reality bites

and while i love that movie, that's not the point of reference today.

today's attack in Hadera: yeah, after Monday night's affairs, i can't say it's a total surprise, but it just sucks. and it was way more real being here and hearing the sirens and ambulances, etc. it's also just wierd to know that my friends were there two days ago, i've been there, and it wasn't all that long ago...

i think it made me sadder to think that it doesn't really affect people that much anymore than the actual event. but i also had this completely non-realistic hope that things were really going to start changing...and not that they aren't at all, but i think i'm not the only one who's started to hope more, after the whole hitnatkut thing (disengagement from settlements)...but i guess i just have to keep doing that, what other option do i have besides complete and utter cynicism.

ok...time to go listen to some relaxing music and try to chill out...

a long week followed by an awesome weekend

last week draggggged for years, mostly because of working longer days and Iris and Noa not being there to commiserate on Wednesday and Thursday, but overall, it was good...lots of fun times with Roee, and even some quality IM time with Amitai. enzywayz...

this past weekend i went with Gali and Yamit to an Aviv Geffen concert on Masada at 4am followed by some lathering on of dead sea mud and floating around in the dead sea itself. Aviv Geffen's voice is somewhat hard to take after a while, but he was there with Daniel Solomon who i LURV and Metropolin was their opening band which was cool. The whole experience of being on Masada at sunrise is amazing, regardless of the circumstances that brought you there, and I haven't been for more than 6years now, so it was fun and i'm really happy that we went. We were all upside down tired by the morning after not sleeping, especially since i spent the past week not really sleeping so much...but after some healthy mud and dead sea at Ein Gedi, we napped by the pool for a while before heading back to PT. I love how everything is much much funnier when you're exhausted and while i can't remember exactly what i was laughing so much about, i know that the whole mud all over my body and face thing seemed to be really entertaining at the time.

so yesss....i ended up sleeping about 14hrs straight when i got back and then hung out with Riki and Oren for most of Saturday, with a short visit with Safta in the morning as well.

I'm now in Mevasseret with Anati and her kids. The twins are a little obsessed with Mary Kate and Ashley Olsen, which i find amusing, and i have to say, i at least think it's more reasonable than say, some GUY MY AGE being obsessed....

last night we had an awesome dinner in Abu Gosh, a small-ish Arab village near here. Dani and Anati go there pretty often and know the guys that own the place. It was cool to hear the guys in the restaurant go back and forth between Arabic and Hebrew and just reinforces my thoughts that if things are to change in the future generations, language is a good place to start. I'm pissed at myself for forgetting the little Arabic that i actually know...but maybe it would come back to me if i actually sat my ass down on a chair and studied...what can i say, my aspirations of being studious and motivated seem to remain aspirations. hopefully i'm not ALL talk though when it comes to this stuff. we'll see.

I was talking to Anati this morning about the twins and how different they are and just how it's amazing (and unfortunate in some respects) how the intifada affects these kids. You don't see it all the time or in everything that they do...but once in a while they will say something or ask something that just reminds you how scared they really are or have been or what not. It'll be interesting to see how this generation feels when they are my age. I guess I will just join the masses and hope that we are actually entering a new phase and that things are changing for the better. but who knows.

Every so often I have these moments when I realize that my mentality and posture and actions are so in the middle. and in the end, i'm never going to be somewhere else but in the middle. Sure, if i am here long enough certain things about me will be "more Israeli" but there's always that "American" somewhere in the middle of it all...how i push myself through the crowd, how i ask for directions, etc. It's funny think that you came to terms with something years and years ago and all of a sudden you realize that's a joke and what you need to come to terms with is the lack of any real conclusion or solution. This is just it and this is me and people will, at least for a good period of time, ask me things in English, or want to explain things to me, or translate when i say i didn't hear them (not that i didn't understand them), and whatever else. Here, I am "the American cousin," and yes, i know i only got here a few months ago so i shouldn't take it personally, i've been "there" wayyy longer than "here" but nevertheless, when where you are starts to feel not so temporary, you kind of hope/expect that the world sees it that way too.

but at the end of the day, i see a picture of myself here and i think, "i look happy..." and I am...and the rest is just the details that i'll ramble on about some other time.

American Adventures (and more)

So the last time i posted i was in the airport...I've since left CDG, been with family, in many more airports, and sof sof arrived back in Israel 3 days ago or so.

I finally got home in CT around 8pm and spent that weekend with the family. I'm tan compared to them...haha, that never happens. Dave Pistrang came to visit too which was good fun. Next time I hear from him it will be from India...mmm, India. I can't deny that I'm jealous. Perhaps I'll be there sometime in the next two years?? So yeah, Rosh Hashanah was lovely; sad that Mimi and Rosy and the kids couldn't make it to CT, but it was nice to have a smallish crowd for dinner. Alexandra, Rich's youngest is absolutely adorable. Smart little cookie, that's for sure. Kids are so into technology these days too...she was playing a game on Ishay's palm pilot and asked him if she could "save it" before she went home so that she could play the following evening...right. Anyway, it was fun to hang out and despite my constantly being a little bit cold (yeah, it'd been a while since i was in 50 degree weather!), I loved being home for a bit. I can't say I was without culture shock. There's nothing more AMERICAN IN YOUR FACE than Walmart and Starbucks. Not in a good way. But yeah, it was ok and I only started to speak Hebrew to people once every couple days.

I spent about 24hrs in Boston, mostly not sleeping, but in a good way. It was really great to see Leann, Rachel, Amitai, Josh and even the old Children's co-workers...it's much more fun to be there when i don't actually work there :-P nahh, it was good. everything seems to have continued as it should have. one of my old bosses was down in DC so I didn't see him, but I met my permanent replacement there and she seems sweet. It was funny to be in Boston and TOTALLY not live there...not even on a break or something. But yeah, besides missing Anna's and my buddies, I wasn't too nostalgic.

The wedding was GREAT! I met Kate, Dianna and Mary's friend and flew out to Akron, OH. Seeing Dianna and Jared in the airport was amazing. I was a little bit in shock that we were actually all in the same place (and crazy that the place wasn't one of our houses in CT) and Dianna was in some random time zone and a little bit all over the place for the weekend adjustment wise, but it was amazing and so so awesome to hang out with them. The wedding was beautiful. I can't say that I wasn't a little bit confused and unsure about the whole Catholic thing, but I did manage to turn to Kate during this part when we're supposed to wish each other something and say thank you to Jesus and I wished her "Shabbat Shalom" like the good Jew that I am :-P

Mary looked AMAZING and i managed to sing at the reception without messing up the words and they even thought I sounded nice (I could have sounded better, but whatever, it was fun) which is all I care about. Kate and I hung out a lot during the weekend and it was really fun. Sad that I didn't meet her earlier since we were both in Boston all last year! oh well. Now we can be pen pals :-)

Our trip back from OH took a while, but luckily we got to stop at Chipotle on the way to the airport, which made my day. Mmmm, Mexican food. I miss it here sometimes. When I have an apt and a kitchen I'll at least be able to make it for myself! Our flight was delayed and by the time i got home to CT it was pretty late. BUT Andrea came to visit...so i got to see pregnant drette-ola, yay! she said her tummy was bigger mostly from food, but you can still tell :-)

The flight back was rather uneventful...except that it got delayed, then my suitcases weren't put on the EL AL flight to TLV because there 'wasn't enough time' -- and yet we sat there for a half hour...right. so yeah, now i'm back in Israel, without my two suitcases...woohoo. Luckily i had some stuff here in Petach Tikva and then the morning of erev chag (yom kippur) Iris and I went to do a little shopping. I bought a nice white shirt and wore light green pants and called it a day. It was funny to sit up on top and not see anything or really hear well what the rabbi/chazan was singing (orthodox synagogue style) but good to be at Kol Nidre nonetheless. Walking around the streets of Petach Tikva with it being sooo quiet otherwise, no cars, etc, was great. It finally felt like Yom Kippur should...a whole lot of nothing. People just hung out in the street and talked as if it was the middle of the afternoon on Shabbat. very cool. Iris and I spent the majority of Yom Kippur lying in bed half sleeping half talking and listening to music. Last night after breaking the fast we went with Michaela and Dov and Suki to Jaffo and walked around -- got good ice cream at Doctor Lek, etc. mmmm...good times. Iris had never been to Tel Aviv/Jaffo so Dov, Michaela and Suki all did a bit of explaining of what we saw along the way...we learn a lot outside ulpan it seems...in a good way.

This morning we went to this crazy huge busy shuk in Rosh Ha'ayin and bought things we didn't need, but to our defense they were really cheap. I finally found a thumb ring I like (I've been looking to replace the one I lost about 6 years ago...) and I got the Harel Moyal cd for only 40 shekels :-)

It's nice to be back. It was the first time that I didn't cry leaving Israel and DID cry leaving Boston/CT. I guess it's always sad when you don't know when you will see people again exactly and when I left in the end of July it was like, ok, see you in a couple months...now...who knows. Apparently I escaped some awful new england weather, so at least i can enjoy the sun here!

ok, enough rambling for now...perhaps i'll write again later since i think today is going to be on the slow side. I'm supposed to maybe go out tonight with Eyal's girlfriend, but if my suitcases don't come, who knows what i'll do...anyway.

later...