Hello Holon

- a couple of pictures from the hike my friends and i went on and our "make-shift" thanksgiving dinner.

So i've moved into my new home here in Holon. 

It has been a crazyyy 2 weeks with hardly any time to write in this thing.

The week before moving into our new apartment we all went to the Judaean Youth Hostel for the 3 days in between moving out of our old apartments and into our new ones. Monday night a group of friends and i- about 15 jumped on a bus to the desert to go hiking and camping. We ended up near Ein Gedy in the afternoon on monday and set up our tents. We made a camp fire and just sat around the fire that night hanging out. The next morning we decided to get up early and go hiking right away. We hiked about 5 hours all through the canyon. We hiked up to the "upper pools" and went swimming, it was gorgeous. Then, we made our way over to the "hidden waterfall" which was beautiful as well. It was a short camping trip but very fun. We really did a lot of hiking and saw a lot of beautiful nature. It's nice to be with people who want to take advantage of our year in israel as much as I do- by traveling. 

Wednesday we moved into our new apartment. In my apartment is 7 of us girls. Me, Jamie from North Carolina, Leah from New York, Sami from Florida, Sylvia from Minnesota, Miriam from California, and Yali from here in Israel. Our apartment is really very nice and the 7 of us seem to get along very well. It's really fun living with an israeli just like us. She is 18 and also just finished high school and is doing what is called Shanat Sheroot (year of community service). Many young israelis now days choose to do a year of community service before the army and they are in what is called the Tzofim, or as we call them israeli scouts. Most of the apartments in Holon from my program have israeli scouts in them and they are all regular Chanichim (participants) like us. 

On the thursday of thanksgiving we were all a bit homesick- all the americans that is. With about an hour to cook in our busy schedule we all seemed to make one thing. I made mashed potatoes, my friend made stuffing...etc. The boys bought a ton of cold cut turkey and two big turkey legs that they cooked. it wasn't the same, but it was a nice thanksgiving. It was another one of those moments here in israel where i realized how far i am from my family, but how much of a family i've really created here for myself. 

My schedule for these next 3 months is a lot different from my old one. On sundays i have Volunteering from 1 to 5. On mondays i have Ulpan from 9 30 to 12 and volunteering from 1 to 5. Every tuesday we have an optional Siyur (or field trip) where the program takes us to places around the country. Wednesdays i have Mifgash Shira in the morning which means our supervisor basically comes over to make sure our apartments aren't growing with mold and they talk to us and then i have volunteering from 1 to 5. On thursdays we have Ulpan from 9 30 to 12 and volunteering from 1 to 5. Also every night there are optional activities to do in and around the city of Holon held by my program. This semester has a lot more structure, but i'm definitely enjoying myself very much.

 

Yesterday we went to a small city south of Haifa called Ceasaria which was an ancient roman port city. The place was beautiful but it was difficult to enjoy it with the pouring down rain. The nice thing about israel is that when it rains here as opposed to it ruining your day, it really brightens it seeing as it hardly ever rains here, so when it does all you can do is be thankful. At one point we all just gave in, took of our hoods and our put away our failing umbrellas, let our hair soak and just made the best of it. 

My volunteering placement is similar in many ways to my last one but also very different. I work with 6 year old kids after they get out of school. My last one was for kids from broken homes, so it took a very long time to gain their trust and little if any affection. These kids are very different in that they hug me and hold my hand. It's rewarding in a different kind of way. The age is also great for me because i only speak hebrew with them so it's a great time for me to practice. I volunteer with two boys from my program, Adam from Florida and Ori from Ohio. We also work with an israeli girl doing Sheroot Leumi (basically religious girls who don't want to serve in the army serve 2 years to community service), she is very outgoing and fun to work with. 

One of the most most beautiful things i've found about this country is that everywhere you look, all of it's citizens have served it in one way or another whether they went to the army or did Sheroot Leumi, you know they did one or the other. It creates a sense of community and Country pride that you really don't find anywhere else.

After this long post I think I'll head to volunteering now. 

-steph