All Shakshuk Up

I continued not to take any particularly relevant pictures, so I will continue to post mostly unrelated ones.

World Famous Team Shakshuka

After doing a bunch of things (and some stuff) for the past few weeks, I attended a Shabbaton this past weekend devoted to developing participants' understanding of Security and Diplomacy in Israel. In short, it was extremely interesting and I learned a ton.  In long:

When I was 9 years younger, I remember being in Israel around the time of the Gaza disengagement and having no idea what was happening/feeling completely disconnected from what little idea I had of what was happening.  I knew that lots of people had a bunch of opinions that didn't coincide with one another, but I don't recall having an especially firm grasp on what exactly the Gaza disengagement was, and settled with counting the number of orange anti-disengagement ribbons and blue pro-disengagement ribbons cars were advertising at the time.  The first stop on the Shabbaton was an overlook of the Gaza strip.  There was a strong emphasis on the human aspect of the conflict, a side I tend to immediately be drawn to (if it wasn't obvious from previous posts).  The guides spoke about a small cluster of gravestones not far from where we stood, placed there as a result of the strange process of relocating Israeli graves in Gaza during the disengagement to enable families to visit the graves in the future.  We ate lunch by a school named after Ella Abukassis, a teenager from Sderot (one of the hardest hit and most densely populated cities close the Gaza border where civilians have 15 seconds to take cover after hearing a rocket warning siren) who was killed by a rocket attack after laying over her younger brother to protect him.  We also visited the famous playground caterpillar bomb shelter in Sderot and talked about how traumatizing it is for children to grow up in a place like Sderot or Gaza, and how impossible it must be for children to understand and process, considering how many grown adults also suffer from post traumatic stress.  We also learned that because Gaza is exactly 26 miles long, there has been a Gaza marathon.  It seems like the only time it happened was in 2011, and then according to Wikipedia, "In 2013 the marathon was scheduled for April 10, but was cancelled following a decision by Hamas, who rules the Gaza Strip, not to allow women to participate." I have all kinds of feelings on all these things.

Gaza

Caterpillar Bomb Shelter in Sderot

One of the first sessions I attended was about asymmetrical warfare, in which we talked about different moral dilemmas and what actions a government can take to eliminate terrorist acts/what makes asymmetrical warfare asymmetrical. In terms of one of the terrorist acts that recently happened in Jerusalem in which a van drove into a crowd of people on the sidewalk, the terrorist is abusing a system (that ordinarily holds a certain amount of trust) by taking advantage of the the baseline trust level that citizens have in order to function in any kind of less than paranoid way.  However, in these delicate systems of trust it only takes one person to shatter the trust and disrupt the peace.  It suddenly gives you reason to believe that strangers you pass everyday have the potential to attack at any moment.  Ironically, the only way of preventing this kind of warfare is by taking rights away from civilians, disturbing their lives, and following through with the terrorist's initial intentions.  But when the only way of protecting civilians is by making rocks, knives, any hard object unavailable, it the solution is completely unrealistic and can leave the public with debilitating fear.

The last talk I went to was about the future of the Israeli Palestinian Conflict.  The speaker talked about how complicated it is for two groups of people to be in the same place for a long enough time to establish the same national identity.  He spoke about the separation barrier/security fence/apartheid wall that, although it has has decreased terrorist acts to some extent, has also worked to separate people who used to see each other everyday, causing greater misunderstanding, fear, and isolation on both sides.  He contrasted the tense Israeli-Palestinian relationship to the peaceful coexistence currently experienced by Greek Orthodox/Christian/Catholic Church and Jews, even though this kind of compatibility would have been imperceivable 100 years ago.  Today, there are tourist maps drawn by Christians that depict a Christian view of the world that does not coincide with the Jewish world, yet it does not deeply disturb the general public. As a result, the speaker proposed promoting coexistence, insisting that "there is an amazing magical impact of human contact."  It sounded really great to me, but this statement seemed a bit too warm and fuzzy to effectively solve such a deep rooted conflict. He explained further. People love their neighbors and friends and are more likely to feel animosity towards and demonize people they are isolated from.  Simple solution (ha): remove the hate and the map won't matter.  Easy, right? The way he spoke about it made it seems incredibly realistic, and there are even programs today that work to forward this idea.  For example, MEET (Middle East Entrepreneurs of Tomorrow) "is an innovative educational initiative aimed at creating a common professional language between Israeli and Palestinian young leaders." Which to me, sounds awesome.  However, people are understandably very cynical about this idea, which I guess is exactly what it's trying to combat. Cyclical cynicism!

Magical Bookstore in Tel Aviv

I also attended a talk from a diplomatic correspondent from i24 news, from One Voice Palestine, and a lecture on militant/terrorist groups in the Middle East.  Everything was super interesting and I learned so much/got significantly more confused about everything in the way that copious amounts of information I care about usually makes me.

Post Hot Yoga, Roladin's Halva and Chocolate Chip Rugalach-like delicious thing of wonder/
How to reap the fewest benefits from hot yoga

Other than that, I had an amazing experience at the post office on a Friday afternoon where I spent over an hour waiting to get a friend's package as a mob of angry mail recipients persistently pushed their way past innocent Americans (I was told that this was not nearly the worst of it and that we had just missed an actual fight that had to be broken up.).  We eventually made it to the front of the line when one of the particularly frustrated stomped away in a huff and gave us his line number.  After waiting for a guard to free us/unlock the door, we finally reentered the world of personal space and lower tensions.  The experience reminded me a lot of this.  Thanks for preparing me, 30 Rock.

View from the bus I spent an hour and forty minutes on today/
Abstract representation of how Israelis experience rain induced driving hysteria

Mamash Mishmosh of Mishmish

I haven't really taken any pictures illustrating anything I've written about, so I will place unrelated pictures randomly throughout. It will be surprising AND exciting. Starting with:

Jerusalem skies

Sitting by the beach on my birthday day!

Birthday cake with family in Kiryat Motskin

I keep hearing hebrew words around me that, once defined, I wonder how I've been able to avoid adding them to my vocabulary during my many years of Hebrew learning. Like the word for to make an effort...it just seems like I should have come across it by now. But this has been happening a lot, so I'm not sure how my expectations for my Hebrew word bank haven't adjusted to the semi-constant reminder that some pretty serious limitations exist when actually trying to convey accurate accounts of...anything. Something silly: I asked an Israeli friend to speak in Hebrew to me while I answer in English so I could practice some Hebrew without being too significantly and consistently ashamed of myself.  After a while, he told me that talking to me was like being at the theater and talking to an American movie that talks back. Which seemed like a pretty lovely and creative way of putting it. Anyway, just wanted to update all two of you about my slowly progressing hebrew situation (matzav!...situatzia?).

Something important and relevant I found on Instagram

This past Sunday our program spent the day in Jerusalem listening to various representatives from contrasting sects of Judaism. Our first stop was a synagogue in a Haredi community called Belz, where we listened to one of the members speak about the history of this sect and answer questions from our group. Because I've had some experience learning about this sect of Judaism, the most interesting and pretty amazing thing for me was to see everyone's reactions to the extremely unconventional way of life. For example: the complete lack of understanding or even awareness of the existence of sex before marriage (basically, age 18).  It was pretty unfathomable to some that this community would be able to isolate themselves effectively enough to allow parents to prevent their kids from obtaining any kind of formal or informal sex education.  However, as someone who grew up in this community and has a deep understanding of it, this man was quite confident in the effectiveness of the system.  Members of our group were also particularly shocked that teenagers would put enough trust in their parents to completely take over the common practice of romance before marriage.  The man assured us that as opposed to the popular beliefs in more western styles of life, young adults in this community actually believe that parents have their best interests in mind and actually aren't trying to commit them to a life of agonizing torture with an unbearable spouse. Who knew?...Just kidding mommy and daddy, you can of course hand select my husband.

Catblob found in Tel Aviv

The next person we spoke to was a representative from the Israel Religious Action Center.  From the minimal explanation that they gave us, I didn't think I would particularly identify with what she was going to talk about. While understanding that sometimes it's necessary to evolve, I generally like tradition and can understand why religious members of a community would want portions of Israeli life to remain traditional, sometimes with a hint of archaic.  However, I felt that the way this woman approached the issues important to IRAC was simultaneously rational and sensitive and forward thinking.  For example, one of the issues she spoke about was the effort to desegregate buses on a few routes in Jerusalem.  I honestly did not know that this was happening, and initially thought that perhaps it makes sense that women and men would be separated on buses in these communities. They are crowded places and if mainly Haredi men and women who don't touch the opposite sex (apart from their spouses) are using the buses then it makes practical sense that some kind of invisible divide exists.  After clarifying that this organization attempts to combat issues that are brought up by members of the community who feel uncomfortable or mistreated (and not issues that unaffected outsiders simply decide are an issue), it made more sense that segregated buses would put a variety of people at a disadvantage: elderly women who have difficulties getting to the back of a bus or who are forced to stand when the back of the bus is full and no younger man in the front will get up for a woman in order to maintain the segregation (for example).  If one chooses to ride a public bus, they do not necessarily have to hug or sit next to a person of the opposite sex, but rather should accept the possibility of brushing against someone in the process of making everyone involved as comfortable and equal as possible.  A few other issues she spoke about were combating racism in Israel and adding and Egalitarian section to the Western Wall.  All sound like good ideas to me, especially since the Haredi man we spoke to said that as long as he isn't forced to participate himself, he couldn't care less if Jews are adhering to tradition in a less precise way than he accustomed to (he spoke about this in relation to the Haredi position on movie theaters in Jerusalem being open on Shabbat, basically saying that it doesn't affect him if they're open because he wouldn't be in attendance either way. Though when it comes to voting on whether or not it should be open, he can't vote in favor because it is against his beliefs. Which although doesn't make sense at all, oddly makes a bit of sense. I think.).

Yama ladies selfie

Last night I ran my first 10k! One of my roommates (Talya) and I went to Tel Aviv to accompany the 20,000+ runners participating in the Night Run. It was all kinds of fun, but mostly the running kind.

At my shiniest 

Sukkot in Israel

Sukkot in Israel is kind of magical with a hint of silly (this may or may not be a country-wide opinion).  It's pretty amazing to see fast food restaurants on the street with small huts directly outside of them in order to allow people to complete the mitzva of sitting in a Sukka for every day of Sukkot while enjoying their hourly falafel/schnitzel/shawarma/hummus fix.  Also the happy-holiday-wishing LED screens on buses, store advertisements, other things, everywhere, give me such a warm happy feeling of community togetherness that seems like a somewhat ironic/confusing feeling to have and write about in a country of so much recent (as well as a bunch of less recent) tension, aggression, and complexity.  It's not that the pleasant barrage of well wishing didn't happen over Rosh Hashana, but being surrounded by "חג שמח"s accompanied by visual aids in the form of huts plopped every few feet is really something special. But of course it's not only fast food restaurants in Petach Tikva, the Sukkot are pretty much everywhere in all kinds of shapes and sizes and levels of fancy.  I guess enough about the Sukkot, but if you want to speak more about them, I'm open to it. Because they are just great. But for those of you who have had enough, some pictures...

Blurry but smiley picture of the Naims and their beautiful Sukkah

Beautiful Sukkah!

Shop in Tel Aviv exploding with Sukkah decorations

After eating everything and relaxing for the first few days of the holiday, our program took us on a two day trip to the north where we hiked part of the Israel National Trail (שביל ישראל), visited one of the most northern points of Israel at Kibbutz Misgav Am (right by the Lebanon border), and did a kind of fast forwarded tour through parts of Tzfat. 

One of the most beautiful color palettes in a temple in Tzfat

During one of our hikes, we were having a chat with our madricha whose name is Klil (which is also the name of a tree that only grows in northern Israel, where she is originally from). She was talking about nature in the north and mentioned how in the north there's a much larger variety of trees which enables parents to utilize a greater amount of creativity when naming their children. Strange that this trend hasn’t really caught on in the United States, but I guess it would be even stranger to be calling your buddies Sycamore, Spruce, or Oak (unless I live under a rock and these names are currently in use, in which case I apologize to all Spruces of the world).

Trail marker for Shvil Israel-- pretty cool that Israel has a national trail that runs all the way from the north to Eilat and that it's actually a popular thing to do

Post-hike beauties at Misgav Am (Lebanon in the background)

While we were at Misgav Am, we listened to a talk by a man who lives in the Kibbutz whose purpose is to show the radical, far right-wing side of the conflict to every birthright group that passes through northern Israel.  His way was more of an aggressive one, wanting to share his view while closing himself off to any opinions or discussions that my group wanted to share or have, for he was older and smarter and more experienced.  Therefore, he considered it to be a waste of his time to listen to the generation of brains that the future of Israel will have no choice but to listen to.  Needless to say, he rubbed me the wrong way, as intensely abrasive/irrational/insulting people usually do.

However, after we heard from him, our tour guide, Ayal, offered a more rational and objective view about something I’ve never really heard discussed in terms of being a significant component of the Middle East conflict.  He spoke about post trauma (clarifying that there are glaring differences between post trauma and PTSD and they should not be grouped or treated the same way).  As a soldier in a small unit in the 2006 Second Lebanon War he was able to speak about his own experiences with post trauma and how it has affected his life.  He read a small piece written during the war about coming back to his base from a mission in Lebanon with the rest of his unit, laying awake all night with the rest of his unit in complete silence and only being able to understand that the situation was awkward and unusual, hoping that it would silently disappear rather than be understood and resolved.

He spoke about the difficulties of accessing the members who are most likely to directly experience these symptoms—the classically male macho member of Israeli society who isn’t likely to voluntarily voice emotional pain and disturbances or start going to therapy (until a girlfriend insists that she can’t continue living with a screaming person in her bed every night…an example of what prompted one of the soldiers in his unit to confront post trauma years after the traumatic events were experienced).
But night terrors and other sleep disturbances, anxiety, irritability, and concentration issues are only some of the symptoms that victims of post trauma endure.  Nor does it only affect the combat soldiers directly involved.  Ayal also spoke about the effects war has on children, mentioning the extremely high rates of bed wetting in towns like Sderot, one of the Israeli towns that has been the hardest, where I believe he said that 70% of children under the age of 17 wet their beds more than twice a week.  As a result of his interest and concern in post trauma, Ayal is very involved in studying and speaking about the issue both on a personal and professional level.  It was just amazing to hear such intense passion about different populations involved and the negative impacts they have to suffer, all while momentarily putting politics aside.
After the group trip, I went with four girls from my program to the Tamar music festival by Masada and the Hot Air Balloon Festival in Eshkol.  Although we were faced with a few challenges like how to comfortably fit five people in a four person tent (and a few others that would probably be best to discuss on a medium my parents don't have access to) it was a really great and beautiful trip.

Masada was our neighbor for a night!

Hot Air Balloon festival in Eshkol National Park

Somehow we didn't realize before getting there that it was definitely a family-oriented festival...pretty sure we were the only child-less group there

Woke up at 4:30 to see penguin balloon butts at sunrise

Red, White, and Blue German balloon with tiny German flag at the bottom to prove it

Even more!

!חג שמח

Israeli shuk: a happy combination of claustrophobia and overstimulation

But also mixed with really beautiful colors and smells and people.  The particular shuk I visited this morning, the Rosh Ha-Ayin Shuk (market), is only open on Friday morning until the afternoon, and because I will typically be teaching on Friday morning, today was probably one of the few chances I will have to go.  Rosh Ha-Ayin has a very large Yemenite population so in addition to produce and clothing and household items, this shuk also offers a variety of Yementie delicious things like Malawach, Jachnun, and others that are probably even more difficult to pronounce. One of the teachers at my school said that some of her spices she will ONLY buy here. 

Mostly just wanted to post some pictures to give you all a taste(ha) of the shuk:

Tried not to interrupt his morning beer toooo much 

Olive man suggested he pack up his olives and come to American to sell there 

I thought it was a swell idea 

Danielle, queen of Rosh Ha-Ayin

Lost flower 

The man from this stand asked to take a selfie with me and the proceeded to repeatedly stab his phone with a knife to demonstrate the quality of the phone cases he was selling

Gummy bears are universal, but I don't think I've seen pizza gummies in America

Malawach Man #1
(because it's always best to fry the things that are already unhealthy)

Malawach Man #2 

Just some light reading


!שבת שלום

A Sketchy Summary of the Past 2.5 Weeks

I will start with pre-Israel departure. As it turns out, I have the most amazing, thoughtful, and sneaky family and friends who threw me a surprise going away party a few days before I left. It was amazing and perfect and I know I didn't have time to express as much gratitude towards everyone involved as they very much deserved, but it was not a reflection of how I realistically felt. So thank you! So much. Everyone. The piñata and pies were especially wonderful.

Bridget and me with my linguistically confused but beautiful farewell cake

Now, Israel! We spent the first few days of my program orientating ourselves in Ein Gedi by the Dead Sea.  This mostly consisted of a hike, various discussions about expectations, and warnings about common Israeli tendencies (they wanted to prevent the inevitable shock Americans experience when lines for buses, stores, basically anything that would require a line, functions more savagely than sequentially).  It was a really beautiful weekend and a great start to the year.

Ein Gedi Sunrise

Ein Gedi FaceTime with my favorite parents  

During one of the first days I was in Israel, I decided to create and accept the challenge of reading the first book of the Harry Potter series during my year here. I thought a book with a familiar plot would ease the transition of reading a novel in a language I've never read a novel in before. Luckily, I found a friend to join me (Rachel) who made the endeavor more realistic than the (potentially) fleeting idea had previously been.  After a week of letting Harry relax on my bedside table, he came with me to the beach where I proceeded to look up many more words than I had anticipated.  However, I thoroughly enjoyed crawling through the first page and a half and look forward to the remaining 319.5.

Rachel & I with our new tedious buddies

During one of the first few days we arrived in Petach Tikva, our group went on a tour of the city organized by Petach Tikva's municipality (I think).  We began at city hall and passed by the zoo, the mall, a few other things, and went on a tour of Petach Tikva's soccer stadium.  The main source of pride seemed to be rooted in the impressively healthy and uniformity of the grass.  When one of my co-fellows asked if he could run around on the grass, he was instructed that only barefoot running would be permissible due to the potential destructiveness of mysterious creatures living in the cracks of his sneakers (but perhaps not exactly in those words).

Josh & Ethan racing on the preened perfection 

Another activity organized for us in the first week of arriving here was an AMAZING RACE, which was actually a really fun scavenger hunt around Petach Tikva, created in an effort to prevent the helpless/lost feeling that one sometimes has when plopping themselves in a strange new city.  In order to achieve successful prevention of the lostness, we were instructed to go to various locations around the city dancing and taking selfies with locals (yesterday we found out that all of these pictures and videos were compiled into a film by our amazing madricha (counselor), Klil, for either enjoyment or blackmail but probably both).

My apartment with a cool local we found at Petach Tikva's shuk

I like eating this for breakfast

Israel Experience's two cities- Petach Tikva and Rishon LeZion at Ramat HaNadiv

For the past week we've been going to Tel Aviv to begin our Ulpan classes, but we've also been able to spend some time outside and explore some of the cool things around.

Spices at Tel Aviv's Shuk HaCarmel 

One day after Ulpan we went to get falafel at one of the top rated falafel places on Trip Advisor (honestly, the fact that Israel does not use Yelp has been a bit of a struggle for me and my inability to make decisions in the absence of thousands of strangers' opinions. As a result, I've been trying/being forced to improve in this area). The falafel making man explained that all of the chickens hanging up were continuously brought by different people after the initial chicken was hung. Most of them make noise when squeezed. Apparently no further explanation was necessary because this is where it ended.

Serious falafel man with a serious assortment of toys

The friendliest/most willing to model cat in Tel Aviv

Souvenirs from Shuk HaCarmel

So the first time I did laundry here the cycle lasted for about 2.5 hours and all of the white-ish things I used to own are now more gray-ish.  Also driers are not the most popular appliance, so in addition to my clothes now having a vaguely board-like texture, they've also gained an attractive horizontal crease that I proudly/inevitably display daily.

Talya (possibly) mastering the art of laundryhangage

 Something I really like about Petach Tikva-- almost all the garbage cans and benches have the name of the city in the middle of a simple but nice design 

New friend

Today's visit to Petach Tikva's shuk

Because who wouldn't want the man cleaning your fish to be simultaneously smoking a cigarette

The shuk's expansive color palette 

Our apartment lacks an oven, and I was initially a bit skeptical about the fish cooking in the toaster oven ordeal, but it actually came out quite normal and nice

My favorite Coke bottle message so far

I may have gotten increasingly sleepy towards the end and neglected to cover anything particularly significant.  I will try to try better next time.