The Past Month

I will try to sum up the past four weeks into a decently-sized post. Here goes:

Me with my 3 favorite girls from Fort Collins, CO:
Sam, Rachel, and Stephanie (left to right)

March 25 was the beginning of a three week journey for my friend, Sam, from Birthright. She's from Colorado and this was only the second time she had ever been to Israel. She was supposed to go on an Oranim program, specifically the one her (and my) friend, Rachel, is on (Israel Teaching Fellows in Ramla). Then, she got a job and didn't come. Anyway, she came here to shadow a few doctors for her job and learn about how Israelis run hospitals. She spent a few days in Tel Aviv at the beginning of her trip and at the end. In between, she did some traveling as well, including staying in Haifa, Nazareth, and Jerusalem. I hung out with her a few times in Tel Aviv. We had a mini-Birthright reunion with our soldier friend from our trip, Danielle. We picked Sam up at the airport on her first day and went up to Herzliya to a Benedict's there. I don't know if I've mentioned it before, but Benedict's is a 24 hour breakfast restaurant. There's one right near me, and every time you walk in, regardless of the time of day or night, they will say "Good morning!" to you. After breakfast, we went down to Tel Aviv and took a stroll around Old Jaffa and Shuk Hapishpeshim (flea market). The next night, I took Sam to get the best chocolate anywhere in Israel -- Max Brenner's; she was so excited to have chocolate for dinner! I saw her one last time, which was to hang with her and friends at the beach a couple weeks ago. I ran into a couple of my friends there, specifically Max and Max from Rachel's group in Ramla. My friend, Hunter, also joined us for a bit. He just got back to Israel after a month-long absence, as he is going to be volunteering for the IDF for the next couple years (but not serving). Sam had a wonderful time and is happy to be back in Colorado.

Me, David, and Shoshana next to a waterfall near Mt. Meron

On March 27th, my program and the new internship program (Oranim 80) that had just moved in the week before went to volunteer paint some elderly people's apartments for Yom Hamasim Tovim (Good Deeds Day). We had a lot of fun and even got a free shirt out of it. On April 1st, while a bunch of the other Oranim programs were on their weekend trip to Eilat (mine did it in November), my program and Ramla ITF took a day trip to Mt. Meron and Tzfat (Safed). We took a short hike in a very nice, green area that had cows where we'd parked the bus. The mountain was also a fun hike; we got to the top and saw a breathtaking view of Mt. Hermon in the distance. Mt. Hermon is part of the geographical border between Syria and Lebanon, but also 8% of the mountain lies in Israel, making that point the highest in Israel. Then we went to Tzfat, where we got a little history lesson at the same exact place where I'd sat down once on Birthright; it was like déjà vu. I then quickly visited the Safed Candles factory and looked for something to buy at other shops, but couldn't find what I wanted. Then we went back home.

Derek and me

Right before Passover, for one night, I got the chance to see an old friend from UConn, Derek. He used to date another friend of mine who worked with me at Hillel. Derek converted to Judaism a year ago and had an amazing time on Birthright. When I hung out with him, we went to Club Dizengoff with his friends and then another bar up the street to chill for a couple hours. They were fun!

Erev Pesach (Passover Eve) came around on April 6th. I went with a friend to Noa's house for the Seder and we had absolutely delicious food. Noa's mom never fails to impress me with her cooking skills. Noa, however, wasn't there because she chose to visit her sister in Rome. But I went anyway, and got to see her family again; they're so nice and fun to hang around. We got a ride back to Tel Aviv the next afternoon. I spent the next week hanging with a bunch of different friends from the Building Future Leadership conference. I went to the beach to hang with my friend, Jenn (from BFL who lives in Jerusalem and works at Yad Vashem, Israel's Holocaust Museum). Another night, I hung with Stephanie and Jevon. Another time a couple weeks before, I had gone out to celebrate Tami's birthday with her, Emily, Emily, Erica, and Perry (I have gotten to know a lot of people!).  I finally broke Passover with pizza on Friday night after seven days. In Israel, you only do one Seder and observe only for seven days (it's eight days in outside of Israel).

Me and Miriam

On April 11th, I enjoyed a night of going to Rishon LeZion and hanging with my old friend, Miriam, from childhood. We grew up on the same street together and used to play Cops and Robbers with my little sister all the time. It was Miriam's 26th birthday, so I went to see her and meet new people. It turns out a friend of Miriam's knows this kid who used to be my friend David's (from my program) counselor, and they both saw us when we were at a bar a couple months back. Small world! It was a fun party.

I brought Adam with me to Jerusalem on April 14th for my friend, Allison's, birthday party. She turned 25 and is living it up. We went to Mike's Place to have beers and meet people (and I met the famous Dave Israel that everyone talks about, he works for Oranim), then to a comedy club to sing karaoke, and another bar to chill.

Left to right: Allison, Dave, Yonit, me, and Adam at
Allison's birthday after party

Yom HaShoah (April 19th) was very special here. My Facebook status from that day illustrates exactly what happened:

"At 10am, I stood at my window in silence. I watched people get out of their cars and stand at attention in silence. All sounds and actions ceased for 2 minutes to sound an alarm to remember the 6 million Jews who perished in the Holocaust. In Israel, time stood still for 2 minutes. It was a memorable, emotional, and dare I say, beautiful, moment. Never forget... לזכור"

My program also went to a special ceremony at Tel Aviv University and listened to a few people speak in Hebrew about the tragedy and one guy's experiences in the Holocaust. We then had this cool rabbi talk to us about spirituality in a workshop. Here's a video to see exactly what happened on Thursday morning.

From afar, me and Yuliya at some Stonehenge-esque thing

I have now gone out the past four days. On April 19th, I went to Max's lacrosse fundraiser party at The English Pub and randomly ran into a girl I went to UConn with. We saw each other and immediately went up to each other and said, "Do I know you?" We found out we must have met at Hillel a couple times, and it was nice to see someone else who went to UConn. She's currently a madricha (coordinator/leader) for MASA's Aardvark program. It's a program for gap year students (between high school and college) to be able to explore Israel for 10 months and do volunteer work and work internships. The next day, I hung out with a friend in Ra'anana and went to another friend, Jordan's, birthday party that night. I went with Sharon from BFL, whose brother I just happen to know from UConn Hillel, and another friend, Yuliya, from Ramla. Then I met a girl who went to Hall with me, Melissa. Playing Jewish geography is fun! There's so many connections, it's crazy. On Saturday, I took a really long (7 1/2 hour) walk around HaYarkon Park with Yuliya and Simon. We ended up in Ramat Gan, went to the Ayalon Mall there, stopped by a flower garden, and got some ice cream. I also went out to another birthday party, for Samantha in my program at Galina, a club on the Tel Aviv Port. Last night, I hung out with another Jenn from BFL (but this one does ITF in Rishon LeZion), and we saw American Reunion. It was AWESOME!

I have volunteering shortly, so I gotta go. But I'll write more frequently, and I hope to start taking more trips soon. Bye!