Wednesday, January 21, 2015

Intro to Jerusalem

                Welcome back! I’m sitting in my dorm room on a mountaintop in Jerusalem, admiring the view. It’s been quite a busy week, and it’s not over yet, but I thought I’d take a few minutes to let you know how it was going. A couple of notes to start off: one, I’m staying here for the entire semester, until the beginning of June, and two, the time difference between the central US and Israel is 8 hours.
                My jet lag isn’t as bad as could be expected, probably because my schedule wasn’t that normal in the first place, so even though I haven’t settled into a routine here yet, I also don’t have to get out of my routine from the states. The plane ride over was very nice – I’d never flown Turkish air before, and they give you three meals and a whole variety of accessories. Besides that, the flight wasn’t that full, so I had three seats to curl up and nap on during the 11.5-hour flight to Istanbul.
                Sarah picked me up at the airport, and I stayed at their apartment for the night. The morning was a little hectic because of the two little ones and a meeting Josh and Sarah had to get to, but Sarah was able to take me to Jerusalem and drop me off at campus (all before ten in the morning). I filled out all the forms, got my key, found my room, and started settling in. There was quite a bit to worry about yesterday – not only settling in, but finishing my placement test, signing up for trips outside class, and all the other little things that go with moving in.
                The scenery around Mount Scopus is breathtaking enough that even if it weren’t Jerusalem, I would love to stay here. It’s about a 15-minute walk from my dorm to the other side of campus, where my classes are, but it’s a very nice walk, and the weather is beautiful right now. There’s also a really beautiful botanical garden en route.
                In case anyone’s worried, by the way, you have to go through a bag check, id check, and metal detector in order to get onto main campus, and only staff and students can get in without prior notification. Basically, imagine that all of Israel has the atmosphere of an airport in the States: no jokes about terrorism, no unattended bags, etc.
                Anyway, by noon yesterday I was exhausted from so many unfamiliar situations and people and trying to worry about so many things at once. When I’d gotten everything done for the morning, I went back to my room, locked the door, closed the window, wrapped up in a blanked and just lied there in silence for half-an-hour or so. I don’t know how extraverts relax, but sometimes I just have to lie down by myself and think, or I hit a shutdown point. Anyway, after that I felt my energy coming back and headed out for the rest of the day.
                The main event of the afternoon, outside of several other errands, was orientation. I usually find orientations disorienting, since they usually involve trying to take in a ton of information and cultural/security warnings in the space of an hour or two, but this one wasn’t that bad. And afterwards, the leaders took a group to go shopping for kitchen utensils, bathroom supplies, food, and etc. I don’t think anyone got everything they wanted, but it certainly helped for immediate needs.
                I also got to translate for the first time. We went to a bagel shop yesterday and, since most of our little group didn’t speak much Hebrew, asked for an English menu. The waitress explained (in Hebrew) that the English menu wasn’t right, which I translated, and we ended up with Hebrew menus. As it turned out, what people wanted wasn’t on the menu anyway, but it was nice to know I could translate if needed.

                And the week isn’t over yet. The weekend here is Friday and Saturday, but I have my first class in a few hours. And after class, there’s an overnight trip to the desert in which I’m participating, that lasts until tomorrow evening. And then there will be time to rest and recharge, and get ready to start classes and start exploring Jerusalem and Israel. I’ll let you know how it goes next week – I’ll probably be posting Tuesday or Wednesday, so stay tuned! Oh, and hello from Jerusalem!













No comments:

Post a Comment