I'd wake up four days a week at 7:30, and by wake up I mean turn off my alarm and wait for Louis to come yell at me to actually get up. I'd have until he made his coffee to actually start moving otherwise he'd walk down without me. After I threw on my jeans and t-shirt, we'd take the 6 minute walk down the road to the dining hall. We either met up with Mia outside her building or down at breakfast, but we'd take our time eating. Fresh tomatoes, cucumbers, and peppers that we cut up the day before; cottage cheese; two bowls of cereal; and a cup of tea that was never quite strong enough, but the excessive amount of sugar in it made up for that.
As our friends showed up to eat, the three of us would head into the back and throw on our aprons. During a week one of us would work in the שתיפה (dishwasher) while the other two would start cutting up trays of vegetables for tomorrow morning; 2 trays of diagonally sliced cucumbers, 2 trays of thinly sliced peppers (usually red or yellow), and 2 trays of tomatoes. You really only had to wash the cherry tomatoes and take off the stems, but the large tomatoes had to be cored and sliced. We got pretty good at it, but only after a few close encounters (don't worry, Louis's hand is fine).
After about an hour or two, a sweet old Russian lady would come around asking who wanted tea or coffee? This tea was much better. Louis, Mia, and I would grab a few oranges from the fridge and take our tea out to the back loading dock for a break. We'd try being nice to the cats out back, but (as to be expected) they thought they were too good for us. So we were friendly with the cats until they were mean…then we hated them. O! Except for this one hideous one! We hated it all the time. It's not our fault though, it had this one eye that looked like it was going to pop out and it lived in the dumpster…it was terrifying.
One day we were out on our break and Louis and I decided it would be fun to climb up onto the roof. We had done it a few days earlier and all our scratches from the ledge had healed, so we were ready to go again. I never said it was a smart idea, but we had a good time so shut up.
Once up there, obviously we were going to have fun yelling at our bosses and watch them look around for us only to then realize that, "yup, the dumb American kids are on the roof again." Then, Chaim walked by. Now my Hebrew isn't amazing, but I'd been working with people who spoke no English for 3 months at this point; I clearly recognized when he shouted, "stay up there, I have a job for y'all" in Hebrew.
After a bit of shouting, I pieced together that there was an old air conditioning unit on the roof that Chaim wanted Louis and I to carry over to the edge of the roof. So we did. Then came the fun part. Chaim threw us a rope and said, "now lower it down." Louis and I were volunteers in the kitchen, and neither of us were in scouts…we didn't know jack about tying knots! We had no clue how to lower this 100+ pound unit off the 35(ish) foot roof, but we were willing to make it up.
We tried to wrap up the A/C, but after a while Chaim grabbed a ladder to come up and show us how it was done. Again, after a bit of struggling through the language barrier, Louis and I understood how exactly Chaim expected the three of us to lower down this appliance without dropping it…o ya, or falling off the roof.
We braced, kicked the air conditioner off the edge, and began to lower it down. Everything was going fine until it got stuck on something that stopped it from lowering. Chaim told Louis and I to hold tight while he went to check what happened. We pulled tighter, and waited for Chaim to tell us the problem. He peered over the ledge and just started laughing. It was already on the ground. Louis and I were preventing a stationary, broken air conditioner from falling to the ground.
Sunday, August 12, 2012
Cycone Sunday
At the Hebrew University I took a lot of classes that I'd love to talk about. I learned a lot of really interesting things…just not in Israeli Legal System. Don't get me wrong, I enjoyed the class, my professor was awesome, and I did learn a lot, but the class was at 6:15 at night until 9:30…on Sunday. THIS IS THE MOST DIFFICULT CULTURAL DIFFERENCE TO ACCEPT WHEN GOING TO ISRAEL FROM AMERICA! Sunday is a work day. We asked Aryeh's grandparents, who made aliyah to Israel over 30 years ago, and even they still miss Sunday. Luckily, I carefully planned my schedule so this was my one and only class on Sunday (it may not be a weekend, but I'll be damned if I wasn't going to sleep in).
Now, again, I did enjoy this class, I just wasn't sure why it had to be three hours long. There were six of us from Nativ in the class, making up almost a half of it, and we honestly spent most of our time in class people watching. There were people from all over the world in the class. We had one or two students in the class that were on their way to have professions in a legal field that were looking to learn more about a foreign legal system; the information they were getting in this class was not what they were expecting (one of them never came back [good riddance…she sucked]) The rest of them just asked the most ridiculous questions, distracted Dr. Hammer, and made 30 minutes of actual information take three hours to learn. I know the time frame because the six of us missed a class due to a Nativ program, and Dr. Hammer was nice enough to meet up with us one night to go over the lesson. We met him at a little restaurant, had a 30 minute lecture, and then enjoyed a cup of coffee (it was a much better way to learn). Then, we left and saw him later at a concert that he suggested we go to 2 weeks earlier. Dr. Hammer was awesome.
Honorable mention: Reuben "Ruby Tuesday" was a huge guy that we loved to just listen to speak. I won't get into it, but everything out of his mouth was a riot…AND HE SPOKE FLUENT FRENCH!!! WHAT?!?!?!
After class, we'd take the 9:45 19 bus back up to Beit Nativ. Dr. Hammer was always on the same bus. For a while we didn't talk to him, but a few weeks in we decided to take some time to chat with him. Again, he was awesome. Three or four of us would stay on an extra stop to get let off across the street from our favorite pizza place, Cycone, and spend a few extra minutes hanging out with "The Hammer." We'd get a pie or two (each), walk back to the fountain across from Beit Nativ, eat half of a pizza there (or a whole one…it's a college leadership program, don't judge me), and put the leftovers in the fridge for later in the week. It was perfect.
Now, again, I did enjoy this class, I just wasn't sure why it had to be three hours long. There were six of us from Nativ in the class, making up almost a half of it, and we honestly spent most of our time in class people watching. There were people from all over the world in the class. We had one or two students in the class that were on their way to have professions in a legal field that were looking to learn more about a foreign legal system; the information they were getting in this class was not what they were expecting (one of them never came back [good riddance…she sucked]) The rest of them just asked the most ridiculous questions, distracted Dr. Hammer, and made 30 minutes of actual information take three hours to learn. I know the time frame because the six of us missed a class due to a Nativ program, and Dr. Hammer was nice enough to meet up with us one night to go over the lesson. We met him at a little restaurant, had a 30 minute lecture, and then enjoyed a cup of coffee (it was a much better way to learn). Then, we left and saw him later at a concert that he suggested we go to 2 weeks earlier. Dr. Hammer was awesome.
Honorable mention: Reuben "Ruby Tuesday" was a huge guy that we loved to just listen to speak. I won't get into it, but everything out of his mouth was a riot…AND HE SPOKE FLUENT FRENCH!!! WHAT?!?!?!
After class, we'd take the 9:45 19 bus back up to Beit Nativ. Dr. Hammer was always on the same bus. For a while we didn't talk to him, but a few weeks in we decided to take some time to chat with him. Again, he was awesome. Three or four of us would stay on an extra stop to get let off across the street from our favorite pizza place, Cycone, and spend a few extra minutes hanging out with "The Hammer." We'd get a pie or two (each), walk back to the fountain across from Beit Nativ, eat half of a pizza there (or a whole one…it's a college leadership program, don't judge me), and put the leftovers in the fridge for later in the week. It was perfect.
Not IL, IL - 2
I was spending yet another weekend in Ramat Gan with my family. It was right near the beginning of second semester and my friends were going to see the Hunger Games at a theater in Haifa. Being that I never read the book and honestly had no idea what the hell it was, I didn't feel bad ditching the group of Nativers to go see my family. Shortly after arriving in Ramat Gan, my 21 year old cousin told me he was going to see it with some of his friends. Since I wanted to spend time with my cousin, I agreed to go. I traveled for an hour and a half to go to another city…to do the same thing my friends were doing in Haifa.
I had been in Israel nearly five months at this point and not much shook me culturally at this point. That being said, as we drove up to the mall I was blown away by what happened.
After picking up my cousin's two friends, we were driving up to the mall and went to find the parking garage. As we pulled into the parking garage, a man in a yellow traffic vest came over to meet us. My cousin pulled down the window and the man asked him to open the trunk. From the passenger seat I was thinking, "excuse me?! You can't just walk up to us and ask us to pop the trunk…mind your own damn business (expletive)." Without a question, my cousin opened the trunk, the guy took a look, closed it up, tapped the car, and we were on our way.
Israel lives with the constant threat of terrorist attacks, and a commonly reoccurring theme between the thousands of attacks Israel has experienced are bombs and public places full of civilians. The slanted tree next to the cafe at the Hebrew University that I ate at marked one such location.
Maybe a second after we pulled away from the garage attendant, it occurred to me that everyone who pulls into that garage gets searched. I imagined someone in America being asked to pop their trunk, the yelling match that would occur, the declaration that his constitutional rights were being infringed upon, and the weeks of media coverage that would surround the issue.
I commented about the encounter to my cousin when we walked into the mall. He hadn't given it a second thought.
I had been in Israel nearly five months at this point and not much shook me culturally at this point. That being said, as we drove up to the mall I was blown away by what happened.
After picking up my cousin's two friends, we were driving up to the mall and went to find the parking garage. As we pulled into the parking garage, a man in a yellow traffic vest came over to meet us. My cousin pulled down the window and the man asked him to open the trunk. From the passenger seat I was thinking, "excuse me?! You can't just walk up to us and ask us to pop the trunk…mind your own damn business (expletive)." Without a question, my cousin opened the trunk, the guy took a look, closed it up, tapped the car, and we were on our way.
Israel lives with the constant threat of terrorist attacks, and a commonly reoccurring theme between the thousands of attacks Israel has experienced are bombs and public places full of civilians. The slanted tree next to the cafe at the Hebrew University that I ate at marked one such location.
Maybe a second after we pulled away from the garage attendant, it occurred to me that everyone who pulls into that garage gets searched. I imagined someone in America being asked to pop their trunk, the yelling match that would occur, the declaration that his constitutional rights were being infringed upon, and the weeks of media coverage that would surround the issue.
I commented about the encounter to my cousin when we walked into the mall. He hadn't given it a second thought.
Basketball
Most nights during the first semester we'd go out and play ball at Gan HaPaamon. There were public courts set up and most of the hoops were close enough to ten feet. Usually you could get a handful of guys together to play a game, but the scheduled night for ball was Wednesday. About thirty of us would head over and play ball for a couple hours, but almost everyone cleared out by 11:30 or so; everyone except Brian, Moshe, Aryeh, and myself. We'd stick around getting in on pick up games with local guys. A lot of them were religious guys studying at Yeshiva, Arab Israelis, and once we played with a few guys from a tank unit in the army.
We played regularly and we recognized a lot of people around the park…we also happened to hate a few of them. One of these guys was an older guy from a Yeshiva named Aaron. He played violent basketball, called for the ball every ten seconds, yelled at his teammates, and had the ugliest damn shot I've ever seen. What's worse: it went in (probably a bit too often). Aryeh usually got stuck defending him and he looked forward to getting a chance to put Aaron in his place every week. Aryeh speaks great Hebrew and I'm positive all the trash talking Aaron thought we wouldn't understand only made Aryeh play better.
Long after everyone else had left the park, the four of us would still be hanging out. It was a great time to be with people I love playing basketball. We'd stay out until the lights would shut off (about 2am); then we'd walk up the street to the 24/6 market, SOS, (not open on Shabbis), and get snacks. Each of us would get a 1.5 liter of Fanta Orange Mango, Fanta Exotic, or Fanta Lemon and a big bag of chips. I usually went for the Terra Chips, Aryeh and Moshe liked to get a variety of stuff, but Brian would always, ALWAYS get the flaming hot Doritos. Every week he'd talk about getting something else, but he could never bring himself to do it. We'd take our snacks outside, sit on the couches in the courtyard, and talk about how we had to wake up for classes in the morning.
We'd usually be out there until about 3am, but even after we walked back to Beit Nativ we'd sit in the lobby until about four. I'm really not sure how I got to Hebrew class every Thursday morning...
We played regularly and we recognized a lot of people around the park…we also happened to hate a few of them. One of these guys was an older guy from a Yeshiva named Aaron. He played violent basketball, called for the ball every ten seconds, yelled at his teammates, and had the ugliest damn shot I've ever seen. What's worse: it went in (probably a bit too often). Aryeh usually got stuck defending him and he looked forward to getting a chance to put Aaron in his place every week. Aryeh speaks great Hebrew and I'm positive all the trash talking Aaron thought we wouldn't understand only made Aryeh play better.
Long after everyone else had left the park, the four of us would still be hanging out. It was a great time to be with people I love playing basketball. We'd stay out until the lights would shut off (about 2am); then we'd walk up the street to the 24/6 market, SOS, (not open on Shabbis), and get snacks. Each of us would get a 1.5 liter of Fanta Orange Mango, Fanta Exotic, or Fanta Lemon and a big bag of chips. I usually went for the Terra Chips, Aryeh and Moshe liked to get a variety of stuff, but Brian would always, ALWAYS get the flaming hot Doritos. Every week he'd talk about getting something else, but he could never bring himself to do it. We'd take our snacks outside, sit on the couches in the courtyard, and talk about how we had to wake up for classes in the morning.
We'd usually be out there until about 3am, but even after we walked back to Beit Nativ we'd sit in the lobby until about four. I'm really not sure how I got to Hebrew class every Thursday morning...
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