Hebrew Madlibs

(Inspired by my Gaga dance class which was taught completely in Hebrew. At first my guesses made sense. Then it was just too much fun to add in my own words, since I couldn't understand anything. Resulted in my trying not to laugh slightly hysterically).
"Shalom. Begin to move. Let your body parts float. Move like you are in water.
Now think about your legs. About your feet. Move like your feet are covered in wet rags. Really allow your legs to experience the feeling of being covered in slimy seaweed. Enjoy. Sink deeper into the mud. Good. Now think about your hands. Grab a pomegranate. Dig your fingernails into it. Feel the juice sliding down your hands. Begin to move in rollercoasters. Let the movement smack you. Now combine that movement with the pomegranate. Throw the pomegranate. Grab another one! Throw that one! Faster! Connect the movement to pleasure! Begin to move more slowly. The pomegranate is no longer ripe. It is moldy. It is growing on your hands and legs. Move smaller and smaller. Do not let the mold eat your flesh. It is eating your flesh! IT IS A FLESH EATING POMEGRANATE! Move more slowly! Do not let it eat you! I repeat! Do not let it eat your hands and legs. Now, sit down. Drown in a bunch of wet spaghetti noodles (yes, this was actually said). Drown! Shake! You cannot breathe! You are gasping for air! You are gasping! And gasping! Try to swim out of the spaghetti. Do not inhale the sauce! It is not air! Swim faster. Faster! You cannot escape!  Now combine it! You are being consumed by flesh eating pomegranate mold and trying to swim out of the spaghetti. You can do it! Shake that flesh-eating mold off your body! Change positions so the spaghetti sauce doesn't go into your nostrils! I can't hear you breathing! Have you suffocated because of the spaghetti?!?! TEN, NINE, EIGHT...TWO, ONE! Relax. Allow your whole body to regain its normal amount of  flesh. Do not worry. It has not been eaten."
Was a great class. The funniest part was that no one noticed I was following these directions, not the ones shouted by my teacher...

Revelation.

I do not want to be a dancer.

I came to this realization this week. After spending so much time agonizing over why I am studying dance in Israel and why I am a dance major, this thought came to me in a moment of complete clarity while I was zoning out during class.

I do not want to be a dancer. I am not truly interested in the dance world. I have been privy to so many conversations here about famous choreographers, dancers and dance companies. A few months ago, I figured that I would start to get a grasp on who they were and would become really passionate about learning more about them. But I have not. Whenever I try to sit down to watch a YouTube video by some dancer the entire dance world has heard of, I get bored (it takes at least 3x the length of the video for it to load!) and wander off to do something else. I never seem to actually sit down and watch the videos.

I walk into dance class and I am glad to be there.

Blindfolded and Doesn't Speak the Language

How I found myself one day in dance class. The girl who had been translating for me was all of a sudden no where to be found. I couldn't see anything. And the teacher was speaking in Hebrew. I heard movement and knew that we were supposed to be doing something, but I had no idea what. So I cracked open my eyes and tried to watch other people.
The experience was freeing. The teacher used me to demonstrate the next part of the exercise, where a classmate would be moving us around, while speaking Hebrew. All I could understand was her touch. So I stopped listening and started concentrating on that. And the pressure of her hand on my arm became easier to understand, until we were flowing around the room, my eyes still covered.
The paradox of being in another country. Most of my time spent here is spent with students who speak English well (I have learned so much about Mexico, Canada, Germany, China). I attend academic classes spoken completely in English (except for my Hebrew class, because that would be absurd, wouldn't it?). It is only when I go to dance class (2 days a week, 6 classes) that I am reminded how out of my element I am here.
And I love it.
It is the ultimate challenge. Stick someone in a class where the primary language is movement, the secondary language is Hebrew and the tertiary one is English. See what will happen. I think I am faring much better than many of my DanceJerusalem friends. Their intense schedules did not allow them time to fit Hebrew class into their schedule, so they are not able to update their vocabulary. However, I am constantly learning new words. And in dance class, it is deliciously easy to infer the meaning of sentences as they are always accompanied by a decent amount of gesture and/or movement. It is the nonetheless still very difficult. People do actually speak English, but I am very uncomfortable with the teacher taking double the amount of time to explain things in English when I am the only student in class. It is also strange to have a student sitting next to you whispering in your ear. And is not necessarily good for their studies either.
Or take this situation. "Hi, Elisa!" "Hi!" (It is really difficult remembering people's names when they are so unfamiliar!) "How are you?" "Great!" "How are you?" "Good. Tired. (Turns to friends) MwFmawoiefljsdlkfslamfklsdfjlksajdfls hahahahahaha." What do I do? Either sit and stare at them intently as they talk trying to understand what they are saying, smile neutrally or wander away. Because regardless of how nice people are, they speak HEBREW! Even if they are not trying to leave you out of a conversation, it is inevitable. And, even when I understand, my spoken Hebrew is atrocious.
Before I came here, I promised myself that I would push myself. I would push myself to get out of the International, English-speaking bubble, to really get to know the REAL Israel. I am so glad that I am in dance classes where I do have to do so, but I am unsure how to take the next step to actually connect to my classmates. They are also 2-3 years older than me. And truly, even just being in another country is exhausting. It is no wonder that people are content to remain in whatever comfortable, homey place they carve out for themselves.

This post was inspired by the trials and tribulations of a good friend of mine. Check out his rants about falling through the cracks as an English speaker in a Hebrew school: http://carloantonio.wordpress.com/.

Stage Presence Comes from the Armpits

Also known as my first week of real school. I think this wisdom, uttered by my Contemporary Professor,  was very applicable. What can be more nerve wracking than the first week? But it is the sweat that one puts in that makes the impression! Or something like that...hahaha.

(What does this mean? What have I been doing for the last two months? September: I was in Ulpan (Hebrew Intensive) with the DanceJerusalem classes (learning choreography, taking modern and Gaga classes. October: Rothberg International School classes began (Hebrew, Hasidism, The Emergence of Biblical Israel) and DanceJerusalem classes (choreography, ballet, modern and Gaga classes).)
In Israel, classes began on October 30th. Now I am taking my Rothberg classes along with classes at the Jerusalem Academy of Music and Dance.

My week was filled with quite a few hilarious mishaps.

• Was unsure where the bus would pick me up. Instead of standing at the bus stop, I decided to stand outside the gate of the Student Village. From there I had a fabulous view of the bus passing me by...
• Assumed that the "behina" being given in class was a quiz, not a test (people here don't really distinguish). Even though I knew we were supposed to study two chapters of material. So, I didn't study very much...Boy, wasn't I surprised (although, hurrah for being a good test taker, I still got an A).   
• Tried to walk into friends' apartment (they live exactly below me). Was so embarrassed I ran up the stairs to my floor, only to realize that I had managed to wash my keys (stuck my keys in a jacket pocket, stuck jacket in laundry). Had to then walk back downstairs to ask them for asylum till my laundry was done. 
• Decided to buy a chocolate croissant. Dropped said treat. Down a flight of stairs. A nice lady in front of me picked it up and handed it to me...I waited until she couldn't see me to take a bite out of it. Yum. 

Dance is Not Comfortable

We have cycled through various choreographers during the last 2 months of the DanceJerusalem program as we prepared two different works. One is part of a piece called...by Vertigo. The other is part of Kamyot by BatSheva. This has been interesting, as we have received very different interpretations of the pieces we are in. Sometimes confusing, as this will often change the directions, but overall very enlightening.

The other day, we had a choreographer come in who was part of BatSheva for 10 years and just recently left. He was by far one of my favorite choreographers. The BatSheva piece that we are working on has often felt very peaceful. It was much easier for me to learn than the Vertigo piece because each movement is very specific and is part of a new story. However, this new choreographer refused to allow us to settle into the piece. He pushed us to go further into it, to really challenge ourselves and I LOVED it. He spoke to us as my coaches used to when I played field hockey. Usually, when we finish this piece, we are all fine, not breathing too heavily, ready to do it again and to correct what needs to be corrected. But, under his direction, we were all panting at the end of the piece. He would accept no less than this complete throwing of ourselves into the movement.

YOU HAVE NEVER TAKEN BALLET BEFORE?!?!?!?!

Even if that isn’t exactly how he said it, underneath his perfectly trimmed eyebrows, I could tell that was what he was thinking. I had just completed my first ballet class with a renowned professor at the Jerusalem Academy of Music and Dance. Surrounded by graceful swans with long necks and light-as-feather-arms who were born with tutus attached to their hips, I galumphed through the entire hour and a half. The dance professor, an imposing man wearing what to me looked like very flexible combat boots(later I was informed that they were in fact jazz shoes), had kindly glued himself in front of me after five minutes of watching me try really, really hard to follow his instructions. With twinkling eyes, he unclenched my iron grip on the bar and commented generally “We want to barely touch the bar. After all, it is not supporting us. We simply rest our hand on it. Lightly.” Later in class he poked me in various places until I was standing with a “supported, strong ballet posture.” I felt more so that I had just been made into a very awkward shape, with my neck sticking out, my bum tucked in and my stomach sucked in determinedly. But he was pleased. So class continued, with me attempting to fake my way through the steps. After a floor portion, which I basically ended up can-canning, class was over and I approached the professor.

“Thank you for all your advice! I have never taken ballet before.”

What the hell am I doing here?

This is a question that has crossed my mind so many times recently. The question itself, I have discovered, is much more layered than it appears. Thus the answers produced range from the literal to the philosophical.
Literally: I am sitting here enjoying the internet that, after exactly 4 weeks, was FINALLY set up in my apartment!!! Thus, facebook chatting with someone who I can actually talk to if I stick my head out the window and doing other such silly things.
Literally on a bigger scale: Studying dance and religion. Living in Jerusalem, Israel. Going to school.
Emotionally: Trying to find my equilibrium. Attempting to balance so many hours of dance and school with establishing a life, while attempting to maintain connections to those who are much further away.
Physically: Trying not to fall asleep.
Mentally: Trying to wrap my head constantly around all the amazing things that I am doing and what they mean for my life and for the world. A few days ago I was in the Elah Valley, where David fought Goliath. David, who became Judaism's most beloved King, fought the giant Goliath in the valley where I slept a few nights ago. I can see the shining gold dome of the Temple Mount from my living room window. The place where Abraham almost sacrificed Isaac, where Muhammed ascended to heaven, only a few blocks away from the Church of the Holy Sepulchur, where Christ was resurrected. The Western Wall, the Mount of Olives, etc. All these places are a part of my daily life.
Which brings me to the more intense layers of this question. What am I doing here? All I seem to do is go to school. I have had little time to explore or engage with the place in which I am living. This is beginning to drive me crazy. With the week-long break that comes with the Jewish New Year, I plan to explore and spend quality time with this center of so many religions. But at the end of the day, what is it that I want to get out of being here? I am honestly not sure.
I find myself asking this question in dance class, when I am exhausted and staring at the clock, counting the minutes to when we will be done. When I am feeling absolutely hopeless about executing a piece of choreography that we have been practicing for weeks. When I watch the other dancers and hear them discuss the icons of dance, whose work and lives I know so little about. I am immersed in this world but, just like to Judaism, I came so late! It leaves me unsure of where I want to be and unsure of where I am. Thus leaving me feeling unsettled about the correctness of actually being here, in this program. Am I just wasting my time? What do I want to get out of this? What do I hope to do with these two fields of study? Usually when nagging strangers hear about my majors and ask why I am studying them, I simply reply that I love them and will gladly go where the wind takes me.
The wind has brought me here. What will I do now that I am here? I feel so exhausted by the whirlwind way that I have been moving through life, while am becoming so aware of my complete ignorance of the place that I am living. I am so caught up in this bubble of international students, in the bubble of dance students within that bubble and I feel unsure of how to escape. Time itself is moving so quickly. How to take advantage without being dashed to pieces?
The optimistic, strong Elisa who got me here with so much passion and curiosity and drive would set goals down here. Set goals about speaking Hebrew, about exploring as much of Israel as I possibly can, about not only reading but really touching and being touched by the people and culture and history of this beautiful place. The exhausted, yet to be emotionally settled Elisa can only think about how great those goals sound, but how much better some quality rest time sounds.
So let the winds blow. I suppose I will try to follow them where I may without getting lost.
And for now, maybe the literal answers to this question can ground me so that I do not feel lost as I search for answers to the deeper, philosophical ones.

To be a bird with(out) roots

This is a phrase that I have been meditating on this entire week, one that resonates with the complexities of my life as it has come to be thus far. Thinking about how it is that we, as human beings, and me, as a changing, evolving being, balance flying and stretching our wings with planting roots and attaching ourselves to places, to people, to things.

This week brought on a strong bout of homesickness, not dealt with well. It has been an exhausting, backbreaking week (kashe, in Hebrew!) and I was not sure when it would end. I needed to restore myself to a mental, emotional and physical place of solidity and balance. Thus a day spent skipping Hebrew class before the other dancers and I took a trip to an Eco-Art Kibbutz. I attempted to find that place of peacefulness that I so require in order to participate responsibly in the world. Isn’t it fascinating how quickly we attach ourselves to things and to people, regardless of their impending end. I leave here in about 3.5 months and find it difficult to not already regret parting with some of the amazing people that I have met and with this oh-so-complicated place in which I live.

Anyways, let me tell you about my travels! So, I went to this Kibbutz which is the home of Vertigo, an truly beautiful, interesting dance company. The project, housed on this Kibbutz, was started by a woman named Noa. Today, after an exhausting, sometimes painful day of rehearsals, she sat and spoke with us. Noa is a true storyteller. She talked to us for hours about her thoughts on life, how the company came about, her relationships with her dancers, how she creates her choreography…Just watching her was fascinating. I heard in her explanations many themes that I have encountered as I have begun to choreograph and think about the creation of art. Noa lives on this kibbutz with her three other sisters and their 12 children. She emphasizes the importance of honesty in her life and in her dances. In dancing as a human and not as a dancer, an element that was strikingly clear in her dance “Birth of a Phoenix”. My favorite dancer in the entire piece was a dark skinned, sinewy man. He danced with dark brown eyes so open and alert the entire dance that I would have been fascinating just watching his face. This was true of many of her dancers: they did not look like typical dancers. But they moved with such alacrity and poignance that their being brought new dimensions of meaning to the word dance itself. She told us how she questions the usefulness and sustainability of dance as is now. How can one live on a Kibbutz that is concernced with being environmentally friendly when one must carts tons of equipment and humans around to places around the world? However, she said, it is something she is researching. Always researching. “The best teacher is one who is not afraid to be a student,” she said with a sparkle in her eye. This is so true of both of she and her sister, who have taught us: they are fascinated by everything. Their work with us is always teaching them new things even as we learn from them. It also spoke directly to my recent thought, one that floats to the forefront of my mind when I am feeling frustrated with my inability to execute a movement in dance or to truly feel what I am doing for fear of being left two steps behind. In those moments I think about how much I JUST want to choreograph. That is where my passion lies, I tell myself, and this is good but I won’t always be struggling to keep up with others. Luckily these moments are balanced by others that remind me just how much I have progressed in the past few weeks and how good this program is for me as a dancer and as a human being. Like today when I gracefully completed a shoulder roll that flipped me over completely and a classmate congratulated me with such enthusiasm, as she knew I had been working so hard on it! Or when the director of the program looked me in the eye and told me how noticeable my improvement and hard work was. How well I was doing. But even more meaningful than those moments of praise are the moments when I myself feel truly immersed in what I am doing. When I am the one leading the group and am sure of the move to come. When I am able to stop worrying about where I am supposed to be moving to next and can really appreciate the place that I am in, even if only for half a second.

I left the Kibbutz feeling incredibly inspired and as though my feet are placed more solidly on the ground here. The faces of my peers are so familiar to me now. The different way that things work no longer make me blink. I am beginning to forget where I need to move to next and am actually sitting in the movement. This is making my experiences that much more fun and rich.

Random moments that I would like to share: This morning, waking up to shower at 6:30 in an open air shower with luke warm water. I was freezing. And very awake after it!

My hilarious roommate researching the difficult life of a T-Rex. How, for example, do you drink a glass of water when your arms are so tiny and you only have three fingers?

Walking into my apartment unsure that it was in fact my apartment. This is not actually a rare occurrence. The other day I was sitting in an apartment diagonal from mine and one of my roommates walked in. I mentioned that I was surprised to see her there and she asked why. “Because this isn’t our apartment?” Thankfully, turns out that one of the roomies had simply bleached the floor and put everything back in different places. And again, this makes me wonder about the need for comfort and stability. I am still not adjusted to the new living room configuration.

The several dinners that I have made with new friends. How important it is to have friends. The qualities you look for in a friend (people with similar views, levels of judgmentalness and bluntness, people who make me laugh).

How difficult it continues to be to connect with people from home. How sometimes that feels so important and affects how I feel about myself so much and how at other times, I really don’t feel that I need to be in contact at all.

How hard it is to walk when your ankles and knees (and shoulders and hips) are bruised. The marks of the art, darling! 

What strange skills I have. Like the fact that making rice sounds strange and difficult to me, but making a caramelized pear sauce does not. 

Life goes on. As does the research. As does my attempt to find a balance between roots and wings.

Dance Away!

So. I am here. Dancing. Right?
Right.
I would now like to explain what I am doing in these dance classes.
Four days of the week (which begins on Sunday in Israel. So today is my Friday. Even though it's Thursday. Confused yet? I am.) the DanceJerusalemers are shuttled over from Ulpan to another campus of Hebrew University, Givat Ram, where the Jerusalem Academy of Music and Dance is located.
Two days we spend with the lovely, powerful women of Vertigo, two sisters who run a Kibbutz for Eco-conscious Dance (I believe, but don't quote me on that). This was the first class we took here and it TERRIFIED me. We begin our classes doing release (let go of the tension in your hips, observe the way your feet move when you aren't controlling them) and manipulations of our bodies. This is wonderfully freeing and incredibly exhausting. It is the most natural and the most difficult thing to do, at the same time. After about an hour and a half of this and attempts to follow demonstrations which require muscles that I have lost and am only now regaining ("roll over your shoulder backwards, then roll forwards over the same shoulder. Switch!"), we begin learning/practicing choreography. This choreography is incredibly demanding. It constantly requires you to be pushing energy out and down into the ground constantly. It is strong and forceful, but also lovely and incredibly precise. I have only recently (read: today) been able to remember and do it all (now I just to have to do it with FEELING!). It is a ton of fun, but is truly tiring. The piece that we have learned I believe to be about 4 1/2 minutes of constant movement, with tons of level and direction changes. Today we began to learn a softer part of the dance that is about surrender. This dance is fierce and hardcore. I am impressed that, after two weeks, I have picked it up (after NEVER EVER having learned choreography like this in my entire life) and am so aware of the true pleasure in movement.
The other classes are lead by a  hilarious, slightly terrifying woman named Aya. She has been called the right hand woman of Ohad Naharin, who is an incredibly famous choreographer here in Israel. He invented a movement style called Gaga and has choreographed many pieces for Bat Sheva, a FABULOUS company in Israel. I simply love to watch Aya. We spend an hour and a half attempting to float, be covered in flesh, have traveling stuff moving through us, isolating parts of our bodies while moving our entire bodies, feel waves of motion go through our bodies while continuously allowing the motion to be organic. If you stop moving, you hear a "But don't stop moving! What, you have to stop moving to talk? Be alive. Not dead like this. Alive. Always alive. And the traveling stuff. Always you must have the traveling stuff." Accompanied often by a slight baring of the teeth. And then a "But don't be so serious about it!" Haha. No wonder I like this woman so much. It is the most soothing and also the most awake state to be in. It is as though you are allowing your body to actually lead you, instead of you always trying to lead it (thank goodness, I'm sure it says). The complete paradox of this motion is so freeing. I LOVE Gaga. We then begin to work on the choreography that Aya has taught us. She is a stickler for details. So much so that we have really only learned about a minute and a half of choreography. But it is so important, she tells us, how you feel it, how it moves through your body. Another dancer discovered a recording of the choreography online and it is amazing to watch it. It is as though the dancers are completely in the present. They do not anticipate their next movement, it just happens, with no connection to the one that came before it. Because we have been taught this movement more slowly, I was quicker to pick it up, although no one has been able to pick it up as perfectly as she hoped we would.
All in all, I feel that I have developed so much as a dancer in the past two weeks. I have so much work to keep doing, but I feel that my body is more alive and that my creative brain is as well. I know now the pleasure of executing specific choreography correctly and doing so in connection with a group of 18 other people. It is magical and powerful and freeing and very difficult. And I am having a blast.
On to the weekend!

Going into detail!

Is not something that I do via blog, obviously! I'm just not mentally here. So, instead, I would like to refer all you blog followers, of which I believe there to be few, to a fellow dancer's blog about his (our) time in Jerusalem. He has all the deets on our dance program, what we do with our everyday lives and some interesting reflections on his time here in Israel thus far. Plus he's just really cool!

http://carloantonio.wordpress.com/2011/09/12/dance-in-israel-reflection/

My dance goals have changed this week from attempting to learn the choreography to actually being an alive, present dancer. This is a very difficult thing to do when you are unsure of where you are supposed to be moving next. So, I have adopted some of the strategies I used when trying to get better at field hockey (which, if you remember, I did rather successfully). Number one: GAME FACE. Always look like you know what you're doing. Number two: you can never practice enough. Number three: Concentrate. No more wandering minds (hmmmm, there is a dead bug on the ground, I wonder if somebody stepped on it). I am determined to reach my full potential as a dancer. As that wonderful, famous quote says:

“Our deepest fear is not that we are inadequate. Our deepest fear is that we are powerful beyond measure. It is our light, not our darkness, that frightens us most. We ask ourselves, 'Who am I to be brilliant, gorgeous, talented, and famous?' Actually, who are you not to be? You are a child of God. Your playing small does not serve the world. There is nothing enlightened about shrinking so that people won't feel insecure around you. We were born to make manifest the glory of God that is within us. It's not just in some of us; it's in all of us. And when we let our own light shine, we unconsciously give other people permission to do the same. As we are liberated from our own fear, our presence automatically liberates others.”
Maryanne Williamson


And isn't that the truth? Who I am not to be....


Even more so, who are YOU not to be? 

So, what are you eating?

Clearly the most important post. Can't believe I've been in Israel for...holy shit, it's been almost a week!!!! Feels like about 10 years.

Hummus. Lots of it. With everything. Crackers, bread, peppers.
Veggies. I know, weird, right? I actually, contrary to popular belief, do like vegetables. And fruit. And, for some reason, I keep buying Costco sized things of fruit, so I eat like 3 pears/bunches of grapes a day at least.
Just cooked my first meal tonight. VERY simple. Need to buy some key ingredients...like flour. And sugar. And garlic.

Moving on and more importantly, the weird/good food that I have had here thus far:
The amazing chocolate with pop rocks in it! I blew all the dancers' minds with this!! Pretty funny.
A chocolate croissant. OH. MY. GOD. Here, they give you WARM pastries. And in the middle of this croissant was basically a ton of similar but better than Hershey's Kiss chocolate. YUM. I have never been so happy.
Yogurt. Well, really, what I thought was yogurt. I am definitely smart enough to read the side of the container and figure out what is yogurt and what is not, not to mention that I helped one of my roommates decipher "Vanilla Yogurt" the other day. But, I was rushing and just grabbed something in the dairy section in a yogurt-like container. I opened it the next day and took a spoonful. NOT what I was expecting. I figured maybe it was just plain yogurt. So I put some sugar in it. The more I thought about it and looked at it, it reminded me of cottage cheese. After contemplating this and staring at the container and, well, eating my strange, sugary container of lumpy dairy product, I finally asked my Israel-savvy roommate. "Oh, yeah," she said. "That's a type of cheese. It's not cottage cheese, but it's similar." HAHAHA. I bought quite a few containers of this and now need to figure out what to do with my runny, yogurty cheese.

I have yet to eat falafel (since I don't really like it) or really anything I buy from anywhere else yet. Sadly, by the time I get  home, all I want to do is sit down!

Dance class number 2 today! We did something called GAGA, which is this up and coming dance style. It was a blast. "Pretend there is a ball in your body. Rolling around your body. Faster. Now there are 2. Now there are 64! Now there are 180! Is that how fast you would move if there were 180 rolling balls in your body?!" Too fun. I actually picked up the choreography a bit quicker today, although I don't think the choreographers quite know what to do with me. The director of the program told me that I am doing just fine and that I am here to learn. Which is what I am doing.

Huzzah!

Shalom! Naim Me'od!

So today was the first day of class and I am reeling! Hebrew from 9-2 Sun through Thurs then dance for 3 hours an hour after! Whew!!!! And having class on Sundays is very confusing - I am still convinced today is Monday!

So, this weekend we went up north. A long bus ride, then an Israeli breakfast which consisted of a bag of chocolate milk, which was fabulous, and a roll, which was not so great. Then we began our hike. The hike was supposed to be easy. Me, a kid from CO in decent shape, figured it couldn't be too bad. The beginning wasn't....and then on the way back up, well, let's just say, we were hiking at at least a 70 degree angle. I was cruising past poor people who were panting and wheezing, but boy oh boy was I tired when I got up to the top! In between, the guides lead us to a waterfall. It was beautiful and tiny, although actually the biggest waterfall in Israel. "Swim!" the guides said. "What?" we said. Israelis have a different concept of communication than we Americans. Instead of telling us 50 times when we would need our bathing suits, they just randomly told us to have them. So, we all jumped in in shorts and sports bras and t-shirts. It was a blast. Soooo beautiful. Did I take  pictures? No. Lame. Sorry!

Then we went to the hostel at Tel Hai. We had a Shabbat service - my first Orthodox one. I was trying to explain the little I know about Judaism to the new friends that I had made, while trying to understand the service myself. I have NEVER before sat through an Orthodox service. The barrier was up between men and women and it was verryyy different, although the boys kept crossing over to talk to the gals, which was funny. Made me miss my reform temple and Wes' services!!!

We did some bonding, which was astonishingly fun (Israeli games are much  more creative than American ones: find 7 gumballs in a tray of flour! Eat a pan of bomba covered in chocolate and carmel  (bomba is basically peanut flavored cheetos)). A nice evening sing-a-long and then bed.

The next day, we were taken to an Industrial Park. At first it was fun, as we got to wander around a really neat photography museum (the only one in Israel), but then we were put in front of a video about how industrial parks are changing the world. They are bringing about peace, didntchaknow?! It was very odd. Luckily, I slept through most of it, hee hee.

More food! We were most excited about the food. None of us have really started cooking yet and having a hot meal was AMAZING. Not to mention more and more and more. Ate so mmmuuccchhh. Soon, we were on our way home. I maintained a long conversation with an Orthodox lad and learned so much. What different views of religion we have!!!!!!!!

Classes started yesterday and, even though I know some Hebrew, my brain was EXPLODING. Hebrew from 9-2 is pretty intense! But, I'm picking it up fast, as are my classmates.

Today I had my first dance class. Taught by two famous Israeli choreographers: Noa and Rina Wertheim. They were amazing. The first part, with all the typical modern dance theory stuff (move like your vertebrae is water, move like there is a stick up your butt) was great and pretty normal for me. Then "on your feet!" they commanded and began teaching us a combination. 30 seconds later, everyone knew the first part and I was looking around like "what?!". I worked my butt off. I'm glad I'm at least in shape and not affected by the altitude (woot CO!). I have a LONG way to go but will learn a lot. One of my roommates, who I really respect, didn't give me any crap about being fine. "You'll work really hard," she said. "It will be a trial and if you approach it the right way, you'll learn a lot. If not, you won't." I agree. And I plan to not be intimidated and just keep working hard.

My accomplishment of the day? I learned how to do a jete! They put this into the dance we were learning and everyone knew how to do it. I was pretty intimidated. A jete is when you spin your torso and your legs come out looking like they are straight and fully extended. A bad explanation for a beautiful move. I am pretty comfortable with the other dancers, thank God (otherwise I would be sooooo intimidated), and asked them to teach me. In 2 minutes, they had shown me a move that they have been working on forever. I have a loonnggg way to go before it looks near as pretty, but I am planning on practicing up and down the halls of Rothberg!

Rock on beauties!

First Night

So, I am sitting outside, in a little corner, on a ledge. There are 4 of us here, huddled together, trying to get internet. I have spent an entire day in Israel. What I have learned today begins with a conversation: "So, the shower, yeah, the water goes EVERYWHERE," one of my 4 roommates informed me. I had experienced this in Israel before - the floor does not dip so that the water goes down the drain. Instead, it spreads all the way across the entire bathroom floor. If you, like me, have incredibly sneaky hair, you will then find and feel guilty that there are black curls all over the bathroom floor. This, however was not what I learned. What I learned was that she was not joking. Standing under the shower head is basically useless, as the water sprays out in about 25 directions. I learned that it was smarter to simply pick one or two sprays of water and to stay under those. So much for a nice comforting shower. 

However, the day has been good! I am unpacked in my single, bought about 230 shekels of food (about $80 or less), and have been thoroughly briefed on what the next 4.5 months will contain for my life. The dance program is AMAZING. We are studying with really famous choreographers starting on Sunday -yikes! I am super nervous but also super excited. I met someone who has been dancing as long as I have. He is enthusiastic about everything and I hope we'll be buds! I have actually met quite a few awesome people, but am a bit too overwhelmed to remember names quite yet. I also have yet to activate my phone...sorry, family. 

My apartment has the most amazing view. You can see the entire old city of Jerusalem. The Dome of the Rock is easiest to pick out, but it is simply amazing to stare at the dusty hills covered in white stone buildings and trees normally found in a variety of climates. I bought my first ever batch of groceries meant to support myself. I live with 4 other dancers (there are 14 total) and we realized that, sadly, we will spend little time in our room, as we must rush from one campus to the next in order to fulfill our academic and dance requirements. I begin the Ulpan (Hebrew intensive) and dance classes on Sunday (weird that things happen on Sundays, here!!). Should be good to remedy the way that my brain handles this foreign language - by substituting with Spanish (and sometimes a bit of Hindi or Chinese). I actually asked someone a question in Spanish today, so desperate was I to communicate with them. The muddle of those languages and the smattering of Hebrew that I know, plus the prayers that I know, are all jumbled in my head. The cool Jerusalem air (it gets chilly here at night!) is soothing though. I guess I'll head to bed soon. 

Missing you all!