Birthday in Israel

On Friday, I spent my birthday in Israel for the second and a half time. The first time was when I turned seven and I lived on the kibbutz. I still remember each kid taking a little paper flower and creating the number seven on the ground so I could walk on it while they sang to me. I still remember the party at night that I had for everyone in my class, the games we played and how I Played the piano for them (it was April and the first time than many of them even knew I played the piano!).

The half time I celebrated my birthday didn't count as much because we celebrated the day before. I got a Supertone's CD and a beautiful jewelry box that I still have and we ate cake. The next day was my official birthday and we were flying home but I got the coolest present ever. Right before we landed in Heathrow, I was taken up to the cockpit, buckled into the jumpseat, given a pair of headsets and got to watch the pilot land the plane (clearly this was pre 9-11 so that will never happen again and I'm so lucky to have gotten the opportunity- it was amazing!)
So this year, I once again (unexpectedly, however) celebrated my birthday in Israel. It was a great, great time. The "Yadlin-im" got together at Nachal Chalilit (trans. Whistling or Singing River) and went on a little hike. It was absolutely beautiful- so green and lush and so many beautiful flowers. The sun was out and the caves were so awesome.

They were pretty low down to the ground, placed up in the cliffs, so we wandered through them squatting down. My uncle and I found one that just kept going back and I wanted to see how far it went but we didn't have a flashlight and the light from my camera just wasn't doing it so we had to head back.

The whole family- Guy, Dan, Karen, Ori, Amos, me, Rotem and Netta. Amir was taking the picture.
At one point, Amos and i got separated and went the wrong way for awhile but I got to see this cool arch made by the trees into a kind of tunnel and it looked a lot like the trees on the left side of the canal in Ox.

When we reached the bottom of the trail, we went to go see some old 1920s building- one was a soap factory and the other was a house built kind of no top and to the side of the factory. They were built by settlers who moved out of the nearest town and set up their own establishment but they weren't able to be as self-sufficient as they had hoped so they slowly, slowly began moving back into the town and nearby settlements.
Looking down into the soap factory from above- which we later went down and sat in.


Amir and I on top of the elevated house next to the soap factory- it was so cute, I would totally live there.
From the Nachal, we went to the Castel (no, it's not misspelled, it's Aramaic), which was situated on a hill outside Jerusalem. It was a contested area between the Arabs and the Jews and was fought over frequently during the 1948 War of Independence. Sadly I don't have much more information because it was all written in Hebrew and I can't read that well. All in all, it was an incredible view of the surrounding Israeli settlements and a few West Bank-ian settlements as well.
It was also so different from all the magnificent English castles I've been to in the last few months- Caerphilly, Cardiff, Dover, etc. But it was special in its own way. The stones used to built it were authentically Israeli and there was very much a Middle Eastern feel to the whole structure.


For lunch we went to Abu Gosh a little Arab down across the valley from Jerusalem. We were given plates of salads, humus, tahina, falafel, chips, etc. and I was set with my original falafel with chips. It was so so so delicious!
My birthday was so great- thanks for all of you at home who emailed too. Sorry I wasn't able to see you guys face-to-face.
The next night, Nitzan, Shoshan and I went into Be'er sheva for a birthday dinner. We did a little bit of wandering around Big, the new outdoor mall, bought some presents, they each gave me a little gift which was sweet and then we went to dinner.

And you can't go to Be'er sheva on your birthday without ending the night with Glida Be'er Sheva. So yummy!!!!

SOOOOOO true

This used to be just a funny cartoon. Now it's a reality. I see people dressed like this all the time- both in England AND in Israel. How is this acceptable?

Original can be found at ashersarlin.com- check it out for other hilarious cartoons, including Shiri's favorite "Flan Train" cartoon.

Rockin' the G-pa sweater

One of the problems of thinking that I'm coming to a warm place for only ten days is that I have a real lack of essentials. All the shorts I have are sports shorts. I only brought t-shirts and kinda grungy tanks. I have a pair of jeans but only a short denim skirt. My sweater is my heavy Ireland one. My brown boots don't quite go with my black nicer shirt. So what do I do when it gets cold at night unexpectedly and I don't have anything to wear? I raid my grandpa's closet and rock the grandpa sweater. Thanks, Saba!


PS- see all the books in the background? That's just a tiny fractions of the books in this house. If I read Hebrew better, I'd catalogue all of them for him. For now, I'll just stick to the English ones though.

Friends

One of the nice things about coming to Israel is that I already have friends. No need to take the time to make some- I already have 'em!

Last Thursday night, Hadas and I went out to the Tel Aviv Harbor and had dinner- we laughed, we reminisced, we talked, we people-watched and then of course, we ended the night with some frozen yogurt. In the first picture we took, she didnt' like me.But she liked me in the second one :) Hadasi and I have been friend since first grade when I lived in Israel. When I came back over the summers, we would hang out, watch movies, go out to movies (we made it through Scary Movie 1, 2, and 3 over three summers), went on walks, just had a good time. I would give her English lessons and she would give me Hebrew lessons, although clearly I wasn't a great students and my lessons didn't stick too much. She's incredible, she always knows how to make me laugh (her emails to me are incredible) and I'm so glad I got to be at her wedding last year!
Last night, Shoshan, Nitzan and I got together and had coffee which was so much fun as well. Shoshan and I were also in school together in first grade but didn't become good friends until much later. I only saw her one last summer but I've seen her a few times this trip and she's great. She's so interested in my life, immediately jumped on the "Let's Get Michal to Israel" team and nearly got me to buy two purses last night! In the end I stood strong but one was so cute! Maybe I'll have to go back tomorrow and buy one as a birthday present for myself :)
Nitzan and I became friends through Hadas since they're good friends and lived together but I think she's awesome. I actually have picture of the two of us from when I was in first grade and she was in second grade and we're both sitting on a couch in the mercav and reading. Of course, I've got By the Banks of Plum Creek, proving that I was a bookworm in first grade but not an Israeli book worm. She's great fun to hang around adn talk to, even though sometimes the movies we end up watching together kind of suck (cough.. Interview with a Vampire... cough). And her boyfriend's super sweet and I enjoy hanging out with both of them.
Love my friends!

And on a completely different note....

....clearly I need new headphones. Oy. Incidentally, though, I can still hear out of them just fine.

On my reading list

I've been reading like a madwoman these last few weeks, especially since I stopped feeling bad about reading in the galleries when it's a quiet day at the museum. Some of my recent favorites have included "The Historian" by Elizabeth Kostova, recommended to me by the wonderful Rochelle Keyhan, any new Laurie King novel I haven't read yet, a new collection of short stories by Roddy Doyle and a few out of order mysteries by Deborah Crombie, recommended to me by Sue Schaper.

Most recently, however, I just finished this incredible book called "Among the Bohemians". Written by Virginia Nicholson, daughter of Quentin Bell, granddaughter of Vanessa Bell and grand-niece of Virginia Woolfe, it not only describes the life of famous family members and other Bohemians in 1900-1939 London, like Dylan and Caitlin Thomas, Duncan Grant, Vita Sackville-West, Nina Hamnett and Augustus and Dorelia John but also goes into detail about their everyday existence. There was a twelve- page long dramatis personnae at the end of the book which was vital for remembering who had love affairs with whom and who was married to whom and who were related. Ms. Nicholson described the Bohemian philosophy behind child-rearing, food, dress, place in society, women's rights, travel, career, etc., asking specific questions at the beginning of each chapter and answering them with details from hundreds of primary sources. This book had extra special significance to me as well because a large chunk of the latest Mary Russell experience "The Language of Bees" takes place in 1925 Bohemia in London and many of the places mentioned in Mary's world were described and more detail and explained to me in "Among the Bohemians". I couldn't put it down and was fascinated by the bizarre, strange, passionate and sometimes desirable lives that these Bohemians. lived. I high recommend it.

So now that I'm finished with that, I'm looking for new books and new recommendations. I ran out of English books so I stopped at this used bookstore on Dizengoff in Tel Aviv and bought one awful book that I polished off in about two seconds and now am in the middle of Herman Wouk's "Youngblood Hawk", which I'm really enjoying. I liked reading "City Boy" and so far have not been disappointed with this one. Once that's done though, I'm looking into reading up on the Inklings. I've read the Narnia Chronicles and the Hobbit but I need to read more of Lewis and Tolkien's other writing, as well as read up on my Charles Williams. A friend recently sent me a short C.S. Lewis essay on "Exmass" which was part of an Inklings blog. I went back to the beginning of the blog and have been reading through short bits and pieces of Inklings writings and I'm fascinated. I can't wait to read more of their books and essays. Plus once I'm back in Ox, I can read the Inklings stuff right where they discussed it- in the lovely and cozy Eagle and Child!



And when I'm back in Oxford, what's on my list? Well, duh. April 27th is the release date of "God of the Hive", the TENTH Mary Russell/Sherlock Holmes novel and I plan on eating it up in the first two days. Maybe even literally :)
But really, any recommendations are appreciated! I always love reading new and exciting books!

An incredible afternoon

I've been terrible with updating and I apologize. Ive' been having some great times here but just been lazy about blogging. Last update, I wrote that Tuesday, I did nothing. Well, that was a lie. It ended up being an incredibly awesome afternoon.

Amos, Karen, Roni and I spent the afternoon at this incredible location, whose name, sadly I cannot remember. We drove through some beautiful locations, including a tell (second picture down) where King David used to wander before he was King David.
We eventually pulled off the paved road into an army-training area where we did a little off roading in the Jeep until we pulled off to the side of the unpaved road and parked. We pulled two brooms out of the back on the Jeep, which was very confusing, and headed down a small hill ghrough tall grass.
We got down to an old ruin area which was clearly some sort of a building at one point. There were broken down columns surrounding a rectangular areas. The entire floor was covered by a thick layer of sand. Roni and I took the brooms and started sweeping and soon....
... this was revealed- authentic, legitimate, absolutely real Byzantine mosaics, still yet to be snatched up by some museum. They covered all of the floor and several side rooms and were covered with the sand in order to keep them from being bleached out by the sun. They were amazing- so vividly colored with beautiful pictures.





After we got a chance to admire and then re-cover the mosaics, we did a little more wandering around the area, including going to see a large room that was slightly lower down in the ground.
Then we discovered an absolutely gigantic cave, where they would often store food and supplies, but also hide if necessary.


I loved lying in the grass- so soft and comfortable and green.
We ended up pretty near the West Bank- behind that hill is Hebron.
Our last stop was an outlook that faced west- we could see Carmei Yosef, Tel Aviv, Ashdod adn Ashqelon from one stop looking west....
and Hebron and the West Bank when we faced East.
On the way home we passed Meggido, where David supposedly fought Goliath. Incredible.

As for what's been going on since that day until now: we took Roni to the airport, I finished all my English books, I saw Alice in Wonderland in 3-D (awesome!), I took the train to Tel Aviv and got myself a cell phone, I wandered through some markets with a friend of my cousin, I had dinner with my best friend on the Tel Aviv harbour, I went to the beach and met a bunc hof new extended family members.

As for this coming week, I'll probably be around the kibbutz for a few days, on Friday we'll be up in Tel Aviv/Carmei Yosef to celebrate mine and my cousin's birthdays which are one day apart, and then I want to spend a few days up north in Akko and Caesarea. So we shall see! I'll try to be better about updating :)