Monday, June 23, 2008

Back to school, back to school...

Got my shoes tied tight, boy I hope I don't get in a fight....

Sorry for the Billy Madison reference, but it's the best way I could describe my frame of mind this evening. Tomorrow I will be having my first day of school in about 5 years. This should be interesting. Keep in mind that this is not my first day at Pardes, that doesn't begin until September. Tomorrow I will be starting a Hebrew Ulpan at Hebrew University. An ulpan is an intense language course, and mine will be lasting for 5 weeks (June 24-July 31). Almost everyone from the Educators Program will be taking it with me (1 girl is taking her ulpan in Haifa), so I'm looking forward to meeting them. Also, I'm ready to take an ulpan. Everyone I know that has been through one says it helped their Hebrew immensely. Hopefully, I'll get the same benefits from it.

This was my Monday

I woke up today around 8:30 this morning and got ready to head into town. Keep in mind that I've never gone to Hebrew U before, so I really had no idea of how to get there. I knew it was either near French Hill or Mt. Scopus (or both???). I was able to get a ride to French Hill, and I thought it would be right in front of me, and as usual, I was wrong. I asked someone how to get to the university, and in quick Israeli fashion he just said "Straight ahead". With those directions I assumed that it would be right in front of me (what would give me that impression??). I'm walking and walking and walking and I don't see a thing. Finally (as I'm sweating like it's my job) I ask someone else and he points out that I was going in the totally wrong direction. Good start. So I correct myself and start heading to Hebrew U. Made my way in, and tried to figure my way through the campus. I have to say it felt great being on college campus, but I felt a bit out of place. For those of you who have heard the song "I Wish I could Go Back to College" from Avenue Q than you would understand. The song is talking about how great it would be to go back to the carefree days of college, but at the end the singer realizes how awkward he would be because he'd years older than everyone else. Well that was me today. All the Americans taking the ulpan are 20-22 years old. It was interesting. On to the day though. I had to register for classes and get my student I.D. card. There was a place to get passport photos done on campus, and I must say that these were the best passport photos I've ever seen. I really look great. She made six of them, I used one for the card and I'm actually keeping the other 5. After I finished with the registration I headed into town to get some lunch and do my usual wandering around streets to find cool places. By the time I was done with that it was about 3:00 PM, so I headed to Pardes to meet with Aunt Gail and head home with her. We went to Ma'ale Adumim first to meet some of her friends, and then got a call from Elana asking to be picked up in Jerusalem. I didn't mind this at all simply because I love going through the city. Everything intrigues me about it, the traffic, the people, the buildings, the signs, the smells (good and bad), literally everything. I hope that excitement doesn't disipate the longer I am here. We then came home, had some leftovers and now here I am. That's all for now.

I'll make sure to keep my shoes tied tight tomorrow, and will pack a quality lunchbox. Talk to everyone soon!

1 comment:

Jocelyn said...

Your reference to Avenue Q is so spot on! Hilarious.