Only In Israel

Only in Israel do they have signs at the beach that say "No Swimming" and people swim anyway.

Only in Israel do the lifeguards announce their departure from the beach, saying that it is dangerous to swim at night without a life guard

Only in Israel do they end such an announcement with "Chag Sukkot Sameach, Shabbat Shalom, Shana Tova Oomitooka, Gmar Chatima Tova."

Because the holiday of Sukkot began last Wednesday night, we had no Ulpan until Sunday. Almost everything is shut down for the weekend, so what do we do? We somehow manage to spend 4 hours on the beach a day. I have no idea how the time goes by so quickly. Seriously, I'm pretty sure, the world goes faster or something. The past few days, I have been there for the sunset and it is absolutely gorgeous. The colors and opaqueness are different everyday, as is the sunset itself. In the US, the whole sky changes colors, but here, only where the is does the sky change. If I look up, the sky is blue, but if I look straight ahead, pinks and purples fill the sky. This week, we also have from Wednesday to Saturday off because of Simchat Torah. My roommate and I went to Ki Kar Rabin (Rabin Square). There was a concert and people dancing obviously having a lot of fun, but we only stayed for a little while because the musicians kept blowing a fuse.

On Sunday, the madrichim took us to Yafo again. Apparently there was a miscommunication between the Hebrew teachers and the madrichim so I went on the same exact tour as I did the week before. There were two benefits though. One was that we went a little before sunset and seeing Yafo at night is so pretty. The other benefit was that they fed us. For free. We went to "Doctor Shakshuka" for dinner where we were surrounded by bread, tahini and other dipping sauces, couscous with soupy stew, and of course shakshuka. Shakshuka is an Israeli dish with tomatoes as the main ingredient. Every version differs depending on how you like it, but no matter what, there are eggs on top of the tomato sauce. I actually made some last week and it came out delicious! Being overstuffed and with the bus not leaving for another hour, a bunch of us decided to walk back to our apartment complex. It was a nice night out and a quick walk back. For part of the way, we strolled along the beach and the other part we walked through the empty shuk. It was a little sketchy, but also kind of cool. When you go to the shuk it's a bustle of people haggling  pushing each other out of the way. The smell of salmon and pomegranates fill the air. With the empty shuk, the smell of fish wafted through the air, but it was dead silent and filled with stray cats instead of religious older ladies.

My ulpan class is not just my program, but also a fine arts program called Betzalel. One of the people in my class was performing at a coffee shop on Tuesday and it also happened to be his birthday. He plays piano so he played a few songs in Hebrew and a few in French (he's from Paris) and then a bunch in English. Nothing brings people together like belting out the Beatles and Michael Jackson.

Recently in the afternoons, a group of us have been playing soccer in the park behind our apartment complex. There is been one Israeli boy who has been hanging around as we play so we invited him in. Yesterday, he was on my team and as we sat out (there were 3 teams) I had a real conversation in Hebrew. Woohoo. Never mind that it wasn't that long, but my Hebrew skills are definitely improving.

Also, and hopefully this works, here are pictures. I know there are some people you know, but I didn't know how to delete them.

http://picasaweb.google.com/lh/sredir?uname=112163354927968040752&target=ALBUM&id=5522652659463816321&locked=true&authkey=Gv1sRgCKDp8YGUje6nnAE&feat=email