יום חמישי

As per usual, I am eating cookies...only this time they are special. They were homemade by Nonny! She sent me cookies and now my room feels like home. Mmmmmm. Angela just told me to stop eating. She said, את משמינה״"..." you are getting fat". Haha. I'm not getting fat but she is very worried. I am very happy.

Today brings me to the end of another week here on the kibbutz. The week has been fairly uneventful. Although, on Tueday night, Dan and I ate dinner with our adopted family. We made Sushi and it was a blast. I left covered in "tattoos". The kids drew stars, butterflies, skulls, hearts and flowers all over my arms. I was sad when they washed off in the shower. We also "fat-boothed" (look for pictures on Facebook) and they taught me how to pop-and-lock. Then we practiced the four questions for Seder Pesach.

Today I had my second Hebrew exam. I think it was okay. I'll see on Sunday. I wrote a funny essay about nature. Speaking of nature, I killed a fish today. I stepped on it. It was an accident. I drank too much coffee and was all jittery. I think I need to cut back on the coffee...it is causing harm to small, armless creatures. Speaking of fish, one pooped on my face today. I injected him and his poop shot onto my chin. I was actually impressed. Anyway, how many people can say that their face has been pooped on by a fish? I think it's probably good luck.

Angela just got home and popped open a can of liquid energy. I am scared. I think she is going to clean. Oh geez...she just put on Ukrainian trance music...it is getting real serious. :)

More later. I'm going to Alex's to make soup.

With undying love for facebook monster-offs, my dolphin pillowcase, dominos, Voxer...and (right now) my earphones!

I humbly remain,

J. Michael Hess Webber

R.I.P. Crush

Today, Crush died. We are sitting shiva for him. Please don't send flowers.

:(

See you later, alligator

I have been doing so many neat things this week and I haven't had a chance to write! I have a lot to talk about so I am about to have a post party. Get ready, get set, get excited!

To summarize, these past two weeks have been extraordinary.

YANN:

Last week I had my first visitor in Israel -Yann! For those who don't know Yann, he was our Brazilian foreign exchange student in high school. We fostered a true friendship and he has been part of my family ever since...for almost 10 years.

Unfortunately, this visit was the result of a lot of sadness for Yann. His father, who had been sick for quite a while and was living in here in Israel, passed away last week. Yann got the news and flew over to Israel almost immediately. He was here for the funeral and to sit shiva. He was staying with his cousin in Ashdod (20 miles south of Tel Aviv). His visit to Ashdod correlated almost exactly with the start of Hamas' rocket attacks on the city. Yann saw a missile fly overhead while he was driving down the road.

He was due to leave on Wednesday so on Tuesday night he came to the kibbutz. We had dinner, skyped Mom, Shea, and Mitzvah and then we drank a few beers with my friends. We went to bed early and awoke on Wednesday at 5:30am so Yann could make it to the train on time. It was a fast visit but it warmed my heart and I think it helped Yann relax after a very intense week. I love him.

THE WELSHMEN - Robin and Matthew.

Alex and I had our customary jasmine tea last Wednesday afternoon. She got a new teapot and matching teacups from the כלבו. They are very pretty and the cups help keep my hands warm because they don't have handles. Before I left, she mentioned that her friends from Wales were going to be visiting the kibbutz the next day. Of course, we had to meet. We share blood.

I met them at the pub on Thursday night. Immediately, I sensed something so familiar about them. Robin is tall and thin, witty, and super hip. He looks like someone straight out of a River Island catalogue. His face reminds me very very much of my cousin, Matt. His sense of humor reminds me of that of my Irish friend Jason Byrne. Matthew, on the other hand, is a little more working class, but in such a charming way. He didn't wear flannel or turtle shell glasses (in fact, he was the only one of the four of us not wearing turtle-shell glasses) but he is an extraordinary conversationalist. His face reminds me a lot of my cousin, Andy. We decided to go on a grand adventure the next day...

HAMAT GADER:

Friday morning the four of us piled into a rental car. Our destination: Hamat Gader. Hamat Gader is a spa village in the Golan Heights. We were headed there to spend the whole day lounging in the hot springs.

This trip was the first time that I had seen the Kinneret (the Sea of Galilee). It was gorgeous. So blue and calm. The Kinneret is extremely important to Israelis because it is the sole source of "sweet water" (fresh drinking water) for the whole country. They pipe the water out and send it north and south. For almost a decade, the Kinneret has been low and it is a big concern for the country. On the news each day they will announce the level of the lake. We talk about it in class too. If the Kinneret runs out, there is no water to drink.

We arrived at Hamat Gader and first visited thier alligator farm/petting zoo. The petting zoo was FULL of Baboons. Baboons are ugly. I would be okay never seeing another baboon. They can stay in the trees. I will stay away from those trees. They have the weirdest bottoms.

After watching the the Baboons for too long, we played with baby bunnies, chicks, and turtles. Then we went to see the alligators. They were huge and awesome. We were watching them from a floating bridge in the middle of the pool. Then it started to move. I looked in the water and saw that an enormous alligator was stuck beneath the bridge. Watching his body wriggle back and forth just below the surface of the water was eerie. The tail alone was as thick as my body. All the sudden I had a huge appreciation for the power of the alligator.

Then we submerged ourselves in the hot springs. Mmmmmmmm. They were full of Russians and we people watched for hours. We drove home around the north end of the Kinneret and up into the Golan Heights. We saw a rainbow and beautiful lush rolling hills. As is common in Israel, the beauty of the land was juxtaposed against the reminents of a difficult past...ruined homes, landmine warnings, and abandoned army towers.

We came home. Adi broke his nose while he was surfing. Alex took him to the hospital. His nose was gross and awesome. He drank Arak and felt better. Then we went dancing. The next morning we all went for a walk on the beach and then had a picnic outside Alex and Adi's house. Matthew and Robin left at 2pm. Alex and I, both cold, got into sleeping bags and talked for a long time. She is important.

MY ADOPTED FAMILY:

I have been adopted! Here is the story, Morning Glory...

As an ulpanist, it is possible to be adopted by a family on the kibbutz. You become part of the family, help take care of the kids, go to family events, spend Shabbat together etc. Having a kibbutz family also provides a lot of support for an ulpanist. If anything happens while the ulpanist is in Israel, their kibbutz family would be er to help handle it. Having an adopted family also helps ulpanists learn conversational Hebrew. All-in-all, being adopted is very beneficial for both the ulpanist and the kibbutz family.

So...

From the first time I went to the post office, I knew it was meant to be. The name of the lady at the post office is Leann (לאן). I felt an immediate connection with her. She is funky with crazy hair. She always has a colorful scarf wrapped around her head and she has a raspy smoky voice. When she laughs, you can tell she really means it. She is interesting and she is wise. I always look forward to going to the post office because I love talking with her. It became my goal to woo her into adopting me.

So...part two of the story...

Canadian Dan and I were running on the beach when he told me that he had finally been adopted. Of course, I asked him who had adopted him. He said "Leann Portugali from the post office". My heart fell. Dan got very lucky. By now, many ulpanists had already been adopted and I was starting to feel like it wasn't going to happen for me. I was a little orphan without a home.

So, I went to the cafe on Friday night and Leann was sitting with Dan and her sister, Sharon. She invited me to sit with them. I did and we talked and talked and it started to rain and we didn't care, we just kept talking. It was time for Sharon to go home and before she left she asked "Mikey, would you like to become part of our family?"

Uhmmmmmmm....duh. It's all I have ever wanted....and now I am happy. I walked home with Dan that night. Actually, he walked and I skipped. Now, he is my adopted brother.

Sharon has two kids who she raises alone. Yurinai (8) and Noor (5). On Thursday night, I helped Leann set up for a modern opera that she is putting on tonight. Then Noor and I went for a walk to the park and I helped Yurinai with his homework (which is too advanced for me). Last night, was the one year anniversary of the death of the mom of Leann and Sharon. I went to Sharon's house and met the whole family. Leann, Sharon, their sister, Dana, and I sat on the porch all night. They smoked cigarettes and showed me old family photos. I absorbed it all. I am so lucky. I will write more about the Portugali family in an upcoming post.

CRUSH:

My friend and coworker, Gaston, found a little turtle in the koi pond yesterday. He brought Crush home. Crush is now living in a Tupperware container with rocks and more lettuce than he could eat in a lifetime. He is a very handsome little turtle. Gaston and I were going to take fish from work to keep as pets. Now, Gaston only wants Crush. I want a hyrax (the Israeli version of a squirrel).

We also found a giant sea turtle on the beach. He was not alive. He must have washed up on shore. It was sad to see. He is the talk of the kibbutz this week. Today, Adi told me that once a cow washed up on the beach and sat alone in the sand for weeks before someone removed him.

Alright...

Many words. Much time. הרבה מילים והרבה זמן!

More soon. I still have to write about my trip to the desert!

With undying love for giraffes in high heels, Elvis in Jerusalem, Walkie-talkies, יופי תופי, popcorn fish, and BANANAS!

I respectfully remain,

J. Michael Hess Webber

52!

Happy Birthday, Mama! As of today, the world has been a better place for 52 years. I love you.

sand in my ear and poo on my shoe

I wrote a long long post yesterday and then the computer crashed and I lost it. I will now attempt to recompile my thoughts.

Yesterday I stepped in poop. Then I sat on my friend's sofa and got poop on the sofa. Then yesterday in class, I sat on my foot and got poo on my pants. It was really unfortunate. You might ask why I didn't scrape the poop off my shoe first thing. The answer is simply that I was too lazy. I am a complicated person.

Also in class yesterday, I had an itch inside my ear. I scratched it and my ear was full of sand. I was on the beach on Friday afternoon and there was some serious wind. The wind blew the sand in my ear. That means it was in my ear for three days. When it is windy on the beach, the kibbutzniks all come out to windsurf and kite surf in the sea. I love to watch.

I would now like to comment on the fact that Angela, Sarah, and I went through a roll and a half of toilet paper in under 24 hours. Impressive. I was thinking of this today while I was scrubbing the walls of our bathroom in preparation for our monthly room inspection. We passed. Our bathroom is currently sparkling. My eyes were burning a little because I felt it was necessary to use pure bleach to clean our shower.

Purim has come and gone. I love Purim. Americans don't do Purim correctly and, as a result, I have been missing out my whole life. In Israel, it seems Purim preparations last all year. The celebrations last all week. There are parades and costumes and sweets and the energy is contagious.

On Thursday night, my friends and I went to the Kibbutz Megillah reading. It was great. It was the first time I had been to synagogue since the start of ulpan. It was great to be able to read the Hebrew and understand more of what was being read. While they read the Megillah, little kids who were dressed in costumes carried around big bowls of gummy worms. Thursday was the kid's Purim party. There was a moon bounce and a giant dance party for all the kids on the kibbutz. They loved it.

On Friday, Hannah and I had a picnic breakfast. Then I spent the rest of the day helping my friends, Peleg and Yarden, with last minute Purim preparations. We painted and stapled and hammered. It was satisfying. After we were done, we climbed a tree and went up to the roof of the heder ochel and watched the sunset.

Friday night was the big Purim party. It was crazyy. There was a mechanical bull. My friend, Vidhura, rode it 4 times and has been walking like a cowboy ever since. Hannah and I dressed up as German barmaids. I had a name tag that said "Gutentag". My costume broke sometime during the night. At the end of the night, my shoes were almost completely black because so many people stepped on them. I went to sleep at 5:30 in the morning. It was quite an event! I like how the #1 question after Purim is "do you remember anything from last night?" Don't worry, I remembered everything.

Last night was the Midget Reveal Ceremony. We each had to stand up and list for the ulpan what gifts we had received throughout the week and then ask "Who is my Midget?" Then, our Midget would step out from the crowd and reveal themselves. I was so happy. I spent the whole week thinking that I knew who my midget was. When I asked "Who is my Midget?" someone I had never met stood up. I was so happy and so surprised. I guess I'm not as smart as I look. What is so cool is that we got to know each other without knowing who each other was. Now we are officially friends...on facebook. His name is Ignacio. He is from Argentina. He gave me the BEST chocolate.

The past two days I have been working at night in the coffeeshop to help Hannah. Her coworker, Debbie, cut her foot on the beach on Friday and is in bed with 9 stitches on the bottom of her foot. I am standing in for her, unofficially. It has been really fun. I am learning my numbers and getting to talk to a lot of people. I am also able to type up my blog post on an actual keyboard. Glorious!

Speaking of Hannah, I have to go help her close up shop. Time to wipe down the tables and stock the teacups.

xoxoxoxoxoxoxoxoxxoxoxoxoxoxxoxoxoxoxxoxoxoxoxoxxoxoxoxoxoxoxxoxxoxo

With undying love for Angela's clothes lines, cockroach antenae in the drain, sombreros, a laundry of dishes, broken futons, tukeem, and tuna with potatoes.

I respectfully and Jewishly remain,
J. Michael Hess Webber

Are you my midget?

שלום חברים!

I am over stuffing my belly with sesame crackers, listening to Cat Stevens, and settling in to write this week's blog.

I spent this weekend in Tel Aviv with my dear friend, Swiss Hannah. I think I want to live in Tel Aviv forever. It is a spectacular city...gritty like Baltimore. I felt really at home.

Hannah and I didn't know we were going to Tel Aviv until 11:30 Friday morning. It was then that we decided to catch the 12:00pm shuttle. We cut it pretty close but we made it. The shuttle took us to Binyamina train station where we caught the train and rode it south. Hannah's Aunt Shoham and Uncle Amnon live in Tel Aviv with their three kids: Noor (15), Yanai (12), and Sarai (6). Our plan was to have lunch with them on Saturday afternoon.

We got to Momo's Hostel and checked in. I think we were the only ladies staying at the hostel. We got a room to ourselves AND it had a balcony...and no heat...and no mirror, and we had to use the boys bathroom BUT we did have a television set to VH1. We walked around Tel Aviv and ended up treating ourselves to a nice posh dinner at this soho-style hipster restaurant called Orna and Ella's (ורנה ואלה). I had vegan tofu curry. Tofuuuuuu.

By the time we were finished with dinner it was freezing and I only had a hoodie to keep me warm so Hannah called her uncle and we went to his apartment to pick up an extra jacket. We ended up staying for three hours. We drank wine and ate almonds and olives and challah while I was taught a ton of words by Sarai. Door, floor, wall, spoon, plate, cup...anything she could point to. I was tickled to be learning so much from a 6 year old. Yanai, who is twelve, brought out some books and helped me read them. He translated the things I didn't know. He also taught me Hebrew tongue twisters. I think I learned more Hebrew this weekend than in the entire ulpan so far. It was fantastic.

After Hannah and I left, we walked around the city and it started to pour! And then it started started to hail! So we sought shelter in a coffee shop/pub and were served free whiskey from a dog-training coffee-making bar tender with a ponytail named Nadav. Then we returned to our little hostel room and watched VH1 music videos and sang really loud to Christina Aguilera until we fell asleep.

About Hannah's family:

Hannah's aunt is a translator of texts. She just finished translating Oliver Twist into Hebrew. We had a really interesting conversation about Dickens. She is also a writer and she gave me a copy of a book she had written in which she simplified Jewish legends for children. Inside the cover she wrote:

3.3.2012

למייקי

מוקדש לך בידידות

Dedicated to you in friendship

מזכרת משבת גשום בתל אביב

A souvenir of a rainy Shabbat in Tel Aviv.

I was really taken with Hannah's family. Such genuine, sincere, and righteous people. We talked a lot about Judaism and what it means to be Jewish, both in the world and in Israel. We also talked a lot about Israel and Palestine.

Many people in Israel disagree with the idea that Israel should surrender the occupied territories and create a Palestinian state. Obviously, this is a highly contentious issue. Shoham and Amnon refuse to fly the Israeli flag because, to them, it represents injustice. Shoham made a very interesting statement about Israel. She said that there is a lot of irony in the state of Israel as it exists right now. Essentially, Israel was created as a Jewish state so that we would have a place of refuge after the Holocaust. However, in the state it is today, Israel has become its own Jewish ghetto. The Jews, says Shoham, have walled themselves into this space. No one exits to surrounding territories and no one enters. There is so much fear of the unknown and ignorance and hate on both sides of the fence. I would be interested in hearing what others think about this.

Later, on Shabbat, Amnon and Yanai took Hannah and I on driving tour of Tel Aviv. He took us to the spot where Yitzhak Rabin was assassinated. I remember that day so vividly. I remember the intense sadness in the world. I was only ten then.

Shoham and Amnon invited me to return to Tel-Aviv for Pesach and to join them for Seder. I am honored to have them as my Israeli family. I was quite taken with them. They make me want to be a better person and I will cherish my weekend with them, always.

Anywayyyy...

This weekhhyjiihh Hannah Montana ze lo tov be Hannah Weiss ze tov, maybe Caja Caja...Gaston wrote that.

Purim is on Thursday! We are celebrating all week. Yesterday we were each assigned "midgets". A midget (or elf) is a person who gives secret gifts to someone else. We have to give special surprises all week until Friday when our midgets are revealed. Today, at dinner, someone delivered to me a pudding (מילקי!) and said it was from my midget. Yesterday, someone delivered a goldfish to my neighbor. The whole kibbutz plays this game. They are really serious about it. Hannah's midget prepaid for her dinner last night and left her chocolate with the person working at the cash register. Everyone should play this game. It makes people so happy.

People are also starting to rock pieces of their costumes. Today, Mauricio walked into the dining hall for dinner wearing a sombrero and a gigantic fake mustache.

Best news yet...I got my Hebrew exam back! 101%! Yessss. I was so excited. Our teacher wrote my score on the board.

I have been writing for a long time. I think I should stop now. I miss everybody.

With undying love for babies made of "cake, and chocolate, and milllk", Hannah's itchy head, ginger in chocolate, comet 4-5, harpoonists, and zatar.

I respectfully remain,

J. Michael Hess Webber