Tag Archives: bus / buses

[Alumni Guest Post] Yom Ha… Season as Israelis

Posted on by
Reply 
New Alumni Blog Post!
Stef Jadd Susnow (Year Program ’06-’07, PEP ’07-’09) 
and Matt Susnow (Year Program ’06-’07) 
Write about the "Yom Ha..." Season in Israel...
      it's a truly special experience being in Israel
      for these national holidays.

This week marked the beginning of one of the most poignant times on the Israeli national calender, a period I like to refer to as Yom Ha… season. Within the span of one week three major commemorative holidays occur: Yom HaShoah (Holocaust Remembrance Day), Yom HaZikaron (Memorial Day) and Yom HaAtzmaut (Independence Day). The emotional roller-coaster that the close proximity of these holidays create was thoughtfully designed when established by the Knesset (Israeli government). By concentrating these national commemorations across eight days, we have no choice but to see how the Holocaust, Israel’s many wars, and Israel’s independence are intrinsically tied.

This week began with Yom HaShoah, whose full name is Yom HaZikaron laShoah ve-laG’vurah, “Holocaust and Heroism Remembrance Day”. As indicated in the name, this day is not only for commemorating the millions of lives that were lost, the millions that were murdered at the hands of the Nazis, but also for acknowledging and celebrating the heroism and resistance that is so often overlooked when talking about the Shoah (Holocaust). This point was driven home this year at Continue reading →

Share

[Alumni Guest Post] Three Stories

Posted on by
Reply 
Daniel Shibley (Yr. '11, Fellows '12) shares some anecdotes:

eOccasionally, I witness events that I think are funny, but I am unsure if others will find them humorous, this week witnesses three small incidents that I think most will find humorous. Enjoy:

  1. Early Sunday morning I was standing at the bus stop in Jerusalem, awaiting the arrival of the first of two buses that would take me back to yeshiva. Despite the early hour, the non-bus lanes were already clogged with traffic, and the lines at the red lights grew longer and longer. Suddenly an ambulance required immediate passage through the gridlocked lanes. Some drivers attempted Continue reading →
Share

Old Matzah or New? Tastes the same to me…

Posted on by
1 
From my blog:

“So I was walking down the sidewalk one day, and a bus hit me in the head.” Such are the stories you hear at a lunch table in Israel. But we’ll come back to that.

In more recent news, I just finished celebrating my first day of Pesach in Israel. And let me tell you, the matzah here is amazing. Israelis actually spend a good portion of the pesach seder laughing about the fact that Americans still haven’t discovered the conspiracy that makes American matzah taste like dusty wood chips. They call it “מבצע ביצה” (Operation Egg) in code.

So many meanings at this time of year!

So many meanings at this time of year!

For the first (and only) seder, I went to the house of one of my Pardes teachers. The seder was absolutely wonderful; it was Continue reading →

Share

Soul Surviving in Jerusalem

Posted on by
Reply 
From my blog:

It appears that I may have two souls.

My first soul isn’t sure how it feels about this. Previously, it was always the center of attention, benefiting from activities that are “good for the soul” – like yoga, baking and writing (note that I said soul, not souls). Now, however, it appears that the love might have to be shared – or maybe it has been shared all along.

According to Kabbalistic thought, each person has an animal soul (הנפש הבהמי) and a pure soul (הנשמה הטהורה). The animal soul is concerned with “me” and “now,” while the pure soul is concerned with “me & others” and “now & later.” The animal soul tells me to fly down the hill on my bike at 30 miles per hour because it’s fun. The pure soul tells me to use the brakes because I still want two legs when I’m done with the bike ride.

I learned this soul concept whilst in a class entitled “Relationships” at Pardes. The first relationship we are covering is the relationship between us, and, well, ourselves. After we discussed the division of soul into animal and pure, we discovered that the pure soul has five “voices”:   Continue reading →

Share

Three Words

Posted on by
Reply 
A story from my Cowbird:

x

On the sidewalk H squints at the passing buses, trying to read their destinations as they motion quickly towards the places they will go. I pretend to help, but the combination of foreign characters and moving vehicles spins my head. “You’ll learn the language soon,” H says to me smiling. I don’t believe him, but I keep this quiet.

On a bus too wide for these streets we sit side by side. Our knees touching, and the quick turns push us closer. We don’t resist it. “Do you know the word seder?” He asks me. Of course I do, and I think of the twenty-two Passovers speeding past in the rear-view mirror: bowls of salted water, dead Aunts waving. This is H’s favorite Hebrew word: Seder, a noun, an order of things. He tells me his favorite word in English: Mind, a noun, a thing that thinks, that makes order, that remembers the right words, acts the right actions, so the person whose leg is touching yours can know exactly how you feel. It was Ramadan, but still that morning in his kitchen he dropped falafel dough in hot oil, dabbed them each on a napkin, ate twice as much as me, and said “I love you.” He tells me his favorite word in Arabic was the hardest to choose, since it is his Mother Tongue and its cognitive reservoirs reach back through every thought he can remember. I notice his eyes are the brightest black I have ever seen. That his mouth goes up without effort. “What’s your favorite word in Arabic?” I ask. “Fahima,” he said. A verb. To understand.

Cheese bourekas and falafel stands. My mind is swimming in cooking oil. Outside the bus, we pass posters promising war with Iran. We pass signs in Hebrew I do not understand. We pass sidewalks and fences of barbed wire. Inside the bus there is order. Two hands touch. Two eyes meet, and they do not look away.

Share

questions and answers

Posted on by
Reply 
Originally posted on my blog on Oct. 30, 2012:

What am I even doing in Israel? What am I doing next year? What brings me joy? Meaning?

At some point, you have to stop running away from these questions. The answer will not come without giving it space to be nurtured.

Today was the first day of my new journey. As a walked out on the strong sun, my first thought was, its too sunny to walk a lot, maybe I should just go back to my apartment. (for some reason now in Jerusalem we going through some unusual heat wave for this time of year)—as my hometown of New York City is under water–

But I realized that was my fear talking. SO I continued.

I take the bus to the center of town, to try to find a piercing place called Tattoo that my friends told me about. But what I realized was that their directions were no help at all. “its by a street called Hillel “(there are 5 different streets in that neighborhood with part of the name as hillel. “its by an Aroma, and café Hillel” (aroma and café hillel is like saying its by a Starbucks and Duane Reade in New York City, aka they are all over the place)

After about an hour of walking around I found it. I walk into the sketchy place and Continue reading →

Share

The Search for Delicious

Posted on by
Reply 
Originally posted on my blog:

In 5th grade we read a book in class called The Search for Delicious… A couple of months after reading this book, we had to pick our favorite book and do a book report on it. But, because I HATED to read, I just picked The Search for Delicious, a book I already read, thus I wouldn’t have to read another book,

Truthfully, I didn’t really even like the book THAT much. But the book (at least as I remember it) was about this king who wanted to know the definition of Delicious. So he asked all hundreds of people, and had his servants search for the answer. But, he realized there is just no ‘one’ definition of delicious, and that he needs to find his own definition.

So why did this book come up in my head today as I was walking the streets? Especially after not thinking about it for over 10 years?

Maybe, it has to do with the fact that I am searching for something, something only I can do. What may be right for others may not be right for me. So I have to do the dirty work and go out and search for it!! Continue reading →

Share

Heavy Boots

Posted on by
Reply 
Originally posted on my blog:

“We need enormous pockets, pockets big enough for our families and our friends, and even the people who aren’t on our lists, people we’ve never met but still want to protect. We need pockets for boroughs and for cities, a pocket that could hold the universe.”

-Jonathan Safran Foer,
Extremely Loud and Incredibly Close

In one of my favorite books, Extremely Loud and Incredibly Close, the main character, a 9-year old boy, talks about how he becomes overwhelmed with the state of the world. He calls this having “heavy boots.”

“Seeing homeless people gives me heavy boots.”

“Hearing that my best friend’s grandma had died gave me heavy boots.”

This metaphor has always resonated with me, because I can easily feel overwhelmed with the pain and suffering in this world.

Today, I have particularly heavy boots.

The past week has brought a lot of destruction, in all senses of the word, to southern Israel and Gaza. There are constant air raid sirens and bombs falling in the south, thousands of soldiers being called in from the reserves, casualties on both sides of the border. Today, there was a bus explosion in Tel Aviv, wounding 21 people. Continue reading →

Share

Falling in love with Tel Aviv

Posted on by
Reply

Originally posted on my blog:

So there is this thing. Tel Aviv vs. Jerusalem- and I’d say probably the majority of your average secular Israelis would say Tel Aviv, hands down. Now don’t get me wrong, I’m in love with Jerusalem… there is incredible history, beauty and complexity here. But there is something else going on in Tel Aviv, and I like it.

First off its a metropolitan city that just feels more city-like… tons of cafes, bars and restaurants that call my name everywhere I go… “Cara, come have a civilized glass of wine on this uber-cute street and watch the world go by.”

Secondly there is the sparkling Mediterranean and incredible biking and Continue reading →

Share

There is nowhere like Jerusalem to celebrate the Chagim!

Posted on by
1

This post is cross-posted from my Studymoon blog at https://thestudymoon.wordpress.com

Hello!

Shmatan here again. I want to start a new tradition that I actually started on my first day in Jerusalem… Drumroll please…

The cat count!

There are thousands and thousands of cats in Jerusalem! Why you might ask? Well, at some point in the history of Jerusalem, there were thousands and thousands of rats in Jerusalem. Introduce cats and bingo, your rat problem disappears. And thus brings us to a time where there are cats everywhere!

So today is our first cat count = 48

I have a feeling this number will be much much higher by the time Annie and I leave Israel!

So I am writing this post in the midst of the Jewish Holiday of Sukkot, but this is the culmination of weeks of incredible experiences. There really isn’t anything like celebrating the holidays in Jerusalem!

Over Rosh Hashana we had invites to so many people’s places, that we ran out of lunches and nights! One of the people who invited us over was a person that I had known for literally 30 seconds before receiving the invitation. Only in Jerusalem!

But the most amazing experience was on Yom Kippur. In Jerusalem on Yom Kippur, all car traffic, I mean all, is shut down. Hey, why stop at car traffic! TV stations, radio, stores, museums, everything is closed! It is so surreal! Not only does car traffic stop, with the newly open streets, everybody piles out into the street to hang out. I mean, there is nothing else to do but hang out! After Kol Nidre services on Erev Yom Kippur, Annie and I went out to Emek Refaim, and it was completely packed with people! For all those Toronto people reading this blog, think Nuit Blanche packed! It was so weird but amazing at the same time!

It’s hard to believe that it is already Sukkot! Time is flying by so quickly. The best news of all is that Annie is finally, really back on her feet! After 3 rounds of antibiotics, skin creams, and lots of TLC, Annie and I went on our first real walking tour of Jerusalem. After a hairraisiing bus trip down to the shuk (I think our driver was moonlighting at the Indy), and a sprint through the Old City, we made it, just in time, for our tour of the tunnels that run alongside the Western Wall. This experience, was, well, mindblowing… That doesn’t even do it justice really! As a part of this tour, we got to see the entire height of the Western Wall, which must run an additional 20 m BELOW what is currently visible above ground, plus we got to stand at a point that is 97 m from the actual holy of holies that is currently off limits to most people. This is the place in theory where the 10 commandments once were (now they are hidden somewhere!). If anyone is coming here, this is an absolute must! This experience was so incredible, very well worth a brief encounter with razor wire that I had on the way home! Jerusalem is a dangerous place LOL :-)

OK, time for our next adventure, our first mainstream feature film in Jerusalem! Have a wonderful rest of Sukkot everybody!

Love,

Shmatan

Share