It's amazing that a month has passed since my last post. I kept thinking that I'd get to the blog in a few days. I'll write something when things settle down, I said to myself...
Well, I've come to realize that things aren't going to settle down. Every week there seems to be a reason to be unusually busy: an upcoming Hebrew test, a concert, wine tasting... the truth is that there are so many things that one can do here in Jerusalem, being bored never seems to be an option.
Over the course of a few sessions, one of the activities that has been somewhat central to the student experience has been the "Who Are We?" effort. In a nutshell, the interns (upper year students who spend the summer in Jerusalem to help get the new class settled in) have taken us through several discussions about who we want to be as a class. Some seemed a little contrived, others precipitated heated discussions, but the truth of the matter is that we did begin to coalesce as a group as a result of these activities. Perhaps the more productive sessions (for me anyway) were when we broke out into small groups to discuss specific topics. This gave us a chance to have more substantial discussions, hear more than a quick comment from a fellow classmate, and engage in real conversation and debate. Who we are will, no doubt, continue to develop as the year progresses, but I know a lot more about my classmates than I did before we went through this. Maybe in some way it was meant to be a "frosh week" experience of a shared hardship that brings people together...
Hebrew class continues to be my main area of focus. It's hard not to when you spend 4.5 hours a day in a classroom with others whose Hebrew skills are basically at the same level. The first day was rather overwhelming, and I wondered if I had been mistakenly placed in too high a class. It's hard to know whether the ramp from barely being able to understand every tenth word being said by the teacher to being able to follow almost all of what she said was a result of the brain turning on, or the teacher adapting her vocabulary to the blank stares of the students, but either way, it's become enjoyable to participate in classroom discussions, read short stories, etc. Grammar is also part of our lessons, and I have to say I'm loving it. Why patach, and why kamatz? I don't know all the rules yet, but there is logical structure in many of the rules we've learned so far. Some people say "Who cares? It sounds the same". I care, and I'm glad we're learning about it. If you want to know more about the voles that commit suicide every couple of years in the Golan Heights, or the illiterate woman Rachel who learned to read so she could attend funerals, give me a shout!
On the fun side of things, I attended a concert a couple of weeks ago with Mati Caspi and Shlomo Gronich playing. Both are what I would call Israeli pop-folk singers, and the music was fantastic. Gronich started the show on his own singing at the keyboard. After a few numbers, a small band joined him for several more songs. Caspi was a guest artist and sang a few of his popular pieces. The great thing about this concert was the setting: about 150 people under a big tent overlooking the Old City of Jerusalem from Yemin Moshe. There were maybe seven rows of chairs in total, and we were halfway back. The singing was soulful, technically superb, and even understandable about half the time (that speaks to my vocabulary, not to the quality of singing). Here's a link to one of the songs Gronich performed:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=H3ixiSk-at8
Last week a group of us went to the Israel Museum for an outdoor wine tasting. The view was amazing, the breeze almost cool (it was in the middle of a heatwave), and the variety of Israeli wines was staggering. ₪60 (about $15) got you a decent wine glass and as many tastes as you cared to have over the course of the evening. Food was also for sale (sushi, wonderful cheese plates, olives, chalva...) to help balance the constant flow of alcohol. Since I was walking home, it really didn't matter so much :-)
The novelty of living in Jerusalem is starting to wane a little, although it's still wonderful to be here. What continues to be source of joy is spending time with my classmates. We often get together for Shabbat dinner Friday night (it ends up being a tight squeeze usually, but a lot of fun), lunch Saturday after services, and Havdalah Saturday evening at a local park. I'm ramping up on a lot of new melodies that "everyone" knows from summer camp (OK, not everybody), but the atmosphere is really warm and we hang out for the better part of an hour singing songs in a big circle. This past week two Arab families who were sitting within earshot came over to say how much they were enjoying our singing. Not the kind of story you're likely to hear about on CNN.
OK, this is getting long. Promise to self: post on a weekly basis from now on! Thanks for reading.
Tuesday, August 10, 2010
Saturday, July 10, 2010
New Beginnings
As another week begins here in Jerusalem, it seems to be an appropriate time for me to start this blog thing that I promised many people I would do. Not having blogged before, this is likely going to be a bit rough at first, so bear with me :-)
I arrived in Israel on June 30, 2010 at 2:30pm (more or less). I had visited a couple of times before, so I knew the general layout of the airport, and what to expect at immigration at customs. After standing in line for about 15 minutes, I breezed through my arrival "inteview" at the immigration window. I guess it helps to have a pre-authorized student visa in your passport. I collected my bags, and walked through customs without a hitch, grabbed a shuttle bus (sheirut) to Jerusalem, and got dropped off at the curb by my new apartment about 1.5 hours later (based on who was on the shuttle, I ended being one of the last stops). The keys were in the mailbox as promised, I went up two flights of stairs with one bag at a time. Someone called out in Hebrew asking whose bags were at the entrance. I had the presence of mind to answer (unattended bags are very sensitive issue here, as you might imagine) and all was well.
I unpacked a bit, found out that I had free WIFI available in certain places in the apartment, and connected with my friend Sari that I had met in NYC asking if I wanted to go out for a beer with a bunch of classmates. That sounded fantastic.
The next week and a bit have been spent buying food and various things for the apartment, getting to know my neighbourhood a bit (kind of the gray area between Rehavia and Talbieh, if that means anything to you). It turns out that the Prime Minister of Israel (Netenyahu) is practically my neighbour! I've gotten used to passing visibly armed guards at the street leading to his residence. I've also been to school, got my local cell phone, health insurance card, pictures taken, etc. We had a 4th of July BBQ picnic that was a lot of fun, pictures can be found on my Facebook page.
Orientation starts this week, and then intensive Hebrew classes (ulpan) the following week for the rest of the summer. I'm either going to be rather fluent, or have one massive migraine, time will tell.
I arrived in Israel on June 30, 2010 at 2:30pm (more or less). I had visited a couple of times before, so I knew the general layout of the airport, and what to expect at immigration at customs. After standing in line for about 15 minutes, I breezed through my arrival "inteview" at the immigration window. I guess it helps to have a pre-authorized student visa in your passport. I collected my bags, and walked through customs without a hitch, grabbed a shuttle bus (sheirut) to Jerusalem, and got dropped off at the curb by my new apartment about 1.5 hours later (based on who was on the shuttle, I ended being one of the last stops). The keys were in the mailbox as promised, I went up two flights of stairs with one bag at a time. Someone called out in Hebrew asking whose bags were at the entrance. I had the presence of mind to answer (unattended bags are very sensitive issue here, as you might imagine) and all was well.
I unpacked a bit, found out that I had free WIFI available in certain places in the apartment, and connected with my friend Sari that I had met in NYC asking if I wanted to go out for a beer with a bunch of classmates. That sounded fantastic.
The next week and a bit have been spent buying food and various things for the apartment, getting to know my neighbourhood a bit (kind of the gray area between Rehavia and Talbieh, if that means anything to you). It turns out that the Prime Minister of Israel (Netenyahu) is practically my neighbour! I've gotten used to passing visibly armed guards at the street leading to his residence. I've also been to school, got my local cell phone, health insurance card, pictures taken, etc. We had a 4th of July BBQ picnic that was a lot of fun, pictures can be found on my Facebook page.
Orientation starts this week, and then intensive Hebrew classes (ulpan) the following week for the rest of the summer. I'm either going to be rather fluent, or have one massive migraine, time will tell.
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