Chiri biri biri biri bom

Shabbat Shalom!

I'm exceptionally excited that wireless is working by the playground now. Especiallly since the psycho internet man refuses to call me back or set up my internet... booooo.

Shabbat in Israel is such an interesting experience, and it's not even saturday yet. Today in Ulpan we had a Shabbat song sing-a-long. I felt like I was in camp again. I had forgotten how much I love singing Jewish songs, though I felt bad for the non-jewish students (and there are quite a few), there's no way they would have known all 11 songs we sang today. Through everything I learned in Schechter and in the Hebrew program at Carleton, I got the impression that most Israeli's, with the exception of the Hasidic Jews, were relatively secular. I even remember learning a word for secular in Hebrew, though of course, it evades me now. However, Israel takes Shabbat very seriously. The buses stop running 2 hours before the start of Shabbat and all stores close by then and do not re-open until saturday nights, maybe. It feels both incredibly restricting and relaxing at the same time. I know that right now me and my roommates are incredibly thankful for Shabbat and the chance to clean our apartment, sleep in, make pancakes, and watch the second half of Aladdin (we were too tired to finish it tonight).

Today, in preparation for Shabbat we took the bus into the main part of Jerusalem to go to the Shuk- the market. It was a really cool experience, and one I definitely want to repeat. The market was full of people getting food for Shabbat and there were vendors lining both sides of the path selling fruits, vegetables, candies, meats, olives, fish, breads, pastries, everything. I bought a strange combination of candy, figs, olives, and breads, and I got to practice my Hebrew (though the Israeli's can pretty much see through me before I can say 'shalom'.

Speaking of Hebrew, hearing it is becoming completely natural now. I don't have to watch my ulpan teacher anymore to understand everything she is saying, and I barely consciously translate anything she's saying unless it's new vocabulary. I'm also getting much more brave when it comes to asking anyone anything in Hebrew. I'm sure part of that is the Ulpan, and the other part is that I'm the designated one among my friends to talk in Hebrew since I supposedly know the most. It's worked out relatively well so far.

Back to Shabbat. We attempted to be really good Jews today and went to a Shabbat service we had heard about. The problem: it was an orthodox service, and women were sent to the back of the room. It was horrible. We couldn't hear anything and hardly any of the women participated in any of the prayers. We just sat there behind a screen watching and listening to the men pray and trying to catch something to tell us what prayer we were on. Women in incredibly restricting sects of most religions often claim that it feels safe, respectful, even holy- I just felt neglected.

After the service we got stuck in some awkward situations with these two orthodox women trying to get us to come to shabbat dinner, and finally made it home to our apartment where we sang shabbat songs really loudly and made dinner, said all of the appropriate blessings, and watched part of Aladdin.

I'm excited for the chance to perfect my room tomorrow, upload the pictures I've taken so far, and post pictures of the apartment here, hopefully!

I miss you! Shabbat Shalom!