Real life in Israel

Tuesday, February 2, 2010

Last night while we were cooking dinner we heard a loud explosion and were not quite sure what it was. Turns out that terrorists from the Gaza Strip had sent off barrels in the sea to land up on the beaches of Ashdod and Ashkelon. The noise was the Israelis blowing up the barrels of explosives. I have heard several mixed stories on exactly what happened but what was interesting was that atleast one of them was found by a citizen. In America we would never think to question a barrel. It is a different mentality over here. One of our city coordinators sent us an email telling us we should stay away from the beaches for a few days. Kinnert reminded us “When you first got here, we told you that we want you guys to experience life a true Israelis, and today you get "the chance" to see what it means. Isrealis overcome whatever we have sent at us.”

People seem to not be so worried but my Hebrew teacher, Hadass, said that this was a new type of attack and they will do what it takes to work on a similar situation the next time. Throughout class this morning we could hear military planes flying overhead, Hadass said that they do this to protect us and to remind others that the Israelis are watching.

I was debating sharing this or not because I didn’t want to worry anyone but like everyone is saying, this is the reality here, take the good with the bad and do what you have to do to protect yourself so there is no need to sugar coat my experience.

I feel like I learn a lot sitting in the classroom. It’s nice to get the perspective of our teacher and from just living the life of a student here. I have heard over and over again that Israel needs help with its education system but at many times I have felt like society here revolves around the schools. You can hear the school bells and songs ringing from where ever you are in the city and the schools seem to be such a central focus of each neighborhood. During one of our breaks in school today our teacher was telling us about an situation that occurs in Israel. Many times children of orthodox families who choose to leave orthodoxy are banished from the family. In Jerusalem there are organizations that exist solely to help these children. Its interesting to see how problems that occur with in the Israeli society rarely exist in other places.

After class today Anna and I ran around the city itself because we were supposed to stay away from the beach. Each and every day this city becomes more and more manageable. We ended our run at one of the adult workout centers. Very refreshing but Israelis definitely look at us like we are crazy because it doesn’t appear that many of them run. I think they would think we were crazy if we told them we walked the city.

This afternoon our group met up at the Matnas (community center) to hear from Momo, the head of Oranim. He was very passionate about the mission of Oranim and really pushed marrying Jewish and raising you children Jewish. After several of us went to the local basketball game. The men’s Ashdod team plays at a local high school every week. It was really an incredible experience. You could hear the screaming fans from both teams before you even enter the school. There was a lot of firsts for me. Jews can play basketball? People wear tzitzit to basketball games? People kiss mezuzahs at sporting events, security guards wearing kippahs? All very interesting and new. The energy in the room was incredible. Each team was decked out in their colors and cheers filled the room the entire time, instruments, whistles and all. I hope to make these games part of my weekly routine, the girls basketball and a soccer team here play weekly also.

Today we were assigned our schools. I was placed at a local religious high school. It also happens to be less than a kilometer from my house, which is incredible. I am excited to get to know a new environment and work with an interesting group of students, it will be nice to experience the holidays with them in the classroom and see how they choose to practice Judaism. I asked my city coordinator about the atmosphere of my school and what I should expect, she said that the principle and teachers are incredible but eventhought it is a religous school it is still a rough environment. Supposely stuents got pretty crazy there last semester. I will also have to wear a skirt to my knees everyday so I am going to have to get some appropriate clothing.

Wednesday February 3, 2010

Today I really began to feel like I live here in Israel. I went to ulpan this morning and then walked with a group of people along the beach to the shuk. The weather was not so good but that did not stop us. I found some really cute scarves, bought raisons, walnuts, figs and apricots for maybe 6 dollars then the rain really began to fall. I quickly ran around the market gathering carrots, eggplant, cucumbers, tomatoes and oranges all for just a few dollars. I’ve never thought it was possible to buy fresh food for so cheap. People started to close up because of the weather so we weren’t able to get everything we came for, next week will come soon.

We headed home on the bus and had a bit of time to unpack and relax before we headed out to check out some more possible volunteer sights. We went to a matnas (community center) in another area of Ashdod. (Ashdod is divided up into atleast 14 neighborhoods all with different schools and community centers). For one who has never been to a matnas it is kind of an incredible place. Its like having a JCC in every neighborhood in a city. They have after school programs and each one has different specialized programs by age, disabilities or any other thing you could think of. Many are huge beautiful buildings.

The one we went to today had 2 different placed for us to volunteer in. The first was a place for children with motor disabilities to hang out in the afternoons, I was reluctant to go but I decided to check it out. Wednesdays they bring in animals for the children to play with I believe for theraputic reasons. They were such sweet kids. It was really an incredible experience. The lack of communication between us and them (because of the language and because of their disabilities) made no difference. Seeing the smiles on their faces from just sitting there, holding our hands was incredible. I have never seen so many people touched by such a simple gesture. The woman in charge of the program said that she hadn’t seen this young boy so happy since the last group of Oranim participants were volunteering there. Afterwards we went downstairs to a different part of the community center where they have programs for students, we met young third graders and kids as old as 16. I believe they all choose to come here and its great that they have somewhere to go after school and that they have good role models in their lives.

On our way home we stopped at the local market by our house. I stop by everyday so I am getting to know David the owner. I also talk to the fish man, Simon. It’s a real cast of characters, hoping to be able to get a discount on the fish soon. We cooked fish Kabobs for dinner and they were delicious. Its truly amazing how wherever we go in the city and whoever we talk to everyone appreciates us and the work we haven’t even begun to do yet. I am really starting to feel comfortable here, I am not a tourist, I feel like I live here.

Thursday February 4, 2010

Thursday is the last day of the work week here. So we completed our first week of Ulpan class. At the end our teacher was like “Its Thursday, we must sing.” I guess in schools here they sing at the end of the week but I will find out more when I get to my school. At the end of the day we went into the classroom with the other Hebrew class and sang hebrew songs together. Some I knew some I didn’t and she even translated a few very simple songs that we all know like Havanagila and other childhood Hebrew songs. Its amazing how much people sing it and they have no idea what it means. I looked up the meaning and I guess its something like “Let's rejoice and be happy, Let's sing and be happy, Awake, awake, brothers! Awake brothers with a happy heart.” The teacher says well sing more next week…

This afternoon most of us went to check out and volunteer at a local food cupboard. It is an organization where they buy left over fruits and vegetables for very subsidizes rates and then bag them up for people in Ashdod that need help putting food on their tables. This organization was started in honor of a soldier that lived in the area who was killed in the second Lebanon war in the summer of 2006. His friends and family say that he cared about helping everyone around him and would really appreciate this. It is the only volunteer place where the work is physical and you understand in a different way how much of an impact you are making. I think we created over 200 bags of food for the local community. I hope to try to work into my schedule to come here because it only happens once a week, since there were so many of us there it took us just an hour to do so much work. At the end they even let us take home some of the leftover food.

Afterwards I went shopping in the area to try and find some shoes that will be appropriate for me to wear while working in the religious schools. There were a lot of interesting clothing stores that I will have to check out this week.

Tonight we planned to go out for dinner with our whole house. We got a recommendation for a restaurant, Nasim, in the Industrial Port which is supposed to be the trendy going out area. We decided to just order several plates for the table and share everything. The food came out and it was incredible. We had huge Greek salads, chicken kabob, chicken wings, snitzel and pizza. We also ordered a Belgium waffle for the table, everything was incredible. I believe after food and drinks for 10 we only paid 20 dollars a person. We played games, serious and funny, and had a great time getting to know each other a bit better.

Until next time.