Operation Shekit

Now that the IDF has pulled out of Lebanon, I propose a new domestic mission! Operation Shekit will involve reducing indiscriminate honking throughout the country. Rubber bullets, tear gas, and other IDF tools should prove to be quite effective in reducing the honking problem that plagues Israeli society.

Post Office Trip

We went to the post office today to reject the package that arrived but didn't belong to us and to pay our telephone/Internet bill and our electricity bill. We were ninth in line when we arrived - it was the longest line we'd seen yet but it did move pretty nicely. However, many customers seemed to have incredibly complex situations and in fact, one gentleman was at the window, tying up one of the three clerks for the entire time we were there.

When it was our turn to approach the window, a women came from outside the post office and marched right in front of us to claim a package. The postal worker helper her despite her violation of the line protocol. The people remaining in the line were not happy at all and were suggesting to me that I should be yelling at the woman because that's the Israeli way. I neglected to yell, preferring patience instead. I realize I couldn't be a proper Israeli.

The woman obtained her package and we were able to gain the (almost) full attention of the postal worker. We paid our first bill. Then, the postal worker placed our change on the counter and then proceeded to talk on the phone. We left the change on the counter to pay toward our next bill but as soon as she was off the phone, she picked up our 50 shekel bill and put it in her cash drawer and walked away to do something else. We were flabbergasted and couldn't react quickly enough in Hebrew. We thought our $11.11 was lost forever!

I scrambled in my head to find the right words to say in Hebrew to ask for the money back. It was stressful! When she returned from doing whatever she was doing I successfully told her in Hebrew that "the fifty is mine." She gave it back. I was elated!

We paid our two bills and she took the already opened package of contact lenses that didn't belong to us back, to mail back to the optical store that sent it to us. (I called the optical store and they were excited to hear from me because the person who's contacts they were really wanted them. They told me to take the box to the post office for return to them.)

Another exciting Friday day in Israel!

My Schedule

I've finally come to terms with how I want to spend my time during the week and so here's what I'm doing*...

Sunday	Monday	Tuesday	Wednesday	Thursday	Friday-Saturday
7:10 a.m. - 3:15 p.m.	12:30 p.m. - 6:15 p.m.	7:10 a.m. - 3:15 p.m.	7:10 a.m. - 3:15 p.m.	7:10 a.m. - 3:15 p.m.
Morning Study, Morning Services, Talmud, Lunch, Afternoon Services, Hebrew	Morning Off, Conservative Judaism, Afternoon Services, Hebrew, Halacha	Morning Study, Morning Services, Talmud, Lunch, Afternoon Services, Hebrew	Morning Study, Morning Services, Talmud, Lunch, Afternoon Services, Hebrew	Morning Study, Morning Services, Talmud, Yeshiva-Wide Learning, Lunch, Afternoon Services	Weekend - Shabbat Readiness and Shabbat

* Please note that fun social time with people like Eve or Jean overrides any scheduling.

My Scoop

As reported here on our blog in mid-August, Jerusalem had a funny city slogan. Now, that slogan has become international news - where's the credit where credit is due? :)

My First Hebrew Book

A week ago Monday, I arrived in my afternoon class and discovered that there was a textbook for the class and that said textbook was written entirely in Hebrew. I discovered that means no English! The book is a recent on, published in 1995 in Israel by a leading rabbinic authority and is a guide to daily Jewish life. Thus, we will spend our time in this class (as will all my classes, I was to discover), translating original texts from Hebrew for half of the class period with a partner and then after spending 90 minutes or so translating and trying to understand what we're reading, we meet with the instructor and discuss what we learned from our group discussions. So, I purchased my first real book entirely in Hebrew - it was very exciting!

Earthquake!

We're very behind on posting because this story takes place over a week ago. The Saturday before last Eve told us that she was woken up an earthquake that morning. We didn't feel a thing and we couldn't check the Internet because it was Shabbat so at a late afternoon get-together, I asked those present if anyone knew about and earthquake. One woman replied that indeed, there had been an earthquake that morning and she even knew the epicenter and magnitude. Hmmmm. Someone was online or watching the news, weren't they?

Anyway, it turns out it was a magnitude 4.5 located north of the Dead Sea. No big deal but then I realized that since Eve lives almost directly below us in a pretty valley, she lives in an old unconsolidated stream (or wadi) bed that must amplify the shaking because her building was shaking and books fell off her shelf but we didn't feel a thing.

Kosher: A Brief Primer

Anne wrote and asked about mixing milk and meat so I wrote her a nice email back and decided to share what I wrote with y'all...

The separation of milk and meat comes from rabbinic interpretation of the latter parts of the verses of Exodus 23:19 and Deutoronomy 14:21 which both state, "You shall not boil a kid in its mother's milk."

From that, the rabbis established Jewish law to prohibit preparing, eating, serving, or benefiting from a mixture of meat (including chicken) and dairy together. Separate utensils are used for cooking and serving meat and dairy foods. Thus things like lasagna, cheeseburgers, and chicken Parmesan are off limits.

There are time limits on when one can eat dairy after meat and vice-versa. We wait a half hour after dairy before meat and we wait three hours after meat before dairy. There are foods that are neutral (also known as pareve) and these include some non-neutral seeming foods such as fish (only those with scales are kosher) and eggs but all fruits and vegetables are pareve as are most snack foods found in Israel (thank goodness!)

We have made our kitchen a meat kitchen and thus have no dairy products, utensils, plates, cups, etc. in the house. We thus love to go to the cafe down the street for some excellent dairy dishes!

You can learn much, much more about kosher from the About.com Kosher Food site.

Movie Star

A few weeks ago we rented our first move at the local Blockbuster; it was an exhilarating experience and a good movie, too. The movie was Ushpizin and I highly recommend watching it. It shows exactly what our daily life is like here in Jerusalem (OK, maybe not).

Anyway, yesterday Steve and I were walking down the street and I saw the star of Ushpizin, Shuli Rand, just a few blocks away from the yeshiva. I was so surprised. He was wearing Hassidic garb, too, so I realize he's really Orthodox in real life and not just in the movies. So cool! But while I wanted to talk to him and say hi, I realized I didn't know enough Hebrew to do so.

Chappelle's Show

Last night I caught Chappelle's Show on an Israeli station, subtitled in Hebrew. It's a good way to learn bad language. I got to see the above sketch, in which Wayne Brady guest starred. Hilarious in English, even better with Hebrew subtitles!

Michelle's List

Recent Israeli immigrant and former yeshiva staffer Michelle recently went back to America for her wedding and she posted a list of things she misses about America while in Israel and things she misses about Israel while in America.

I will comment upon her items...

Things Michelle Misses About America

Department stores (I miss Target and Old Navy; we have "department" stores but it's definitely not the same as Macy's, etc.)
Washing machines with large capacities and short cycles (As laundry guy, I would love a shorter cycle washer - each load takes about an hour and a half to wash - it's very long and I'm not sure why)
Garbage disposals (As I mentioned before, I would trade in my washing machine for a garbage disposal. Not having a garbage disposal is just awful.)
Polite service people (We haven't found this to be a problem; people have been really nice and friendly. However, We've heard lots of horror stories.)
Entenmann's (The food here is amazing and wonderful; I need no U.S. replacement.)
Sundays (Absolutely! One needs a day after Shabbat to recover. Sunday as a "normal" work day is very difficult to get used to.)

Things Michelle Misses About Israel

Fresh produce (Yeah, the produce is awesome here, as so cheap!)
A wide selection of quality kosher restaurants (Oh, yeah! Without a doubt!)
Radio news on the hour (I don't understand enough Hebrew so this isn't helpful to me but I think this is done in the U.S., too.)
Shabbat descending on Jerusalem (Friday afternoons are amazing. Everyone is rushing around all day and until the afternoon and as sunset gets close, the people disappear from the streets and the stores close and then, all is peaceful and you see families dressed up, heading to synagogue. I heard the Shabbat siren for the first time last Friday. It is sounded at candle lighting time and could easily be mistaken for an air-raid siren but one just needs to keep in mind that it's being sounded at sundown on Friday.)

Our Books Are in the Country

We found out that our books are in Israel! They're at our friend's house outside of Jerusalem, which is where we had them shipped. We can't get out there at a convenient time for either of us but one of the faculty members, who is also a friend of our friend and lives a block away, offered to pick up the books and bring them to us at the yeshiva. Thus, the books could be in our possession as early as Sunday! I hope I feel like reading whatever's in those four boxes!

Prayer Interrupted

Before our tunnel tour, I took a few minutes to pray at the Western Wall. It's nice to be able to say, "Hey, I'm at the Western Wall, why not pray?!"

Background: At the Western Wall and throughout the Old City, there are many beggars and others collecting money for charities. I load up my pockets with small change when I go there.

Anyway, I was in the midst of the afternoon prayers when a young black hatted guy comes up to me to ask for money. Well, I've never been interrupted during prayer before and, I happened to be in the middle of the Amida, the prayer that one should not interrupt even if one's home (or synagogue) is on fire or if a Jewish king comes up to you to talk to you (but if it's not a Jewish king, you can interrupt the prayer because said king might kill you for ignoring him but the Jewish king should know better and not bother you).

The tradition also holds that one should concentrate so much during this prayer that even if a 17 year-old girl walks right in front of you, naked, you wouldn't even notice her! (I say "Test me!")

So, apparently, I was not concentrating enough because I was interrupted by the black hatter and I started saying the prayer out loud, hoping said black hatted guy would hear that I was in the midst of the Amida. He didn't notice and he started touching me and that's when I shouted "Shemoneh Esrei" (another name for the Amida) at him.

Once he realized his faux pas, he was so embarrassed and then he ran away. I guess he figured that someone who's dressed like me (i.e. not wearing a black hat) can't really be praying.

But, he did wait for me to finish and then asked again for money and I told him no way, dude and I gave to everyone else around him.

Table of Five

Yesterday we visited the Bible Lands Museum, which is not far from our apartment and is adjacent to the Israel Museum. We arrived early and, unfortunately, the English-speaking docent cancelled so there was no 10:30 tour but we browsed around the museum ourselves.

Then, we went next door to the Israel Museum (thank goodness for our $23 annual student memberships!) and were able to catch two English tours - the first was an overview of the archaeology exhibits and the second was a great tour and lecture on the Dead Sea Scrolls, some of which are housed at the museum.

In between 11:30 and 1:30 tours, we had lunch at the museum cafeteria where the 20-something cashier asked us if we had seen the TV show "Table of Five." It took us a second and we said we'd seen "Party of Five" back when it was on (1994-200).

She insisted, "No, Table of Five." We asked why and she said that one of the customers at the serving line looked like Charlie from "Table of Five." At that point we knew she was referring to "Party of Five" but in Israel it must've been translated to "Table of Five."

We looked at "Charlie" and indeed, she was right. But I don't remember Charlie with a kippah and tzitzit.