Exploring Religion

So last Tuesday I had some religious experiences. Being in Israel, Judaism is very second nature. It is everywhere, especially during the holidays. The busses all read 'happy Hannukah' , everyone wishes you happy holidays in the supermarket, there are Hannukiot lights on the street lamps and Sufganiot being sold at every corner. It isn't any doubt that it is the holidays or that everyone around is Jewish. It is no myth that when people move out of Israel they become more religious because they have to prove they are Jewish. I have not gone to services or kept separate dishes while I was here because being Jewish is so much more natural than it is in the US. Anyway, on tuesday I got more religious than I have in a while.

My friends Agostina, Aliza and I went to Mea Shearim to check it out. Mea Shearim is a super ultra, ultra orthodox neighborhood. Basically the people there believe that no one should live in Israel until the Messiah comes, yet they live in Israel. There is a bus line from the center of town to Mt. Scopus that goes through this neighborhood and I literally gawk at the people walkign through. It is a completely different world. Black hats of all shapes and sizes, dressed to the nines in black suits, all of the girls wear black pleated skirts to their ankles, blue colored button-down shirts and sweaters. And this is all in the heat of summer as well. I would sit on the bus in my shorts and a woman would come on and stare at my bare knees. Agos said someone had talked to her about the reasons she should cover up more because it was not appropriate to wear what she was wearing while even passing through the neighborhood.

I have a lot of issues with the strict nature of their lives and the inferior status women have, the fact that religious men will not acknowledge a woman's existence (like when i try to talk to them when I volunteer at the hospital and they avert their eyes and ignore me, or that I will be sitting on a full bus and a man would rather stand the whole way rather than sit next to me. I know that their are rules that I cannot understand and that a lot of people are very content in this lifestyle but it baffles me. I also hate the way that religious people feel fine in Israel to have neither parent unemployed and live off the government, especially because in any other country this would never fly, and that our religious second cousins who live in Israel never spoke to us all those years because since we are not haredi (super religious) we do not count as Jews. Anyway, clearly I have issues with this neighborhood but I was so fascinated with it. It is a completely different world.

So we made plans and planned outfits. I thought we should take off all of our jewelry (I took out my nose ring) and put our hair in a plain ponytail. I wore the longest skirt I had- thank god ima made me buy a Kotel skirt, and a button down shirt and a sweater, i felt very appropriate. We were so excited to go on the bus and see how people treated us. People sort of give you these looks like you are from a different world, like "I would not want to be wearing that".

We tried to be very inconspicuous walking around. It was very interesting because as a woman you have the tendency to want to flaunt yourself and be noticed and here it was the opposite. Although we didn't feel like we had to be invisible but there was definitely a sense of blending into the crowd and trying not to be noticed for any reason. As a woman and as outsiders. As outsiders we did well because although we did not make a scene of any sorts we would always squeal with excitement at all the strange things we saw:

the separated buses- men in front, women in back

stores that only sort the various hats or framed photos of rabbis

strange toys- rabbi matching games, kids doll with peyot and a talis

millions of buffet restaurants that look like Boca Raton

wig styling salons

and the like

WE LOVED IT

The only disappointment was that we thought we could get really cheap groceries but we were wrong.

Later that day we went to Nachlaot, a really really cute neighborhood and looked at all the chanukiot. It was amazing, we had gone their to see all of the sukkot but at night seeing in every window a chanukiah made me feel really happy to be jewish. That was really corny, but it really made me so happy. They even had all these tours walking around to stare at the windows.

Then Agos and I went to the kotel because I had not been there yet. They had a huge chanukiah there which you are supposed to go see being lit. We had been to the Jewish quarter like 6 times but not to the Kotel (who know why) so we came prepared with pens and paper. The last time I went to the kotel was the day we got to Israel and I was really jetlagged and not in the mood because the lady at the entrance yelled at me because I was not appropriately dressed. I just laughed at all the women praying and crying at this old stone wall. Today I felt a lot better about it, partially because we had been having such religious experiences that day and because I understood how important this place was to so many people and we had the privilege of being right there. I don't often appreciate that I get to spend so much time in Jerusalem, a place that is so holy and so special because I don't consider THAT important to me on a regular basis, but that night it was really nice that we could just take the bus and arrive at the Kotel.

We wrote our notes and walked up to the kotel but we had to wait a good 15 minutes in order to touch it. Partially because the women's section is tiny and partially because all of the women insist on praying right at it so that no one can get near the wall. So we waited and waited and finally squeezed up to the wall and then struggled to get the note in, because boy that is a full wall.

Tals/ Kibbutz II/ family

So, since the last post I wrote about was really only about a sandwich and that was 3 weeks ago, I would say I was due for another writing, and this time I'll try to talk about real things?

I have learned somethings since that weekend, and that means going away for the weekend. The social scene in Israeli universities is very different. Namely, people go home for the weekend. It comes from 2-3 years of being in the army where you go home for the weekend and in a country where everything is close. Still, though I find it a little odd, maybe not odd, but, well, different. I go to college 2 hours from home and I only go home for holidays and vacations. My friend goes home every weekend on a 5 hour bus. Plus she travels down thursday night and back on the 5 AM bus every sunday. It's great dedication.

Now, this creates a very interesting dynamic. On the family unit it keeps the family unit together for much longer. There are graduation parties and everyone cries and the child leaves the home but then they come back on thursday. Or better yet, they have a day job and they come home every night. The children don't leave the nest really until they go to college or maybbe just when they get married. I think it keeps families closer but at the same time it doesn't force the kids to become more independent which I think is a big benefit. I certainly feel that being so far from home, although I miss the family so much and how much i wish I could just go home for the weekend, it has forced me to make very independent steps.

Anyway, what I am trying to stay is that people don't stay in the dorms or in Jerusalem on weekends. I don't know how it would be to stay in town, because people do live in the city, but Mt. Scopus is very lonely and isolated as it is and on friday/saturday when there are no busses we cannot do anything, so I make plans.

So I went to the Tals family home who were our neighbors on kibbutz and I grew up with their daughter Mika. Mika could not come home from the army but they have 2 other daughters and i really had a great time. i felt really comfortable just to hang out and be a little weird. it made me realize that there is a very difference between Ima and Abba's friends who I could call if i had an emergency and people i can just go to hang out with. Since i have no family here (except for really religious third cousins somehwere who wont acknowledge my existence) and no one i can bother each weekend i need to find those hang-out people- those are the people who become your adoptive families in the end. in the end it is the people who know me best and in israel it is the families of the 2 girls i grew up with, Mika and Yahav- the Tals and the Erez-Slotts.

So the next weekend I went to visit the Erez-Slotts and the rest of the kibbutz. Now this is a very different experience- for one, Yahav does not live with her parents. Although they live about a 3 minutes walking distance every kid on kibbutz after 11th grade gets their own apartment in a pseudo-youth village in the corner of the kibbutz. This certainly creates a very interesting familial dynamic but that is for an entirely different sociological research study. Anyway, the kibbutz is very layered. For one, it is the place I grew up in so I can pass my old house, kindergarten, dining room, etc and have all of the nostalgia, but it is nice that they all live in the kibbutz and not just an empty place in some neighborhood. Second, its the family thing, all the people who watched me grow up are there and certainly many of those families and Ima and Abba's friends i could go to to hang out, but since this is kibbutz its entirely different. Third, there are the people I grew up with. Going to visit Yahav means I follow her around a little and sleep in her bed, but visiting the kibbutz means i am part of the youth village. I was very very surprised and pleasantly I should add that I felt very welcome there. People seemed to know I was showing up and people acted like I had just been there even though a lot of people were not home when I was there before so I hadn;t seen them in 5 years. No one was unwelcoming or acted like 'why are you here?' People also asked me about my life and if it was weird that i was back. it made me feel very nice because i tend to feel that kibbutz people are so entangled in their own lives and in the kibbutz that they dont notice other people's lives as well. Anyway, I felt a little strange and there were lots of volunteers and people i didnt know but i ended up having a really good time. i hung out with people the entire weekend and went to "cool" bars in other kibbutzim (no comment) and the famous Ketura pub, but i really got a sense of their lives and felt like i was a welcome visitor.

I did not feel like i could have been living there or that i wanted to, but i took the 6am bus with my friend Yasmin back to Jerusalem and i was sitting in the bus stop, me in my MASA backpack (the organization that funds and creates trips to israel) and her in her army uniform and i thought, if things were different i would be sitting here in my uniform going to my base as well. I know that things would have had to be A LOT different and who knows who i would have been (and believe me i have spent a lot of time pondering this) but if i still lived on kibbutz one thing would have been for sure, i would also sit in the bus stop sunday mornings in a uniform waiting for a bus to go back to my base.

I am not just saying this about the army, but it is strange to think about Yahav, a girl who was born 13 days before me and until i was 9 we shared the same life and while my life has taken so many turns i can see what it could have been like by looking at her life. I know this is oversimplifying everything, but from a physical standpoint i kept thinking that weekend, if we would have stayed on kibbutz, this is what my weekend could have been like. I think there are few instances where we can say that about decisions: if i would have made a different decision it would have come out liek this. sure who knows who i would have been but since the kibbutz seems to be something you can count on to stay more or less the same- that could have been my life.

My last point after all of this was the people- Mika, Yahav, will always be in my life. I spent alot of time at Mika's house looking at photo albums and watching home videos and hearing stories. And the funny thing is that 80% of their videos and pictures we have almost duplicates in my house. And while their video of out move from the baby home to the toddler home has the dad's voice and is pointed on mika and mien has abba and focuses on me, they are all the same. We had the same memories and significant events of our early childhoods. Every time they are ever in the US or I am here we make special special efforts to see them. Not just because we are still friends but because they are my constants. No matter what i know i will always see them and we'll be at each other's weddings and all. I don't know if many people have this with people they are not related to but its this weird bond. Even if i didnt like them i would always have to see them and i would have to drag my butt half way across the world to see them.

Israel is really inescapable to me. I thought earlier this trip that it was just the place i was born in- not really different than France if i were to have been born in france. And yes, it is a lot alot about that- the kibbutz, the places that hold memories, the people- they will always draw me back here. But it is ISRAEL and well, the fact that i am expecting visits from friends going on birthright and can see people who i worked with at camp because they were on the israeli delegation and the obsession american jews have with israel and the fact i speak hebrew and the fact that my name only makes sense here (although i start to not like it in hebrew because its so commonplace) and the fact that israel has so many issues and cannot stay off the news and people ask me my opinion from the "israeli voice"- well that makes Israel be layers and layers for me.

Now i will go to bed because tomorrow i am going to natanya for the weekend, because although it is certainly not the most glamourous place in israel, lets face it, i cannot be home alone with a sandwich again.

Noa on her own

So today I'm on my own. Sometime I get to be on my own; when everyone goes to Ulpan and I have quiet time, when I was sick all week and I had to stay in my room all week- that was fun!, or now today all weekend alone. Miriam was supposed to come if she didn't make it to Syria but she did yay! for sucks for me because everyone else went up to Tel Aviv and Haifa, but oh well, I did get to spend a few great hours with an amazing sandwich that somehow I have become obsessed with- my only friend in the cold dorm complex. Actually, Yulia, my Russian roommate who speaks no English or hebrew is here, but she hasn't left her room in 10 hours- she is a strange one.

Anyway, I watched some Friends episodes, cleaned the whole apartment, did laundry, reorganized my class registration- exxxxccciiiitttemmment. Ya.

I just felt I should write SOMETHING- so there you have it, the boring drivel of a friday night- wow it's friday night, i feel lame.

Oh, to cheer you up: THE SANDWICH:

ROLL- no sliced bread, that sucks

MUSTARD

ROAST BEEF/ CORNED BEEF/ SALAMI

PICKLES

LETTUCE

TOMATO

PICKLES

PICKLES

yum.........

Patterns 101

Well today made my life. I wiggled into the Basic Patterns class and today we spent 4 grueling hours of measuring, exacting, and cutting out a pattern onto fabric so now my feet hurt and are smelly, but i have begun my blazer!

The whole thing is cut, and in 5 short weeks it will be finished. I am very very very pleased. This is exactly what I wanted to do.

Wednesdays in the morning 10-2 we sew and 3-7 we learn patterns. Its a long day but I am enjoying so much. I feel lucky that I can understand hebrew because there is a girl on my program also in fashion classes and she is very lost. I also made friends! I felt very isolated from the rest of the Bezalel students, but the fashion department has only 33 students so they are very welcoming and interested in everything USA and American fashion, college, culture, and obsessed with New York.

So now I am stretching my legs, eating hummus and enjoying the quiet time because everyone else has gone to Ulpan.

I HATE ISRAELIS, for now

So i know you arent supposed to write bad things on the blog, just all the amazing things that are happening, but ill just keep it real because i am not one not to say what is on my mind.

So being here is a little difficult in some aspects- mainly the culture of city israelies (i am trying not to generalize too much).

So, i thought this was just in tel aviv, but in jerusalem too you meet the pushy, rude, unprofessional, stubborn, hard-to-deal with, thinks-everything-is-not-a-big-deal, Israeli. I know I am going to say all these things and offend people but from the people I have met and in the setting i am in i will jsut say this: I dont know how israel functions without falling apart

okay, so basically this all stems from signing up for classes at school. ill preface this by saying that I am happy with my schedule, just not the system.

So i am used to an orderly system where you sign up for classes online and you get a specific time where you rush rush rush to try to get into classes by the spots that are available. then the first 2 weeks of classes you attempt to get into classes you arent enrolled in by signing up for waiting lists, hoping someone has dropped that class and you by a stroke of luck were online at the same time, and occasionally pleading teachers for empty desks.

At Bezalel it is very different, or at least for us international students. what we had to do is go to the individual secretaries of each department and plead to get a spot in classes. The other students had already signed up for classes so half the classes I had pinned for were already full.

"Are there ANY spots?"

"No"

"Is there any way to get in, i'm only here for a semester"

"so, there are no spots"

"i dont understand, what can i do to get in? what if someone drops the class?"

"there are no spots"

Great, so basically in this world of art i am the bottom of the food chain. basically we were told we could only take fine arts, no other departments would be open sorry. hello? i was promised fashion design, ceramics, photography, why did i come all the way here?

Turns out in israel its not 'what you see is what you get' its very very different. i went to the fashion department and had a similar conversation and tried hard to convince the secretary that i should get a spot. nothing. i left politely cried for a while and vowed i would go home the next day ("this isnt worth my time") and called my counselor (who is a student there) for help.

"you cant be polite, noa, that doesnt work here, you have to push" she said to me.

so we went back to fashion and she pleaded with the lady and made her look at the class lists and somehow a magical spot opened in 2 classes. Thank god.

A similar story happened with ceramics. No spot no spot no spot. So i went to the class and pleaded with the teacher and as uncomfortable as i felt that i was inconveniencing her, i said "do i want to be here or not?" i could be polite and sweet noa and walk home with nothing or i could endure some discomfort and get into this class. and somehow there was an extra wheel and i got in..

SO, what i am saying is somehow after these 2 tumultous weeks i got the classes that i wanted, but boy, couldnt there have been an easier way? i was all under the control of these secretaries who never showed up and were always on break, and when they were there had to be convinced to open their books and not roll their eyes at me and say "no room for international students". now this isnt an affront to secretaries because i was one once, but this culture that i dont know how it stands on its feet.

THERES A BETTER WAY! i want to shout.

i love israel but i could do without people shoving me and not saying excuse me, class starting half an hour late because not everyone had shown up yet, and it taking 3 days for the internet to get set up, our studio keys to be handed out, our bus passes to be bought, things like that.

SORRY, THAT WAS MY RANT. just had to say it. maybe ill erase this now...

Identity Crisis Solved?

So I have been doing A LOT of thinking about Israel, me and Israel, Noa and Israel, lalalala. Basically like the last 2 years.

I realized early Freshman year that I should have probably gone to Israel that year. I came to college where I had to meet all these new people and try to define myself to them and I never was sure where to put in Israel. So i decided, ill go abroad there. I worked at TY that summer and met lots of Israelies and lots of ZIONISTS and got a little sucked into the idea and said junior year israel junior year israel.

So now I am here, obviously, but it is finally time to figure this all out. This whole identity crisis that is the Israeli/American Noa. Where do i fit in in israel? where do i fit in in america?

So lots of thinking. I went to the Kibbutz and that helped me a lot to come to terms with my childhood home and realized I still love it and will always want to go back.

But what about the rest of Israel? So Ariela helped me realize that i am very constrained by this American zionist idea that I have to FFFEEEELLLL something spiritual and fulfilling about Israel, this whole "coming home" "finally fitting in" "fill a void in my heart" idea towards Israel. and i realized that harbored a lot of my problems toward Israel that I just wasnt feeling these things. As much as i love israel i am not feeling this intense pull towards it. It was stressing me out that i wasnt feeling like i have to stay here the rest of my life, but that is okay.

It can be where I grew up, a place i know, and a place filled with interesting places, friends, and ideas but it doesnt have to be everything. I am happy with my life in America and expressing my Judaism in america, and israel may not hold a spot i am missing in my life, but I can still like it and want to visit it.

It definitely isn't like going abroad to any other country because it holds so much meaning in my life but it is also okay for me to say that I like my place in life right now and I am okay to return to america in a few months and not necessarily be counting down the days until i make aliya

Update!

I added photos everywhere, and I'm a brunette again!

The South!

We went to the South, the deep south! And in Israel it really is the deep south. Evene in Jerusalem it's the desert and once you leave the perimeter of the city, you enter the desert desert desert. We did lots of stuff, we went places and stuff but it's boring but we were activitied out from day one. We went to Sderot and talked a lot about the bombings and I know I should talk all about that but I won't because it gets all political and touchy and I just don't do that.

We went to Dimona at night which I thought would be the biggest dump in the world but it looks like it got a facelift since... it was a dump. Anyway we went to see the Black Hebrews who explained to us that their leader had a vision that the community of christians in Chicago needed to live in Israel. They were telling their story and I was very skeptical listening to their story that just seemed like the mormon story except that the Black Hebrews had to live in Liberia for a year before they were dumped in Dimona, it's definitely not a romantic story but you can google it. Anyway after some eye rolling they explained that they focus on music and dance so they sang for us and taught us to dance and it was amazing. AMAZING. Nothing like changing your opinion. But they do love the word ya! like Halleluya! as in god, as in We praise you ya! Don't get me started.

We also ventured to a REAL BEDOUIN TENT, AHHHH! But i do love the bedouin tents except that I was peer pressured to ride a camel and do a "spiritual sit" in the desert where I had to "think about my feelings and reach deep within" and as nice as sitting and thinking is i am really not into all of that uhh- feelings stuff, I'm just not.

But anyway we had lots of pita and hummus and kabobs and sang around the campfire and we all really bonded, even some of the weird music kids (We travel with group of international kids who learn music at a conservatory in Tel Aviv but only a few are normal).

Then we did nice activities, we filled sand bottles with colored sand, and went to an overlook where you can see Israel, Jordan, Egypt and Saudi Arabia, and went snorkeling; it was well planned. All the touring and activities and discussions felt a lot like being in summer camp but hey if someone else is organizing a guided tour at the coral reef, Ill go along.

Finally, Kibbutz part 2. THE KIBBUTZ

So after I rallied everyone up for THE KIBBUTZ the tour guide said, "I really don't like Ketura, they're don't guests very well, they're pretty snobby," and so I said "watch it." But in reality when we got to dinner he asked the Keren Kolot people to bring more chicken and broccoli and dessert, so I guess as a hotel, yes the Kibbutz isn't that great.

But, here's the thing. HERE'S THE THING. The kibbutz kids were all away on a retreat to the Kinneret so it was just me and my group. No family, no friends, just Noa and Kibbutz. and it was NICE. The kibbutz, i mean. Without the distractions about worrying about how it would be socially and stressing out about not being there for so long, I really loved it- the freedom and independence, the community, the old house, the dinning room, the pool. It really made me appreciate that I had grown up there, and it put it back into a soft spot in my heart. Oy, that was too feelings-y.

Jerusalem

Jerusalem in 2 Parts

1. Trip to Jerusalem

2. Move to Jerusalem!

So we embarked on a 4 day trip to Jerusalem at 6:30AM and never really stopped after that. I feel like we saw EVERYTHING in Jerusalem, EVERYTHING. Some things I could have skipped, like a very claustrophobic trip in the water tunnels of the city of David and a trip to every orthodox synagogue in Jerusalem for Sinchat Torah where I got to sit in a multitude of balconies and back rooms.

But we did see a lot of amazing things. First and formost the neighborhoods- Nachla'ot and Yemin Moshe. Oh my goodness they were beautiful. They were so clean and quaint. They were very green and all Jerusalem stone. Lots of balconies and porches and cute, cute sukkahs. It was bad though. I was like, shit, I really didn't want to like Jerusalem that much, or for that matter anywhere in Israel. Let me explain, I wanted to like Israel, but not enough to say I want to be here! I want to live here, but god those neighborhoods were amazing.

We saw a very interesting scene at a hotel bar thursday night. We went to a really high -class bar at the Mamila Hotel. There there were lots of religious teens partying. What a strange scene you could see only in Jerusalem, maybe in Brooklyn, but it was very interesting to see boys in kippahs and girls in covered-up relgious wear drinking, dancing with each other! and acting very un-modest-like but that is the confusing nature of this city.

Now we have made Jerusalem our home. We moved into the dorms which are amazing. The student village is huge and we are all living in 5 people apartments everyone with their own room and a common room and kitchen. I am really lucky to have roommates I really like. We haven't had to much time here but I already really like it here. Even just the cooler weather from the sweltering Tel Aviv heat, more space for everyone, walking distance to Bezalel. Of course, in true Israeli fashion we went to Bezalel and we told pretty much nothing. We got an introduction to the school but we don't sign up for classes until Wednesday, so as usual, we'll see....

Kibbutz Ketura

So Kibbutz Ketura....

The kibbutz in which i grew up has given me boatloads of stress for about 3 years now. The last time my family and i went to israel was passover 2006, so about 4 1/2 years ago and when we went to the kibbutz it was really awkward and uncomfortable and I said I never wanted to go back. I would go to israel and not to the kibbutz. On kibbutz everyone lives in their own routine. People are very very social but everything is done by routine, everyoen goes to the lunch and dinner at the usual times, goes to the pool at the usual times, pops by a friends house unannouced. No one is calling each other to say, hey you want to meet up? Which is a wonderful way to live, but as an outsider is quiet daunting, and especially for me, a person who is very scared to invite myself to things for fear of being unwanted, the kibbutz feels like a social awkwardness nightmare. I didnt know when to go to the dinning hall or whose house people were hanging out with so I was alone a lot of the time. Needless to say I did not want to come back.

But that is kind of impossible, be in Israel for 5 months and not visit the kibbutz? unheard of. so Ima and Abba and Ariela went down for Yom kippur and i begrugingly agreed to follow them down for sukkot. I was shitting bricks though, i was on the bus down from Tel Aviv and I wanted to cry. Why did I do this to myself? I am just setting myself up for 4 horrible days.

The moment I got there though, my childhood friends Yahav and Mika (all of us were born within 20 days of each other and we have always been a little triplet. Yahav is the only one who still lives on Kibbutz, though) went on a night hike. I dropped my things off where ima and abba were staying and we did a really nice hike in the full moon down into the kibbutz.

It made me really get it. No matter what, Yahav and Mika will always be in my life. Even if we lose touch its this bond that will always be there, i will always see them again.

The same is true for the kibbutz. no matter what it will always be part of my life. even if i dont go back and live there or go live in israel again i will always return to it even just to say, i once lived here. I am going with my group there next weekend and i feel like it will be like that. i can introduce my new friends to my old life.

so kibbutz surprised me. yes, people were in their own lives and most dont go out of their way to invite you to things and say 'were having lunch at 12, come join us' and that makes things very difficult for me. but it was also a lesson for me to get out of my comfort zone. it sounds like a small step but at school i would never just show up at the dining room and if i see people eat with them and if not ok. I would never do that. After being in middle school and having girls purposefully not include me in things, i have created defense mechanisms for myself. a lot of that has subsided over the years but still going to the dining room on kibbutz alone made my stomach churn. But it was definitely better than i expected. In most cases I saw people I knew and they were more than happy for me to sit with them. At nights I found things to do and even went to this hang out place in the mountains with people I wasnt that good friends with. I didnt feel too alone. Yahav was really a godsend because she really made an effort to invite me to things and include me. I felt really thankful that I had her because I felt like we were really friends and after all this time we were real friends and even though she had her own life she welcomed me.

Stress and Fasting

So the past 2 days have been pretty significant; first Slichot in Jerusalem and then Yom Kippur. So we drove to Jerusalem thursday night for a traditional Slichot service which is I guess a prayer service you can do from a month before to start.... okay I wasn't really listening, but we went through some of the old city and it was nice. I was very excited because I couldn't even remember the last time I had been there if at all. Then we went to the Kotel, or near the Kotel because I have never seen so many people in one place before. It was insane. There must of been 100,000 people or something, it was ridiculous. I really liked having so many people there all for the same purpose. There was a group of Yeshiva boys near us singing the prayer and dancing and I just thought, 'where else could this happen?'

When we tried to leave, though, all the good feelings evaporated. The masses had started to disperse and the way out was blocked. We tried to push and move through the crowd but it had become a mosh-pit. It was very scary and stressful to feel like I had no control where I was going and not knowing where I was if I were to get lost it would be such a struggle to find the group again. Also in the back of my mind I had what happened at Love Parade in Germany, so I kept thinking, what if someone fell, what if I fell?

We started to leave at midnight and only returned home at 4AM.

The next day Yom Kippur began. It was the normal deal, Kol Nidre, fasting, Neila, but in Tel Aviv the atmosphere is amazing- no cars on the road, everything is closed. I wasn't expecting this because so many people are secular but the tradition is that people don't drive. It was incredible- everyone was walking on the roads and riding their bikes. Wow

Parentals came to Israel

The parentals are in Israel!! They arrived saturday night, oh Ariela is here too.

Well lots has happened and yet it seems like everything just goes the same way it always has, even though I have been here less than 2 weeks.

We go to Ulpan, I space out a lot and try to not roll my eyes as we learn to conjugate and read 4th grade level hebrew, its hard. Tomorrow I am going to take the test for a different Ulpan to see if they have a level for me but we will see. I don't want to be a total snob but i need to be challenged if this month is going to mean anything in terms of my progress in the language. I would even rather to not do Ulpan at all and do volunteer work or go hang out on the kibbutz just to be exposed to hebrew more, but that may be too much to ask, well see...

Otherwise I'm hanging out with the parentals and friends, going to the shuk and the crafts fair and seeing Tel Aviv. I promised I would not try to bore everyone with the blog so while nothing that exciting is happening I'll keep it short.

I will say that while Tel Aviv is definitely happening it is exhausting- I'm also not used to cities, but people are pretty rude and abrasive and everything is loud and hot and expensive, so maybe not the city for me, but Jerusalem soon.

ISRAEL

OH MY GOD. i felt like crying all the way from when we landed until i got to my apartment. i dont really know why, mostly because i was overwhelmed and the airport had all these signs that said "israel is always a part of you" and "everyone has a place in israel" and so i was thinking "its true! its true!"

so anyway i was so on edge maybe because lack of sleep or because everyone was speaking in hebrew, all the signs were in hebrew and i was now starting a new program with all new people. anyway, i took the train to tel aviv and hobbled my way over to 138 dizengoff where i thought i would be so late and embarassed. turns out they wanted people to arrive 4-6 pm so my 5:15 was totally fine.

they led me to my apartment right in 138 dizengoff with violetta (russian), yulia (german) and sarah (american). breathe. we met everyone else at 6:15 and walked to a park by the water to do "ice breakers". very international group (italian, french, spanish, australian, british, american, german, and russian) but not so diverse gender-wise (16 girls, one boy). we then walked to a restaurant and had a lovely meal and met the famous shoshana. now a thing about shoshana, i have been emailing her all year and was terrified of her because i thought she hated me, but turns out everyone has been emailing her, phewww.

so we have been doing tours of tel aviv. everyone is really nice and really eager to make friends so i am pretty at ease. its definitely college orientation-like but with so few people its so much nicer and less stressful. we also do tours with another MASA group who is studying music at a conservatory in tel aviv, but they mostly (not to be totally prejudice) are alot of nerdy boys who spend too much time with their saxophone/oboe/piano. but still its nice to have people.

we have been walking around orienting ourselves with tel aviv (home for the next month) and on organized tours, the most notable on an open roof bus where the bus driver made us all dance in the aisles to sephardi music.

i have been very impressed with the organization of it all- everything is planned for us for these few days before ulpan- especially after knowing so little about the program. i still dont have a real schedule, but i know ill be in ulpan after sunday and go on a tour to the south in october where we spend shabbat on kibbutz ketura, oh ok.

so im in tel aviv, friday night, i have the option to go to chabad for serivces which i think i will opt ot and try to find a masorti synagogue for next week.

paris post

Tired, tired, tired.

Lets learn another life lesson here, never try to see the sites in paris while dragging around your 50 pound suitcase, not fun. then again i dont really have anything to complain because i was in paris, or for the sake of this post i am in Paris.

so anyway, heavy luggage and Paris. basically the reasoning for my blog's title because if you were in paris august 31st you may have seen a girl with her suitcase, namely noa and her suitcase; ahhhh.

so i saw paris though, i persevered, and i am really glad i pushed through because it was quite spectacular. there are just so many monuments and famous buildings and things to see. i got off the subway at the arc de triomphe (sp?), walked to the eiffel town, down along the seine, by the presidents house and all of the guards and soldiers, to the obolesque, the louvre and the pyramids, all the way to hotel de ville and the RER train to the airport.

well i guess what they say is true, paris is beautiful, i dont know if it can be compared to barcelona which may take the cake at this point, but it was pretty magical, minus the suitcase of course.

Paris

So I am in Paris!! At first it did not look any different than any other city but today I will lug my bag into the heart of the city and explore the sites.
I am sad to leave the farm, the kids were so cute and Eve and Filip were so nice and we just had a really nice time. i dont think i would ever decide to become a farmer but their life is very picturesque; where they live is beautiful, they can get so much of what they need off their own land, they have lots of friends who come over all the time, they spend a lot of time with their kids. but it is a rough life, they work ALL the time and they always have to worry about money and priductivity.
anyway, i stayed at a hostel last night which i had never done before and was super weird but it was just me and another girl, who now i cant remember her name; she was canadian and had also been doing organic farming in france, in corsica, so it wasnt that weird to sleep in a room with a total stranger. the hostel was actually very nice, good job ariela who recommended it except the deafening noise because the room faced the street, oh well.
well, my time is running out on the internet so i'm off into the city.

so then we left

so we left the farm
we had to have one of those super awkward talks where you tell someone you hate them but try to make it seem like its about something else; maybe thats not a common conversation, i guess we were kind of breaking up with them.

we wanted to say: we hate you, you are annoying, you need to treat us better than hired help, i will not pick up rocks anymore, it was a mistake to come here (maybe less harsh than that)

we said: it is a health hazard to be here, ariela will die if we stay (or just the health hazard part), its ima and abbas fault because they said we have to leave, we wanted to pick lavander and make jam, sorrryyyyy

wow, i am glad that is over. i am also glad that we made friends with their cleaning lady who is 24 and she let us stay with her the night. she lives in a big house with 9 people and we had a little bonfire party and it was really nice. especially nice not to stay at the farm after THE TALK.
we spent thursday taking the french trains north and arrived in montlucon in the afternoon and wondered how we would find the family. but we spotted them, a woman with two little kids all dressed in farm clothes which are not any different than kibbutz clothes.

sooo new farm. Eve, Filip (which i managed to call pierre for a few days), marius 6 who i called maurice until he whispered to his mother to correct me; and sarah 3 who we have to befriend every morning before she will talk to us.
super super cute family who works REALLY hard on their farm with lots of vegetables. we pick potatoes, beans, lots of tomatoes; plant strawberries and leaks and turnips.

but it is so different than baume rousse. we live in a room in their house, eat every meal with them which takes an hour and a half each time and goes like this: breakfat 8:30, lunch 2:30, dinner 9;30 its a little unusual. we help cook and clean and watch the kids sometimes, we are basically let in as a part of the family; what a nice change.

there have been lots of visitors; eves sister and her two screaming kids who we lost marius and sarah to, they couldnt talk to us with all the excitement of their cousins; eves mother and father and stepfather; and friends-soon-to-be-business partners and thei baby paul. lots of people lots of excitement.

some shit happened

ok so the farm actually sucks
basically early saturday morning ariela got stung by a wasp/hornet and got hives everywhere and went into anaphylactic shock (spelling?). it was bad and not fun and too intense but there were all these doctors staying in the B and B on the property who came to help (with homeopathic medicine they tried to heal her with doing pressure points on her ear..? but that is besides the point). basically lots of shit and the ambulance and fire department came- like 9 people crowding around her with an IV and a AED (AED? cant remember of CPR righ now) and oxygen mask and they rushed her to the hospital in an ambulance. she is fine now after 2 hospital visits and a new epipen to carry everywhere but woah. hello french healthcare.

ok, basically that escalated out idea that we arent very happy here. not only because of the wasps but because the couple didnt really care that it was all happening- they even refused to pick ariela up from the hospital because it was too late. they also are very distant; we have to eat breakfast and dinner alone and its just us working and they give us a place to stay. plus the work is all weeding and picking up rocks from a rock field and just not that fun.
anyway, ariela has had amazing wwoofing experiences and she says this isnt the way it should be- we should want to stay longer rather than not be able to wait to leave- so now we are looking for other plqces to go. we may not be able to go anyway but we will at least try. i am not that crazy about farms but i dont want to come away from this thinking farms suck and so does wwoofing.....
anyway; updates will follow

The list of things Noa did even though she did not want to

So ive tried to be very flexible; anyone who knows me knows this is hard for me and that if i dont want to do something i wont or at least not with a smile on my face (cue for my mother to laugh)
so here is a list of things i did even though in normal life i would never do
1. ate melon twice- twice!
2. ate zucchini
3. picked up rocks in a rock field
4. peed on myself- lets explain. i was stung by a wasp and the guy at the farm said very seriously that i had to pee on it. awesome. we wont go into details but lets just say dont try this at home; get some cortisone cream or something
5. hiked

Farmer Noa

So i havent written in a while, its becoming a trend, but i read some peoples blogs who wouldnt update for months so i will say im pretty good; some people (ehem rachel) are just crazy and manage to write every day but i cannot match that skill

anyhoo, the family had a lovely stay on the beach of tossa del mar of costa brava, spain. we relaxed a lot and tanned a lot and wwent to barcelona which was amazing. definitely the most impressive city weve been to with something to see on every corner; lots of tiles and colors and gaudi. ima and ariela bought horrendous matching dresses at desigual but they will tell you they are amazing.

then we had to part and ima and abba and aidan drove to paris to fly home and dropped off ariela and i at the farm. bye aidan! i wont see him until january which is the longest weve been apart (except of course the 5 years before he was alive) so tears were shed; well not really but he has really matured this summer so he actually said he would miss us.

so farm life. its very picturesque. drome; the area we are in is beautiful and tthe farm is super cute. we do lots of jobs like pick onions and potatoes and plums; make jam which i love, weed; water plants and such. its very farmer work and not the funnest but nice because we get food and shelter in exchange- a good trade i would say

Now I live in a castle

we have arrived in southern france in a town named Siorac en Perigord.we drove 14 miserable hours from belgium through horrible traffic inparis (but i saw the top of the eiffel tower- go me) but we are here. everything in this region of france looks like it has been untouched for 300 years. there are roads and telephone poles but otherwise itcould be the middle ages. everything is stone and terracotta roofs and hilly and green. when you look up the mountains you can see huge chateaus (ie. big houses) and castles on the top. real castles, its a little crazy because this is really where battles used to happen andthe knights and the princess in the tower- okay maybe i'm exagerating a little, but still.we walked up to a castle last night that dated back to 1354. if you'vebeen to israel you can understand the idea of being somewhere thatlived through history, but coming from america my house was only built in 1982 so you can imagine the difference. it just always amazes methat these places still exist and in the same conditions they wereonce in and were not just destroyed to make room for a new generationand a walmart. besides the computer i am typing on and this plasticchair it could be 1734- well maybe

moi no parles frances?

July 29
we left amsterdam today after seeing my second cousin fabian and his new baby and wife Ana. everyones english is impecable as is most peoples in amsterdam. all in all the netherlands are pretty fabulous. the countryside is very green and flat and picturesque with the old housesand windmills and cows you see in postcards. amsterdam is veryhappening and just a beautiful city overall. there isnt an ugly cornerin the whole city; everything is built around the canals with oldbrick homes and rooftop gardens and just a very clean city.
being in brussels in a good comparison because brussels is less nice but there are more sights to see- museums and monuments and big,elaborate architecture. amsterdam has less big attractions but a more livable vibrant city.

i am now in the house of my mothers second cousin, Sophie, and her daughter,Celine, which i guess is my third cousin. we are here meeting Boubi's cousin with whom she was in hiding during the holocaust. She gave us instructions to go to leuze; a town in the belgiancountryside where my grandmother; her mother and some cousins were inhiding. my grandmothers cousin said there is nothing to see becausethe house they were staying in is gone, so just Abba, Ima, and Aidan went.
Back to my second/ third cousins. they invited us over to their house to stay for the night and Ariela and i went. now they speak no english and i do not speak any french besides "bonjour" and "merci". Ariela speaks french and we made an agreement that she would translate in france and i wouldtranslate when we get to spain. unfortunately this meant that theywould say something in french and she would translate to me in englishand back and forth- it was exhausting. next time i will try to learn some french.

Hallo! That means hello in Dutch- woah!

So I failed to write, big surprise, but it has been mostly because we haven't had internet. So I'll take us back in time to July 23....

We arrived in amsterdam on thursday. i flew, separately from the rest of the family which was sad, and had a stopover in iceland. we landed in reykjavik at about 3 am but it was completelysunny and bright. i tried to stay awake so could see the view from the window when the plane took off but i kept falling asleep, so the only thing i can say is that iceland is cold, oh well.
when i got to amsterdam i was met by ima at the train station- thank god because i had no idea where i was going despite abba's 20 page trip overview handout. She took me to Ima's cousins' (Ami and Ina) house downtown which is really nice and cozy. after wwii, Zayde moved to the US while his sister Rozie moved to the Netherlands so the family is fully dutch. i have met them a few times before but it is weird and cool to have these relatives who can show us aroundthe city and translate. we have been walking around amsterdam which is really nice andeuropean. the architechture is very pretty and old and eveything looks so cute. there is so much history to this place that everything looks like a castle or old palace.i t definitely feels very foreign anddifferent- everyone is blonde for one and speaking dutch- but everyone rides bikes or tiny smart cars, and everyone is so friendly, unlikenew england.this week we are biking arond the countryside which although i am pretty sick is really nice because it is so flat.

Suitcase Packed

I returned from camp 2 days ago and already unpacked and repacked for this new adventure. Camp was amazing incredible and so much fun and I have not really processed leaving Tel Yehudah but I guess that will come, maybe on the 8 hour flight to Amsterdam.

So here I go. At 4pm we will drive to the airport and at 9:30pm I will take off to go to Holland. I am actually taking a different flight than Abba, Ima and Aidan so it will be interesting. I have never flown internationally by myself.

I am stopping in Reykjavik, Iceland which is pretty exciting; I hope I get to see some sights from the window of the plane.

We are going straight to visit Ima's cousins Ami and Ina and their 3 children Sarah, Naomi, and Rogier. Ami and Ina I have seen many times at my Bat Mitzvah and Aidan's and Zayde's birthday. The last time I saw my second cousins I was 4 and they were teenagers- now they have children. Ariela met them 2 years ago and she said they are the coolest people ever so I am excited to remeet them.

I am just nervous because I have to get to their apartment by myself and I do not speak any dutch, but I wrote down some phrases: kunt u mij helpen, waar is de trein? (can you help me where is the train?) It just sounds like English with an accent so I will just try that.

It all begins!

And we're off!

The blog officially begins today, July 22, 2010 when we leave for our first destination: Amsterdam, Holland.

The journey will be with the whole family until september in the Netherlands, Belgium, France, and Spain. I then will go to Israel by myself to start my program and meet Ima, Abba and Ariela there.

July 22, 2010- January 11, 2011.

It is all pretty crazy.

We are doing traveling and family visiting in Europe and then I will be attending the Bezalel Acedemy of Arts and Design in Jerusalem.

It is all so so exciting.

Let's begin!!!

My first entry

Hello,

This is my first entry.

Noa