CharlieWood

NOT A BIRTHRIGHT, AN OBLIGATION CHARLIE WOOD It is quite proper to resist and attack a system, but to resist and attack its author is tantamount to resisting and attacking oneself. M.K. Ghandi Six-months after leaving the Middle East nightmares keep my memories fresh. Growing up religion served as a supportive community and moral compass in a world that many times seems to be spinning in all directions. This is one part of the story of my own experience growing up in a Jewish community, visiting Israel and Palestine, and that ever present moral compass. My first memories of Judaism center around the third Wednesday of every month when my family would volunteer to help cook and serve a meal to 50 homeless people. The volunteers for our particular Wednesday would gather and produce a small ... read more

First off Turkish keyboards are a bıt different and so most of this entry will have ı's where there should be i's. It has been a bıt longer then I intended but here I am more then two months wıthout a blog and sooooo much to wrıte. Thıs wıll be a long one so take your pıck or tackle ın portıons. Sectıons wıll ınclude Tubıshvat ın Tsvat, Daphna Poolhouse Adventures, Along the Traıl, Walk About Love, Taste of Yeshıva, Scuba Paradıse, Istanbul Vacatıon, and Eastern Paradise. Tubıshvat ın Tsvat Sam and I decıded to start walkıng the Israel Traıl, or Shvıl Yısrael (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Israel_National_Trail) and walk untıl we felt lıke ıt was tıme to do somethıng else. To start we would embark from Jerusalem and spend Tubıshvat, the Jewısh Earth Day, ın Tsfat the kabbalıstıc cıty where ... read more

Well then, April 17th to August 14th is a pretty bad break but what can I say? I have been busy I suppose and the travelblog is really not as easy as it looks. Anyways, I hope that the past three months has been as exciting and invigorating for all of you as they have been for me. My travels have taken me to New Zealand and the life of a traveling agricultural worker which has had its ups and downs but I will get to that in a bit. I will break this installment up into the following sections: Ben comes to Visit, Wrapping up Adelaide, Killer Darwin, Family Travels, Tough Lessons with Bovis, Adios Australia, Praneel Comes Through, New Experiences Large and Small, City Hotel, Wine Boycott, and finally Future Endeavors. Just to list ... read more

Time seems to have really started to roll. The past few entries I have been maintaining a weekly rate but the last week and a half have went by a lot faster it seems. The good thing about having a little more time is that there are a lot of things to update all of you with. Or at least there should be. This entry will cover WOMAD, arachnophobia, academic update, the high table, and probably a few other things as I think of them along the way. I would like to say before I dive in that I can’t tell you all how much your comments and messages rock. Keep em coming. WOMAD WOMAD was just a few days ago so this won’t be chronologically accurate but the experience is just jumping off my tongue ... read more

Two weeks are in the books and to be honest it feels like a lot longer then that. I guess a part of it is that this past week has been pretty hard on the body. I have officially made it through “O-Week”, or orientation week. I think I mentioned it in last week’s entry but it definitely deserves a paragraph so here goes. It opened with an afternoon of being pelted with all kinds of shit including fish and squid oil, rotten eggs, and rotten tomatoes. We were then paraded around the neighborhood while we sang songs. That was followed by the nightly activity of heading to the local pub and getting absolutely annihilated. Each morning we were woken up at 7 AM (I actually only went to the first morning) to compete in a ... read more