the Hebrew class. The other class watched Sallah Shabbati - a wonderful movie, don't get me wrong, but no better use of my time then our brunch. After eating, we still had time left in the class so Adina came up with the wonderful idea of playing 2 Truths and A Lie. This is an icebreaker where everyone goes around and tells the group two true facts about their lives, along with one lie that they made up. The group then guesses which fact is the lie. We played in Hebrew, so there was at least a little educational value. Shifi made everything so much fun because she is just the cutest Hebrew teacher ever. She is by far the second best Hebrew teacher I've ever had, right behind Morah Besner.

After class ended, a number of us headed over to the Central Bus Station to begin our weekend fun. Adam, Aaron, Joshy, Gabe Co, Asaf, Brian, Nadav, Meir, Jacob, Joey, Max and I went to Ramat Gan to a hotel/resort called Kfar Maccabiah. After a little bit of a room balagan where the rooms that they initially gave us were too small for three people, we ended up moving to bigger rooms that could each sleep four, so we needed one fewer room. We headed to the hot tub, pool and saunas right away and hung out there for a few hours. After that, we went back to the rooms did Kabbalat Shabbat and Maariv, and then had dinner. We hung out and watched tv for a while, and then went to our rooms for bed. In the morning we woke up for hotel breakfast and it was wonderful!! They had fruit and cheese and bread and pudding and yogurt and shoko and juice and cake and parfait and tea...we were all really full after breakfast and we went back to our rooms for late morning naps. When we woke up, we headed down to the basketball courts to play for a few hours and then went back to the pool area for a while. We had dinner back in the rooms with some more tv watching and then took some more napping time. We woke up as Shabbat ended, packed up and headed home. Once we got home, we dropped our stuff off and a number of us headed off to a movie theater/restaurant on Rehov Lloyd George to see A Serious Man (A Good Jew in the Hebrew title). It is based in St. Louis Park, MN where a lot of my friends live. Joey's little brother plays the role of "Daniel's Reefer Friend," who is always asking Daniel to pass the marijuana that he is smoking. The movie is VERY interesting as a modern Book of Job parallel and just generally as a thought-provoking film. I really enjoyed it.

This morning it was off to Silicon Wadi again (with a stop at The Frank first for lunch), and then back home. On the way home I saw a nun in Naot sandals - one of those interesting incongruities that you only see in Israel. We watched a lot of LOST today and then Rachel, Adina and I went to grab pizza. Rachel had a meeting for her Poland trip and Adina and I walked around a little more, then it was time for another episode of LOST.

Now it's time for bed, but it feels really good to be caught up on my blogging.

Talk to you soon,
Seffi