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 c [View Full Entry]

---

---

First and foremost. Drumroll please….. Kiva Fellowship!! You are reading the blog of a member of Kiva Fellow class number 13. Please visit my site (kivacharlie.wordpress.com) if you haven’t already done so to read about why I have decided to take an unpaid position working with Kiva, a microfinance nonprofit for a year+. Along those lines I am actively soliciting donations to make this commitment a possibility. I am targeting raising $20,000 and I know I can do it. I truly believe that the work I will be doing will make a positive difference and need your help [View Full Entry]

---

---

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  [View Full Entry]

---

---

Hope that this acts as a bit of a flush out entry. I still have my subscription list from 2006 and my South Pacific trip and I have added random contacts. If you are getting this and want to unsubscribe, I'm sure the notification email gives you the option to do so. Otherwise, if you get this and think you know someone who might want to be on the list please send along the link to http://www.travelblog.org/Bloggers/CharlieWood/ and they can subsrcribe. Sorry about the admin. As it is, I find myself at the start of a great adventure. I have once [View Full Entry]

---

---

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 [View Full Entry]

---

---

It appears my plan to keep weekly updates has gone out the window. After reading a few of my past entries I pretty much realized that since I am stationary at the moment in Adelaide I should probably not keep boring all of you with stories about school and St. Mark's. The past month certainly has been full of stories and experiences but I will trim them done to a 'best of' and hope it is entertaining. The biggest event to speak of has been my trip to Melbourne April 8-14 and a subsequent Easter trip to a country town called [View Full Entry]

---

---

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 [View Full Entry]

---

---

My third week in Adelaide is in the books and in all respects it was a successful one. Through a combination of beginning school, continuing to plug into the local scene, and getting some regular routines I am overcoming the worst of the inevitable homsesick period I have been going through. While I am in a pretty sweet spot on the globe with not many worries at all, lots of things remind me of friends and family back in the states. Enough of that though, back to what I have been up to. School Begins I have had a lot of [View Full Entry]

---

---

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 [View Full Entry]

---

---

To be honest I have had a fairly relaxing week since I last checked in. With no classes until the beginning of March and barely anyone back for school besides international students I have been enjoying late mornings and meandering days. That should be ending though now. The place I am living, (http://www.stmarkscollege.com.au/), turns out to be a little bit like a fraternity type place. This fact did not come out until I got here but now that I'm here I am about to begin "O Week". During this week we are basically going to be kept drunk constantly, woken up [View Full Entry]

---

---