Tuesday/Wednesday – Day 26/27
August 16, 2012
Tuesday was the start of the goodbyes, which for Israel weren’t nearly as hard. Probably due to the feeling like I’m constantly going back there. Aside from that, today marked the completion of Sarah’s education, as we finally finished “The Return of The King”, the third in the Lord of The Rings trilogy.
For dinner I went out for a last meal with my cousins the Slonims and Adi to Black n Burger, an upmarket burger joint well known for it’s excellent fare. Which though neither of us quite showed it openly, we both knew that we’d miss each other substantially.
Wednesday I took the first train from Jerusalem to Tel Aviv with my Uncle. Seated in the last carriage so as to avoid the noisy children in an early carriage I started to nod off too sleep.
When I woke up however I was greeted by a surprising sight.
What I saw when I woke up
After passing Beit Shemesh, it turned out that the last carriage becomes a prayer service every day, organised by their community. Loud chanting followed and I stood out of respect at the appropriate points. When the cohanim (priestly caste) got up the back to where my Uncle and I were, he made the comment that they’d conveniently chosen a place so that we didn’t have to move to join them, both of us being cohanim ourselves.
After that it was a final cheese sandwich from Fromagerie Basher in Tel Aviv before catching a bus and train to Ben Gurion Airport. Amazing this time I was quickly waved through security!
My flight with Israir was short and sweet. I watched some TV off my phone, listened to Warren Zevon’s ‘Excitable Boy’ and saw ‘The Rise of the Planet of the Apes’ before landing at 9PM in Berlin. It took some effort to orient myself and to find the train and U-bahn I needed but before long I made it to Rosenthaler Platz where I waited with baited breath for Theresa, my German friend, to pick up her phone and help me get to her place where I shall be staying for the next week.
Rosenthaler Platz
Sunday – Day 19
August 7, 2012
Today I stayed in to work. Preparing for job interviews, arranging logistics with UPenn (a painful affair) and just sorting my life out.
Leaving my cousins to hang out with more shnatties, I went out with Amy Bortz in central Jerusalem to HaMoshava 54, a new instant coffee place with amazing free samples, and a GIANT 28 NIS frozen yoghurt. Yum.
Following that, Amy and I began to walk home when, we chanced upon a christian tour group from Hong Kong. Knowing that something interesting was likely to occur soon, I stopped Amy and we continued to eat the frozen yoghurt in place. Sure enough, soon they were singing the Hatikva with hands on their hearts and a real sincerity. Nice to know not everyone hates the Jews :P.
I asked the leader of the group what they were doing in Israel and they told us they had been studying Hebrew, Judaism and Israel for the last two years and this was the culmination of all their hard work. A tour to the bible lands to walk in the footsteps of Jesus.
They then encouraged us to sing with them Heveinu Shalom Aleichem, and we started dancing too!
After that, they took down our names, so that they could pray for us to ‘make aliyah’ (emmigrate to Israel) in hopes of bringing about the third coming of Christ.
Friday/Shabbat – Day 17/18
August 6, 2012
This morning I woke up to one of the most exciting emails I have ever received. Ask me about it.
From there it was a good few hours back to Jerusalem!
On arriving I decided to take a walk and ended up getting lost in Jerusalem (a rare occurrence) for a few hours and thus had a good three hour walk in the heat. I bought some rogelach (an Israeli pasty) and more felafel!
Dinner was a quiet affair at my cousins, with Daniella, back from the army for her first weekend at home. Surprisingly she seemed to find basic training a most enjoyable period and was treating it much like summer camp, earning the name ‘Savta’ (Grandmother) for handing out sweets to the other trainees.
Shabbat was peaceful, sleeping and visting family and friends. However, Saturday night was out on the town with Daniella! We visited a few of the less reputable establishments in Jerusalem and I met a few drunken friends of hers who seemed not to be able to stop yammering. Despite this, I enjoyed myself until I collapsed into bed at 3AM.