Random Excursions

Wait, you mean there's more to this time of year than holidays?

We're going a wee bit out of order here, but here are some things that happened either before the holidays or between Rosh Hashanah and Yom Kippur.

And also, I would like to thank all of you for reading---the blog already has more than 3000 views and I simply can't believe it. So thank you.

Alright! Let's get to the good stuff.

One key highlight to note is that the weather has finally started to change. We're getting clouds now (which makes my photography much more interesting and the periodic shade is helping the temperature feel lower even on days when it's not) so that's awesome.

Jaffa Gate at night

Since the weather has been so pleasant, it's hard not to want to be outside all the time. However, since I'm in school from 830 until 1600 or so, depending on the day, it's been hard to get outside. One night, Jessie and I took our fancypants cameras and some tripods out to Yemin Moshe, where we like to do havdallah, and we just spent some time taking pictures of the walls around the Old City. It was sooo fun, and it was a great break from being inside. The religious in Israel make the daylight savings time change in between the High Holy Days so that the day of the fast on Yom Kippur is shorter, so now it's dark around 6 and we're only 6 hours ahead of EST until they have their time change next month. It's crazy!

View of Abu Tor from Yemin Moshe

With Israel seminar we took a trip to Yad Vashem and Har Herzl recently. I went to Yad Vashem over Ulpan Break (read about that excursion here) but it is always a meaningful and interesting trip. This time, we spent about an hour in the Valley of the Communities with our teacher Jeremy, and we talked about the impact that such an exhibit can have on the collective memory of a people.

The whole day was dedicated to studying/examining collective memory and civil religion and statism. After an interesting experience with the security at Yad Vashem (5 or more people walking into the museum together constitutes a group, and each group is required to have with them an official Yad Vashem tour guide...very interesting politics of narrative going on in these Israeli museums, because they want you to hear their version of the story) we went through the museum and had more discussions.

These stones show that people have come here to visit and commemorate those who passed away in the Holocaust--an interesting and significant example of new secular sacred spaces.

After our time in Yad Vashem, we ventured onto The Connecting Path (its official title) that connects Yad Vashem with Har Herzl. Essentially, due to the topography in that part of Jerusalem, you have to make an aliyah (go up) from the Holocaust to Zionism. So interesting.

Soldiers on Har Herzl

So what is Har Herzl? Basically it is a mountain (hill) named for the first man buried there, Theodor Herzl. This man is THE man behind Zionism (at least that's how he's perceived) and he now shares his mountain with some of the great leaders of Israel and Zionism, as well as the military cemetery. For those of you keeping score, we've now gone as a class to 3 of the 4 main cemeteries in Israel (Trumpledor in Tel Aviv, Har Herzl in J'lem, and the Kinneret Cemetery). In this category, the last one remaining is where David Ben Gurion is buried in the Negev desert.

Herzl's grave

Each of these cemeteries is so different, and there's something big to be learned at each. At Har Herzl, we talked about how the space itself is being used. Herzl is all alone, surrounded by a sort of gathering area where state ceremonies of remembrance take place in the spring. Totally isolated away from him is Ze'ev Jabotinsky (I live on his street!) but we haven't learned about him or Revisionist Zionism yet--more on him later. We visited Golda Meir, Yitzhak Rabin, and others.

"Just sing a song for peace"--from Shir L'shalom, one of my favorite songs, left on the grave of Yitzhak Rabin

Like all of our field trips, I found this one to be interesting. However, because I had recently been to Yad Vashem, I found this trip to be particularly educational because I spent a considerable amount of time watching people interact with what they were seeing. Some people just wanted to get through the exhibit (something you can only do by seeing every room) and some people stood for minutes at a time, trying to soak in and process all the information. I also spent time in the last room of the exhibit, where there are quotes from survivors and poets and victims, all on different themes of the Holocaust. Some talked about love, and the bliss of the last few moments of life, and the inability to express themselves adequately on the feelings raised by the events of the Holocaust.

All in all, school is going well. We're able to confront different topics (why am I a Reform Jew? Why does Israel exist--and why here? how do we teach this to students later?) and I love that everyone comes with their own background and customs and experiences. I'm learning a lot from my classmates and from my incredible teachers, and I really feel like this is just an awesome place to be and to learn and experience what it means to be Jewish, and to be Jewish here.