ברוך דיין האמת

butterball died... we went to check on him for the first time in a couple days and he was on the balcony... not moving. very sad and very difficult to clean up. RIP butterball... you are on a better balcony now.

חברים חדשים

we have some new friends living on our balcony... tentatively named charlie and butterball. here are a couple (not-so-great quality) pictures of butterball.

i have to give a lecture tomorrow for my ulpan class, but i can't concentrate because i am waiting for a call back about an apartment we really want starting in august [edit: we got it!]. plus, my lecture is about this guy: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nz97DTJrhAY

Mom and Dad's Visit

Here are pictures taken while my parents were here visiting from May 20-June 5. Enjoy!

עזה

I just composed a short rebuttal to a comment on Facebook that was posted in response to a video Amalia put up, and wanted to share it here, as it sums up some of my thoughts on the recent flotilla crisis . I am interested in hearing your thoughts.

Grace, a few things.

First, in response to your claim that the IDF admitted the transmission was a fake [original transmission at http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9dE2StbDL_Q]:

"So to clarify: the audio was edited down to cut out periods of silence over the radio as well as incomprehensible comments so as to make it easier for people to listen to the exchange. We have now uploaded the entire segment of 5 minutes and 58 seconds in which the exchange took place and the comments were made. This transmission had originally cited the Mavi Marmara ship as being the source of these remarks, however, due to an open channel, the specific ship or ships in the 'Freedom Flotilla' responding to the Israeli Navy could not be identified."

Source: http://imeu.net/news/article0019173.shtml

The broadcast Amalia posted is the unedited version, so you can hear everything. It may not have been the Mavi Marmara, but it was one of the ships in the flotilla commenting.

Second, the "music video" posted admittedly makes light of the tragic situation, which you may, understandably, view as inappropriate [found at http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FOGG_osOoVg]. The fact is, human lives were unnecessarily taken. It is a real tragedy that any lives had to be lost, but the simple fact is that the Mavi Marmara was defiant and violent towards the Israeli Naval Officers. The music video captures much of the current Israeli sentiment, as people here are shocked and baffled as to how the world could react the way it is, knowing the sequence of events that took place one week ago.

Let me remind you that Israeli forces were beaten with metal rods and stabbed before any shots were fired on the Mavi Marmara. You can't just "raise a white flag" after severely injuring people who have not yet attacked you. Here is one of the videos, just in case you didn't see or hear about it on Democracy Now!: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gYjkLUcbJWo

Grace, there are extremists on both sides. Those who attacked Uri Avnery obviously have no right and are not supported by any mainstream Israeli view. What I wonder is, "what kind of attitude exists among some members of the population" of Gaza who launch indiscriminate rockets into Israel nearly every single day, despite international condemnation. It's the same kinds of people who attack Avnery, who launch rockets into Israel, and who plot to kill presidents-- we all know these aren't mainstream opinions.

Also, your assertion that the Rachel Corrie, luckily, did not suffer the same fate as the Mavi Marmara is because it was "delayed" is inaccurate. 5 ships passed into Israeli waters unharmed before the Mavi Marmara incident. Why? Because as Jared pointed out, they didn't beat soldiers with metal pipes and knives. After docking in Ashdod, their cargo was inspected and allowed through. (By the way, Israel allows in about 15,000 tons of supplies into Gaza each week.)

The Gaza blockade is a legal method of warfare, so long as several preconditions are met (which they are), and it is officially sponsored by the US and maintained with Egypt. The article below clearly shows that the steps Israel took in boarding the Mavi Marmara were completely justified, even in international waters.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Blockade_of_the_Gaza_Strip#Legal_arguments

Should the blockade's severity be reevaluated? Yes. Was Israel right to defend itself against the terrorists aboard the Mavi Marmara? Yes. Was trying to break the blockade the best way to shed light on Gaza's situation? Clearly not.

Grace, it is clear that the intentions of those aboard the Mavi Marmara were not solely to bring supplies into Gaza. They had a mission, and that mission was to provocate. They succeeded in that they brought the Gaza situation to the forefront of the world's consciousness, but unfortunately a terrible and avoidable tragedy occurred. I can only hope that soon the 'blame game' will cease and meaningful debate and discussion can ensue, in order that quality of life for those on both sides can be elevated.

יום השואה

today marks Yom HaShoah, or Holocaust Remembrance Day. in israel, one of the main ways it is commemorated is by sounding a siren throughout the whole city at 10am, for about 2 minutes. everyone immediately stops what they are doing and stands silent during that time period. today a few friends and i went outside the pardes building a minute before the siren to watch and remember with the israeli public. as soon as the siren began, all cars (except one cab, notably) halted and their passengers exited. it was a more powerful moment than i could have imagined, knowing that all of israel, the center of the jewish people, was remembering an event, perhaps the event, that defines much of jewish history. never have i seen so clearly a representation of the acknowledgement of the past of the jewish people, framed against a beautiful and powerful backdrop of its present.

..אתה יודע שאתה גר בישראל כש

you know you live in israel when...

it's windy. and you have sand in your mouth.

הגדה

also, i saw a $45,000 haggadah yesterday. needless to say, it was pretty.

מחשבות עמוקות

i'm on break now! i have no idea what i will be doing for the next 3+ weeks.

a woman told amalia and i today that we were "lying in her face." naturally, we weren't.

it's been really hot, which is great, but then i got out of class today and it was freezing/windy/drizzling and i was confused. so were my sandals and shorts.

מחנה יהודה

it's pretty amazing living above the shuk. for example, the bell pepper man below us gives us free peppers (and green onion, and tomato) every day, or at least when he sees us. we always try to pay him, but he just won't let us. so we bought him a cake. i'm pretty sure he said he doesn't eat cake, but i bet he ate it anyway. also, my favorite sunflower seed guy just remembered my order (a quarter kilo) without me asking for it. he doesn't have any teeth.

however, there is drilling, and i have no idea where it's coming from. also, there's wet cement right outside our front door, and i had to pull some macgyver stunt action to get in. i'm thinking of drawing something in the cement.

שקצה

so today i learned that the hebrew/yiddish word shiksa (aka a non-jewish woman) means abomination, like what G-d calls non-kosher animals. thats awful. in other news, i learned that breast milk and blood from humans are kosher. yay!

(נהג! (חלק ב

riding the high of my last successful nehag yell, i tried my luck again last night. utter failure. people staring. me mumbling. shame.

!נהג

yesterday morning was a real coming of age for me, perhaps the pinnacle of my experience in israel thus far. you see, here in israel the bus driver's name is nehag, or driver, no matter who it is (unless it's a woman, in which case it would be naheget, which i have only seen once here). it seems derogatory (perhaps hearkening back to the "garcon means boy" scene from pulp fiction), but it's standard here and is heard on the bus whenever the driver's attention is needed. every time i am ready to get off the bus, i worry that i might have to yell it and thus make a fool of myself (what if my voice is too soft?, what if people make fun of my accent?, what if i smell?). so yesterday, when the driver prematurely closed the door on me, i quickly took out one of my earphones and let out a loud and confident NEHAG!, and sure enough, the door opened. i was quite pleased with myself and my good friend nehag.

מצווה

Israel has a trash problem. More specifically, the shuk, also known as my home. We never know where to put our full trash bags, which has led to problems in the past. Our meat-peddling downstairs neighbors don't want us to put them near their stand, and for whatever reason, the guys who actually collect the trash in the shuk don't want us to put them in their trash carts. Go figure.

So last Friday night, after I had just lit Shabbat candles on my own (Amalia was away), I took the latest full trash bag downstairs to deposit it on my way to synagogue. Luckily, there was a man with a cart, coming through to pick up the remnants left behind from a bustling day at the shuk. As he was conversing with a woman in Arabic, I casually dropped my bag in his cart and began to walk away. Suddenly I heard an "Alo, Alo!" from behind me and turned around. What I got out of the short conversation that followed in guttural Hebrew was that even though I lived in the shuk, I could not put my trash in his cart. Fine, I thought, there were plenty of other places I could put it on my way to the synagogue. As I continued on my walk, I heard a small voice behind me asking if he wanted me to give him the trash. Confused, I turned around to see a young boy, no more than 9 years old, wearing a kippah and carrying a small bag of drinks, presumably on his way home for Shabbat. I told him I was fine, I would find a place to put it, but he insisted. As I handed the bag over to him, I asked him why he wanted to take it. He responded with a simple word, "mitzvah," as he quickly shuffled away to rid himself of my bag and celebrate Shabbat with his family. I let off a proud "Shabbat Shalom," and as I watched him just a few steps in front of me, I couldn't help but smile.

...שלושה חודשים

I know, it's been a while. If this upsets you, please direct your attention here. Wow, so it's been about three months since I've posted, and A LOT has happened. Some minor highlights in no particular order: took a hiking trip to the South with school and stayed in a (rather large, semi-authentic) Bedouin tent, went to the West Bank for the first time for lunch at a teacher's house, had a nice Hannukah break, got sick, had an aliyah at a Sephardic shul in Dimona, straightened my hair for New Year's, ran into old camp friends, saw a group here from Ner Tamid, went to Tzfat with friends, went on another trip to the South with school (stayed on a kibbutz), and that pretty much brings us to now. This is the last real day of my semester break (we only get a week, where most Israeli universities get about 4 weeks, oh well). We have been doing a ton of cooking as well, and just bought a blender for soups and milkshakes. We spent way too much on it so I hope it works.

In sum, things have been progressing quite nicely here; I am of course used to the long school days and working weeks that start on Sunday, and I feel like I have really settled in and am comfortable in Jerusalem. My goal for the blog from here on out is to update much more frequently, with shorter, more inane posts for your reading pleasure. I will now proceed to show you some pictures that have little to do with anything I just talked about, but that I like nonetheless.

Shabbat Shalom,
Sam

P.S. Please check out my other website, Samblumberg.com for some more pictures of my adventures.

The Shuk, my home
















Amos, Old City shopkeeper
















Friends and food downstairs in our apartment
















Huge flash flood in the South- normally there is no water here
















Intense wind on top of a mountain, overlooking several Kibbutzim near Eilat