Hi guys, I know I really need to, like, update this blog more often so that the posts don't become novels. Unfortunately this is going to be another long one where I tell you stories and then attempt to explain what my immediate future looks like. And then after this one, I promise to try and amuse you with shorter and lighter blog posts filled with interesting anecdotes. . . . Yyyyeeesss.
First up on the table: my trip to ISRAEL for Semana Santa!! If you checked out my facebook album, I attempted to order the photos with dates, but I'll go ahead and give you a little more detail on my adventures here. Why did I go to Israel, you ask? Ok, background information: I met my lovely Israeli friends Amit Perelstein and Amit Segall back in Toronto, September of 2008, through Couchsurfing. And I thought it was high time to visit them in their sunny country.
So then: March 31st I flew out and arrived in Tel Aviv at midnight; Perki and Segall picked me up and we hung out for a bit at someone's house, where I was offered marijuana for the first time since I hung out with Perki and Segall in Toronto. These boys are a bad influence... :P
April 1st: Groceries with Perki's roommate Lior, where as you might have seen in my FB album, all products with yeast in them are off-limits (Passover), but matzo is in high abundance. Perki and I went for a walk on the beach to kill some time before going to visit Segall at his work in Ramat HaSharon (just beside Tel Aviv, where they grew up). Segall made me my first delicious Israeli cappuccino and stuffed me with cookies. Then Perki showed me around Tel Aviv, and we had dinner at Perki's friend's house.
April 2: Perki takes me to Jaffa and introduces me to really good hummus. We basically just walked around in Jaffa all day, sat in the sun, people-watched, and went home to have supper. Then the boys (Segall, Perki, Kan-Tor, and Weiner) took me out to Rotschild street in Tel Aviv where we drank out on benches, botellón-style (but we bought the wine from a Spanish-themed bar first, a bit classier). I have fun with these guys....
April 3: hit up a t-shirt market with Segall but none of us bought anything. I got cute magnets though! We went to the port to get pizza and walk around/fight our way through the crowds of people also out for a stroll. Worse than Spain on a Sunday, I'm telling you. Well it was Saturday, which is of course the Jewish Sunday, so.... went to a cute bar and got my first Goldstar (beer); afterwards me and Perk went to go see Alice and Wonderland in 3D, fuck I hate those stupid 3D glasses... hahaha. Hey Perk, where's the picture of us with those glasses?
April 4: Segall took me, Blondie, Aviyah and Weiner to the Ramat Hanadiv gardens in Zikhon. Post-garden tour Segall and I thought it would be a good idea to find the "secret spring" the brochure taunted us with in the 'park' area of the park. And so we commenced our epic hike across the Israeli wasteland, which almost killed Aviyah, but not quite. Halfway through we came across some Roman agricultural ruins; then we kept going and just hoped for the best. (ie that we would get back to the car.)
Of course we did make it, and next up was Haifa, where we got lunch, visited Elias' tomb (I think) in some church (God I'm awful) and then poked our heads into the Baha'i gardens... freaking amazing, and random. On the way home Blondie invited me to his house for the second Passover dinner, which was very sweet of him, but he did NOT explain the amount of food I would be expected to eat. Happy Laura of course wants to try one of everything, but she was not aware that there would be two full tables of food offered BEFORE the main course. And dessert. God help me. And yes, I ate the fish ball. I still remember it quite well, haha.
Perki picked me up and we attempted to go out with Lior, Segall, and Weiner, but we couldn't find a bar we liked so we ended up getting a hot dog and playing "Sababa ve hacol" the whole night. So it wasn't a complete loss. :)
April 5: Went to Caesarea with Perki and Segall. The Ralli museum was cool (and free); there were some neat pictures and Dali sculptures to gaze at. Caesarea was like a little archaeological theme park. Sun, ruins, explanatory videos, and gift shops. Wheee!
April 6: drove in the morning to Kan-Tor's house in Jerusalem with Perki; Weiner came too! Kan-Tor outdid himself in an eight-hour, very-complete tour of Jerusalem. Basically we came down from Mount Scopus to the Mount of Olives and crossed into the Old City, and then walked around there all day.
Jerusalem, how can I describe thee. Plenty of religious types, Jews, Arabs, tourists... Judaica to buy, Holy Burgers to eat, wishes to make... Jesus' path with the cross to follow... birthplaces of people, old walls below the ground, different quarters all mashed together. A labyrinth of stuff, really. Afterwards we went for a walk in Ein Kerem, and (sort of) saw the Rose Garden, Knesset, and Supreme Court. Weiner went home; Perki, Kan-Tor and I got pizza and later a beer with a whole bunch of Kan-Tor's friends from school.
April 7: it took us a while to get to Yad Vashem (the Holocaust museum), so by the time we had been through there (it is quite complete), it was closing and we couldn't see the monuments outside. Ah well, Jerusalem is a maze for those of us without previous knowledge or GPS. Stupid Jerusalem... haha. Kan-Tor invited us out to drink wine at one of his friend's houses, and later the group of us went out to dance and drink expensive rum and cokes. It was actually super fun. Even Perk got into the music despite his earlier skepticism... haha.
April 8: Last day in Jerusalem! Kan-Tor dropped me and Perk off in front of the Damascus Gate and we got some souvenirs in the Arab quarter. Ok, I got some souvenirs. We hit the Jewish and Armenian quarters as well (not sure if on purpose) on our way to the Jaffa Gate, and we also got some directions from some Jewish guy in a tourism office. This had the added bonus of Perki doing prayers with tefilin for my benefit (because this guy is of course very happy to help any stray Jew find a few minutes for prayers in their day). Perki also got to have a little heart-to-heart with him in which he learned that it's ok to be my tour guide, but not my husband. Thank goodness we ran into that guy... what would we do without religious guidance?
From the Jaffa Gate we made it to the Ben Yehuda pedestrian walk and finally to the Mahane Yehuda market. It was cute and functional, and I reeeeally miss that cinnamon chalva we bought there. Perk, I changed my mind, I'm going to need you to bring me some when you come visit. :P
We got some really good ice cream there too. The kind of good that's reminiscent of Cream in
Toronto (I'm sure you all remember, #1 ice cream in Toronto last year?), haha. Alternative flavours and whatnot. We tried the basil, but settled on spices and pistachio. I would definitely go back.
Hummus and kubbe for supper, and then a quiet night doing laundry in a university residence complex with an appalling lack of public bathrooms... sigh. Hehehe.
April 9: took our leave from Kan-Tor and left him an autographed picture of myself, Kan-Tor and Weiner. It will be interesting to see how long that stays in the frame... :) Perk and I then drove to Ein Gedi, on the Dead Sea. Saw my first and last camels and a couple Bedouin camps on the way. Swam/floated in the water, found the mud pit and mudded up, and then clambered agonizingly over the hot rocks back to our stuff (lots of rocks, little sand. Was there any sand?). Perk was a superhero and brought me my sandals... haha. Oh Lord I'm such a wimp. When did this happen?!
We rinsed off and headed back to Tel Aviv. That night I met Dor and his girlfriend, a couple other people came over and we played some word game (in English, how sweet of them) that I refused to play properly, and then was so tired that I had to go home. Man, being a tourist is tiring....
April 10: Well, it's Saturday, and we need some food for breakfast. That means a trip across the city to find the open grocery store. (What was it called in English? "International Taste"?) It was totally awesome to find Honey Nut Cheerios, and we continued the fruit, yogurt and muesli-for-breakfast tradition we'd started at Kan-Tor's place. Yummm. Today Perk got a break from me; I got dropped off at the Tel Aviv Art Museum and then walked over to the beach to hang out for a bit. It was quite nice to just walk through the streets in summer... ah, summer in April.
Then of course my phone ran out of money as I was telling Perk where to come pick me up, and I had to hope my directions ("just north of the fake Gaudi building") were adequate, which they were in the end. Thus how the ugly, fake Gaudi building saved my life! And I will forever be indebted to it. ... I'm not sure how I feel about that.
At home we made shakshuka (Perki made shakshuka) and Segall came over to serenade us and get yelled at by the cranky neighbour. Haha, poor boy. The three of us met up with Weiner after supper (and after watching the Jerusalem episode of the Simpsons) and we went out in the Florentin area of Tel Aviv. Ate a delicious hot dog. Went home.
April 11: Are you getting bored yet? Today was a day to run errands, and a day to do nothing. The weather made you want to just press fast-forward and get to the next day. It was weirdly oppressive. And of course it happened to be Holocaust Memorial Day starting in the evening, so all in all a bit of a strange day. We saw the port at Herzeliyya though, which was nice, and Perk got a nice shirt at the brand-new H&M in Tel Aviv.
April 12: Last day in Israel. In the morning was the two minutes of silence; me and Dora (the cat) watched from the window as everyone stopped what they were doing down in the plaza. The siren winds down and everyone starts moving again.
Perk had to drop off an assignment at the university, so I got to see the campus, and afterwards I finally tried sachlib. We walked home again, got a bag together, and went to sit out on a beach near Herzeliyya. Fries, wine, sunset, and then it was time to get ready to go. We ran into Lior as we were leaving to have supper and so we all got to go get sushi together. :) Yummm... then Perk brought me to Ben Gurion, where he proceeded to get interrogated about me, supposedly to speed up the security process. Poor Perk, what did I drag him into?
Then it was goodbye Tel Aviv... I'll miss you.
And such was my vacation! Of course it started raining as soon as I got back to Madrid/San Sebastian... sigh. But the weather quickly improved and I'm back feeling good. Last weekend I went with Iñaki, his German friend Marianna, and his roommate Jakob (the Dane) to France on Saturday, and Vitoria on Sunday. Then just this past weekend Jocey came to visit me in San Sebastian. So every weekend pretty much feels like another vacation. It's awesome...
I've opened up my couch to Couchsurfers again, so I think this weekend I'll be hosting. The next weekend (May 8-9) Inga will come to visit (¡¡finally!!). And then can my little brain even believe it... only three days left of school. On the 13th I'll head over to Barcelona to pick up Perki from the airport and crash at Inga's house. Perk leaves again on the 26th of May and my parents will be coming on June 5th until the 15th. Then I just need to be in Liberec for Lukas' wedding, and I'll be going back to Ontario for a couple weeks in July. Then it's up to Yellowknife and down to Monterey at the very beginning of August. And I start a whole other adventure! Geez, wish me luck, guys.
So there y'all have it! I'll try to keep these posts lighter in the future, I promise. :) Talk soon...
