Kathryn and Mitchel Do Israel

Day One:
The Dead Sea

I examined my burnt shoulders in the mirror that evening before getting into a decidedly cold shower. They were redder than ever. I have to admit, it has been ages since I've been out in the sun let alone when its at least 42 degrees out.

The rocks beneath my feet we scorching hot and stuck together because of all the salt from teh water. I waded into the water that was rapidly rising, turned to face my back to the wide expanse of ocean before falling backwards only to be caught by the buoyancy that the salty water provides. The water was boiling, hotter than a bath. I floated between a lounging position and being upright, trying tot touch the cold water below with the tips of my toes. Not an easy feat I might add.

We washed our stinging skin off under the cool, fresh water showers and lay our towels out on the stones. We sat and talked for a few hours before heading for the change rooms and treating ourselves to ice creams at the canteen.

The bus was cool and the air conditioning soothing on my hot face, drying the sweat that had begun to form while we waited, rather impatiently for the bus to arrive. Not long after we got on the bus we both fell asleep watching as the desert whizzed past us and the sea turned into mountains.

Day Two
Jerusalem: The Old City

The bustling shuk of the Arab Quarter never seemed to end, and we found ourselves getting lost in the winding alleyways, walking past the same shops over and over again. every so often we would find ourselves down a different street. F
irst we explored the Jewish Quarter and all the old buildings towering above us, the ruins that lay below in their natural state. The Kortel was full of people celebrating, praying and tourists being tourists. I always walk up to the wall and look up at its vast expanse. I see women dovening, tourists putting notes in the wall and families rejoicing from the "wrong" side of the machitza (separation).
There is a tradition of walking without facing your back to the wall after dovening. I always feel uncomfortable doing it, and I see the look in some women's eyes that I must have in mine as I perform this ancient ritual without the true understanding.
Today I walked away normally.
We carried on wondering through the shuk filled streets and found our way to the Church of the Holy Sepulcher. We entered the church along with many more Christian People making their pilgrmage to the place where Jesus was prepared for the cross, we watched as they bent down and rubbed oil on that very spot and prayed. Walking around the church this time was different than before. As well as lookign at all the historical and religious places we looked at all the artwork and how it changed form different time periods and spoke about the meanings behind all the paintings, Mitchel even throwing in some tidbits about ancient historians that thought the mural on the roof of the Sistine Chapel was a representation of Christianity being a dark religion, when in fact, it was jsut a bit dirty.
We sat down for lunch at "The Best Falafel" place and for ten sheckle it was pretty good.
                               

Day Three: Tel Aviv/Yafo
We left mid morning on a Shirut to Tel Aviv and managed to find our way to the pier. We sat on the rocks talking for a while before deciding that it was about time for lunch. We walked for a while along the ocean, the air filled with the smell of people having family a Mangal (Barbeque/Braai) on the beach. Children were loudly playing around on the grass as we walked. I kept a rhythmic pattern of foot steps trying to keep up with Mitchels long legs. Four steps on each square of paving. Sometimes three. We walked for what seemed like forever in the heat of the day, almost dehydrating because we were sweating so much.
We stopped in yaffo for a well deserved, steaming hot pan of freshly made Shakahuka. We ate in silence, not taking breaks between each mouthful. The sweet and salty mingled taste of the tomato sauce was an unbelievbly good sensation to have in ones mouth. The bread was soft and we used every last crumb to soak up the sauce on the pan. The water dropplettes rolled down the side of the jug as we sat in a food coma.
Seeking salvation and an escape from the heat we sought a shop to sit in for a while, pretend to browse as it were. Thankfully there were quite a few Home Ware stoes and we spent about two hours sitting on all the different couches and beds and chairs, even stopping, removing our shoes and feeling the softness of the carpet.
We found our way back to Yafo and walked through the old city looking at the mall artist galleries before having an afternoon shloof in a nearby park.
We boarded a bus to Haifa that night, both of us attempting to get comfortable squeesed in to the small, familiar bus seats of an egged bus.

Day Four: Haifa Stairways
The next morning we woke up freezing in the too low air conditioning of the Hashy Apartment. We showered, brushed our teeth ad pulled on our worn shoes ready to climb some stairs. We took the Carmalit, wich is an underground subway cart all the way uptown. The view was beautiful. You could see almost the entirety of Haifa. There were small cafes and resturants all opening for the day and as we walked we talked about how it reminded us of Cape Town. The air was fresh, almost too fresh to breath properly. We walked down what felf like 1000 stairs untill we found ourselves back where we started, a little sun burnt and a little sore in the leg area, but happy and excited about what a fantastic day we had. We saw so many different kinds of houses and parts of society.

Day Five: Haifa Bahai Gardens
I woke up bright and early to the uncomfortable smell that encompassed the entirety of the Hashy Apartments. The smell got into every part of ones being and lingered for a few days. Mitch and I had decided that today was the day for the exploring of, what we affectionately called, Uptown. We hopped on the Carmel, conveniently located just outside the apartment. We arrived uptown quite early. The city was just waking up and people were hurriedly getting to work before their bosses fired them.
We quickly found the Bahai Gardens and joined the queue eagerly waiting to be let in. I had been to the Gardens before, when I was sixteen, we spent a lot of time taking selfies trying to get the gardens in the background, but this time I could actually appreciate the effort put into the building and just how beautiful the city of Haifa was. We joined the organised tour, to get a little bit more information on what we were doing. Remember kids! It leaves at 12 sharp.
The Bahai People built the Gardens as a tribute to their leader. Everything is built symmetrically and so that one can really appreciate the beauty and splendour of the gardens. There are fountains and water streams that go all the way to the bottom of the gardens, as well as hundreds of round lights, that illuminate the gardens at night.
We walked down 9 tears of the Gardens and once we had reached the bottom found ourselves some ice-y, cold, frozen yogurt the cool us off.

It was back to the Apartment for us to fetch our things and catch our bus back to Jerusalem. The bus ride was quick and comfortable, we spoke about Netzer and all the big ideas we had and about our friends and how we would handle life when we got back home after being away for so long. Neither of us had any idea.

Day Six: Jerusalem at Night
We stepped off the tram just up the road from where we were living at around 7pm. Tired, with dragging feet we walked down the hill longing for bed and the return of Lily who had spent the last two months in either South AFrica, Israel or England. Spotting the Hustle and Bustle of the Mamilla strip we took a quick peek inside and found what was almost a carnivalle. Along with the usual mass of shoppers and art adorers there were now hundreds of people watching the street performers and the clowns that seemed to be around every corner.

One woman that caught our eye was the one blowing GIGANTIC bubbles for all the kids to jump up and pop, shrieking with excitement.
She was my favourite.

Lily and Josh were home and our Group was on the way to being completely reunited. We all threw on some clean clothes and headed out to Hamarkia, the best soup place in town, for a well deserved dinner.

Day Seven: Bethlehem
It was hot waiting for the Arab bus on the side of the road. The ground was hot, the people were hot and there was a load of construction going on in the background.
We caught the bus when it came.
The fences were high, the designated pathways were long and redundant, the doors were large and there was a beeping sound whenever you went through. Soldiers stood guard waiting to search people whom they deemed 'suspicious'. We walked through without any trouble. The man behind us, who was clearly in a hurry to get where he was going, was made to walk through metal detectors and be subjected to being searched and asked to show his ID. He was not pleased.
Inside Bethlehem we walked along the separation wall, admiring the graffiti and even witnessing a bunch of what looked like 15 or 16 yearolds all working together to create a new piece of political artwork.
We spoke to a woman whose house is completely cut off from the rest of the neighbourhood by the wall. She told us of the time when they were first building the wall and how her and her family were locked inside their house. She told us of another time when there was quite a bit of conflict in the area and there were soldiers that would use her house as their base. She was distraught.
We walked around for a good few hours getting increasingly lost, but not all that bothered by it. We stopped for a delicious lunch of Hummus and Falafel before heading back passed the wall and out through the check point, onto another bus and into our apartment.

There we found an assortment of Shnatties, both from Hashy and Netzer, all back from their trips in Europe. Our group was complete again. We sat in a circle on the ground swapping stories of the past week.

I'd like to leave you with one of the best quotes of our Shnat:
Jordy: "Why dont we go to Humus Ben Sira?"
Shosh: "Im okay with anything!"
Jade: "Why dont we just go to Japanica! Thats something that no one wants to do."

Theme Nights in Karmi'el- In Pictures

Harry Potter Theme Night

Jewish Identity, Please.

Day One:
We arrived hot and sweaty from a long day packing up two months worth of life to a little kibbutz in the north of Israel called: Kibbutz Hannaton, ready to begin a four day exploration of Halacha (Jewish Law) and what it means for us as Reform Jewish Youth.

The cup of ear grey tea that I held in my hand was really doing the trick to wake me up from my half asleep state of mind. I looked around the room, the walls that weren't covered with packed bookshelves we a terribly depressing shade of dark green. The bookshelves on one side of the room were all fancy and had engraved Hebrew letters in gold on the thick spines of the hard cover books. The other shelf had books of all different shapes and sizes, and I could recognise a few different languages from where I sat. I was told to choose a book. Any book. An over whelming task for someone who was completely shell shocked as to what was happening. I was unsettled, over tired and still hadn't come to terms with the fact that the second period of Shnat had come to an unceremonious end. I spun around to the book shelves behind me hoping to find something that would capture my fancy. On the bottom shelf was a dusty, tattered book held together with grey masking tape all down the spine, two more lay next to it, all uniform in their masking tape covers. I gingerly opened the book right in the middle. The Hebrew print was small and the pages were old and faded. There were hand written notes down most of the sides of the page. Translations, thoughts, notes. I was stunned that I could read them, having expected them to be all in Hebrew.
I flipped to the front of the book where an inscription had been written along with the name of the person who owned the book. On closer inspection of the cover I discovered it was all interpretations of the Torah and its meaning.

I told the rest of the group that I had chosen this book because it had belonged to someone who really cared about learning and valued the teachings of the Torah. He had taken the time to really try learn, read and understand.

Our opening session was the basics of halacha, and where it all came from, and also, where we thought it was going.

Dinner that night was a Netzer Politics Fest at a fancy restaurant just outside of Kibbutz Hannaton. We had a chance to bond with the Madrichim and eat really tasty deserts!

Day Two:
We started the morning off with a panel from the kibbutz who told us all about the uniue kind of environment they are trying to create. The kibbutz started as a conservative kibbutz but over the years has developed into a pluralistic kibbutz that has a place for all the different streams of Judaism. everyone is allowed to pray together the way that they want to pray, everyone being able to express their Judaism and their halacha as they wish. We asked a load of questions about Halacha and how it is kept on the kibbutz what with so many different opinions, and they told us that they all have a chance to have their own shabbat, and if its not comfortable for you one week, you might be comfortable the next week. You have to be open to living in this way and you have to be able to accept and be willing.

What interested me was that there were a lot of marriages between people from different sects of Judaism, and they worked.

I sat with my eyes closed, my feet propped up on the chair next to me. We sat in a semi circle, each of us with our eyes closed waiting. As he played the repetitive tune of the nigune on his dark guitar he sang alone. One by one we all caught on to the tune of the nigune and joined in. The music that we were all creating rose louder and became softer, everyone listening to the other and singing in unison.

Day Three:
My eye lids were heavy listening to the lecture being given to us, and my mind kept drifting from the topic at hand. We were in a cemetery of the Jewish people of some time ago. I woke up when we went inside the tombs and started analysing weather or not it was okay to carve images into ones tomb stone. We spoke about the animals, and them just being a sign of maybe your family, or hunters. They started off simple but became more elaborate as the time passed. Is that allowed? Some only had geometric symbols, but how were we to know weather or not they were representations of God? The last few tombs really got us thinking. There were depictions of Gods in Greek and Roman theology. Were these just because of the fashion of the time, is it still a big deal? Some of the tombs we looked at had elaborate carvings of things that represented the old temple, some were a bit more modest than others. But we were still asking weather this was okay or not. Does it follow Jewish Law, Halacha, to have such thiongs, and where do we draw the line?

In the small town of Tzippori we asked the same questions. The houses and synagogues were elaborately decorated with mosaics of Greek mythology. In one Rabbis home there was an entire floor decorated with the story of Herkeles and his enemy. In the Synagogue there was clearly a zodiac symbol that had the twelve tribes of Israel on it. Where does one start and stop when it comes to letting the culture of the time influence your religion?

Day Four
Writing our own Halacha for kibbutz turned out to be harder than it should have nad we decided to try again once we were all in the right mind set back from Chofesh.

xxx

It's About Time

10 August 2012

The Service:

The Service at the small Reform Shule across the road was awkward and uncomfortable. The old, crinkled faces of the congregation bore into me as I sat in the front with my fellow Shnatties trying to lead songs that they didn't know, speaking a language they didn't really understand. It went as well as it could have.

The Movies:

We had a small dinner of cruskets, bread and all sorts of different spreads on the floor of our apartment before heading off to the Movies with a whole bunch of kids from LJY, RSY and the Karmiel Israelies. I saw "The Five Year Engagement" with Jade and Jordy, and the other girls saw Batman. 

All of a sudden the screen went blue and the three of us looked confusedly at each other. Jordy turned around and kind of spoke to the room asking "What's going on?" and the one person who spoke English said there was a break so we all sat quite awkwardly and giggled until the movie came back on. Our movie finnished first and we had an hour to kill before the rest of the kids finnished theirs, so we decided to be little kids for just a bit and went on all those silly rides in the mall. We went on the merry-go-round of horses three times and only got off when we were about to throw up. Then we did it again.

12 August 2012

Farewell Dinner:

Our last lesson with our Hebrew teacher brought with it a little surprise. A Cake! We made her a cake! She always had so much food for us, and so much cake and we gave her so much trouble and never had our notes it was the least we could do. It was a very odd cake.

Galit, our Karmi'el Madricha met us at this fancy restaurant called Art De Coco, which is famous for their desserts. They were all fancy, and delicious looking miniature cakes. We each had our own meal, something that rarely happens on shnat, but shared a bite of each around. I had Spinach Lasagne.

Spinach Lasagne!

14 August 2012

Packing up:

The house was messier than it had ever been before, while we were trying to smush seven months worth of Israel, Northerners and ourselves into an eight person mini van. The heat was excruciating and we had been up since 7am. The Death Room was clean for the first time since we moved in, but still smelt as though six things had died in different parts of the room and then coma back as zombies. After we had all packed our stuff into our bags and boxes we kept it int hat room to clean the rest of the house and the kitchen. 

For lunch we ate what was left of the avocadoes and fresh vegetables in our own salads and on cruskits. It really was a beautiful breakfast.

Galit came over to take back our keys and give us all lollipops... a bit odd... and say and awkward goodbye. We finished packing an doff we went, glad to see the back end of the rape-y building and the 200m radius of Karmi'el that we knew.

xxx

"Minds Clouded With Trees"

9 August 2012

Michelle's Birthday:

The small apartment had undergone a little re arranging and so I was thrown off on arrival. There was so much more room for activities in anticipation of the rowdy party that was t take place for Mich's Birthday. Sophie and I went to get ourselves some nourishment in the form of Noodles from the resturant down the road and shortly after arriving back and scoffing them down, about 30 different people from Australia and South America flooded the apartment.

I sat, quite stunned in the corner on the blue couch. A sweaty, half dressed and moderatly hairy, but also quite attractive South American boy leaned down and planted a sweaty scratchy kiss on my cheek before introducing himself as "Raphaeelllll". Another tall blonde guy did the same thing, although I didn't quite catch his name.

The night sky was dark and clear with the sun setting quickly over the rooftops of the buildings that you could see from the balcony. I sat on the small couch next to Gal while a small South American girl smoked in the corner only stopping her deep drags to try and persuade Gal and I into coming "to the club". We talked for a bit, catching up on past events and him showing me his battle wounds from their paintball experience of that morning. A few more people arrived and all the girls dragged me off to the other room so that they could change and parade around in six different outfits before finding the right one for "the club". I sat on the edge of the bed next to Sophie and Shana as people popped in and out of the bed room looking for the party, or their friends. 

After we had all decided that the one pair of black bike shorts looked better than the others we all headed for the roof, for what the Aussies call "preesies", which are basically pre drinks. (I'd like to say that I've caught up on all the Aussie lingo quite quickly) We sat in small circles, or clumps of people all talking excitedly about the world. Gal and I on the floor while we looked up at the five girls all sitting on the edge of the roof. They looked as classic as if they had been directed there, and we were all in a movie. The light reflected their features so perfectly, and their legs all crossed the same way made me feel a little uncomfortable. 

Back inside, and after quite a few hours of "Should we go out? Shouldn't we go out?" All of Netzer found themselves in comfy clothes sprawled about the chilly bedroom. The walls were bare and the air conditioning was a bit too cold. There was a small window above one of the beds where I sat. Out the window there were a few buidings illuminated by orange street lights.

The evening progressed and people came in and out but we got progressively comfortable playing guitar, singing songs and generally having a grand old chill/jam session.

The tune of the guitar filled the room, there were tired eyes staring out of the window behind me as he played on. A gruff voice emitted from the mattress on the floor in a symphony of practised words. They sounded so natural, so effortless. They combined beautifully with the repetitive rhythm and although my brain could barely comprehend the meaning behind the words and their speed. He cut in with the feelings that must have been building up inside rhyme for some time. He spoke clearly, with a twinkle in his eyes. The Portuguese was even more in comprehensible than the English but if you tried not to understand and just appreciate the beauty it was there. Everything, in one room.

I put my phone on the bed next to me recording the nights progression, this is just what was happening in the world: (A Voice Recording)

xxx

Just Some Casual Testosterone

1 August 2012
The room was dull and depressing without all of Shana and Josh's decorations on the walls. I sat on the evil broken bed, Jacob on the other bed and Gal and Liz on the mattress on the floor.
We opened ther window to let the breeze in, and try and cool us down. Gal sat playing the guitar as he normally did. They played me their song for the first time and Jacob was rapping LIVE IN MY LIFE! It was so cool. In the morning we made pancakes and exchanged musics.

3 August 2012
Jacob and I walked tot he New Mall up the road to fetch Mitchell from the bus stop. It was hot and sweaty, like Karmi'el always was.
He was wearing colourful pants and an African shirt he had got in Ghana. He had a florppy hat on his head and he smiled and waved excitedly as we walked to meet him.
We spent the day watching movies and eating popcorn and other deliciously sweet things.

xxx

The Best Night

Trying to decide what to wear while living in a house with six other girls is the hardest thing. You'd think it would easier but its just makes it worse. Especially on a program like Shnat, where everyone is dirty hippie Shnattie and we've been wearing the same clothes 7 months. The bus was hot and the sir was sticky as we bumped and bustled our way to the mall for a fancy dinner. We found ourselves in a burger bar at the end of the road. The dim light of the restaurant made everything look more fancy than it should. We just didn't fit in there, which became quite apparent when we were all hysterically laughing at Jade and her salad that made her face sting.

After dinner we walked around the shops and made ourselves depressed about all the pretty clothes that we couldn't afford, or have any where to wear them to really. But, if I had an empty suitcase and an endless amount of money I would have bought all the cool hipster clothes.

We came home and watched so many movies and ate so much more food like pop corn and all kinds of deliciousness.

This is the delicious burger I had for dinner.

Welcome Home!

The missing links to our little Kvutzah had come home so we had our first dinner with more than one person in the flat. We spent most of the afternoon/evening making delicious food. Around the dinner table we were entertained by Jades stories of Chavaya and their disastrous tiyul. 

Netzer-Not-Netzer-Fest

The day started bright and early with breakfast at 7am. I had scrambled eggs and some salad and a bowl of crazy cereal that's every different kind of colour you could imagine. Probably not the healthiest but certainly tasty and delicious. I pulled my Green Chultzah over my head and steadied my breath for a whole day of leading sixteen year old's, something I have never really done before and not by myself. 4

We started the day by herding 200 British and American teenagers to the big field where we we split them into groups and proceeded to run the activity that we had prepared for the day. e planned to run activities and discussions but I soon discovered that the kids wanted to talk to each other and so after running a few get to know yu games we split the smaller group into a few more smaller groups and gave them a few topics to discuss. Family, Religion, Politics, all on a really simple level.

After lunch we had our Go On Shnat peulah which is the only real reason we were there I think, where we sang a song we had written and showed them a slide show of how much fun they would have on shnat. We wanted them to ask questions but they didn't really, but thats okay.

By the end of the day I was so ready for them to go home and take their bratty-tness with them and I was so hot and uncomfortable I just waned to get on the air conditioned bus and go home.

There's no Place Like Home

The 4 hour bus ride was way too long for me to handle. The bus couldn't have puled into the station sooner, and my heart was pounding in my ears as we boarded the packed tram making the all too familiar journey back to the Etgar flat and, to what feels like, the most like home to me here in Israel. 

Thursday:
Molly is one Jordy's best friends who came to visit her, here in Israel. She has long straight dark hair and spends most of her time being cool, making faces and silly noises. It was her last night in Israel and out first in Jerusalem since we left. We all went out for a night on the town of food, drinks and some dancing. We started off with some Hummus for Hummus Ben Sira and for dessert we had the best waffles from Babettes. Sophie and I shared a waffle, one side being Hot Chocolate sauce, that was creamy and bitter and Cookie Crumbs. The other half was Dulce Deleche that coated the entirety of your mouth with the pure sugar-y goodness topped off with some ground white chocolate sprinkles.

We went out for some drinks at Zollies, a classic shnattie Bar in Crack Square and ran into all the Aussies in the world. A guy just passing by noticed their Aussie Drivers Licenses and joined our table. It turns out that all his family is from Australia and that they were her for a Family Event that was, coincidentally, being held at the building where we were staying. Jordy an him hit it off immediately and we spent the night dancing with all his cousins in Kings, another one of those Sdhnattie bars that I promised I wouldn't go into.

We ended the night with some Hot Chocolate at the Karaoke Bar at the top of Ben Yehudah, Molly, Sophie and Jordy taking to the stage, and blowing us all away.

We walked home in the cold wind that made me miss all the night on Etgar when we would make the same trek to our flat in the unexplainable wind of Ben Yehudah at 4am.

Friday: 
We slept in.
That afternoon a few friends of mine arrived in Jerusalem. They're from a different youth movement. We walked around the Old City of Jerusalem for a while, exploring the Shuks and the sights of the city before heading back to the apartment for a 'Special' Shabbat dinner. We bought a whole bunch of Chips, Pizza Flavoured Pringles, Bamba and had ourselves a Shabbat Picnic in the Windmill Park.
We went around the circle and everyone had a turn to say why their bag of chips represented something about their Shabbat, and why Shabbat is special to them.
My friends went off to see thoe Kortel and we hung out with the guy from the night before. \Back in the flat we lit up a hubbly and talked to the interesting people that have been living in the flat for the past two months since we left.
Joe: I've never seen anyone play the guitar like him. He's here working with Arab people who live in the West Bank and in East Jerusalem. He's really interested in all the politics of Israel. He is the reason that we're not allowed to rent cars on Shnat because of the time when he was here and happened to steal someone's car. He was kicked off after four months. 


Joel: He looks like Andrew Garfield and has a cool blue shirt.


John: When we spoke he looked at us like: "Why are you still talking?" "Who are you?" "Why are you here?"


Lizzie: She changed her out fit at least six times a day.

Saturday:
More Sleeping in! It was beautiful! In the afternoon we went to the Shuk in the Old City and on a short tour of the Christain Courter and to the church of the Holy Seplica.
My two friends headed off home and the three of us girls that were left made some ravioli and tomato sauce for dinner and hung out on th balcony. We streamed some ridiculous movies and ate ice cream until like 4 am in the living room. It was so great.


Sunday:
Jordy and I were supposed to go shopping for comfy pants, but we ended up not going and so I complained vitterly to her until she hugged me better (:
Lol. It was funtastic.
That afternoon we all hopped on a little bus off to a Kibbutz for NetzFest.


I spread out on the back seat of the bus and leaned on my arms looking out the window. We drove past the scenery that had been the backdrop of my life for so long and there was a sinking feeling in my stomach because we would be going back to the terribly broken and sad apartment in the heat of Karmi'le and back to all the negativity and bad vibes that manifested in it. 
The bus driver played good music and before I knew it we were off the bus, back into the heat and humidity of the real world and thrown into 24 hours of intense camp vibes. It made me feel better to know that we were doing something real with life though.