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Hey everyone!!!! I am having a blast in Israel. I've gotten over not being in control of my life and being told where and when to go. Sorry...no photos because the computer i'm using keeps freezing every time I try to open the photos on this program.

So....a quick run down of what we have done so far.

After I sent the last blog, I returned to hang out with my new friends. They turned Ice Breakers into Water Boilers. There is this huge joke about ice breakers because we've done them so many times it's rediculuous. We stayed up until the wee hours of the night and I was one of the last men standing...Actually, I was the last woman standing. On the first day, one of out staff leaders who is big into photography said she wanted a group of people to take jumping photos at every place we go to. There are 6 of us and we have been named Jump Street (because we jump on the street for photos...could you have guessed that?)

On Tuesday morning, we had breakfast at 7:30 and were on the bus by 8 AM. We headed to Mount Karmel for a nice short and informative walk. Shimi (our Israeli guide) told us a bible story about Elijiah coming to this mountian and what it meant. The significance of that place is that the rock is super dense and there isn't much water because it all drains through the cracks of the hills and is there for a challenging place to survive. Elijiah proved he could survive to (i don't remember who). We walked for about 20 minutes and sat on a sloped rock while listening to Shimi tell the story with a wnderful view behind him. After the talk we walked another 20 minutes and got back on the bus. We then headed to Eliat to see some more sights. We went to Lousie Promenade where Shimi told us the story of the promenade. It was something about a french guy and I don't know because I zoned out a little (it wasn't that interesting I guess). Across the street from that is the Bahai garden. It is the one of the most sacred place for Bahai believers. Shimi told us that the rules of the garden being in Eilat are that Bahai people are not aloud to try to convert Israelis. The garden was beautiful (you'll see the photos one day). After the garden we headed to the Mediteranian Sea. Wow! It was so gorgeous. We had lunch on a restuarant on the beach and then all 40something of us swam in the sea. The water was so nice! Everyone really felt so good about being there. Lital (staff person) wanted to take a photo of someone flying in the air, so the obvious choice was for people to toss me in the air. It took a couple of tries, but she got an amazing photo of me with the clouds behind me. No one wanted to leave the beach, but we had to drive to our hotel that was a little way away. We got to the new hotel, picked our roommates and got our room numbers and then headed up to clean up before dinner. We ate (the meals are pretty much the same as the first night) and then had our evening activity. We split up into groups, got the name of a soldier and had to write a story about their life. We all made up funny stories about our people, except my group that wanted to take it seriously for some reason. Then we were on our own. We hung out until the we hours of the night. I had to make myself go to sleep because it was way late and I had to be at breakfast by 7 AM.

Wednesday started with the same breakfast as the first hotel, but slightly more options. The were wonderful. There is always tomato and cucumber. We got on the bus by 7:30 AM and headed out on a much longer hike than the day before. Nachal Kzivl was the name of the hike, which means Lake Zivi. Driving in we saw Montfort. We started at the top of a valley, were going down into the valley and then going to go up to the top of the hill on the other side of the valley. The hike started out as a steep down hill climb over and around rocks. There was a nice stream with a pool to hang out in at the bottom of the valley. We hung out there for a while. We put our feet in, some swam around and it was so nice. No one wanted to leave, but we had to. Up hill we went and went and went and went. It wasn't too bad because it was in and out of shade, but it was soooo hot outside that everyone was drenched in sweat. The hike ended in the town of Mitzpe(viewpoint) Hila. This is the home town of an Israeli solder that has been held captive for almost 1500 days (4 years ish). We went to the house of Gilad Shalit to take a photo at his house and leave a note that we are sending good thoughts into the world for his return. Sharnell, you should tell you're mom to pray for him. The neighbor came by to see what we were doing there and she was nice enough to talk to us and tell us what has been going on. A month ago the family and others marched from this town to Jeruselum and the family is now living in a tent outside the government building asking everyday what they are doing about their son. That was a really cool, special moment that we got to have there. From there we stopped to have some lunch were i had Swarma and then picked up some Israeli soldiers that were going to hang out with us for the next 5 days. We picked them up off the side of the road and then headed to Akko where we walked around the old town and got to see some culture for the first time on the trip. There were kids jumping off the building into the sea. I got some great photos from it. We headed back to the hotel, cleaned up, ate and then headed to the evening activity. We read the stories to the soldiers and they had to figure out which one was them. It turned out that my thoughts were reallty close. I wrote that she was from Kiriat Chim (because that is the only town I know that isn't a big town) and that she plans to travel in Latin america after leaving the army. Both of these things were true!!! How amazing is that!!!! We then spent the night hanging out and having a great time (definitely stayed up too late again!

Gotta get going....I'll tell you more stories soon!

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