Israel and its Neighbors

Sunday, May 30, 2010

School in the morning as usual, half of the classes cancelled. Things are really starting to unwind as the year ends. You think kids in America get distracted at the end of the year... Because of the exam
schedule here the last month is basically impossible for me to follow what is going on.

Monday, May 31, 2010
 
Today I had off from school so I decided to head to Jerusalem to run some errands before I left. I went in with my friend Aron, first we walked by the Israeli Supreme Court and Knesset (Parliament) and then we went shopping in the Old City.

While we were there I got an email from the NYTimes Update that there had been 10 people killed when Israeli soldiers boarded a boat headed for Gaza with foreign aid. I did not know what to make if this and we had heard recently in the news Israel was encouraging the boats to stop in Ashdod to be check out first on their way in but that did not happen. (Egypt gave the same offer). We continued on and headed to the Western Wall. It was interesting to think back to my first experience at the Wall this trip. I was thinking how it was one of the first times I was going to the wall knowing I would be back in the near future so I did not necessarily need to feel rushed. This time, I went thinking this probably is my last time. I had a nice time being there alone and its nice to leave on a good, content note.

Afterwards I went to meet up with my friend Rachel Kosoff who is in Israel with her family. We were about to head into the Muslim quarter of the Old City and we noticed most of the stores were closed. We went in to one to see what was happening and we learned that they were all closing down for 3 days in solidarity with what happened with the boat headed to Gaza. That is when I knew things were a bit more serious than I expected. I walked around a bit longer with Rachel and then Aron and I headed back to Ashdod for afternoon volunteering.

As we drove back into Ashdod we noticed a lot of traffic and got a text from a friend that there was some commotion going on at the port.

I got to my volunteering and we had a new student today. We were nervous about his English level and all of a sudden he started speaking to us in English. He was born in Argentina, learned English there, moved to Israel a while ago for 2 years in Eilat, then moved back to Argentina and now was back in Israel for the past 6 months. He was a very interesting, bright young boy. I asked him about what was going on in the news today and the possibility of war. He answered saying that he really enjoys summer and is looking forward to it so he hopes if there has to be a war its in the fall. It continues to amaze me of the realities of this country. This boy who has not even lived here for that long has to think about such problems as war and how it will effect him. These kids are not sheltered from anything here.

I went home and we watched the news a bit and all shared our opinions and experiences of the day. A few of my housemates were at the port witnessing the Pro-Israel protests going on. I heard there were 2 Muslim women sitting there watching what was happening. They spotted a Muslim man wearing a Free Gilad shirt and pin (the soldier who is still captured) and they started to get in an argument with him, probably saying, how can you be a Muslim and stick up for Israel and its military and then all of a sudden the pretty quite protesters were chanting and singing around all of this. I am sure this was quite crazy to witness. There was also tons of media crews in Ashdod because the boats were brought here to be searched and they took many of the people from the ships from here to jail, I heard many went to Be’er Sheva, others opted to be sent back to their countries.

For those of you following the media, you obviously here different things from different people, you can learn for yourselves and make your own opinions. I really do not know what will happen from here but to be honest, it does not feel like much had changed around me. Maybe its my American bubble or maybe I am right and things are going on as usual, who knows. We have not received an email from the program or anything and things are continuing on as normal.

Tuesday, June 1, 2010

This morning I woke up to write my family an email about the situation here and I immediately noticed that I heard planes flying overhead. We hear them every once in a while and its just usual military procedures and I am sure people checking up on Gaza but its been pretty constant today. I am not really sure what is going on and you all probably know just as much as me.

I went to school today and worked with a new class of 9th grade girls. They were very sweet and we just spent the period introducing ourselves. 4 out of the 5 girls were born in France and lived there until they were between the ages of 7-10, the other girl was born in Israel but of Indian background. The diversity and stories of the students from this school and the Jewish people as a whole never ceases to amaze me.

This afternoon we had an enrichment regarding the Israeli Army which happened to come at a good time but I wish we had talked more about current events. After I went with some of the people in my house to jump in to the Mediterranean, we are only here for so much longer and I do not want to take these last few weeks for granted.

Our Israeli friend Ohad drove in for dinner and we made him a big (semi- American feast). We cooked eggplant parm, garlic bread, salad and quinoa. We made sure to be really Israeli and make sure he was stuffed before he left.