Jerusalem, What are the odds?

Today's language of the day: Botswanian brought to you Isaac

Dumella mrr (Hello)

Today was awesome. It started out with me waking up at 9:30 a.m, I was able to wake up so late due to the fact that Gila said I didn't have to go to class today. I LOVE YOU GILA. Then I woke up and took a nice long hot shower. Then mosey and I started to study for our AP euro test, and went over the sheets of work that Don gave us to study. It turned out the test was easy, and all we had to do was tell the definition and significance of the main principles in the aftermath of the Napoleonic wars. Then after class we only had a round 30 minutes to pack and get everything ready to go to Jerusalem, luckily we left on time and I don't think I forgot anything. Then we took an hour bus ride of the city of Jerusalem. Our first stop, even before the hostel we went to the Machena Yehuda Shook in Jerusalem. It is my favorite place in Israel, by far. I love the atmosphere and the different people you see around every corner. Also it was friday in the shook, so everything was in full swing, and the streets resembled the State fair in Minnesota. The reason why I wrote as the title of the blog" what are the odds" is because of what I saw in the shook. So after we got dropped off by our bus driver we walked into the the shook from the main entrance, I was looking all around and all of these memories came rushing into my mind. I was looking to the right and all of a sudden I saw a familiar face, I looked again closely; it was my cousin Ryan Fish. I went over to him and we talked about how crazy it was to see each other at such a people-filled place. It was super cool, and I spent the whole rest of the day on the lookout to see if I would happen to see hime again. While we were in the shook me, Isaac, and Gabe all walked together and had our specific missions. Isaac's was to find parve arugala, Gabe's was to find a drink of some kind, and mine was of course to find the buckwheat man and get fresh buckwheat cakes. I you do not know what I am talking about their is a guy who has a "rice-cake" making machine that shoots out hot-rice cakes and then he gives them out for people to try. The best part is that it is not rice that is in the cakes, it is buck-wheat, a very delicious grain, especially when it is hot and shaped in a circle. I did not get anything while we were at the shook, but it was nice just to walk around and be home once again. After the shook we went back to the hostel and got ready to go to the Western Wall. All the girls put on their skirts and all the boys put on their nice khakis. We then all walked down to the Western Wall from our hostel (which is not that far away). Once we came the Kotel it was packed. Bodies with white kippot covered the wall and the area in front of the wall. The group then split up into the boys and the girls. I made the trek into the Western wall main area and was immediately bombarded by the praying of the Hassidic jews and also the celebrating that followed. This was my first time going to the Kotel on Shabbat, and I totally recommend it to anyone who wants to get the full experience of what being Jewish really is in the land of Israel. During the celebrating that I was mostly involved in I noticed another familiar face, it was Yossi Cats. He went to Hopkins and was now a Hassidic rabbi that was leading the celebrations at the Western Wall, it's pretty cool. He noticed Jacob who was wearing this Hopkins Hurt shirt(ultimate team). Then we started naming off all the alumni from the past Hopkins Ultimate Frisbee teams such as Justin Kaminsky, Josh Klein, Eli Leonard etc. He knew all of them. Then the second person that I recognized was Sydney Usem, who is in Israel on a Yeshiva program for 2 weeks. He was a counselor at a camp and a close friend who I see at my synagogue sometimes. It was also pretty amazing how I was able to find him in such a large crowd of people, but nonetheless we were all Jewish and celebrating Shabbat. At around 6 we left the Kotel and went back to the Hostel to have a nice Shabbos dinner. After dinner we did an activity where we got to know each other better. It was kind of like speed-dating, and I met all the girls and had a nice meaningful conversations with all of them; the activity tightened our bond as a group. After dinner we had a nice session for chilling and just relaxing. I went on the roof with a couple people and we looked out and saw the pretty view of the city and talked about our up's and down's in life. It was eye-opening, and It made me feel really great ful for what I have today. Now I am going to bed and tomorrow morning I am going with my CORE teacher to an Orthodox synagogue, I am so excited, it has been one of my dreams to do ever since I was able to sing the Sh'ma:)

Sala sentle(Bye)