Sunday 5 February
Lily and I busted a huge ass mission at 8am on Sunday morning, for breakfast and a sim card. We didnt quite get a sim card but had the best bagele (Bagel) froms "Sams Bagels". It was so American. We had to meet at Beit Shmuel at 10 to start orientation so we lugged all our luggage the "short" walk there, Mor setting the pace at what can only be described as a brisk walk. Not an easy feat pulling approximately 33 kilos worth of shiz behind you.
Nervously we greeted out Shnat Director and Madricha at the door, not quite sure if we were in the right place at all.
Then there was the anxiously anticipated acquaintanceship of the Australians. Hows that for alliteration?Okay, I'll stop. We nervously peeked round the door at a room full of smiling faces and were bombarded by hugs and questions, many of wich I couldn't understand due to the thick accent from down under. We soon made friends and jokes were flying across the room. We had a small welcome ceremony overlooking the Old City from the balcony, and a tour of the Bedit Shmuel site. This was followed by a Rules and Regs discussion and a trip through Jerusalem.
This was by far, the most exciting thing. Our Maddies (Noa and Guy) arranged a small tour/scavenger hunt through down town Jerusalem, mainly to show us around some of the cool places and to get our bareings. The hunt included things like:
- Convincing citizens to sign a petition to change the Jerusalem symbol to a kangaroo
- Getting bar tenders to sing songs.
- Pretending we were on boats.
- Trying to taste ice cream flavours.
- Spotting Arsim.
- Finding cool new things and
- Eating soup.
The soup was my favourite part because it was cold outside and the soup restaurant was the coolest place ever. Not only can you eat soup served by strange and interesting people, but you can also play checkers and a chess if you wish.
After dinner, we all felt obligated, it being our first night as official Shnatties to go out for a celebratory drink. We went back to our new little discovery. A small hole in the wall that looks as though one would be human traffic-ed from is actually a really vibe-y little bar. The bar tender is a Palestinian and so Lily got into heated debates with him, but its our little secret hide out. We bought a local Israeli beer and a local/imported Palestinian beer and sat around chatting about life the universe and other round things.
I' going to tag one of the walls.