Hanging Out with New Friends in Israel

Today is Tish B' Av in Israel. If you are more religious, it's a day fast, as opposed to a 24 hour fast like on Yom Kippur. Many horrible things have happened to the Jews on this day. For us at the Ulpan, it was a free day without class so it wasn't so horrible. Last week I made an appointment to get my hair done today because we didn't have class and it seemed like a good time to do it. I know you're probably wondering what happened to my hair, now that I told you about horrible things happening on this date in history. Well, I'm here to tell you that this first picture is not me after my appointment! It's a picture of the wonderful sherut driver (shared minibus for 10 people) that took me to my appointment after I missed my bus and then later he was the same driver that took my friends and me to the mall!




Now here I am with Prosper and his assistant. She blew out my hair with no less than 4 brushes and it really, no I mean REALLY looked great.

Onwards to the mall, which is called the Grand Canyon. Pretty impressive, eh? If you keep looking at the following pictures of it, you'll see some fun stuff :)

The malls here often have grocery stores (SuperSol) and drugstores (Super Pharm) in them. This mall had an ACE hardware....with dining room tables, chairs and furniture outside its doors.

I couldn't help but think of Evie when I recognized this fabulous aroma wafting over me! Just think how many crepes I would need to make if I made crepes this size!!!

Last night was time to go out (no classes today)! We headed out on the bus to the German Colony. I LOVE the public transport system here. At any given hour the busses and trains are full. From bottom left clockwise, here's Kath who is from England, Bailey who is from Canada, Joseph from Boston and David who now lives in San Francisco but is originally from Denver. I found Kath on the FB page for fans of Haifa University prior to coming out here. We became instant friends sharing similar emotions. David watches out for me. He often reminds me of Ben and Zack and I guess I remind him of his mother except I let him swear in front of me and she won't.

Before I met Kath in person, I thought she was going to be a bit stuffy as she wasn't smiling in her FB picture and I also thought she was a professor! Little did I know, she's actually taking all the classes she was writing about to become a rabbi! And she smiles alot, but not with staged photos! We have a lot of fun together. And I even caught her smiling in a picture last night too!

This past Sunday night Dudik's parents took me to the beach for a walk and dinner. Dudik is Ziv's (see third or fourth entry of blog) best friend. Last year when Dudi came to work at Tamarack, Ziv asked if we could be his host family. He has stayed with us several days and has hung out with our family doing things like biking, eating, the zoo, eating, Royal Oak, eating, the mall, eating, getting Evie's ear pierced and lots more. It was great to finally meet his parents, Miriam and Yanki!

And now, sof sof (finally) I am going to leave you with the most beautiful picture of an Israeli sunset ever, partly because I saw it and partly because I captured it. I almost feel like a travel agent because this picture makes me want to say "Come to Israel and feel her warmth and beauty!" I know you'll all be happy to know I haven't loss m ability to be corny here :)