Hello, friends!
I had a wonderful Shabbat. My friend Ana and I went to the house of one of our rabbis. He is an older gentlemen, and he and his wife were so sweet! We had such a good time...so much fun.

Meanwhile, last Thursday was my last day of Mechina (beginner) level classes. Yesterday I started a new level! It's really exciting for me. Even though I still don't have so much of an idea of what's going on, I now walk around pretending like I know oh so much because I'm not in Mechina anymore...now I'm clearly an expert! ;-) In my new classes, I now have to learn how to translate Torah text from the original Hebrew. It's really exciting for me to actually be able to learn in Hebrew instead of English, but I can't help but feel a little bit frustrated, too. All the usual challenges of learning a new language obviously apply. I have NO CLUE what I'm doing. Fortunately, I have a tutor that I meet with four times a week to work on this very thing, so theoretically, in a few months I might actually be able to do this stuff...we shall see...I'll keep you updated :-)

Living in Israel is such a different experience. Even though so many of the people (at least here in Yerushalayim) speak English, the culture is very different. I think largely due to the type of life people live here--a very precarious one--they don't put much importance on little things. There are no false pretenses of kindness to strangers (including service people like waiters!). I am trying to appreciate the culture difference when I interpret certain behaviors as rude, but it just drives me a little bit crazy at times. People have no conception of lines here...if you wait for a bus for 20 minutes, 40 people will slam into you to push past you to get onto the bus when it finally arrives. When I walk around the streets of my religious neighborhood, if I smile at people that walk by they look the other way. Including little old ladies. At the same time, these people live with the knowledge that all of the neighboring countries would love to see them wiped off the map entirely. One of my teachers was talking yesterday about her concern with our lack of rain lately. Anywhere else, a drought wouldn't be nearly such a cause of concern...neighboring regions with water would help out. There are no such friendly neighbors here, and water is life. When I go into town, I pass by a pizza place that was blown up just a few years ago. I have walked past the yeshiva where not so long ago (within the past year) a gunman walked in and shot students studying Torah..young kids. I found out that the number bus that I take regularly was blown up a few years ago. I say these things not to frighten my friends...I truly feel perfectly safe here...but simply to share the reality that Israelis experience. It's pretty sobering.