Ironically, the only reason that I am able to write post is because I'm home sick today with a cold. I don't know where I picked this up; as you'll read, I've been around many people recently, and I could have contracted this microbe just about anywhere.
On Thursday, I had a terrific day at school. My pupils were very attentive and interested, and had a lot of energy to work. I'm really beginning to learn the different students' personalities, and to figure out exactly how strict I need to be with whom. Usually, with most students, all I need to do is ask them once to put away their soccer cards, and when they give me the "shnia fingers," insist that, no, I mean now. That doesn't really work with the 8th-graders, who tend to be more resistant to requests than the other students, but it works with even the more mischievous 6th- and 7th-graders. When I returned home from Lod that afternoon, it wasn't the end of my day, however. Ordinarily on Thursdays, after returning from school, my day consists of teaching Tamir English, attending Ulpan, with Alex, Alex, and Veta, arvit, running and exercising in the park, and studying Trei-Esar with Rachel via Skype. This last Thursday, however, I had been invited to Moshe's young daughter's Bat Mitzvah, which was celebrated in the Ram"a synagogue in Lod. I didn't exactly know where this was, but I brought the invitation with the address on it with me to Lod, and hoped that people would know where Rechov Plomnik was. Unfortunately, nobody did, and I was directed in the exact opposite direction when I first began inquiring where to look. Personally, I would have expected groups of old Sepharadic men sitting on benches together to have the best idea of where to find a Sepharadic synagogue; not so. It was actually the young Russian-speaking chilonit Israeli mother with a stroller that correctly showed me the way. I thanked all of my vocabulary practice that allowed me to understood what she was using, when she used such terms as "רַמְזוֹר" (traffic light) and "כִּכָּר" (traffic circle) and "כְּבִישׁ" (street). I arrived about an hour after the event started, and without TZ, who was feeling incredibly sick, and was unable to attend. I handed TZ's card to Rivkah, the Bat Mitzvah girl, and found Moshe in the crowd of relatives and friends. He was very happy to see me. I realized how special his invitation had been; almost everyone else in the room was either a very close relative, or else another member of Rivka's Bat Mitzvah class.
This was my first orthodox Bat Mitzvah; at every Bat Mitzvah that I have attended in the United States, the Bat Mitzvah reads from the Torah scroll, and the ceremony and its significance are the same as those of a boy who is becoming Bar Mitzvah. This was much more like a very large birthday party, in comparison. Many of Moshe's family members are from the United States, and although some (such as his adult niece, whose daughter is one of TZ's best students) found it easier to communicate in Hebrew with me. Although I would like to eschew using English when speaking with Israelis in Israel, because an event such as this is such a perfect opportunity for me to practice my very-limited Hebrew, I was trying to be personable, and decided to speak with others in the language which was best understood by both. There were speeches by family members which I unfortunately did not understand as well as I would have liked, some so-so performers, and a slideshow at the very end. Moshe's father gave the first speak. Moshe's niece's husband, who was sitting across from me, told me that Moshe's father was a Rabbi, and a student of the famous American orthodox Rabbi, Rav Soloveitchik. Lani and JP-RP, I thought that you would be interested by that. I made certain to bring back the commemorative benchers that were handed out, one of which I set aside for TZ, and gave to her on Sunday morning. On my way to Lod, I had asked the bus driver when Bus #13 stopped running, and he replied that it would stop around 10:30. The party was out slightly before 10:00 pm, and, luckily, I had misgivings. So, I correctly predicted that the bus had stopped running, and that I would miss my scheduled chevruta with Rachel. So I ran all the way back to Ramla, and never once saw the Bus #13 running anywhere. I wasn't back until past 11:00 pm, and got into bed relatively quickly.
Friday morning, I was up at around 7:20 am, and was a little bit slow to get ready for my expected trip to Jerusalem, to be spent with Josefin, who is currently pursuing her Master's degree at Hebrew University. After my (somewhat lengthy) morning routine, I packed up, and walked to the bus station behind Ramla's kenyon, the mall. I took the 9:00 am bus northward, and didn't even need to elbow any elderly Israelis out of the way to get on. For those of you who don't understand that last reference, Israelis are notoriously pushy in crowds, and orderly lines simply do not exist in this country. I read Rambam's Mishneh Torah on the bus. I'm still working my way through Sefer Avodah, which is also where I was at the end of last summer. Although this section is of historical interest of me, understanding the functioning of the Temple is something so distant from my own life, that much of the interest flows in one ear and out the other. A few details here and there stay with me, but I really don't understand many of the rules of, say, sacrificial animals being mixed up at various stages of the process of offering them on the altar. This is the kind of text to which I hope to return when I am older and (if I am so lucky) more learned. I arrived at the Central Bus Station at around 9:50 am, incredibly happy to be in one of my favorite cities in the world. I love Paris and Ithaca, but for entirely different reasons. There is no Louvre in Jerusalem, but there is no Har-Habayit in Paris, and no Olin Library in either one.
Josefin had an allergist's appointment, so I walked along the sidewalk beside the light rail tracks to the Machaneh-Yehuda shuk. Jerusalem's shuk is several times larger than Ramla's, of course, and although both sell fresh fruits and vegetables, bread and pastries, eggs, dried fruits and nuts, etc. There is also Judaica for sale in Jerusalem, and I picked up a few items for some special people back in the U.S., although I am still looking for just the right gift for a few people, including one Special Someone. I bought some (persimmons) for a very good price, and munched on a few while enjoying being part of the crowd. It's been quite a while since I've heard English spoken by passers-by on the street; in Ramla, beyond Hebrew, one hears Arabic, Russian, Amharic, Hindi (?), or even Spanish more frequently than English. It's such a shock; Jerusalem is such an international junction. In the Judaica shop, the woman behind me was speaking in French, and I turned to her, asking her, in my rather rusty French: "Vous
parlez Français?" To which she replied, with some surprise "oui, je
suis française," to which I in turn babbled "אפרסימונים
en fait,
j'ai fait mes études en France; cependant, je suis américain." I met Josefin by the light rail station, and gave her a big hug. I hadn't seen her since the end of May, when we walked together at graduation, and I met her parents, brothers, and grandparents. Together, we picked up ingredients for Shabbat lunch and seudah shlishit. There's no shortage of good things in the Jerusalem shuk. Josefin bought everything except the bread, and the persimmons that I had already bought, because she knew about my financial predicament, the result of my having lost my wallet (no, it still hasn't turned up, and I'm planning on buying a change purse on Rechov Dani Mas in Ramla). With full bags, we took the light rail several stops. An elderly woman snapped at Josefin for being too noisy on the light rail; it's just the way things are in this country. After a stop at the local supermarket for hummus, matbuchah, wine, and a few other items, we returned to Josefin's apartment, where I met Josefin's roommate, Jannet, who is a very knowledgeable person. Eli arrived at around 3:00 pm, and I nearly jumped on him, I was so excited to see him. We only had about an hour before Shabbat fell. We all took our showers, and prepared.
After lighting candles, we walked downhill towards a synagogue, where Eli, Jannet's friend Ivri, and I helped make a very small minyan for minchah and arvit. During kabbalat Shabbat, it began to rain. Rain comes in bursts in this country, so by the time that we left the synagogue, following behind Binyamin, the Israeli man who had agreed to host us, the rain had already ceased ("וְתֵן
טַל וּמָטָר לִבְרָכָה"). We walked, right along the line that divides Jerusalem into the zones controlled by Israel and by the PA, respectively, to his house, where his wife and four children were waiting. His wife's English wasn't as good as Binyamin's and she mostly spoke to us in Hebrew, but understood our English or Hebrew responses. Again, it would have been best for my Hebrew for me to demand to speak only in Hebrew with the others, but, to be honest, this would not have been the friendliest thing to do, and I already felt as if I were taking liberties, because I'm a vegetarian, which I hadn't been able to communicate to our hosts ahead of time. No worries; I had enough to eat. We talked a lot about Hebrew language, Eli at one point getting into a vocalization debate with Ivri, as well as jokes and riddles that we knew, intrafamilial marriages, the weekly par'shah, child-rearing, etc. We stayed for a few hours, then Binyamin walked us most of the way back to Hebrew University, to ensure that we could find our way. We spoke a little bit before heading off to bed, planning the next day, but I was completely exhausted, and preferred to go to bed early, which ended up being a little bit before midnight.
The next morning, Eli woke up first, and we were out of bed at 6:40 am, preparing to take an expected 30-minute walk to find a Yemenite synagogue. We walked downhill, wearing our tallietot (I haven't mentioned it, but I've begun to adhere to Eli's more stringent definition of what constitutes an acceptable eiruv, and am therefore likewise stricter about not carrying my talleit under my arm). We kept on asking directions; one old Charedi man, who was surprisingly friendly, directed us. Then, Eli spied a man who he thought looked Yemenite, and asked him. He was spot-on; the man was indeed headed towards a Yemenite synagogue, and was overjoyed to find two additional adult men to help fulfill the minyan. As it was, a minyan would have been possible without us, but barely. We prayed in a congregant's apartment, in a room only about the size of my family room. Eli was almost ecstatic at the degree to which the minyan was Maimonidean. Let's get a (limited) list going:
- Begin with בָּרוּךְ שֶׁאָמַר; no korbanot whatsoever, and all birchot hashachar recited at home.
- Very short pesukei dezimra without even הודוּ לה' קִרְאוּ בִשְׁמו, the recitation of which I think I've read dates back to the early Ga'onic period.
- No אֵל אָדוֹן, one of my favorite piyutim, because it interrupts the berachot preceding the שְׁמַע.
- No separate chazarat hasha"tz; all congregants recite the entire amidah, including kedushah, together with the sh'liach tzibur.
- The Sefer Torah was beautifully written on reddish klaf, which is the only acceptable kind of klaf acceptable, according to the Mishneh Torah, Hilchot Sefer Torah 7:4. Also, a very high diameter-to-height ratio, according to Ga'onic tradition (and, of course, Mishneh Torah, Hilchot Sefer Torah 9:1).
- When one receives an aliyah, one reads directly from the scroll, rather than having another person, who has prepared, read in one's stead. Eli read sh'lishi this week.
- The corresponding verse in Targum Onkelos after every verse of the Torah.
- No additional prayers for the IDF, etc., following the reading of the Haftorah.
- No recitation of עָלֵינוּ לְשַׁבֵּחַ at the end.
- Communal cyclical readings from not only מִשְׁנֶה תּוֹרָה but also from מנורת המאור.
We finished at around 10:00. Afterwards, Yosef, the man whom we had followed to the synagogue, conducted us back to his house, where he very proudly introduced us to his wife and mother. He even invited us back for Pesach, which isn't for another few months. I think that the reason he was so excited was because there are relatively few young, engaged Yemenite Jews like Eli who had furthermore just made aliyah from the United States, and was therefore doubly a wonder. The invitation was directed towards me, too. If Eli ends up accepting, I will, too, I've decided, but, friendly as Yosef was, I know that just another American Ashkenazi (albeit one with Maimonidean leanings) spending 10 months in Israel isn't nearly as special as Eli is. Eli and I walked back to the Hebrew University campus. We got directions along the way from a man named Moshe, who happens to have been born in Ramla, and who has family living on Rechov Weizmann, which is about five to ten minutes' walk away from my house. They are Tunisian, and it is entirely possible that they attend the same Sepharadic synagogue on Bar-Ilan street that I do.
Eli and I got back to Josefin's room, where Jannet was just leaving, and she let us in. We studied for a little while, going over a passage from Melachim Bet that I had wanted to discuss, and also reading from Eli's Mishneh Torah that he had brought. Josefin appeared shortly; she had also had a good morning. We made a big salad together, then ate it for lunch, along with the other wonderful things that we had purchased from the shuk. I was ravenous, and probably ate as much as the other two put together. We had all missed each other, and realized, for instance, that we are all studying via Skype with Rachel, who never ceases to amaze us all with her energy and passion. Wow. We talked a great deal about our own experiences in the past. We've only really been close to each other beginning the second semester of our Junior years at Cornell, although we had all had varying levels of interaction before that. Josefin and I are at about the same level of Hebrew right now; hers is a little bit better, though I think, and I compound my own problems because of my perfectionist-paralysis when it comes to grammar. I try very hard to get my tenses, binyanim, and gender all correct when I speak, which sometimes results in my not speaking as readily as I might if I spoke with more abandon and less inhibition. Still, I think that I'm getting there, and, furthermore, this awkwardness in no way hurts my oral comprehension, which is sometimes quite useful.
Josefin took a nap, and I ate almost all of the cookies that were left in the tin that we had purchased together, while speaking with Eli about my experience thus far in Israel. It suddenly occurred to me that I have been feeling the acute sting of library withdrawal. In Ithaca, I always had access to a vast array of texts; I could pick up a volume on just about any era or region of the world, and study some history. Here, not so. I just really, really want to sink my teeth into some scholarly history, in print format, and can't. Iranian history is what I feel acutely lacking in right now, but, at this point, I'd take a nice, thick, well-written book on any number of topics beyond history, which if you know me you know well is a very real passion of mine. Speaking about studying history and politics in Israel, here's a fascinating New York Times article about the Hamas-printed textbooks used in Gaza.
Josefin and her roommate had invited several friends over for seudah shlishit. Again, we prepared a big salad together, this time for the guests as well as for ourselves, which was lots of fun, as expected. There were a total of seven of us, and the others made good, friendly, intellectual company. As I've mentioned before, I love being around people who are more knowledgeable than I am. After our meal was over, we recited arvit and made havdallah together (Eli recited, as expected). I had to leave almost immediately, but the Josefin, Eli, and Jannet accompanied me to the light rail stop so that I wouldn't be lost. On the ride back, I read more Mishneh Torah, and tried to listen in on French and Hebrew conversations, in order to practice my skills in both languages. At least French words and phrases still plug directly into clear meanings in my mind when I hear them, which is more than can be said for Hebrew speech, which remains something of a puzzle. I walked through the front door of my apartment a little bit after 9:00 pm, which wasn't so bad, and spent the rest of the evening working on the new-and-improved Memory game that TZ and I have prepared.
On Sunday, I went for more teacher training at Talpiot college. I didn't learn so much, but I got to use a very high-quality color printer and laminating machine, and produced a very nice set of memory cards. Also, when I expressed my thanks in Hebrew to Batsheva, the woman who helped me, she thought that it was incredibly cute, and rushed over to her colleagues to exclaim how חָמוּד I was being. Oh, well. When I returned, I was amazed at how exhausted I was, and ended up going to bed very early, getting up at 10:00 pm very briefly, then falling back asleep until the next morning, when I arose feeling rather sick, and texted TZ, Moshe, and Carmel. Since then, I've been stuck in my apartment, without very much to do. I've been drinking plenty of water, and hope that I'll be able to return to school tomorrow. I feel particularly bad, because on Mondays I'm supposed to come to the house of one of my students, to give him private English lessons, and I don't want to lose the momentum of last week. He was doing so well...
Thinking of you all, cool people!
~JD
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