Weekend! And it’s… Thursday night? I still can’t get used to the Sunday-Thursday work week here. The days of the week in Hebrew translate roughly into Day First (Yom Rishon, Sunday), Day Second (Yom Shni, Monday), and so on, so with the Monday work week still in my head, I have to take a moment to calculate the current day by subtracting one. To further complicate my delicate brain, the work week is also described by the first 5 letters of the aleph-bet, so Sunday is Yom א, Monday is ב, Tuesday is ג , Wednesday is ד, and Thursday is ה , so again I need to calculate that ה is the 5th letter of the aleph-bet, but the 5th day of the week is really Thursday. I’ve had about a dozen near heart attacks thinking I mixed up days during my first week of classes! My paper class schedule is already tattered from taking it out compulsively and reassuring myself that I’m living in the right day.
Also, let’s not forget the calculations involved with currency exchange, a 24 hour clock, and not to mention the metric system! I’ve even been buying prepackaged cold cuts because I don’t want to tackle the issue of how many grams or kilos to order. I leave it as a battle for another day.
I have to mention.. OBAMA! A great US moment missed while being here. I woke up the morning after the elections, which was about 2am in New York, and I was shaking when I turned on my computer to see who won. The majority of the young Americans around the campus seem to be Obama supporters, and my ulpan teachers definitely are, but there are some exceptions. Today, one of the teachers made a joke comparing Obama to a messiah, and one girl said, “More like the antichrist.” Everyone ignored her, except her equally bothersome friend. When we had had to tell a story to illustrate an Israeli expression- “yardah li evan mehalev”- which is used to express a heavy feeling (stone) in the heart, they both used the story of when they thought they were registered for two different Bet uplan classes! Oh no! I’m so glad their issue was resolved peacefully, and that they took the time to share the story with me … Partially related, can someone please do a phonological study of J.A.P.s, particularly in relation to why the sound of their voices gives me a headache?
I’ve been homesick on and off lately, and I’ve even enquired about spring schedules at schools I was interested in in New York previously. I like it here, but so far I don’t love it. When I walked into a lecture hall this week to find out that a crucial foundation course I was told is in English was actually in Hebrew, I was already trying to calculate if I could get a 100% refund on my tuition. I emailed the advisors who steered me wrong, and they pretty much told me not to go to the class, read the required text for it (in English), and go to the discussion portion only. It’s supposedly in English, although I don’t know because I was so fuming that day, I didn’t go. I decided I can’t make any real decisions about whether I stay or go until I’ve been here longer, though. I’ve gone through so much, I’ve toppled so many bureaucracies, I can’t drop it now!
I need to update more so my posts aren’t snippets of about a million different things. There is so much I want to write about… characters I meet every day, this erratic eretz, and this crazy city. I promise I will!
