I finally made it to Hebrew U right around the time I predicted I'd be there- 5:30. Woot. I thought that we'd go out somewhere very Israeli (aka Sima's) for dinner but the girls wanted to eat everything in the apartment before they leave tomorrow night. So I met Melissa, an Evangalical from Idaho, who is deciding what to do for her masters, a girl from England, one from Washington (Seattle) who knew Jessica, my old roommate.... the British girl's accent wasn't very strong much to my surprise. So I asked where she was from and she said Norwich and her family's from the southern part of England. I told her about Anna, the girl in my Hebrew class who had a very thick British accent. She asked where she's from and I said "Birmingham." Ah-ha, she said, those people have very strong accents that even she can barely understand them herself. Cool, this was fun meeting the Brits and learning about the UK- definitely better than studying in London!
We had a big dinner of schintzels (frozen, then cooked), pita, hummus, lentils/couscous, beans/eggs, and vegetable pasta soup. We finished up with pancakes for dessert- yummy. Meredith and I both thought it was crazy but definitely not as crazy as our brownie fiasco from the year before. While talking about, someone popped in for something and she asked me where did I come from and I said that I just came in from Haifa. She had a friend there in the ulpan and apparently this person agreed with me- the girl said that it sounded like she was pretty lucky to be studying at Hebrew U instead of Haifa.
Unexpectedly, I ended up meeting my old boyfriend. To put it in short, we realized that our values clashed more than we thought and just parted ways on a neutral note.
I slept in for the first time since my first day back in Israel- until 9:30! I was soooo happy! Katie made some eggs with mozzerella cheese- she stopped going to classes after 2 weeks. She just didn't want to study anymore and would rather play. So she's been around Jerusalem and central Israel for the past 3 weeks and surprisely, still hadn't been to Tel Aviv! After chatting for a while, it was time for me to head out to meet Zvi Feine for lunch at the Joint (JDC). I wanted to walk. So I left her to finish cleaning out the apartment.
I walked pretty much from Hebrew U to Ramban/Diskin in the center along Route 1 (Bar Ilan). It didn't feel as long as my first time and I felt that if I came back here next year, I could do this on more regular basis. When I realized that I had about 5 minutes before I was supposed to meet him, I decided to catch a cab on a meter. My guess that it would cost about 15 shekel but the meter went to 17. Close enough.
JDC building is so weird but definitely as weird as some places in Tel Aviv. It was beautiful nevertheless. I met Zvi in his office and then we went for lunch downstairs. He told me about his trip to Poland, some stuff about the Ethiopian aliya plans, other people in the room, etc. He pointed out a guy who has been working for JDC since like 1944!!! I was so tempted to go over there and ask him to tell me about his early days on the job but I figured that he spoke only Hebrwe or Yiddish. Zvi also told me how he uses Yiddish a lot for his job which surprised me- including during his trip to Poland. "The older people speak Yiddish, the younger people speak English," he said. So if I can learn Yiddish, I might be able to get around a bit in Poland after all- don't need to know the Polish language! There's really something about Zvi that you can't help but smile how much he enjoyed his life and is proud of what he's done. Next week, he's taking his grandson on a trip to Tanzania to see the world's largest animal reserve park. So his schedule was tight as mine but I was glad that I saw him. Next time, he said, his apartment will have finished the renovations and I will be able to come over.
Afterwards, I talked to Meredith and it turned out that they needed to turn in the apartment by 4 PM and wouldn't be able to go to the shuk beforehand. So I thought that maybe I'd just walk to the Old City to pick up dirt cheap ibuprofren but at the end, I stopped on King George and caught the bus back. I helped the girls throw out the trash and whatever else they needed. I thought about going with them but given the time it takes and the fact I needed to get to Tel Aviv by 7 if I wanted Linda to pick me up with my heavy bags, I decided against it. So the three of us waited at the bus stop for 28 and I wanted to get an apple but was afraid of missing the bus. Meredith offered to run in Mr. Zol's and while she was in there, 28 did come by. But I could wait another 15 minutes. I didn't say anything to her when she came back out. We were sorry that we didn't spend more time together but hopefully at least if we're together again next year, we'll definitely have the time!
I went to the bus station without a problem as usual even though it was crazy time (5:30 PM). The bus drivers were definitely picky about not overloading the buses, especially that there were 2 480 buses going at the same time. Off to Herzliya/Tel Aviv for a week... thankfully because I don't really want to be carrying my suitcases for a good while...
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