Jerusalem in the Summer

Jerusalem is about to start buzzing with culture and music and I'm getting exctied. The Shuk is going to buzzing till late at night with the smell of parsley and the buzz of poetsm live bands and I'm sure the odd screaming chanting prophet here and there. That's one thing Jerusalem seems to keep recruiting - screaming prophets.

Most of the prophets though tend to profess the present though. With dread locked bears and dirst smeared faces they grumble "AHHHH! Its HOT today! No chance of rain! And Wo unto those who dont slip, slop, slap! Thou shalt get burnt! That is thy Lord who burns you! AHHHRRGGGG"

The last couple of week my local ancient city was lit up with light instilations thoughout the city for the Jerusalem Light Festival. It was cool to see on the backdrop of ancient stones with 80's disco lights. STAM! It wasnt tacky, it was actaully really cool.

This is some examples of the instilations.

Greener Grass

The other day a friend of mine told me they were considering making Aliyah and I just about had to wrap both hands around my mouth to prevent a violent “WHY!?” from exploding out of it.

Not really sure why that was the first thing to wiz through my head. Maybe it was the result of the ache in my back from washing chocolate soiled dishes at the ice cream shop, added to the twitch I now have in my right eye from reading fine print to make sure I don’t screwed over by some asshole boss with a crafty accountant, in addition to my sore throat from explaining to the seventh person I was transferred to on the phone that in fact I am in Israel and they should be providing me with medical insurance.

Or maybe it was just because my jeans were sticking to the sweat that was running down my crack like Niagara.

Some days I really feel that you can solve both Israel’s water and electricity problems just by harnessing the water and potential hydroelectricity from the sweat that runs down Israeli’s cracks during the Middle Eastern Summer.

Today wasn’t really a rough day in the grand scheme of things, but it wasn’t a “wow! I’m living the dream” kind of day.

My morning coffee was interpreted by a siren used in war times to tell people to get to the nearest bunker.

Too bad the siren couldn’t also announce that it was a drill… If we were under attack my last words would definitely not have gotten me into heaven.

Just like in Sydney I have good days and bad days. Today I was quite pissed off at having to walk for an hour to fill out some forms so I can get payed for a job I did 2 months ago. But surprisingly after a slice of pizza with extra cheese and a couple of table spoons of Nutela, I felt a lot better.

The grass for me has been greener one this side and I’m happy. It’s just some days I have to remind myself that for green grass to flourish you also need the worms which bore through the grass like maggots through a corps, you need water, and every so often you need a little shit.

A Day in the Life of Ulpan Etzion

Sorry for the hebrew, was going to translate but really can't be assed.

 A Film By Ben Goldman

This film, although in hebrew, gives a pretty good summary of the months I spent at the Absorption Centre/Ulpan. I feel it describes the excitment, the frustration of standing in lines to sign stupid forms and then not having the right piece of paper, getting lost, dealing with the hebrew language and making friends, all of which I've probably written about somewhere in this blog.

I am ready, I am.

Today I moved out of the bubble the government provided for me and 249 other Olim Chadashim (new immigrants). My toilet roof was leaking most of the time, the drains vomited frequently, it was infested with fruit flies for a bit (despite the complete absence of fruit - wtf), it was freezing in the winter and hot in the summer, and the walls we paper thin so I was privy to my Argentinian neighbour’s domestic disputes, but for 5 months it was home.

It’s really quite liberating. I’m still in the same city, same job, same friends, only now, I filled with this sense of independence. That life has begun. It’s real.

I think I could really liken my experience in the Ulpan to purgatory. You’re neither here, nor there, but you know something big has just happened, and something even bigger is going to happen.

Unlike the old place, the new place is definitely more furnished than the room of a teenage Buddhist monk. My new housemates don’t live in the same room as me. They are also both of the female gender.

The final party at the ulpan was really nice. Looking around at the people I remember looking at in the same room. I remember judging them at first glance; hot, not so hot, cute, potential friend, indie etc.

At the end of year party I had deeper adjectives by which to describe my friends, my family; the laugher, the woman who cares, my neighbour, the guy who’s always up to party, the stoner, the girl with the butch waddle, the talker (avoid when in a rush), the shtettle mum, etc.

During ulpan 5 couples go engaged, 3 got married, a couple people dated and broke up, and 3 people were in an intensely awkward threesome. Memories.

I was a little apprehensive to leave the nest, but I think now I can safely say “I’m ready to start living!”

Stay tuned for my video apartment tour.

Ice Cream

Finding a job and a place to live has been great, I move in in a week and I’ve already been working for a week. I really enjoy being a part of the Ben Yehuda back drop. Seeing Birthright groups come and go and satisfying pregnant women’s craving for Snickers ice cream and Coconut sorbet. I have to admit I have started to find the work a bit mind numbing.

Two days ago I did an 11 hour shift. Which means I probably wiped sticky ice cream of the tables 55 times, scooped 123 ice cream cones (give or take) which is about 356 balls of ice cream (give or take), made 14 waffles, 12 milkshakes, 5 take away tubs of ice cream, and 4 lattés (they were for me).

Now after you’ve tasted the 26 different types of ice cream three times, you already feel a little sick, so you need a latte for some savoury. Then your mind starts playing tricks on you. You forget who ordered what ice cream and end up giving whisky flavour to a 3 year old (which is fine, they’ll just sleep well). You forget what language you meant to be speaking to the customer (Hebrew, English or French). You even forget what languages you speak. It ends up sounding like this:

  Customer: Shalom

Me: Errr…

Customer: Can I try the Twix ice cream

Me: Errr…. Weh

Customer: That’s delicious

Me: Tu vous gutey encoure?

Customer: What?

Me: Oh, סליחה, רוצה לטעום, I mean, ah, what?

<then I blame my confusion on the noise>

Me: Sorry the music’s so loud, what can I get you?

Customer: What music?

Me: … (I don’t have an answer) …We don’t have that flavour.

Customer: … (silence) Can I try the mint chocolate chip…

You get the point

I was worried that my mind was going to melt like a little boys ice cream in the Middle Eastern sun, I was worried my mind was going to get smeared all over some hungry kid’s face.

I decided to start playing mind exercises to make sure I don’t lose mine.

When I whipped down the tables I estimated how long the ice cream had been smeared over the table for. There are a lot of factors; temperature, humidity, sun/shade, thickness of the blob, even the sugar content of the flavour.

As I used my finger nails, brute elbow grease, and a thousand sprays from the Windex equivalent I turned physical labour into actuary.

It gets a little worse.

Yesterday I found myself speaking to the ice cream. “C’mon Ferrero Rocher, get in the cone, I’m always so good to you, whenever people ask me for my recommendation you’re my go to guy, why are you being difficult”.

I looked up at the confused customer, and fade out surreptitiously and faded back in with the words of the song playing in the background pretending I was singing it all along…

Besides the worry that I’m losing my mind, I also worry that I might have lost my bandaid in a scoop of strawberry sorbet.

Other than that, I get lots of visitor which is fun, and I think I’ve mastered waffle making.