Karmiel

For my second semester in Israel, I am living in Karmiel. Karmiel is up in the north in the Gallile.

Here's a map of the area as a reference point.
Here in Karmiel, we do volunteer work. These jobs include MDA (Magen David Adom, which is like the Red Cross in Israel), teaching English at the elementary schools and high schools, working at the Gan (kindergarten), working at the soup kitchen, working with animals, working at Akim (center for people with special needs), working at the K'far Yeladim (a village for kids with broken homes), and other various things. I spend my Monday, Wednesday, and Thursday mornings teaching English at the high school. In the afternoons, I work at the K'far Yeladim. I live in the Mercaz Kleitah (the absorption center) in Karmiel. I have an apartment with 5 people here. My roommates are Debra, Dana, Ariel, and Rotem. We're a pretty good room if you ask me. We eat together, cook together, etc, basically everything you would do with apartmentmates.

This is the 5 of us about to sit down for our first homemade meal.
As more things happen, more will posted

Israel Today Seminar and Southern Tiyul

We had a seminar for 3 days called the Israel Today Seminar. We got to choose a topic that sparked our interest and have activities based on that theme. The first day of the seminar was on Sunday. I chose a tour of the separation fence and a tour of the Begin Museum. It was pretty interesting, especially the part about the fence. After the museum, we quickly had dinner then headed to Yafo for a play. It was called the "Please Touch Theatre." It was blind, deaf, and or mute people putting on a show. They started off making bread, and by the end of the show, bread was made and the audience could come up to the stage, meet the actors and eat the bread. It was such a touching show. Monday, I chose the option to do arts and culture in Israel. We went to the Islam Museum. After that, we went to the dance studio where the Horah Jerusalem Dance Company trains. We got to watch 2 dancers perform, and we got to dance a bit ourselves. Then we went to a museum called Jerusalem Quality of Life. It was pretty interesting because it was basically a house for artists to work. Tuesday, I decided to choose the option of going to Tel-Aviv. That was a lot of fun. I decided that when I move to Israel, Tel-Aviv is where I'll live. We walked around Nachlat Benyamin and since it was a Tuesday, there was the arts market (or something like that) going on, and I bought really good smelling soap. After the short shopping, we headed over to the Olympic Experience Museum. It was so exciting. It was a virtual tour, but it didn't feel rushed at all. Then we went to Holon where the Blind Museum is located. It's called Dialogue in the Dark. It's so cool. The whole exhibition is in the dark and our tour guides through the exhibition were either completely blind or visually impaired. We were taken through 7 different rooms, some of them were representations of our everyday mundane lives (like going to the grocery store) and we got to experience for a few minutes what it was like to not be able to see and it was a whole new experience. Wednesday, we had our orientation for second semester. It was a long and boring day. Thursday was the first day of Tiyul. We had the option everyday of tiyul to choose either the easy or the hard hike. I chose easy everyday except for one. The first day, the easy hike went to the Ein Gedi Nature Preserve and did a bit of hiking there. After the hike, we went to a Bedouin Tent. We got to the tent and rode on camels. When the people who did the hard hike came, they rode on camels. Then we all shmoozed a bit, had an excellent Bedouin meal, had a taste of Bedouin culture, then we had a bonfire. Instead of marshmallows, they gave us potatos. The next morning, I chose the easy hike option. This was going to colored sands. It was so cool there. The sands were naturally colored. We collected sand, put it in a bottle, then chilled out. After lunch, we headed to Kibbtuz Keturah to get ready for Shabbat. It was a relaxing Shabbat. Motze Shabbat (Saturday night after Shabbas is over), I did the activity with the Garin (kids about to go into the army) and we did a mini scavenger hunt then had a bonfire. It was fun. The next day, I chose the easy hike option which was the Desert Arts Workshop. I did the film portion of it. We made a funny movie. It was called Lost At Dune. We had our madricha (Achi) as our Israeli tour guide who had a thick Israeli accent and bad English. She took our stuff and left us stranded in the desert. Then one of the boys did the "NOOOOOOO!!!!!!!!!!!!" scream. Another kid threw water on him, and I grabbed the water bottle yelling about how it was our last little bit of water. Then we had the sleep scene where we were all having the same nightmare. Then, we did a spin-off of the Blair Witch Project. Then we referenced The Lord of the Rings with how hungry we were and how we "could still taste the strawberries...and cream." We had a tribal council where we voted someone off the island and we decided to eat him. But right before we got to kill him, one of the guys stood up and gave us a pep talk about how we're all in this together (and yes we did sing that song a number of times throughout the film) and how we need to stick together and how the kibbutz was very close by to us. Then we referenced The Lion King a bit with some slow motion running, but we spoofed it a bit because we were falling and helping each other up. At one point I fall, and the boys just left me there until one of them noticed. It was so funny. As soon as we got to the gate, we were welcomed to Kibbutz Keturah, School of Witchcraft and Wizardry (Harry Potter reference). We walk up to the tour guide, exhausted and she asks us how our time in the desert was for 10 minutes. We made quite the comedy. The next day, I chose the hard hike option because the easy hike was in Timna, and I had been to Timna before this trip. After the hike, we went to Eilat. Eilat is a great vacation spot. We had a boat ride on a party boat, then some free time around the city. The last day of the hiking was either Har Shlomo (the highest mountain in the region) or the Red Canyon (literally right next to the border with Egypt). I had originally chosen to do the hard hike at Har Shlomo (until I learned that I couldn't do it because of my fear of heights). So I did the Red Canyon, which was so cool anyways. After that, we had lunch at the Halleluyah restaurant. Then we went to the beach for watersports. I did banana boating, kayaking, paddle boating, and tubing. It was a lot of fun. We had dinner, then had the night off. A couple of us went out for a couple of drinks. Especially those of us going to Karmiel. It was going to be a 7 hour bus ride, so we figured we'd sleep off the hangovers. Surprsingly enough, no one got extremely smashed and none of us had a hangover.

Poland Trip

**I APOLOGIZE IN ADVANCE FOR ANYTHING TOO GRAPHIC**

Wednesday January 12, 2011

Today is our first day in Poland. We left base at about 2:30. On the bus, I sat next to Gill and told her about my break. Things went pretty smoothly at the airport minus waiting in line for the first security check. We got on the plane and left for Warsaw. I fell asleep before take-off, woke up at breakfast, ate, then went back to sleep. At the airport in Warsaw, we all put on our warm clothes and headed to our first stop: the Jewish cemetery in Warsaw. This cemetery was huge (80 acres, with 250,000 graves) and it’s still functioning. It was the most unique cemetery I had ever been to. There were terrace type walls made from fragments of tombstones that had been destroyed during the war. This was to keep their memory. The writings on the tombstones were in Polish, Hebrew, and some Yiddish. The people buried there ranged from super religious Orthodox/Chassidic to secular Jews, and each tombstone showed it. You could tell who was a Cohen, who was a Levi, who the rabbis were, who had money, etc by the symbol carved into the tombstones. The Cohanim had the priestly hands, Levi’im had the handwashing symbol, rabbis had ohels (literally translated to tent, but it almost looks like a mausoleum), authors and scholars had books, charitable women had a hand giving צדקה, the rich people had whatever they wanted because they could afford it. Strangely enough, there were non-Jewish symbols in this Jewish cemetery like cherubs, angels, etc. There were communal graves for those who died in the Warsaw Ghetto. After the cemetery, we went to the Noyzak Synagogue for mincha (afternoon prayer) and a limud (study session). We left the synagogue and had lunch. Afterwards, we got on the bus and drove for 2.5 hours to Lublin. This was the only bus ride in which we were neither watching a movie nor listening to music. That night, we watched Escape from Sobibor.

Thursday January 13, 2011

Today we went to Majdanek. At first, we sat in a little room that Gill said looked like an old time theater. I had to agree with her. Jules Guten (our tour guide for Poland) began with the statistics (which are the same facts that many of us had learned before the trip). Then we actually went inside the camp. For another girl and me, this was the first time we had seen snow fall (or the first time I know of seeing snow falling, I’m sure my parents will tell me otherwise). It was very difficult to know what to feel because we wanted to be excited to see snow fall, but we had to be respectful because we were in a concentration camp. The first thing we saw (besides the snow) was the double barbed wire. For an uneducated person in regards to the Holocaust, it would almost seem like the people kept inside the barbed wire were feared by the people who stood outside the barbed wire when this camp was actually in use. The first building we went inside was the showers. These were real showers for people to get cleaned. Jules told us that this camp’s shower temperatures had different meanings. If a group of people received a cold water shower, they were going to live a little bit longer. If a group received a hot water shower, they were going straight to the gas chambers in the next room. Hot water was used to open up the pores in the skin so the gas produced from Zyklon B could get into their bodies faster and speed up the killing process. As we left the showers and gas chamber building, we were surprised not to see the crematorium immediately next to the gas chamber. The crematorium, in fact, was on the other side of the camp. Jules also told us that there were 18 watch towers. Such an ironic number for the watch towers. (The number 18 is made from the word חי which means life. This is an ironic statement because the guards in these 18 watch towers did not keep everyone alive). We walked into the next building (which was a former barrack for sorting people’s personal belongings) and saw a scale model of the camp. There seemed to be a lot of land and we learned that the Nazi soldiers wanted to add more barracks to the camp. This is where my emotions let go. I began to cry. We left that building and walked into the next one. It was a room full of shoes. (In case you were unaware, not too long ago, a building at Majdanek with many more shoes than we saw had burned down. In case you were wondering, there are still shoes at Majdanek, just not as many as before.) It was very hard to be in that room. I couldn’t find a pair of shoes among the many, but I found a white shoe on top of the dirty shoes. Many people said they saw the red shoe, but I didn’t see it. However, I still found it touching to see some color in a bunch of darkness. After we left the shoes, we walked over to the crematorium. We passed a memorial that was being built. It was an eagle flying away. We learned that the eagle is the symbol of Poland. This was such an ironic thing for me to see because many of the people who were sent here would never be flying free, unlike that eagle. We kept walking until we got to the crematorium. We stood outside the crematorium for another moment to learn a little bit more. On the ground, I saw a dead rat. This was the most ironic thing for me to see. A rat = what Nazi soldiers thought of the Jews. Dead = what they wanted and what they did. It was even more ironic that this rat was right outside the crematorium. With this irony and the rest of the camp, I knew I could not go inside the crematorium. I even told Yossi I couldn’t go in, but he told me I had to go in anyways to see what Jules was talking about. I went in, kept my eyes to the ground and couldn’t move. I didn’t want to see anything inside and I didn’t. I started to shake and told a different staff member to get me out of there. It was too much for me to bear. I got out of there and cried even more. Once everyone else made their way out, we went to the ditches where the people in the camp were punished for the revolt in a different camp called Sobibor. We then walked up a few steps to a memorial. It looked like dirt in the memorial, so I sat down on a little step looking into the memorial. Then, Jules told us that it was human ash. I stood up immediately and nearly threw up. We finally left the camp and got back on the bus. We were going to Krakow. That was a 5 hour bus ride. Along the way, we watched Schindler’s List. Surprisingly, that was the first time I had ever seen the movie. We finally got to Krakow, got to our rooms, and came down to dinner. After dinner, Gill and I were given a 15 minute warning to get our presentation together. It wasn’t enough mental preparation time, but it was fine when we did our presentation on the Jewish community and Jewish life in Krakow which dates back to the 10^th century.

Friday January 14, 2011

Today we went to a few of the synagogues we mentioned in our presentation. We visited the Tempel Synagogue and the Remuh Synagogue. We were supposed to visit the Kupa Synagogue, but the person with the key never came. After the synagogues, we went to Schindler’s Factory. Unfortunately, my camera decided to stop turning on. I was able to put my sim card into someone else’s camera. I was surprised to see that the museum was barely about Schindler. It was mainly a museum of life in Krakow and it was located in his factory. We saw his office though. After the museum, we had free time before Shabbas.

Sunday January 16, 2011

Last night, we had some time to walk around in Old Krakow. Friday night, we went to the Isaak’s Synagogue for Kabbalat Shabbat. Saturday morning, we went to the Remuh Synagogue. After shul, we had time to chill out. Once Shabbat was over and we ate dinner, we went out to explore Krakow. It was a pretty nice city. Although, it was raining off and on, but it wasn’t too much of a pain. Today, we went to Auschwitz I and Auschwitz II (Birkenau). That was pretty hard. I couldn’t go into the room with all the hair because I knew that if I did, I would be sick to my stomach. After we left Auschwitz, we went to Birkenau which was empty for the most part. The gas chambers were destroyed, a few barracks were left, the train tracks were still there, but it was still empty. It was a lot of open land. At Birkenau, a couple people had prepared a small ceremony for this camp. Once we left Auschwitz-Birkenau and headed to Lodz in a hotel that Yossi said was haunted. I didn’t feel it’s supposed hauntedness, but everyone else on the trip did.

Monday January 17, 2011

Today we went to the Lodz cemetery. I didn’t think very much of it because there weren’t as many interesting tombstones, people, or tales of Lodz as there were in Warsaw. We left the cemetery and headed over to Warsaw. We got to Warsaw and saw our hotel and how nice it was. We stopped at the hotel for a pit stop then continued to the site of the last bit of the Warsaw Ghetto wall. It wasn’t what I expected at all. It almost reminded me of the Western Wall, but not as old. When we left the wall, we went to a memorial of the Warsaw Ghetto uprising.

Tuesday January 18, 2011

Today we went to a little town called Tykocin. It was like a stereotypical shtetl town (if you still don’t know what I’m talking about, think Fiddler on the Roof). After Tykocin, we went to the forest where some of the Jews fought before the Final Solution had been decided on. There was snow all around and before we entered the cemetery part of the forest, I had a mini snowball fight with a couple of my friends. Once we left the forest, we started heading to our (please forgive the wording here) final destination, Treblinka. It was probably the hardest place to visit. This was the one place that the Nazis actually did what they needed to do and hid all the evidence as they had planned. There was nothing left. Just stone memorials with nobody’s name mentioned, except for Janus Korchak’s. At Treblinka, we also had a ceremony dedicated to those who didn’t survive at Treblinka. It was too eerily quiet at Treblinka.

Best Night Ever & I Saw the Pope...video included

My Australian roommate and I decided to get fat and go get gelato. We said "we're in Rome, we might as well." We were walking around looking for a gelateria, but couldn't find one anywhere. We were convinced that the people of Rome were hiding the gelato from us, and our Italian lovers (of whom don't actually exist...DON'T WORRY DAD). We walked past this one restaurant where one of the waiters, who was standing outside trying to get people eat there, handed us a card. We walked into the train station and found gelato that satisfied both of our needs: variety of flavors and enough gelato to make us happy. We got 3 flavors each. Then, we decided to go get dinner and walked to the restaurant that we had walked past previously. We sat down, ordered our food and a half bottle of wine (red wine for me). During the meal, we learned the waiter who handed us the card was Moroccon and the inside waiter was Indian. As we were finishing up our meal, the Indian waiter came up to us and said at 11:30 we close, you will come out with us? At first, we thought it was a joke, but he was persistant about it and we realized he wasn't joking. We asked for the bill and quickly left. We got back to the hostel, met a new roommate (also from Australia). We ended up talking about religion and history and it's interpretation, then she and I decided to go to the Trevi Fountain and make a wish and take pictures. I put on a dress, and we headed out. Along the way, we decided we might as well get more gelato. We went into this restaurant/gelateria, paid, then got gelato. I got kiwi and watermelon. It was delicious. The guy who served us gelato knew I was from the States and asked me if I spoke Italian. I said no, but he still said something to me in Italian. As we were looking for the Trevi Fountain, we asked someone if we were going the correct way. He said we were. After we left him, I wanted to go back to him because I thought that he looked and sounded like Seth Rogen. We continued on our way and got to the Trevi Fountain. We took pictures and a couple asked us to take a picture of them. The husband was from New York and the wife was from Colombia. As my roommate was taking pictures, one of the picture-taking-mosquitos came up to me, asked me my age, said he like 18, and told me I was very beautiful. Then as we were taking pictures of ourselves, 2 Italian men (who were kinda old) came up to us, one asked "are you from Texas?" and I said yes. We soon realized he was asking my Australian roommate. Then they asked where she's from. They guessed the United States and Canada (even though she has a distinct Australian accent). We talked for a bit, then for some reason, they asked me what my astrological sign was (the second time I had been asked that question that night). As we shook them off, another mosquito-picture-taker came up to us, handed us roses, we took pictures with them, then he asked for money...so we handed them back to him. We had decided that from the time we found the first gelato place to the time we got back to the hostel after the Trevi Fountain, everything had worked out for us.

I was suggested to go to the Vatican today to see the pope speak in St. Petersburg Square. So I said why not, I have nothing else to do today. Everything I really had wanted to do, I did the previous day: the Colosseum, Pantheon, Trevi Fountain (twice in fact), the number of churches, etc... So as I arrived in the Vatican, I said to myself "I'm in another country." Then my next thought was "I'm actually at the Vatican. Wow." Finally I said "I'm going to see the pope today. This is a once in a lifetime opportunity." I stood around St. Petersburg Square for an hour just waiting to see the pope. I videotaped everything he said, including the blessings he gave. Imagine...me, a good Jewish girl, receiving a priestly blessing from the pope himself in St. Petersburg Square. After he said his blessings, I think I was the only one who did not respond with 'amen.'

When in Rome

So I am in Rome. This is the last stop of my journey unti lIsrael Experience Week (where I will be in Poland). Yesterday, in Florence, I came down to breakfast and saw 3 fellow Nativers. After breakfast, we went our separate ways for the day. I went to the Vecchio museum (which has a copy of the David outside in case any of you were wondering how I managed to take a picture of the David), I went to the Accademia Gallery (which hosts the real David), and I went to the Uffitzi (which hosts my absolute favorite painting, The Birth of Venus). I had walked around a bit more and when it began to get dark, I went back to the hostel to relax for the night. The 3 Nativers I saw at breakfast came back, we talked for a bit, then they went to bed. I stayed on my computer. An hour later, 6 more Nativers walked in. I knew I was going to see them in Rome, but I was surprised to see them in Florence. This morning, we learned that all 10 of us were staying at the same hostel this weekend. After breakfast, I checked out of my room, got on the bus, and headed to the train station for a 9:25 train to Rome. A smooth ride for the most part. When I got off the train, I learned that the hostel was a 5 minute walk from the station. I checked in to the hostel, but I couldn't get into my room until 3:00. So I decided to walk around Rome to get to know the area a little bit before I actually went sight seeing. I walked to the Trevi Fountain and around. As I walked around even more, I felt nervous. Of all the places I'd been travelling in alone, I did not feel safe in Rome. I came back to the hostel to relax some more. 15 til 3, the 3 Nativers I first met up with in Florence asked me what I was doing for Shabbat. Not realizing it was Friday, I had nothing planned. I have a very limited time in Europe because I head back to Israel Sunday night, so I plan on spending Saturday sight seeing in Rome. I also learned that even more Nativers are staying at the same hostel. It should be an interesting weekend. As they say, "When in Rome, do as the Romans do." I'm not quite sure what that means, but I sure plan to find out

Venice and Florence

I arrived in Venice in the afternoon. The hostel's website had a list of how to get there depending on where you were. After the airport, I got on a bus that takes you to the central bus station. It cost 3 euro. When I got to the central bus station, I bought a 24 hour waterbus ticket and hopped on the waterbus that would take me to the stop near my hostel. A 30 minute waterbus ride isn't that bad. I got to the hostel, went to my room, chilled for a bit. Realizing I forgot an alarm clock, I went out to see what I could find. On the bus ride, I discovered my ipod has an alarm clock on it. Problem solved. The next day, I went out to explore the city. I went to the Rialto bridge, explored around, managed to get lost a little bit. In the process of getting lost, I managed to find a synagogue and a Kosher restaurant. Go figure. I then decided to go to the other side of Venice and explore St. Mark's Square. I did not go into Doge's Palace because the line was too long and why bother if I feel no connection to it. I did take pictures of the outside of course. I walked around a little bit and saw a great thing: The Ferrari Store. Yes, I did go in and yes, I did buy a Ferrari....

...set of golf balls. I walked around a little more, got lost again, but found my way after a little while. I went back to the hostel and decided to go out for dinner at a little restaurant right next to the Rialto bridge. I sat outside, under a heater, got pasta and a dessert. The outside waiters/host were very friendly, energetic, funny people. After a wonderful dinner, I went back to the hostel, relaxed a bit, then went to sleep. This morning I made my way to Florence via train. I found my car and seat (Car 7, Seat 36: next to the window). I was unaware that the train made several stops before reaching its final destination. Getting on 2 stations after me was a nun who ended up sitting next to me (of course my חיnecklace was hanging out). Now to figure out what to do in Florence

Silvester in Berlin

I am currently in Berlin. I am staying with my dad's college roommate, Duane, in Berlin. I was here for New Year's (which I have recently learned), called Silvester. Here during Silvester, people set off fireworks, cracklers, sparklers, etc. Berliners like to drink glühwein, beer, and sparkling wine. They eat döner kebabs, apple strudel, pastries with numerous fillings. Fillings include chocolate, a mixture of 4 fruits, banana, cherry, egg nog type cream, etc. Yesterday, I walked around East Berlin and saw the Brandenburg Gate, a Holocaust memorial, Reichstag, Potsdamer Platz (Sony Center), Unter den Linden (Under the Linden trees), Hackesche Hoefe (traditional courtyards development), the Bebel Platz (underground library commemorating the book burning), the New Synagogue and many museums. Last night, I was in West Berling and saw the ruins of the memorial church, Charlottenburg Palace, and the Schinkel Pavillion (where a nymphomaniac queen had a balcony so that her lovers would not have to see each other). I went back to Brandenburg Gate to see what happened during New Year's. It wasn't much. I had a beer (because I'm in Germany and that's one of the things that you have to do), but still, I don't like the taste of beer. Still, it was my first legal New Year's. There was a band (but they weren't very good). At 23:00, live coverage began there, but I had left about an hour before because it was quite boring.

Germany is a lot of fun. Today I went to the Jewish Museum. The museum is about Jews in Berlin from the mideval times until the present. It was a very interesting experience.