Last Saturday I landed in Boston from the DR at 8 am, and was very excited to see my family, Antuan, Mrs. Coop, Marc, and everyone else there. I got to tell them a little bit about my trip, but quickly had to transfer a few things to the suitcase my mom brought to the airport for my next adventure. It was great to be in Boston for an entire 2.5 hours, but by 10:30 am, I was sitting on my next plane headed towards ISRAEL.
I was headed to Israel with an MIT program called Global Teaching Labs, in which MIT funds students to teach in high schools in various countries for the month of January. Most people in my group of twenty were already in Israel by the time I got back from the DR, but luckily, a close friend who was in my group and had been there twice before just happened to be on my plane there. We met up in Newark before our 10.5 hour plane ride to Israel. The plane was great - finally a time of rest and doing nothing. I actually adore long plane rides, because it forces me to read, journal, sleeep, and rest (I almost wish it could have been longer so I could have slept more…). Although I didn't get to sleep in a bed for two days, I did get to see 4 consecutive sunrises/sunsets from a plane over the line of clouds, and was reminded of God's constant beauty despite my always changing location.
I am very comfortable with traveling, very used to airports, and wasn't really worried at all about navigating through the Israel airport and to the college I was staying at. However I did underestimate what a blessing it had been that most of the places I had traveled to predominately used english. Being in Israel is like being a 4 year old kid who hasn't learned how to read yet. Your surrounded by signs everywhere, and you know they mean something to most people, but to you its absolutely meaningless, even though you want to know what it means. Some signs will have english under the written Hebrew (and sometimes Arabic), but many still don't. That's where God providing me Kathleen on my plane became one of the greatest things He could have given me (although miraculously understanding Hebrew would have been pretty cool too). I didn't really worry at all the entire trip (I had learned that lesson from Kenya), but I was still humbled by not being able to understand anything around me (kind of like when my professors are writing things on the board…), and my constant need for direction from others.
We made it to the train headed for Akko pretty easily, but were pleasantly surprised to find out after being settled on the train for a little bit that it had stopped running because of flooding of the tracks. The entire train was emptied, and we were forced to find a bus to Akko. We ended up running into two other students from MIT, and followed them to get a sherut, or shared van, which took us to Haifa. Two buses later and a bit of walking through the pouring rain, we made it to Ort Braude College, our home for the next 4 weeks. After being welcomed by a full bag of Israeli goodies, a new backpack, and lots of info, we checked into our dorms. A hot shower never felt so good!
Oh and I forgot to mention I was proposed to in the midst of all that traveling by a Turkish man who barely spoke english…
I am living in a suite with 4 other girls, one which I share a room with. We have three bathrooms, a 'kitchen', and 3 bedrooms. I'm excited to get to know all of the girls and many other students here!
After showering and unpacking, our director here (who is exactly like the mom from the Incredibles and more like a grandmother to us), took a few of us out to dinner and grocery shopping. One thing I learned about Israeli culture - pretty much all restaurants either serve dairy products or meat, but never both because they are kosher. The restaurant we went to was a dairy restaurant, and because the whole restaurant was in Hebrew, our director Maxine basically read the whole thing to us like we were little kids (reading it in the "backwards" direction to us english speakers). She basically just ended up ordering for us - sweet potato ravioli, a salad (this is where the dressing comes in walter), pesto lasagna, and vegetable lasagna, with a grand dessert to finish it off. Picked up some grocery necessities (bananas, bread, cereal, peanut butter, milk, apples, and oranges of course)…not knowing what anything actually cost (what is 80 shekels to you?).
Came back to my room afterwards, skyped/caught up with some people at home, and slept exactly how you would imagine someone would sleep who hadn't had a bed in two days :)
I was headed to Israel with an MIT program called Global Teaching Labs, in which MIT funds students to teach in high schools in various countries for the month of January. Most people in my group of twenty were already in Israel by the time I got back from the DR, but luckily, a close friend who was in my group and had been there twice before just happened to be on my plane there. We met up in Newark before our 10.5 hour plane ride to Israel. The plane was great - finally a time of rest and doing nothing. I actually adore long plane rides, because it forces me to read, journal, sleeep, and rest (I almost wish it could have been longer so I could have slept more…). Although I didn't get to sleep in a bed for two days, I did get to see 4 consecutive sunrises/sunsets from a plane over the line of clouds, and was reminded of God's constant beauty despite my always changing location.
I am very comfortable with traveling, very used to airports, and wasn't really worried at all about navigating through the Israel airport and to the college I was staying at. However I did underestimate what a blessing it had been that most of the places I had traveled to predominately used english. Being in Israel is like being a 4 year old kid who hasn't learned how to read yet. Your surrounded by signs everywhere, and you know they mean something to most people, but to you its absolutely meaningless, even though you want to know what it means. Some signs will have english under the written Hebrew (and sometimes Arabic), but many still don't. That's where God providing me Kathleen on my plane became one of the greatest things He could have given me (although miraculously understanding Hebrew would have been pretty cool too). I didn't really worry at all the entire trip (I had learned that lesson from Kenya), but I was still humbled by not being able to understand anything around me (kind of like when my professors are writing things on the board…), and my constant need for direction from others.
We made it to the train headed for Akko pretty easily, but were pleasantly surprised to find out after being settled on the train for a little bit that it had stopped running because of flooding of the tracks. The entire train was emptied, and we were forced to find a bus to Akko. We ended up running into two other students from MIT, and followed them to get a sherut, or shared van, which took us to Haifa. Two buses later and a bit of walking through the pouring rain, we made it to Ort Braude College, our home for the next 4 weeks. After being welcomed by a full bag of Israeli goodies, a new backpack, and lots of info, we checked into our dorms. A hot shower never felt so good!
Oh and I forgot to mention I was proposed to in the midst of all that traveling by a Turkish man who barely spoke english…
I am living in a suite with 4 other girls, one which I share a room with. We have three bathrooms, a 'kitchen', and 3 bedrooms. I'm excited to get to know all of the girls and many other students here!
After showering and unpacking, our director here (who is exactly like the mom from the Incredibles and more like a grandmother to us), took a few of us out to dinner and grocery shopping. One thing I learned about Israeli culture - pretty much all restaurants either serve dairy products or meat, but never both because they are kosher. The restaurant we went to was a dairy restaurant, and because the whole restaurant was in Hebrew, our director Maxine basically read the whole thing to us like we were little kids (reading it in the "backwards" direction to us english speakers). She basically just ended up ordering for us - sweet potato ravioli, a salad (this is where the dressing comes in walter), pesto lasagna, and vegetable lasagna, with a grand dessert to finish it off. Picked up some grocery necessities (bananas, bread, cereal, peanut butter, milk, apples, and oranges of course)…not knowing what anything actually cost (what is 80 shekels to you?).
Came back to my room afterwards, skyped/caught up with some people at home, and slept exactly how you would imagine someone would sleep who hadn't had a bed in two days :)
My dorm room for the next four weeks!
80 shekels is $20! The exchange is almost exactly $1 to 4 nis.
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