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Published: June 15th 2008
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I have now been in Jerusalem for four days and its been a strange experience. It's nice being with Carly and Derek. Most of the people are great and the Rabbis are nice, friendly and open to question and doubt. My two roommates at Kibbutz Lavi, Heather and Amanda, are lovely and entertaining people.
Day 1: This turned into Day 2 with 30 hours of traveling for everyone and probably a total of 4 hours sleep for me. It was a very, very difficult, long and tiring day of travel. It made me realize what I was really getting into. This is hardcore study of Judaism. After 14 hours on a plane, the time in layover, check in, check out, customs, waiting for buses, traveling on buses and then activities to 'introduce and unite', we definitely all realized this was much more than just a trip.
Day 2: Tsfat, one of the four holy cities in Israel. It's a huge center of the history of the kabbalah. It was in the mountains and the drive was absolutely gorgeous. It's arid land which makes the green patches even more coveted and enjoyable. We got to hear from an artist, had
a tour with Daniel and walked up and down one million and one steps. My thighs are still sore three days later! I had my first Swarma which was very delicious and I started learning the Hebrew alphabet. That's another wonderful thing, hearing Hebrew everywhere. It's a bit strange because its not the language I'm used to hearing, which is Spanish. What is hard for me to get used to though is the conservatism of dress and behavior. I've never seen so many Hassids, Orthodox, Paes wearing, long sleeve wearing Jews! It was kinda crazy. But definitely eye opening. I really needed to see it. Forgive my spelling.
Shabbat was an experience. All this praying in a language I didn't know. It went so fast it was hard to understand, but the food was amazing. They feed us really well. Here they keep very strict. We couldn't write, use electricity, the elevators were set to automatic. It was a lazy day.
Day 3: Rabbi Karlinsky taught a class and it drove me off the wall. I can't talk about it. It's upsetting. I'm too free-thinking. I did like the discussion that Rabbi Shmuel had with us about prayer.
I like prayer. It really connects you to that spirit in everything that's all around you if you do it right, that tingling up the spine. I like Estee, his wife, as well, and their adorable children. Estee is very down to earth and is a pleasure to talk to.
Today: I can't believe this is the only time I've had to write. I suppose I've been so preoccupied with learning about if I have the scholarship from Colorado or not. Today we had 6 flippin' activities. SIX! I am so tired now but I'm not sure when the next time I'll get to write will be. I might have to backdate some more when I pull out my notebook but at least you all can get the gist. We went rafting today. It was a lot of dead water at first, but fun. I was good at it 'cause I'm strong. We were soaked and dirty at the end but it was fun. I got some sun which is good for my white butt. Then we changed, went to lunch which was pizza. That was cool. The pizza tasted different, but was still good. They just keep feeding
us! It's like they're plumping us for winter or something. After that we went to the Golan Winery for a wine tasting. Everyone loved the sweet, juice-like dessert wine and they gave us the glass to take home. After we went to Katzrin where there were ruins of a village. I wasn't really paying attention to the tour because I was so hot and tired. We had to wake up early in the morning. After that we went to the grave of Mymonetes (sp?). That I'm not into. Especially since they split the men and women up.
That is another thing, the separation of the sexes. What is THAT? WEll, I suppose I AM in the MIddle East, but its hard sometimes. It caters to men most definitely. It's frustrating.
Anyway, after the grave we went to Tiberius and took a boat ride on the Sea of Galilee which is really just a fresh water lake. It was fun and absolutely gorgeous. We got to play hand drums and we were led by this crazy, dread-locked, drooling, high, Israeli drummer. It was really fun. Derek was good. I want to learn some more. After that we had dinner,
but there was no meat because it was a diary dinner. Man, I want meat. NO MORE FISH!!!!!!!!!! ICK! The rest of the time we just walked around because we were too exhausted to do anything else.
Okay, not my best writing, but there's the basic gist. It's a different world here and I'm learning a lot. Tomorrow we're checking out of the kibbutz and going to Jerusalem (pronounced, Ye-ru-sha-lye-em).
~Lisa
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