The past two weeks

Saturday, 12/4

Saturday night after Shabbat ended, I went to a concert with Tamar Friedman (Timmi), Leah Pollack, and Samara Rosner.  When we were waiting for the bus to go to the zoo the previous week, I saw a poster across the street with information about a Gilad Segev concert (an Israeli artist whose music I LOVE).  I didn’t know of Gilad Segev until last December when my family was in Israel for Marielle’s bat mitzvah and Ilana bought his CD.  (I listened to that CD every day during my drive to school for a very long time.)  On the way back from the zoo I took a closer look at the poster and found out that not only was there a discounted rate for students, but the concert was at Beit Avichai, just down the street from where we live! Later that week I went to Beit Avichai to buy tickets, and I had the entire conversation in Hebrew.  This was exciting, because one of the frustrating things about living in Jerusalem is that people make it hard for you to practice your Hebrew.  The moment you struggle to think of a word or an Israeli detects your accent, they’ll switch to English.  Obviously you can keep speaking in Hebrew, but it starts to feel pretty silly when you know they would understand you better if you just spoke in English. 

The actual concert was GREAT.  It was a really small show, and the audience was mostly adults and people in their 20s.  We sat in the front row and at one point, someone passed up a note for us to hand to Gilad.  On the note was the name of a song she wanted him to play and it said “In honor of my birthday.”  The song happened to be one of my favorites, because the first word is my name! At first he wasn’t sure if he remembered the chords, but eventually he figured it out and played it for her.  At the end of the concert we got to take pictures with Gilad and talk to him a little, which was very exciting, and he even said he might come to the US at some point!  It was a great show, and a great Saturday night.

Leah, me, Gilad Segev, Samara, and Timmi

Sunday

In honor of Hannukah, there was an optional Tiyul on Sunday.  We went to a place that was the site of a battle both during the time of King David and the Maccabees.  Nearby, there was also a battle in the Independence War.  Later that night, we went to an old age home to sing Hannukah songs with some elderly Israelis, most of whom were Russian immigrants.  It was pretty hard to communicate with them, but we could tell that they enjoyed having us there.

Stevie, me, Timmi, and Max

Me and Timmi

Monday

Aaron Lapping’s cousin, Ari Steinberg is on Nativ.  Ari’s parents surprised him by visiting him in Israel, and they also brought with them things for Aaron from his mom. 

Included in the things Aaron’s mom sent him was more gluten free cookies! It was such a nice surprise, and obviously the cookies were fantastic.

Me and Aaron (and GF cookies!)

Tuesday

In honor of Hannukah we had a “party” during Ulpan.  The party consisted of a few Hebrew classes sitting together in one of the bigger lecture halls while a woman played piano and tried to teach us some Hannukah songs.  She wasn’t very successful, but was a nice break from class.  Later that night for Erev Nativ, we went to a light show at David’s Citadel.  To get there we had to walk through Mamilla, an upscale shopping area, and the Hannukah lights there were gorgeous.  The light show itself was also really cool.  I didn’t follow the storyline very well, but the graphics were very impressive.

Wednesday

Ever since I joined the YMCA a few months ago, my friend Hilary and I have been talking about going swimming there.  Finally, on Wednesday morning we went!  It was so nice to swim again (I hadn’t gone swimming since I was at camp) and I’m hoping to go again this week.  Later that night we went to the Hebrew University Hillel production of Joseph and the Technicolor Dreamcoat.  Hilary and I had been anticipating this night since we found out they would be putting on the play.  We listened to and sang songs from Joseph for weeks leading up to the show, so when Wednesday night came we were ecstatic.  The cast did a fantastic job, and it was really fun to see some Nativers perform in it. 

Thursday-Saturday

These were pretty laid back days.  I spent a lot of time reading a book called The Wall (by John Hersey, the author of Hiroshima) about the Warsaw ghetto for my final paper for my Holocaust class. It was a really great book, and I definitely recommend it.

Sunday, 12/12

On Sunday my “business team” presented our business plan to the class.  Our product is purified bottled air.  People laughed a lot (understandably), but our presentation went well and it has been a fun idea to pursue for our class (though I think it would be a pretty ridiculous product to actually create).  

That day was also EXTREMELY windy.  According to my friend Yael, who is currently in Arad, there were sand storms in the south, but in Jerusalem there was just exceptionally strong wind.  Because of the weather I planned on staying in that night, but I ended up braving the wind and going out to dinner with Eric.  We went to Japanika, a sushi place that a lot of Nativers like.  I had never tried sushi, but I decided it would be a good thing to try because it is generally gluten free and everyone loves it.  I planned on getting something with just vegetables, but Eric said that vegetable sushi isn’t “real sushi” and I had to go big or go home.  I know nothing about sushi so I went along with it and got tuna, cucumber, and avocado.  Though I was really hoping I would like it, when the sushi actually came, I was very apprehensive about actually trying it.  And when I did try it, I didn’t love it, to say the least.  My least favorite part was the seaweed which was really hard to chew and didn’t taste very good.  (My sister later told me that the seaweed is something you have to get used to.)  Though I didn’t really like it, I’m glad I finally tried it, and hopefully I’ll eventually find some sushi that I like. 

Monday

My roommate Aimee’s birthday was on Monday, so Roshana and I bought her a cake and decorated the door and the wall outside our room.  Later that night I played piano for the first time in a while, which was very relaxing.

Leah, me, Eric, Debra, and Aimee

Birthday girl

Me, Aimee, and our decorated door/wall

Tuesday

For Erev Nativ we watched a documentary called Trembling before God, about being homosexual in an Orthodox Jewish community.  It was sad to see how many peoples’ families cut off contact with them when they came out and to hear about their respective struggles to find where they belong when the world in which they used to live no longer accepts who they are. 

Wednesday

Wednesday was a long day.  I had been sick for a few days, so I finally went to the doctor and got some much needed Sudafed.  Later I had my Holocaust class.  Our teacher was at a conference on Monday, so to make up for the class we missed we had a double class on Wednesday.  We were supposed to finish class at 7:30, but instead we finished at 8.  Immediately when I got back to base, we had a meeting for everyone going to Poland in January.  By the end of the night, I had been studying the Holocaust from 4:30-9:30.  It was a lot for one day, and I was pretty exhausted by the end of it.

But my night still wasn’t over!  Elana Pentelnik’s birthday was the next day, and since a lot of her friends wouldn’t be in Jerusalem on Thursday night to celebrate, we celebrated on Wednesday night instead.  We went to Waffle Bar and everyone had a great time, despite many of us being exhausted and sick.

 

Maya and me (Wellesley sisters!)

Me, Elana, and Eric

Thursday

We had our second B’Yachad seminar on Thursday. (B’Yachad is the group of people who are in Israel for the year who are going to be counselors at Jewish summer camps this summer.) When I got on the bus I was really surprised and even more excited to see a group of my camp friends!  I knew that we would be with people from other programs for this seminar, but I didn’t know what other groups we would be with.  It was so nice to see them and catch up, and I’m really excited for our next seminar with them.

Friday

I planned to go to Shira Chadashah with Hilary for Kabbalat Shabbat services, but when we got to the lobby we found out that a group of Nativers was going to do their own service in the park right by Beit Nativ (Gan HaAtzmaut).  We decided to join them and stayed for Mincha and Kabbalat Shabbat.  When we got back to base, we ran into Dave Yedid, Samara Rosner, Zoe Kronovet, and Daniel Lewis, who were going to Kabbalat Shabbat services at Jerusalem’s Open House (LGBT group).  We decided to tag along and joined them for our second Kabbalat Shabbat service of the night.  Both services were really nice, and it was a fun, spontaneous thing to do. 

After dinner I skyped with my friends Joel and Hanna, neither of whom I had talked to in a very long time.  (Thank you Joel for finding that missing comma.)  Then I skyped with Marielle who brought the laptop around the house so I could see the new carpets and take pictures of my room.  She was very patient with me and moved the computer to the perfect angles for my many pictures. Eventually, my mom and dad joined the conversation, and after an hour I finally went to sleep exhausted.  I got a lot of sleep though, and am feeling a lot better, which is very fortunate since finals are in a week!  That’s all for now… feel free to COMMENT (that is directed at you, Marcus family).

Lions and tigers and bears...and elephants and toucans and monkeys and hippos

(This was written on December 3)

Last Friday, after a pre-Shabbos visit to the shuk, I went to Talpiyot to spend Shabbat with Gabi Remz, Sam Forman, and Maya Lee-Parritz.  It was their last weekend in Jerusalem before they moved to Bat Yam (they’re on Year Course and live in three different places over the year), so I really wanted to see them before they left.  For dinner they had a Shabbat/Thanksgiving potluck with some of their Year Course friends, and Forman was making the turkey.  He had never made a turkey before, but the one he made was probably the best turkey I’ve ever had.  Everything else was also really good, and I was really impressed at how well the meal came together.  Though there were some initial setbacks (no tablecloths, not enough bowls, etc.) everything worked out and it was a really nice dinner.  At one point Gabi said, “Think about it, there are no parents here; we did this all on our own.  I couldn’t have imagined being able to do this in 8^th grade.”  It really was very impressive and it made me even more excited to move to Karmiel in February and be more independent. 

On Saturday morning, Gabi, Forman, and Maya went to a Kiddush at their Rabbi’s house and I walked back to Beit Nativ from the Year Course apartments.  It was nice weather outside, and it felt good to be able to find my way back to Beit Nativ without any help.  Later that day I went to a Kiddush hosted by my friend Samara’s parents.  Samara’s sister has celiac disease, so her family knows lots of gluten free recipes.  It was a refreshing change to go to a Kiddush where I could actually eat something, and all the gluten free desserts were really delicious.

Sunday was a busy day for my Silicon Wadi class.  We began the morning at 9:30 with a visit to the Intel factory in Jerusalem.   Intel is the world’s largest semiconductor manufacturer. The first part of the visit consisted of a lecture/conversation with Ariel Wasserstrum, the manager of the Intel Jerusalem branch that we visited.  Ariel gave us some background about Intel as a company and the role of Intel Israel in the company as a whole and in Israel’s economy.  Intel has about 80,000 employees worldwide, and 300 facilities in 50 different countries.  The company has three main pillars on which it focuses: energy efficient performance (less power for more performance), connectivity (find a way to connect all computers one day), and security (embed security features within the chip).

After talking to Ariel, we had a tour of the factory.  Somehow, I wasn’t on my teacher’s email list, so I didn’t get the message that we had to wear closed toed shoes that day and wore sandals.  I was really upset that I wouldn’t be able to tour the factory, but Ariel called someone and they brought me a pair of boots to wear.  We were also given full white bodysuits, and had to wear plastic, sock-like covers on our shoes to get rid of any static electricity.  After putting on a pair of safety goggles, we were all ready to see how the chips are made.  We saw the process of cutting the chips larger circular “wafers.” The wafer has all the information on it and is then cut into the chips that are in our laptops, netbooks, etc.  Each chip on the wafer has different strengths and weaknesses, so they are grouped based on certain criteria, and are used in different electronics.  We saw how the chips are cut, washed, and removed from the wafer, and we were even given key chains with (defective) chips in them!  Though we didn’t understand all the details of the chip making process, it was still really interesting to learn about it and see the actual chips being made.  It was also cool to come back to base, open my computer, and see a little sticker that says  Intel Centrino (Centrino is one of the chips that Intel makes).  I had never paid any attention to the sticker before, but now that I know what it is, it’s a lot more exciting. 

When we got back to Hebrew U we had a quick lunch before hearing a lecture from Saul Singer, co-author of Start-Up Nation.  To be honest, the excitement of hearing Saul Singer was more exciting than the actual lecture.  He talked a lot about what was written in the book and what we had talked about in class, so there wasn’t much new information presented, but it was still exciting to get my book signed and take a picture with him.

Me and Saul Singer!

Our teacher, Avner, with Saul Singer

On Monday we had yet another field trip, this one for my Holocaust class.  We went to Yad Vashem, the Holocaust museum in Jerusalem, for about six hours.  I’ve been to Yad Vashem before, but this time was pretty different than in the past.  For one thing, after two months of learning about the Holocaust, I knew a lot more that I did on previous visits, which allowed me to get more out of the museum.  But I was also looking at it from a more educational perspective, thinking about what would be useful for my paper.  Additionally, though six hours at any museum is a long visit, I felt like I was rushing through each exhibit.  It’s obviously impossible to take in every part of the museum, but I definitely plan on going back before I leave Jerusalem, because there is so much more to learn there.  The biggest difference though, was that I was really amazed by the museum itself.  Last year, my grade made our own “museum” about Jewish life in Central Europe (specifically the Austro-Hungarian Empire) leading up to the Holocaust.  I hadn’t thought much about our museum until I was at Yad Vashem and I realized how much work that must have gone into designing it, gathering information, and putting it all together.  It really deepened my appreciation for the actual museum.

For Israeli movie night that Monday we were watching Noodle.  The movie is about an Israeli woman who helps a young Chinese boy reunite with his mother after she is deported from Israel.  It was a really touching movie, and the little boy was adorable.  While we watched to movie we had a competition to see who could write down the most Hebrew words and their translations (with help from the subtitles).  I wrote down about 40 words and I won… a piece of bazooka gum!

Tuesday was a GREAT day.  After 3 hours of Hebrew, I came back to Beit Nativ and got an early start on my Hebrew homework.  It was really nice out, so I decided to work outside, though that is a definite guarantee for distractions.  I did get most of my work done though, and I had a conversation with Aaron Sherman, one of the Yerucham madrichim, about different kinds of pens, pencils, and markers, and what size lead we like in our mechanical pencils.  As I was finishing up my homework a group of Nativers was leaving Beit Nativ to go to the zoo.  I had wanted to go to the zoo for a while, so I ran upstairs to drop off my backpack and joined them.  I wasn’t expecting the zoo to be anything special, but it was SO cool.  I think part of the reason it was so exciting for me is because I haven’t been to a zoo in a very long time, but regardless, I had a great time.  We saw an adorable red-faced panda, two leopards chasing each other (one of which only had three legs, which we didn’t notice until later), baboons cleaning each other, a whole array of beautifully colored toucans, and elephants, giraffes, an ostrich, hippos, zebras, lions, peacocks, owls, and more.  Of everything we saw though, my favorite was definitely the chimpanzees.  To start with, one of the first things one of the chimps did was pick up some dirt and throw it at the glass where we were watching from.  It was also really cool to see how acrobatic they were and how human like many of their movements were.  After a long and very fun day at the zoo we headed back to base for Erev Nativ.

Me, Zoe, Leah, and Becca

Leah, Eric, and me

We started Erev Nativ with a game of Hannukah bingo.  It was a really fun time, especially when almost everyone in the group got bingo on the same turn.  To settle this, and to determine the winner of a gigantic bag filled with shoko (chocolate milk in a bag) we first had a dance off, and then we had to dive for a pen in the middle of the circle in order to answer a bonus question to win.  After our intense game, all three groups joined together to make Hannukiot, which we’ve lit every night of Hannukah so far.  Making the Hannukiot was really fun, and the whole night was a great way to get ready for Hannukah.

My Hannukiah!

Thursday was a pretty typical day—no field trips or anything special—but before I left school, I got a dress and a scarf.  Every Thursday at Hebrew U there are clothing stands set up near the escalator.  I’ve never stopped to look at the clothes because I always want to get home, but this week I didn’t have anything to do back at base so I decided to look around with my friend Leah Pollock.  It was fun to look around and take our time going home, rather than rushing home like I usually do.  When I got back to base, I went to the shuk with my friend Aviva Pollack and relaxed for the rest of the day. 

Later that night, I went to the Science Museum with some friends.  For the month of December, there is an event called Chamshushalayim in Jerusalem, during which there are all sorts of discounts on museums, shows, and restaurants in honor of Hannukah.  Admission to the museum was free, as was entrance to an exhibit called Deep.  The exhibit, which is about sea life very VERY deep in the ocean apparently came from Paris and is only in Jerusalem for a few more weeks, so we were really happy that we got to see it.  There was also a cool section in the museum with optical illusions, and a kids’ section with a carousel that moves when someone pedals a bicycle.  It was a cool museum, but definitely doesn’t compare to the Science Museum in Boston.  It was a fun night and nice to do something different, and I can’t wait to go to other museums for free, thanks to Chamshushalayim.

Me and Elana on the carousel

Aviva, me, and Elana

Some more Thanksgiving pictures



Surprise letter from my family! =)

 

Me and Matt Javitt



Me, Sean Haber, and Seth Fineman

 

Kaya Reisman and me