Rainbow at Ein Gev to the left of my room

and to the right, an amazing sunset

While I am sad I have to leave, my last couple of weeks here have certainly not been wasted.  I finished my job on the 7th  and have had until today to do anything I please.  My last week of work I had Wednesday off so my firend Lauren (from France) and I decded it might be lovely to bike from our kibbutz to Tiveria which is about 30 kilometers away.  Lauren has a bike and one of her kibbutnik friends lent me his for the day.  The bike I was given had a seat made practically of stone and brakes that were such crap you had to start using them full throttle like atleast 15 feet away from where you want to stop.  But who am I to complain, nachon?  So the ride there was absolutely exhilarating.  Amazing views and just a lot of fun.  When we arrived we met a friend for lunch at a great little cafe and walked around town for a ocuple of hours.  Then the ride back.  This is when I realized how hard the seat really was.  Trying to sit down was murder for my tush (yes, I ended up having bruises in the aforementioned area) and I ended up having to stand pedal most of the way home.  For the lsat 4o minutes of the trip Lauren traded bikes with me to give my quads and glut a rest.  She wanted to stop to take a pic and called up to me to signal a break.  Forgetting I now actually had proper brakes, I braked my front tire full force and went FLYING over my handlebars, dragging myself and my bike to the ground and properly bruising and welting my legs and upper thighs so badly that my upper legs were one big bruise for a week and a half after.  Also, because Lauren was riding behind me with no brakes, she couldn’t stop fast enough to avoid me and she ran into the pile that was me and her bike landed on top of me bruising my back and she landed in the street so we ended up both facedown on the pavement staring at eachother like “WTF mate?”  Also, when I landed, I landed on my right elbow.  At first I htought I had borken it (you could hear the bone hit cement and I couldn’t use it at first) but luckily I was wrong.  I did do something to it, I think I might hae a couple of pinched nerves (I don’t know but every time I hold my arm up or bedn it the whole thing tingles and goes numb lol).  Despite the spill at the end Lauren and I had a really awesome time and I’m really glad we took on the challenge.  Sixty kilometers in one day and I’m pretty damn proud of us!

Pumpin it on the way to Tiveria

Lunch at Tezza Cafe

sunset on the way back home from Tiveria

When I was officially done with work I spent a ocuple days hanging around the kibbutz and then embarked on some really fun adventures with my friends Kike and Ari (both from Mexico).  Ari left for Tel Aviv a couple days before us and then kike and I packed our bags to meet him and some of our other friends in the city.  We stayed with our friends that night and spent the next day getting Kike’s hair dreaded at a hair shop called Kundala Rasta.  The whole ordeal took about 6 hours.  Tht night we went to a restaurant on the port that serves ALL chocolate.  Everything they serve is made from different Grade A chocolates.  Pizzas, soups, desserts, drinks, waffles, this chocolate heaven was endless.  We took the midnight bus down to Eilat and arrived there at 5:00am.  While we waited for some technical difficulties to work themselves out, we wandered around the sleepy city and came across a 24-hour outdoor hookah bar under the bridge to the boardwalk.  The guy working there was pretty chill and he smoked with us and let us rest there for a couple hours.

Nagillah at 5 in the morning, yummy

it was soooo cold

Finally 10:00am rolled around and after sneaking into a fancy hotel to use the bathrooms to freshen up (Ari took a full bath in the sink), we hopped a taxi to the Egyptian border.  After paying a relatively small fee, we were granted access into Sinai.  We hopped a sherut (shuttle) on the Egyptian side to a place called Raas El Sataan which literally translates to “head of the devil”.  However, the name is really Raas Sata which doesn’t directly translate but in essence means “one head between two hearts”.  It is called this because there is a type of widow’s peak formed by the land with two beaches on either side and this area makes up Raas El Sataan.  We stayed at one of the beaches on the first side and it was called Little Head.  I can’t even begin to describe how absolutely breathtaking Sinai is.  Not only is the landscape and sea beautiful, but this place has these crazy energies that are so calming and peaceful.  There is something truly mystical about this place.  We stayed in a hut on the beach which is actually called a hoosha.  The camp is run by Bedoins and there are huts, a restaurant, a campfire, a cople lounging areas, and bathroos and showers.  On the way there we met these two guys who are retired diving instructors from Eilat and staying at the same place we were.  The first day we were there Ari, Kike, and I got there and all three of us passed out for hours after a long night of travelling and woke up just in time for dinner.  Before and after dinner we sat around the campfire with our bedoin hosts drinking and smoking and playing and singing music.  Not only do the Bedoins cook AMAZING food (probably the best meals I’ve had sice I’ve been here) they also make some mean tea and coffee.  There’s really nothing like it.  I woke up the next morning in time to see a beautiful sunrise with one of the guys from Eilat.  We sat there for a couple hours shivering and talking and watching the coming of a new day.  When Kike and Ari woke up we enjoyed an amazing breakfast and laid out sunbathing for a couple hours.  Sunrise guy offered to take me snorkeling so I could see the coral reef and it was absolutely gorgeous.  The fish were amazing, every type and color you can imagine and the coral reef was gorgeous.  I even go to see 3 baracudas!  The water wsa pretty cold so after about an hour and a half or so and the transformation of my lips to the color of blueberries, we went back to camp to warm ourselves by the fire with some nice Bedoin company and coffee.  That night the Bedoins invited Kike and me to join them for dinner  They were serving this enormous fish, one of a couple they caught that day to serve fresh to their patrons for dinner.  Kike and I enjoyed a traditional floor-seated, finger-using dinner that really could not have been better.  Dinner was followed by more music and partying with the Bedoins before turning in.  The next day was filled with more rest and relaxation before heading back to Eilat for the night.  We stayed with some of the boys friend’s who are here from Mexico.  The next morning Kike and I did a little shopping before having to say goodby eand Ari and I finally started the journey home on a 5:00pm bus to Tel Aviv.  From there we caughta sherut to Ein Gev and got back around 2 in the morning.  Sinai was amazing.  A great place to go to chill out, get your head on straight, and enjoy the Egypt sun safe and hassle-free.

our hoosha

Ari and Me

sunrise

restaurant

Kike

Ari, me, and Kike in front of our hoosha

It was nice to be back home and I chilled and hung out with friends for a couple days before setting out for a day trip to Jerusalem for that last bit of soul fulfillment before leaving Israel.  I took the 7:00am bus from Ein Gev directly to Jerusalem and then hopped a bus over to the Western Wall.  I prayed there for about an hour, maybe a bit longer, and then did some shopping over at the Jaffa Gate and Jewish Quarter.  I returned to the wall twice while shopping because I just couldn’t stay away.  After I was done shopping I began the 8 kilometer walk back to the bus station.  I had a cople hours to kill which is why I walked.  On the way I stopped at the Jewish cemetaries and walked in them a bit, viewing the difference in burial depending on money and then stopped ina  cafe for some coffee and baklavah before getting to the bus station for my 5:00 ride back to Ein gev.  I made it back around 9 to chill with friends and begin my packing.

Men's side of Western wall

view of Jerusalem from the cotel

Jewish cemetaries

example of poor Jewish cemetaries

My last day was spent packing, walking around the kibbutz to say my goodbyes to my favorite places, and saying tearful goodbyes to the friends that have quickly become family.  And now I’m here.  I hopped the 6:23pm bus from Ein Gev to Tiveria, the 7:15pm bus from Tiveria to Tel Aviv (about a two and a half hour ride) and the 11:00pm bus from the bus station to the airport.  I got here around 11:45 and must wait for 3:10am to begin check in.  My flight from Tel Aviv leaves here at 6:10am.  I land in Madrid at 10:30 and from there leave for Chicago at 11:50.  I arrive in Chicago at 3:30pm Chicago time and leave for Denver at 5:50pm.  I get to Denver at 7:35pm Denver time.  Calculating starting from my bus from ein Gev my total travel time will be… rega (wait)…. 33 hours and 12 minutes.  Phew!  Beseder, wish me luck and I’ll see yall soon!  As always, there will be a more comprehensive collection of pictures on facebook.  These are just some of the goodies.  Yala bye!

Beseder, first things first.  I did not change jobs.  The harvest season ended a week after I would have been able to switch making it pointless for me to work in the bananas.  Ein Gev harvests other produce as well (dates, avocado, mango, figs, grapefruits, etc.) however only men work in those fields.  I opted no on the cows because the hours are crazy (there are 3 different shifts in one day) and you always come home smelling like cow chara (poo).  And because it’s getting colder here, there is no need for much gardening so instead of 3 volunteer gardeners there is only one.  I think everything happens for a reason though because I’m actually loving my job at the holiday resort and I have become very good friends with a few of my coworkers and it really would have been sad if I had to leave.  So, in the meantime, I’ve become a veteran holiday resort worker — a speed demon at polishing cutlery and glasses, the hulk when it comes to stacking chairs on tables for floor cleaning preparation, and I think my mopping sytle has seen several transformations before reaching the mopping peak that I’m at now.  Israeli’s use these crazy squeegie like things (megof which means mop in hebrew) that are similar to windshield cleaners at the gas station to mop EVERYTHING — indoors and outdoors.  First we drench the floor with a floor cleaner/water mixture and scrub using the megaf covered in floor towels.  Then, we remove the floor towels and aggressively squeegie the water from the WHILE dining hall into one measely drain in the floor of the dishwashing room.  Following this vigorous workout we re-cover the squeegies with more floor towels to do a quick dry. And that right there is probably the physically hardest part of my day until I go running/hiking after work.

Because my day is so easy, I’ve made it a habit to walk home from the resort instead of taking the shuttle the 1.5 kilometers to the kibbutz.  This gives me some really nice alone time to decompress before I get home because once on the kibbutz it’s hard to find any place to be alone for very long.  I switch off between walking home on the beach which is absolutely BEAUTIFUL and walking through the banana plantations.  This totally makes me feel like I’m in the tropics or the Jungle Book and I’m half expecting to see a monkey munching on some bananas just around the corner!

Next, toda raba (thank you) to everyone who managed to send me birthday wishes in one form or another!!!  It’s always a good feeling ot hear from all of you over in the states and it meant a lot to me to hear from everyone.  My friends here didn’t drop the ball either.  We all went over to this restaurant across the street from our kibbutz called Marinado.  It is known all over Israel for it’s delectable and beautifully prepared meat as well as it’s wine selection.  On select nights they have wine tasting in the shop of the restaurant where they sell EVERYTHING from homemade halvah to ground spices to in-house-made cheeses to kitchen utensils!  If you’d lik to know more about it the url is www.marinado.co.il.  After dinner the waitresses brought out a huge brownie cake that my roommate had made on the sly with candles and a birthday song!  It was wonderful!  That night was a pub night so all my friends went to the pub to celebrate with me and true to form I passed out early and didn’t make it to my own bday celebration!  I made up for it the next week though because we had a masquerade ball at the pub for theme night and I got decked out as one SEXY little zebra!!!

Birthday Celebration at Marinado

Betina and Me at my Bday dinner

Me and Dan (from Holland) "masqueraded" as Zebras

Thirdly, a couple weeks ago all of the volunteers took a day trip together up into the Northern part of Golan Heights to do a little hiking and sightseeing.  We took a stroll along a beautiful sightseeing hike with a guide from the kibbutz and saw some beautiful views of the valleys, the border of Lebanon and the horizon of Israel.  We also strolled through an Arab marketplace and went to a Druze village where we stopped and ate lunch at a delicious restaurant, family style, and then lounged in their lounge area afer lunch drinking Turkish coffee and munching on baklavah.  This was a really fun day and a great way to get off the Kibbutz.

View of Israel on Hike in Golan heights

The volunteers from Kibbutz Ein Gev in Northern Golan Heights

Druze Village

Next point of discussion, the weather and days here are rapidly changing from how they used to be!  Sunset now begins around 4:15 and by 5:00 it is dark outside.   I suppose that’s what happens when you don’t change your clocks!  The weather is very different as well.  When I first got here I would sweat just walking to the market across from my room.  Now I am wearing pants and sweatshirts and my Uggs just to walk to dinner and it is often pouring rain with torrential winds that blow down from the Syrian mountains and up from the Negev desert.  Apparently the winds are felt the strongest in Ein Gev because of our location and if you were to go just 10 kilometers to the East you would barely even feel it.  The darker days are befitting for the events here at the moment though.  On a small scale, my closest girlfriend in the volunteers (Betina) left Sunday morning to go back to Turkey and my closest guy friend, Brandon left Monday morning to travel a bit before returning to South Africa.  About two weeks ago two other volunteers also left — Jako (who had been here 8 months and is from South Africa) and Andrew (who had been here for 2 months and is form England).  Another volunteer, Peter from Macedonia left quite suddenly to go to Jordan to bea part of some political activist demonstration that is goin on there.  We’ve obviously been getting new volunteers to fill the spots but it is obviously a different dynamic with the new people and the old are greatly missed.  Also, on the small dreary scale, I came down witha bad case of food poisoning this last Saturday and spent my evening and all night “sticking my face in a place that was never meant for my face.”  Thank you Bill Cosby.  I was obviously given Sunday off word to rest which was nice because at that point most of it was out of my system and I was able to relax with my friends before they started their journeys home.  On the larger dark scale, Iran has been doing nuclear weapons testing the last couple of days and Israel respectfully asked them to stop and they basically said they’re gonna do what they want and if Israel tries to interfere then they will attack Tel Aviv.  My roommate Maike told me this yesterday, apparently this information was released Sunday.

On a lighter note, I had an awesome outdoor excursion this past Friday.  As some of you know, right across the street from my kibbutz and behind some of our plantations is a trail head to a trail going up a “mountain” called Sosita.  At the top of this mountain is an archaeological dig of a Syrian castle from 2000 years ago.  This is also a Syrian post from the 6-day war and you pass a couple weapon silos on the trail up.  Some of the uncovered artifacts are amazing, such as a marble gate with a cross carved into it that is in such good condition it looks as though it was created yesterday, not 2000 years ago.  They’ve also uncovered some amazing floor tile mosaics, pillars, baptism pools, the discoveries are endless.  Anyway, one side of the mountain is made up of all rock, boulders, old stone walls — basically the perfect playground for a rock-climbing enthusiast.  I was on my way to do my daily warm up power hike up Sosita and run when my friend Ari from Mexico asked if he could join me.  We got to the trail head and as we started up he proposed leaving the trail and ust making out own way straight up the mountain.  We started this when he spotted the rock climbing possibilities and neither of us could resist the intrigue of risky adventure.  This was an absolutely awesome idea.  We rock climbed, and I mean REAL rock climbing all the way up the mountain and found a perch on this huge boulder at the top with a view overlooking the Sea of Galilee and the whole Jordan Valley right in time for the Shabbas Sunset.  This was absolutely breathtaking and an amazing way to welcome in Shabbat.  After watching this beautiful spectacle, we proceeded to scale across this old Syrian stone wall that wasn’t very sturdy.  At one point I held on to one spot for too long and a stone came loose, sending me sliding down the wall before flinging me around so my back was to the wall.  I luckily was able to catch myself backwards crab-style before falling, however I did receive a pretty nasty couple of scratches on my left thigh.  Could have been worse though and the adventure with Ari was well worth it!  (The pics of sunset are not from this excusrsion, rather they are from a sunset hike I took with some friends just so we could get these pics.  We do this hike a lot and only once did we bring our cameras!)

View of the Sunset over the Sea of Galilee from Sausita

Aerial view of Ein Gev on the way up Sausita

Marble wall with cross at top of Sausita

Red Sky at Sausita

Taking pics on te way up Sausita

My departure date is getting closer and closer and while I’m excited to come home and see everyone I can’t help but wish i had way more time here.  My soul will cry when I leave.  I have never felt so at home anywhere in my life.  My friend Ori is trying to find a violin on the kibbutz for me to play because I’ve been struggling without one and penting up a lot of emotions and frustration that I would love to get out.  She is one of my close friends here and she is a kibbutnik.  I really love hanging out with her.  She is probably one of the most beautiful souls I have ever met and I feel that I will keep in touch with her for a very long time.  I hope to come visit her again wherever she may be.  I’ve been toying with the idea of volunteering again after my masters program is completed so I can come back to Israel.  I have also been toying with the idea of making aliyah.  I understand why kibbutzim life is so intriguing however in a few years time I fear there may be no kibbutzim left as they are all becoming capitalized and privatized as western culture is impossible to keep at bay.  Even here at Ein Gev the kibbutniks say this is not a kibbutz anymore because of the way things are starting to run.  It’s a shame because this way of life is so beautiful and simple and really gets you back to the way humans were meant to live… in harmony and cooperation.  I don’t know how I feel about personally living my whole life on a kibbutz and bringing up my family here, but I certainly understand the reasons people have for choosing to do it themselves.  I hope some kibbutzim can hold their ground and grasp to the traditions of the kibbutz way of life.

Ori driving me and friends to the "hidden lake" for hookah and tea time

smoking shisha at the hidden lake with ori, brandon, betina, and jonathan (behind camera)

The missing Jonathan

Finally, because I have not taken any vacation yet and have been working my tuchus off (I’ve only had 2 Saturdays off since I’ve been here and that’s the only day off every week), I have a LOAD of vacation time saved up.  Technically, next week could be my last week of work and I could travel the rest of the time I’m in Israel.  Ori, the girl I mentioned earlier, finishes work December 7th so I think she and I are going to try and travel together starting the 8th until I leave on the 18th.  Two definitely destinations are Tel Aviv and Jerusalem.  We are also really trying to go to Sinai and Cairo in Egypt and and if there is time I will possibly try to go back to Masada and the Negev to stay with the Bedoins and do the sunrise hike.  Also, for those of you who this concerns, my flight itinerary has been changed.  I will actually be coming home December 18th rather than December 19th, however everything else is exactly the same (flight airlines, flight numbers, flight times, and flight layovers).  Iberia Airlines cancelled my connecting flight form Madrid to Chicago on the 19th, hence the change.

Phew, so that’s the show yeledim v’yaldot (boys and girls)!  I hope you enjoyed yourselves and I hope to see yall again soon.  There are/will be more pics on facebook!  My love to you all!  Yala bye!

P.S. My friend Brandon gave me an extraordinary book before he left called The Book Thief by Marcus Zusak.  This is some of the most beautiful literature I have read and this book has easily become one of my top five.  Anyone looking for a thought provoking and resonant read, I highly suggest sitting down with this BEAUTIFUL piece of work.

During my free time in the afternoons I’ve been running on the road that runs by the kibbutz and around the Sea of Galilee.  Because we’re so low in altitude here, running is super easy for me and I’ve been running 6 miles a day.  The views are of the beach are beautiful on this run and it’s hard to stay focused!  On my route I pass by a string of beaches that runs a couple of kilometers down the road where people can camp in tents right on the beach.  There’s always tons of people and an ice cream truck that goes around vending to the campers.  I’ve also been making a ton of friends here.  There are people of all ages from everywhere here.  I think the youngest volunteer is 18 and the oldest is 32.  My closest friends come from Turkey (this girl Betina who I absolutely adore), France, and England.  There are a couple of kids from Mexico and South Africa as well as Germany, Korea, Denmark… pretty much you name it and we’ve got it.  A lot of these kids know their home language as well as English and Hebrew and can switch between the 3 fluently.  It’s crazy to hear people talk all around you in so many different languages.  It totally makes me feel like a stupid American for only knowing English.  I’ve also been getting closer with my roommate Marin, from Germany.  She’s 30 and leads a really really cool life.  She lives in a community flat back home and spends a lot of time working at a nonprofit political radio station.  She leads/organizes a lot of anti-fascist and anti-nazi demonstrations and is very smart and interesting to talk to.  I get the idea she’s a feminist but then sometimes I think I may be wrong.  She’s really funny and is always cracking me up with one thing or another.  I definitely lucked out in the roomie department.  She’s leaving in a month so I will either be given a new roommate in the room I’m in or probably be moved to another room where there’s only one person right now.  I wouldn’t have my own because the privilege to live alone is given to those volunteers who have been on the kibbutz the longest.

There are a ton of kids here who are extremely serious about Israel.  One of my friends from Mexico is 18 and comes from a very Jewish, very involved, very Zionist Mexican Jewish community back home.  She’s already been here for 2 months and has no return date.  After leaving the kibbutz she will be working in a 2 month Israeli army program and thinks she will probably make aliyah and just move here and serve her time.  There are many other kids here just like her who are so young and so committed to Israel.  It’s really cool to be surrounded by this kind of enthusiasm.  Many of these kids are taking their first steps for permanent immigration to Israel.

Another one of the girls from Mexico was telling me about an awesome adventure she had while she and I took a post-dinner walk the other night.  Before she came to the kibbutz she stopped in Haifa, alone, and went skydiving!  She showed me the video and it is absolutely amazing.  When you take the dive, during the free fall, you have a view of almost all of Israel.  It is absolutely gorgeous.  I really really want to do it but it’s extremely expensive to sky dive here for some reason.  It’s about $400 to $500 for skydiving and the video if you want one.  This is a little extreme considering you can go skydiving in Colorado for $120.  This is something though that I will be considering, the experience would be absolutely amazing and definitely something I will never forget.

Monday night we had theme night at the pub on the kibbutz.  Every Monday everyone dresses up for a different theme and goes to this pub (the only “night life” around this area) and has a really good time.  Theme night was started by the volunteers a while back and it’s so fun that even the kibbutzniks have joined in and everyone comes in costume!  It also helps to bond the two groups I think.  The last theme was Hippie/60’s Flower Power.  We all got dressed up (needless to say I lent out a couple of clothes because I had a surplus of appropriate dress) and got our drink on!  My friend Eva (pronounced Ay-vah) ordered me her favorite drink as this was my first visit to the pub.  I can’t remember what it’s called or even everything in it but it is blue and tastes like you are drinking an otter pop.  Very sweet, full of sugar, and easy to get down, although I didn’t want to drink too much of something so sweet so I only had one.  I also partook in trying Goldstar, the equivalent to Coors in Israel, and was treated to a shot made of vodka and raspberry.  Usually it’s “tradition” for new members to be given a taku-taku shot: really cheap tequila that apparently tastes like gasoline and makes you feel like you’re going to be sick before you even get it all the way down.  Everyone was super intent on getting me to partake in this tradition but I held my ground and saved myself.  Not being a drinker, I don’t really see the point in spending money on something that is going to make me feel disgusting and not even be easy to get down.  After sitting and chatting with a few of the kibbutzniks for a while, my friends Betina (20 years), Ben (20 years), Andrew (18 years; Ben and Andrew are both from England, different parts thought and different dialects) and I decided it would be a lovely idea to take a night swim in the kinerret.  Sounds good in theory but in practice not so much.  Ben and I were freezing our butts off while Betina and Andrew made fun of us for being wimps.  We lasted about ten minutes before we talked them into getting warm and bundling up in front of a movie in the volunteers club house to fall asleep to.

The Kinerret is fresh water, not salt water, hence the reason it is Israel’s main water supply.  The only problem is that their surplus is dwindling really fast and there has been very little rain the past couple of summers to refill the sea.  It is scary to walk around the kibbutz and see different indicators of how low the water level really is.  The beach I’d say is about 100 yards further down than it used to be, and the original harbor is not in use because big boats can’t even pull into it without getting stuck.  The kibbutz had to build a new harbor farther out in deeper water.  You can see where the ships used to dock and the water has dropped about 20 feet.  Everyone is very aware of the problem but Israel as a whole has not taken proper measures to conserve the water supply.  As individuals people do what they can but there is still so much more they could do to save water and the state just hasn’t organize appropriately to make a difference.  Everyone prays for rain but I think it’s going to take a little more than a couple whispered prayers.  

I haven’t really been doing much else.  The time here is very relaxing because the only real commitment I have is to being at work on time and doing a decent job.  As soon as I get off the day is free to do whatever.  This place certainly cures any kind of stress one is carrying and puts the mind at total ease.  I almost feel as if I’ve just finished a year-long meditation class in a week.  I’ve stopped biting my nails and I’ve also quit smoking cigarettes.  In one week!  Obviously I need to make sure I keep at it since both have been persistent habits but I’m pretty confident.

I’ve also recently been adopted by one of the cats who lives here on the kibbutz.  She’s super small and cute and I haven’t figured out a name for her yet.  I’ve been feeding her little scraps here and there of anything that I can find/have left over from meals.  She likes to come into my room and cuddle with me on my bed which is totally cute and adorable.  My friend Lauren from France calls her Mummy Cat because we don’t have an actual name for her and she just had a litter of kittens before I got here.  She’s very beautiful with stripes and spots that make her look like a little tiger.
Last but not least, I have obtained all of the contact information for the kibbutz for the family members that were waiting and for any interested friends.  It is as follows:

Address of the Kibbutz:
Kibbutz Ein-Gev
Jordan Valley
14940
Israel

Fax Number: 04-6658000 (However in the US you have to put some numbers in front and I’m not sure what they are so I’ll have to ask Smadar).
Public telephone: 04-6751009 (again, same thing with the numbers).

I have my phone with me in case of any emergencies but please please please please please no texting me or calling me unless it is a life or death situation.  In that case you should see if I’m on skype first, and if it’s possible please email me first.  I get charged for everything.  I’m usually on skype around 11:00 pm my time (that’s 9 hours ahead of California and 8 ahead of Colorado) so if you want to chat you can most likely catch me then.

I love everyone and miss everyone tons but I am having a wonderful time here and I am so glad I made the decision to come.  This was probably one of the best choices I’ve made my entire life and just in this first week I can see how it is going to leave a huge impact.  Thank you everyone for all of your help getting me here.  I couldn’t be more grateful.  I will be adding these and the rest of my photos to facebook either tomorrow or the next day so for captions and such just check there.

My trip here was pretty cool.  I left the kibbutz program center with the intention of taking 3 buses to the kibbutz from Tel Aviv.  I made it to the bus stop with all my luggage and a taxi pulled up asking if I needed a ride to the airport.  I told him no, that I was going very far and he probably didn’t want to drive me.  When I told him I was trying to get to Ein Gev he got very excited because he never gets to see anything except for the streets of Tel Aviv and ushered me in the taxi faster than I could get my luggage together.  This guy was super cute, with a wife and kids who checked in with him about 5 times during my taxi ride which was probably only about an hour and a half.  He served as a great tour guide, pointing out all the cool places we were passing and talking to me about all the different areas we were driving through which included some familiar places like Cesaria, Nazareth, Tiberias, and Samaria (which by the way my middle name is Samara, so that’s kinda cool).  We also passed a bunch of Arab and Jewish villages built on hills and he told me that you can tell which are which by the structure and architecture of the villages (I think this may take a more knowing, discerning eye because they all looked the same to me).  He says the villages are built very slowly, one wall at a time, because of the lack of money — in his words “no one goes to the bank to build a village”.  On our way we passed a lot of open land and I saw a tree growing out of a rock.  I thought this was kinda cool and for some reason made me think of the burning bush… don’t ask me why.

When I finally made it to the kibbutz he ended up dropping me off right in front of the volunteer houses by luck (neither of us knew where we were going) and my roommate happened to be sitting out on the porch ready to welcome me.  She helped take my bags in and then showed me around the kibbutz — very small but very homey and everyone is super welcoming.  There’s a bunch of different kinds of people here.  The volunteers are from all over — Japan, Africa, Germany, Mexico… a whole bunch of places.  Morin (my roommate) happens to be from Germany.  She’s not Jewish but is extremely into Israel and Judaism and has already been on the Kibbutz for 5 months and staying for another month.  A lot of people are not Jewish but the Kibbutz is kosher.  My roommate said that even a lot of the people who live permanently on the Kibbutz are not that observant except on high holidays.

The food for dinner isn’t so great.  Bread, veggies, weird looking fish and cheese, some soup, cereal, and egg creations.  Everything has kind of an interesting taste to it but it’s at least eatible.  If it is especially gross some days I don’t have to worry too much because the kibbutz super market is directly across from my room and is packed with a whole bunch of stuff and the volunteer club house is equipped with a stove.  I also luckily have a refrigerator in my room which I’ve already stocked with some chocolate milk in pouches and yummy diet banana yogurt.  Haha, leave it to me to get diet!

The kibbutz also has two restaurants on the premises that are supposed to be very good.  A seafood restaurant which is apparently famous, although my roommate says it is kinda crappy, and a bistro.  I also apparently get a lot of free stuff when I work at the resort dining lounge.  The kibbutz also has a couple of banana plantations that workers manage and we get free bananas.  Finally, the kibbutz also runs a cow… ummm… factory?  Basically a bunch of cows that we milk three times a day and clean up their poop.

There’s also some great hiking areas right around me that Morin tells me are very gorgeous as well as a bunch of nature parks that are also beautiful.  On our beach there is a wooden raft thing out in the water a ways that is anchored down and you can swim to it and lay out and tan.  The volunteers and inhabitants of the kibbutz get to use this private beach for free and the visitors have to use a different beach that they have to pay for, hehe. There is also a book shop just down the road which is good because I am almost done with the second of only two books that I brought with me and it seems we have a lot of reading time here.  Hopefully they have some David Sedaris!  My roommate said we can also trade books and she has a bunch of Ken Follett, another of my favorites, so I’m happy with that.  There is also a second-hand clothing shop that is extremely inexpensive and a laundry facility.  You drop your laundry off to them and they clean and fold it and you pick it back up.  Sounds great but she said that if there’s anything especially important to you don’t take it there because sometimes (rarely but sometimes) clothes have a tendency of disappearing because there are so many of them it’s difficult to keep them organized 100%.  She also said it will sometimes take up to 4 or 5 days to get your clothes back if there’s a lot of laundry so if you need something the next day it’s better to just wash it yourself in the sink and hang it on the clothesline that every room has out front on their porch.

The kibbutz is all about work ethic.  You have to prove yourself to the other members and volunteers by working hard and doing your job well.  If you are late that is not okay.  You get three days off per month as well as 3 out of 4 shabbats.  For every Shabbat you work, you get an extra day off.  You don’t work all day, just 5 or 6 hour shifts I think, and if you work that in the morning you have the afternoon free to do whatever (swim, go into Tiberias, hike, whatever).

Last but not least, I would like to reassure my family that even though I’m on the east side of the sea I am in a very safe place.  After five months Morin says nothing exciting has happened and this is the safest place she’s ever spent five months in her entire life.  I miss everyone so much and can’t wait to tell more great stories.  The internet situation is this: there is obviously internet, however it is not wifi and there is one computer to share among everyone.  I have skype but no video camera.  I can do skype calls you just won’t be able to see me.  Because I can’t use my computer for internet there will be no pics posted for a while until I can go to an internet cafe on a day off and catch up with my pics.  I will keep blogging as much as possible and send emails.  If you want to hear fromme personally send me an email to mikki.finkelstein@gmail.com and I will get back to you as soon as I can.  I will also be sending postcards so if I didn’t get your address from you before I left reply to my blog or send me an email with your address if you want a postcard.  My love to you all!!!

Shalom!

View from the plane coming into Tel Aviv

I’m currently staying in my second of two hostels.  The first night I stayed at Momo’s Hostel.  Great name, not so great of a place.  The internet was broken and the showers were super gross.  I stayed in a single so I’m not really sure what the dormitory situation was like there.

This morning I got up early to get to the Kibbutz Program Center to figure out placement stuff.  I was the first customer there and told that it would take about 2-3 days for placement.  I decided that if I had to stay in Tel Aviv that long it was definitely worth changing my hostel.  I stopped at a corner market on the way back and got that amazing chocolate milk that comes in a pouch.  MMMM sooo good!!!!  I packed up my stuff, checked out of Momo’s, and walked half a block to my new hostel called Sky Hostel.  This one is so much nicer it’s hard to believe there were more people at Momo’s.  Nicer and with working internet!!!  I’m staying in the girls dorm this time because it’s about half the price and Europe pretty much sucked me dry.  However, the dorm beds 6 and there’s only myself and one other girl so it makes the room even bigger than having a single.

After getting settled in and skyping with Arielle for a little, I made my way back to the Kibbutz Program Center (they told me to come back again in the afternoon).  When I got there it was packed with people.  Almost all Americans all about my age waiting for kibbutz placements.  They were all being told it would be 3-4 days for placement so I was groaning thinking, “Great, I’m a lone wanderer for the next week” when the lady told me that she had found me a placement and I could go tomorrow!!!  So yay!  I’m going to a Kibbutz called Ngev I think (her accent was so strong I could barely understand her).  It’s on the Sea of Galilee up north.  I’m not sure what type of kibbutz it is or what I’ll be doing but I’ll find all of that out tomorrow morning and let everyone know. To see where I’ll be follow this link: http://www.eyeonisrael.com/map_Israel.html.

After the great news I went for a run along the boardwalk in Tel Aviv.  This boardwalk connects either 2 or 3 beautiful beaches so I just ran the whole thing because I was amazed by the views and all the people.  On one side I see girls in string bikinis bearing all and on the other side are Hasidic and Orthodox Jews taking their kids out for a walk completely covered from head to toe.  I love this place.  After running I stopped at this cute little mini gym type thing that they have along the beaches.  It’s not very high tech equipment but it’s cool to work out with a view of the water and better than paying 50 NIS for a day pass at the closest gym (that’s about 11 dollars for one day!).

Beach in Tel Aviv

Later on I wandered back to the beach for a little R&R.  The weather was gorgeous today.  Totally perfect for laying out… not too hot not too cold and with a perfect breeze.  I caught a little lunch/dinner at this great beach restaurant called London with a front table directly on the beach.  I ordered a Greek salad and when it came it took my breath away! Super huge for one, I got like 3 meals out of it, and two, the size of the feta they put on this salad is out of this world.  They basically took 5 blocks of index-length and width sized pieces and piled them on the top of this already gorgeous salad.  This was the best feta I have ever had.  Super creamy and delicious.  My waiter was super cool and let me just pick at my salad while reading my book (David Sedaris) for two hours.  I was able to sit there and enjoy the sunset which was really beautiful.  If you haven’t read anything by David Sedaris I suggest you go out and buy/borrow from the library a copy of one of his books.  This man is absolutely hysterical.  If I wasn’t already drawing enough attention by being an American in a foreign place I certainly made up for it by laughing hysterically out loud to myself at both the beach and the restaurant.  Oh well, what kind of a person are you if you can’t laugh alone? 

Have to get up super early so I’m signing out.  Can’t wait to get to my kibbutz!!!!!  Then everything will be sibaba!!!

Day Two: Sept. 29, 2009

My first full day in Maastricht I attended Arielle’s Dutch class which was pretty cool.  It’s crazy how many kids in her program are from DU!  After class she took me to this great sandwich shop.  I’ve learned that sandwiches and fries with mayonnaise are two staples of the Dutch diet.  Mayonnaise in Dutch literally translates to “frite sauce” or fry sauce.  At many places you have to ask for ketchup.  After filling up on yummy sandwiches, we wandered into the Maastricht shopping district.  I learned that Maastricht is a main shopping hub or European cities all over the area.  It was bustling!  The district is packed with amazing European clothing boutiques and department stores, shoe shops, and yummy smelling snack and candy shops on every corner.  Sprinkled throughout are cute little coffee shops offering varieties of herbal goodies to suit everyone’s needs.  That night Elle and I ate at a street-side restaurant out on the patio looking onto the square of the town.  Great place for people watching; everyone has such great style!

Day Three: Sept. 30, 2009

After starting my day off with a beautiful run around the university campus, Elle and I took a train into Aachen, Germany for a day trip.  This was a great excursion!  We got into Aachen and wandered around the city for a while taking it all in.  This was a first for both of us!  We hopped a taxi to the Lyndt Chocolate Factory and thought we had stepped into heaven!  I could not stop salivating at this place.  Everywhere you look there is a type of chocolate bar not ever seen before!  I am disgusted to say that we spent 20 Euro on chocolate!  Presents for some special people!  We also picked up Lyndt hot chocolate mix.  Instead of chocolate powder it’s actually a bag of milk chocolate shavings that you mix up in your warm milk.  The best cocoa of my life!  After hopping a taxi back we searched out a sushi restaurant called Best Friends; a restaurant we heard had great sushi.  Try to picture a Japanese sushi menu, hard enough to figure out what you’re ordering in English, but try discerning what you’re ordering when the Japanese is translated to German!  We actually did pretty well and enjoyed a great dinner.  On our way out we stumbled upon an open-air music festival going on the day we were there.  Great music, food stands, and street-entertainment everywhere.  We took a ride on this giant ferris wheel and snapped some sweet snapshots of the 360 degree city-view we had at the top.  This ferris wheel was huge and both of us were a little giddy getting off!  On our journey home Arielle got to practice her Dutch with a few bus drivers while we tried to find our line.  She did a great job and we made it home all in one piece!

View from ferris wheel in Aachen

Day Four: October 1, 2009

Arielle had a bunch of class again today so I worked on my graduate school essay and played a bunch of sudoku while I waited in the computer center.  After a bit of learning, I finally had the opportunity to go boot shopping!  Everyone here wears boots and super stylish shoes, usually leather, and there are shoe shops lining the streets! I ended up snagging myself some FABULOUS European boots at one of their less expensive department stores.  That night we did burrito night with Arielle’s roommate and friends.  Afterward, Arielle and her friend Phil and I took a midnight visit to a close coffee shop for some time to chill and chat.  Josh, his guy reminds me so much of you it’s scary!  Made me miss you so much!

Day Five: Oct. 2, 2009

Today was the day I had been waiting for!!!  Elle and I got an early start and hopped the train to Amsterdam after an early campus run.  So cool!  This is a city where they know what they’re doing!  Food , sex, art shopping, beer, and weed all legal in the same city, and in some areas all on one street!  There’s seriously nowhere in the world like Amsterdam.  We made our first stop at the famous Grasshopper coffee shop.  We got a great bubble gum spliff and enjoyed our morning coffee by the street.  After breakfast and coffee we stopped in a couple souvenir shops before heading over to the mind-blowing Van Gogh museum!  I felt so cultured and sophisticated after 2 hours of gazing at art by Van Gogh, Rembrandt, Renoir, Monet, and others.  There is really nothing like a good cup of coffee and some breathtaking art.  We wandered around the city some more, listening to all the different languages (definitely a super-International city) and getting jostled along the narrow cobblestone streets of the city.    We happened upon a coffee shop called Hill Street Blues (Evan thank you for the recommendation!) that featured a completely opposite artistic disply than the museum.  We had walked into a 3-story coffee shop completely graffiti’d from floor to ceiling, literally.  There was no empty space anywhere.  Layers and layers of tags and drawings cover everything down to the covers of the lights, the civarette vendor, and the snack machine.  As you sit here studying the layers of tags thinking about how many people had to have been at this coffee shop over time to produce something like this, your mind is captivated and activated by the techno/bass/house beat they have setting the ambience for mod artists and punk rock stoners.  We even had the chance to vibe out and watch this dude do some amazing art on the wall with these sweet wall-paint markers.  Lola I wish you had been here, this was totally your element girl!  Leaving the shop pleasantly lifted we ventured into the Red Light District.  WOW!  What a total shocker!  These women are packed into these brothels that line the streets.  They sit in window displays like zoo animals taping on the glass and catcalling at the interested males lurking through the streets looking for a lay.  Most overwhelming of all is the age of a lot of the girls.  Some had o be as young as 16 sitting in those windows feeding off the attention of old creepers!  GROSS!!!  Arielle heard that the city is officially shutting down the Red Light District in 3 months… maybe to clean up a bit?  Anyway, get your jollies in now because it’ll be gone before you know it.  After a long day we finally made it back to Maastricht.  We stopped at this coffee shop called Smokey’s to finish the goods we had gotten at Hill Street Blues.  It’s actually a boat on the canal that runs through Maastricht.  Two levels of coziness and great laid-back music.  We made the cold hike back to the dorm to snack on some great cheese and smoked salmon before settling down to a little Sex and the City and dreams of Amsterdam!

Hill Street Blues Artist

Arielle has just now introduced me to the world of blogging and I’m trying to get used to it before she leaves in case I have to ask any ditzy questions of the much less ditzier of us two.  Arielle is leaving for the Netherlands tomorrow and not only am I super sad abotu that it’s making me realize how much I still have to do before I can get on my way.  The next couple of weeks will be super busy but I will try and see as many of you as I can.  For all of you in Cali I’m trying to get out there one of the last two weeks of September to see everyone before I take off so get ready to party with me!  I’ll be emailing you guys with the official dates once everything is cemented.

Love you all.