An Impulsive Land Flowing with Milkys and Marzipan

Two flight meals, 3 lady gaga songs, and a new squeegee later, I was back in Israel. Yes folks, there are stories to share from the first day.

We begin at the Crowne Plaza in Philadelphia, where I took a private tour of Cheltenham, while six passengers were picked up. All of them were off to a cruise taking them to Nova Scotia and Maine (you hear that mom?) I told them where I was going, and I can't tell you how many times they told me to be safe...

I was the fourth person in line at the El Al counter. If only there was a giveaway :-( Both bags were overweight, but I only got charged for one...Waited for my flight for almost three hours, called the next generation of Hillel in the midst of their first bagel brunch of the season, boarded, and sat for an hour chewing on gum. The delay was blamed on a glitch in the air conditioning, but the atmosphere is so called it didn't matter. They were also slow loading the luggage, which I'll take responsibility for.

Most of the flight's soundtrack was provided by a group of seminary girls, who I think have the lost the need to respirate. The most serious of issues discussed, of which I was forced against my will to overhear, even among the roaring engines and groaning of Capt Jack Sparrow in Pirates of the Caribbean 3, sounded something like this:

Seminary Girl (a): Can I ask you a serious question?
Passenger (b): Sure.
(a): You said you're getting married in ten days, right? I noticed you have really curly hair, and I do too. Did you straighten your hair when you started dating?

I know, I know.

Not only did these girls pleasure the skies with their voices, they pleasured my cab driver too! Them aside though, I felt like I had just left the country when I arrived. Never had I felt such clarity when returning to a foreign culture. Even from the beginning of the cab ride, I noticed under the highway bridge taking us out of the airport, there was a flock of sheep being led by a shepherd boy. The layers were already emerging, and I was so glad I was once again noticing them.

So what was the first thing I did when I got to my hostel room? I mean before devouring some of the Tastycakes I smuggled in (in the spirit of Michael Levine)... I showered! Unfortunately, I have a bad history with water, such as the time I flooded the Hillel basement...anyway, this time I flooded my new and clean hostel room. I was clean and lathered up with Dead Sea products, but not well rested. I proceeded too direct the puddles back into the bathroom with my Crocs, because I saw no squeegee, and was not about to embarrass myself in my first hour. However, then my roommate Reuven, another counselor on Kivunim, arrived, and convinced me to purchase one. Up until that point I had visited the Western Wall, and passed out from exhaustion in the middle of the marathons of Mincha services. I bought dinner at 5:30 from New Deli because I was so out of it, but figured I shouldn't go to sleep, but this squeegee search turned out to be a perfect excuse to fight sleep deprivation. I hopped on a bus to the major Malcha Mall in Jerusalem. Now, imagine a Jewish sleep away camp, without counselors, times 200, and you have an Israeli mall. MASS CHAOS. No maps, no order, but plenty of shoes! So many that I bought a pair of Tevas, as well as a squeegee.

This would conclude the squeegee escapade, but I include an additional nugget of musical interest. All summer I was introduced to modern pop music, and all day in the taxi I was listening to hebrew parodies of those songs, as well as Jewish ones, in the forms of commercials (Mipi El, Don't Stop). When I got back to my hostel, I was [pleasantly] surprised to hear Alexandro blasting from the courtyard. Apparently Bet Shmuel is a hopping venue, and almost every day there is a bar or bat mitzvah, and plenty of other celebratory functions. That means that right now Lady Gaga is penetrating my walls, and I'm probably going to fall asleep to her and Waka Waka for many more nights...