Out of Darkness Comes Light

Warsaw.

The Ghetto:

It's not their fault they live here in the old Jewish Ghetto--they were forced to move here under communism and now they don't have the resources to leave. They don't want to live in these haunted tenements either...

The Nazis were especially torturous toward religious people, chopping off their beards and lighting them on fire, forcing them to sing or dance.

The Nazis staged a documentary in the Ghetto that showed the Jews as an immoral people, but the original tapes were later found. They show that the Jews set up hospitals, soup kitchens, schools, and cultural centers.

Polish Uprising Museum.

The museum felt disorganized and overwhelming. It was visually overstimulating and confusing. I think I got a general sense that I didn't have before that the Polish people really suffered during WWII. There were entire cities that were simply leveled to the ground by the Germans. While in the museum, although I felt for the Polish people, I kept looking for things relating to Jews. There is something different about what happened to the Jews. Maybe it's because it was on a larger scale but I don't think that's it. I think it's the dehumanization and deindividualization, systematic humiliation and degradation. I also feel a deeper connection to what happened to the Jews, for obvious reasons. I wonder if the non-Jews feel the same disconnect toward the Holocaust that I feel toward the Polish uprising.

We are going to be leaving Warsaw soon. I just looked at a map and realized I never learned any street names here.

Jerusalem. July 12, 2011.

Prayer doesn't change things. Prayer changes people. People change things.

חיוך עושה קסמים––a smile makes magic

Quotes from Adjusting Sights by Haim Sabato:

We'll wait for the next bus. That's the story of our lives. It's the story of everyone's life. There'll be another bus. There's bound to be. We'll get there.

The faith of today is not the faith of yesterday.

From this we learn there are different kinds of good deeds. There are those that everyone knows about, performed by great men at great moments, and there are those that seem trivial, performed by the ordinary moments of ordinary days. And it's the second kind that earn us a place in paradise.

Wherefore doth a living man complain?

Be glad you're alive.

Not all times and days are the same. There are long days and short days, full times and empty ones. There are hours that go by like years and years that pass like hours, interminable moments and lifetimes like a fleeting dream.

Yad Vashem, The Holocaust Museum in Jerusalem.

The tour guide feels a lot more natural here. I understand her accent; she understands what it means to be Jewish.

This morning we were in Arad and put a mechitzah (a wall that divides men and women) during Shacharit (the morning prayer service). We put the Torahs on the women's side, a bold move. The girls led the service and read Torah. I've never seen the girls so into it and the boys so out of it. Everyone is up in arms. I'm still thinking about how I can explain to them about the beauty of separated praying. I can't find the words though. #modernfeministtraditionaljewproblems

There is something about the Shoah (the Holocaust) that makes me want to find the meaning in my life and the importance in what I'm doing.

On the bus from Arad to Jerusalem today, I taught Yuval a song and he taught me a new tune to שבחי ירושלים. Then we started talking about Arabs and Palestinians and Jews and Israelis. He showed me a piece by Shai Agnon about the Mourner's Kaddish. The piece was nice but it wasn't the universal-feel-good prayer that I'm partial to. I told Yuval and that led to a conversation about Cain and Abel and creation and morality vs. altruism. He said, "their morality shouldn't affect our morality," on the topic of Gilad Shalit.

A country is not just what it does; it is also what it tolerates --Kurt Tucholsky

I am freedom's festival, the last and best

Come, take your rest.

--The Emperor of Atlantis

I just teared up out of happiness (?) when I heard the story of women who shared recipes at night in the barracks of concentration camps and kept records in a kosher book and a non kosher book. One woman was able to keep the books and donated the kosher cookbook to Yad Vashem and through this project she was reconnected with one of those women.

What would you do to hold onto your humanity?

This reminds me of a story I heard many years ago about a man who was kept prisoner for years in a windowless room. To keep himself from going mad, he recited facts about wines. He just went over these facts again and again to keep his mind on something. I was worried at the time; I don't have anything memorized. I don't know recipes except for matzah brei. I can't remember song lyrics in order. I know bits and pieces of the periodic table, Bernoulli's equation, and half of a Shakepeare sonnet. Would that be enough?

A lot of people got married and had babies after the war as soon as they could. How! Would I have wanted that?

A lot of kids in my group gave donations at the end of the museum tour and wrote in the guest book. Something means more to me when I see that it means something to them.

Har Herzl, the national cemetery.

The טקס (ceremony) is taking place at the new section. The ground is waiting for new graves. This is the worst part of this whole place. When I think of Michael Levin's grave, I think of my friends who are in the army now. They're just little kids. I don't want this piece of land to be here. I wish it wasn't waiting so patiently.

Overlook of Syria.

Yom Kippur War: what kind of country raises her children to emerge from a safe place and put themselves into mortal danger? To jump on a grenade to save their friends?

Tzfat.

"Israel is not only a land--it is a state of mind." the Kabbalist at the Yemenite cafe

Jerusalem.

רק פה--A man came up to Yaakov, our bus driver while we were stopped at a red light to get a light for his cigarette.

I took one of the girls in my group to the hospital for an allergic reaction. We were treated by a short version of Gandalf wearing a large black kippah. He was an old, religious Jew and a most compassionate doctor. He said, "Thanks be to God that God gave wisdom to man that he may invent medicine."

For what it's worth, these posts about my trip this summer are dedicated to the members of Subgroup Awesome, who helped me process, held my hand, and inspired me to think and care deeply about each moment of each day. Thank you, I love you.

The Death Camp

Treblinka.

זה־השער ליהוה צדיקים יבאו בו׃

This is the gate of the Lord, the righteous shall enter into it.

This was embroidered on a curtain that blocked the way to death at Treblinka. The curtain had been stolen from a synagogue where it had covered the Aron Kodesh, the holy ark where the Torahs were kept.

Such was the obsession that the Nazis had with destroying the Jewish people that they knew exactly how to profane our holy objects and twist our holy words. They were not content with killing--the killing was just a fraction of it. Two parts murder, three parts humiliation, one part torture, four parts hatred = one whole Holocaust.

People just came here to die.

There were no fields to work, no walls to build, no tracks to lay. The job of the few living Jews in Treblinka? To dispose of their fellow Jews.

"The presented pictures were taken by Kurt Franz, the deputy commandant of the death camp in Treblinka. They came from the album called, 'Beautiful Times.'"

Treblinka looks like a cemetery. The difference is that each stone represents not one person, but an entire community.

The Homeland

Warsaw. July 7, 2011

Before the war, a third of this city's population was Jewish.

The president of the Warsaw Ghetto Judenrat (Jewish Police) committed suicide because he didn't want to hand over Jews to the Germans. We visited his grave.

Tikochin. July 8, 2011

"For centuries the whisper of those prayers ascended to heaven--it has stopped now. Will it ever be heard again? And was it an alien hope that sounded there, or our own?" --Stanistaw Vincenz

The Polish bus driver left the bus door open while he had a cigarette so now I am hunting bees on our bus with the rest of my staff. We are sinking into the mud in the parking lot. Besides that, however, Tikochin is incredible. The synagogue here is enormous and beautiful. It has been turned into somewhat of a museum and pictures of Jews from before the war are all around. I found one that looks just like Mama! Literally just like her! I can't stop looking at her. I guess it's true that we always view our mothers as the most beautiful people in the world. The pictures here make me feel like this is my heritage. I look like a Polish Jew. I feel like a Polish Jew. I've always felt that Israel is my homeland from a religious and cultural standpoint but I feel like Poland's shtetls are my family's origin.

Tikochin looks like a living museum. There is a man selling whittled wood outside the synagogue. He is bearded and old and poor. He looks like an actor. He looks like what he is making.

Yuval borrowed my camera to take pictures of a photograph of the Bnei Akiva youth movement, a movement he was part of growing up in Israel. He also took a picture of a beautiful girl on a beach in a bathing suit. He's crushing on a dead woman.

Nazi soldiers forced Jews from Tikochin to sing HaTikvah ("The Hope," now the Israeli national anthem) as they marched them to their deaths in the pits of the forest. Within two days, the Jewish community that had lasted 400 years was entirely destroyed.

I've never seen so many stars of David and Israeli flags. The kids love to take pictures of the symbolism. I do too. Just as the Swastika sends such a strong message, so does the Magen David (the Star of David). I'm proud to be wearing it around my neck now. They also love to take pictures of butterflies, flowers, barbed wire, fences, and railroad tracks. We create a language with these symbols so the images read like a text.

Josh broke down in tears here, one of the few. It's a beautiful forest with birds chirping and the sweet smell of confiers. I wish I could imagine it so well that I could cry.

Yuval chanted El Malei Rachamim, "God, Full of Mercy." He began to cry when he was singing these words in Hebrew:

"O God, full of mercy, Who dwells on high,

grant proper rest on the wings of the Divine Presence -

in the lofty levels of the holy and the pure ones,
who shine like the glow of the firmament

for the soul of the dead
who have gone on to his world,

because, without making a vow,
I will contribute to charity in remembrance of their souls.

May their resting place be in the Garden of Eden -

therefore may the Master of Mercy
shelter them in the shelter of His wings for Eternity,
and may He bind their souls in the Bond of Life.

God is their heritage,
and may they repose in peace on their resting place.

Now let us respond: Amen."

I asked him later why he began to cry, thinking he was just so moved by the moment. But he wasn't. He is the most religious person I have ever been close to, and to hear him say this was very sad for me. He said he cried because the words of the prayer were impossible for him to believe at that moment, that "God Full of Mercy" was a false title. That as we stood above the death pits, he could not believe in a merciful God.

Now we are watching "Fiddler on the Roof" on the bus to depict shtetl life. Everyone EVERYONE is singing along. I am proud to report that I know all the words.

"Life has a way of confusing us, blessing and bruising us"

I just went pee in the woods at a rest stop. I have a stinging, raised rash crawling up my legs. I fear for my life. There is also a dog following me. Sup, Poland?

Majdanek

Before we went to Majdanek, we were in Krakow for a day and night. We saw the grand synagogues the Jews had built, we saw the remnants of the ghetto wall that look like rows of tombstones. It was raining the whole time we were in Krakow. We went to a really nicely done, small museum about the Jews of Krakow. "It would be a treachery to those who lived here to remember only their deaths and not their lives." So we learned about their lives.

Majdanek.

"You'll have to read these things for yourself. I don't feel comfortable saying them out loud." -Shlomo, our tour guide

The smell here is making me feel sick. It doesn't remind me of track meets or grass. It is very misty and dark. Crows are everywhere, caw-cawing ominously.

Majdanek is within the city of Lublin. Houses built after the war border up against the Majdanek barbed wire. Apartments a few blocks away overlook the entire camp.

People saw what was going on here! What were they thinking!

Now the sun is filtering through the humid air. It makes the place look like a Hollywood movie--the only things clearly in focus are those directly in front of you.

This barrack is filled entirely with shoes. No one is speaking.

This is a stable for 54 horses. But they made 500 humans sleep here.

There was a reserve general who gave his soldiers a choice. If someone didn't want to partake in the murder, he didn't have to.

Along with that general, only one soldier chose not to participate.

It smells like barbecue in the crematorium. The ovens have large openings for burning the maximum number of bodies possible.

"May our fate be your warning." on the monument that houses the pile of ashes

Every window of every apartment I can see right now has a clear view of this pile of ashes.

Can "how?" be an emotion? It is not sadness nor anger which I am feeling today. Bewilderment is close, I suppose. I walk with my arms at my side and my palms facing forward asking, How?

Poland

The Polish countryside is carpeted with thick, dark forests. I can almost imagine people hiding in them, I can almost see their faces between the trees.

In each small town, the smoke stacks and ornate churches are the prominent features.

Auschwitz. 7/5/11

I'm surprised that being at Auschwitz doesn't make people nicer. Tourists from all over the world are more pushy, loud, and obnoxious than usual. The lines are very long.

The place just looks like a museum. I feel uneasy about being here only because of the emotions the name Auschwitz elicits and not because of how it looks or smells or feels.

ARBEIT MACHT FREI

Jews made the sign. The B was installed upside down as a call for help; "something is wrong here," it says. It reminds me of the upside down "3" that was spray painted on the doorway to the third level of my freshman year dorm from the stairwell. That 3 always bothered me.

The only way to exit was through the chimney of the crematoriums.

We are given headphones. The tour guide's voice has a rapid pace and a thick Polish accent. "Here, the SS doctors conducted illegal medical experiments," she says as if on an infomercial. How does she do this every day?

"About 2,400,000 people were murdered in this camp. About 200,000 people survived."

Sometimes the train journey would last 7-10 days without food or water. At what point do you just want to die? How was the will to live so, so unthinkably strong? Is it human instinct to think that you will be the outlier? That if anyone can make it, it will be you?

What am I living for? Would my reasons pass the test?

I teared up just now, when I saw Josh sobbing at the sight of the confiscated talitot. Sometimes it takes seeing emotion in someone else to draw it out of myself.

The shoes aren't all the same black, dirty leather, flat sole I was expecting. There are all colors and fashions, sandals, heels, everything. I even thought, oh, those are cute.

A room of hair and make up brushes.

None of the signs have the correct apostrophes and it bothers me.

Before Auschwitz grew too large, prisoners were photographed, like a mug shot. And now we are looking into their eyes.

Their uniforms weren't warm enough for the winter.

They look like skeletons but with very, very sad facial expressions.

I've only been here an hour or so and I already feel myself shutting down. I can't open my mind up to the possibility of this tragedy. I can't accept that people were starved and tortured by the millions and stripped of all their possessions and family and dignity. I am standing on a street where people died of exhaustion and cold during unbearably long roll calls. How?

No one in the group is speaking. Besides when they're all asleep, this has never happened. They are comforting each other.

This really puts things in perspective, doesn't it?

The Standing Cell.

I don't understand how they thought up these punishments. I could never in a million years devise such horrors. If they wanted to kill people, why didn't they just do it? Why did they make them suffocate or drop dead from standing, exhaustion, starvation, cold disease, overcrowding..

Shiri told the story of her grandfather. He didn't have fingernails. He had burns on his body from a guard's cigarette.

Someone took a picture of us sitting as a group. We are a symbol here.

Scratch marks on the walls of the gas chamber, and a Magen David etched in the concrete wall too.

The crematorium ovens look like brick pizza ovens but they are long enough to accommodate bodies.

Birkenau.

They didn't just want to kill people, they wanted to terrorize people.

Yuval was holding his Tanach and I asked, what are you reading? I just want to hold it, he said.

Imagine getting elected on Hitler's platform, on the basis of exterminating an entire people.

The air here smells like it does at a track meet in May--cool, grassy, sunscreeny. We are holding water bottles and wearing sneakers. I'm ready for the triple jump.

The reconstructed barracks smell like musty wood and sunscreen too.

There is an endless expanse of brick chimneys left from when they hastily burned down the wood barracks to eliminate the evidence. It looks like a graveyard, or ancient ruins.

The Selection Process: which line would I be in?

I don't want to touch anything here. I wish I could hover from above so that not even my feet would have to make contact. Death is everywhere.

"It's very creepy to sleep next to dead bodies," Shlomo says about the barracks.

A main goal of the medical experiments was to find efficient ways to sterilize women. Ovaries were torn from their bodies without anesthesia.

Me: Everywhere I go, I keep taking pictures because I need to show my parents.

Matt: I need to show my children.

It's so peaceful here now. It's quiet except for feet shuffling on the gravel paths and the murmur of quiet voices. Birds are chirping and guides are giving tours in different languages. I am tired from walking all day. I'm also very calm. I am in such disbelief that the enormity of what happened here is not hitting me.

The grass is high. I'm worried about getting ticks. Is it wrong to complain now? After seeing this, how can I say- I'm cold, tired, hungry, or crowded? How can I say a room smells bad or my feet hurt or this food tastes terrible?

I brought 2.5 Minute Ride (by Lisa Kron) with me (thanks, Adina) and I'm reading it. I think I'll send Lisa Kron an email tonight (I did, she responded).

The ashes of the people who had been murdered were dumped on ponds and rivers and fields, as fertilizer.

After having their head shaved, starving, and wearing new ill fitting uniforms, people were often unrecognizable to close friends and family.

"I want to be remembered wearing a suit." --Andrew, pointing at a wall of pictures of Holocaust victims from before the Holocaust. There is a glamorous couple depicted, in a suit and a fancy dress. God knows what they looked like when they died. But I'll remember them looking like movie stars.

It's scary, but I sometimes wish we could simulate life in a camp for just one day. Just to get one iota of understanding. Because we can't imagine. We can't imagine what it was like to go to the bathroom where thousands had already gone, and only for a few seconds. Or to never feel warm during the winter, or to hear the last breath of the person sleeping next to you, or to live off 15o calories per day.

Why am I able to walk out of here? Why do I deserve to leave?

Terezin

Her name was Irene. She was a survivor of Terezin, one of the few who stayed there until the war was over. She was born in Bohemia in Poland, the 2nd biggest Jewish community in the country. Her family was very assimilated.

She went with her family on the train to Terezin, but no one knew where it was going. Can you imagine getting on a train with your family without a clue where it's going?

In Terezin, people were never alone. There was always someone on top of you, underneath you.

Her sister survived Bergen Belsen.

"It was very hard after the war. No country wanted us."

Now, Irene said, most people living in Terezin have no idea what happened there. She has visited several times. Once she asked a local if he had ever seen a Jew. He said no. Then she said, "I am one, and these women are all Jews." He said, "But they look like us."

Now Irene lives in Israel and identifies as Israeli. When a pilgrim asked Irene, "how old were you when you were brought here?" she said, "One doesn't ask a woman about her age."

After meeting Irene, and while walking through the museum, I wrote down these notes:

Why do we need to talk to survivors?

What does the art made in the ghetto express?

The secret art itself was a form of resistance.

Brundibar--Children's Theater

Religious life also endured; there were lectures, services, funerals, burials

Education and cultural events were escapes from the misery of every day life--the people were able to feel dignified.

They were determined, in all conditions, to live like humans.

Next, we walked into a small, hidden room. It was the synagogue. On the walls, prayers and songs were painted, many of which I knew well. "Know before whom you stand." "If I forget thee, O Jerusalem, let my right hand lose its cunning, let my mouth cleave to the roof of my mouth, if I do not put Jerusalem above my highest joy." "Our brothers, of the entire House of Israel, who find themselves in jeopardy or entrapped, whether on sea or land, may God have compassion upon them and bring them forth from trouble to relief, from gloom to light, and from tyranny to redemption, urgently, and let us say, amen."

"With all of this we have not forgotten your name and we hope you have not forgotten us."

The group broke spontaneously into song. I don't remember who started it, but we all joined in and sang the songs on the wall. I learned the same songs when I went on Pilgrimage myself in 2008. In 2008, we sang the songs with the captive soldiers in mind. When I went home to America, I sang the songs with Pilgrimage in mind. When I went on Nativ, I sang the songs with America in mind. When I came to Cornell, I sang the songs with Nativ in mind. And then I sang them in Terezin.

And I thought, every time I have sung these songs before in my life has been in preparation for this moment.

How could people have sustained their faith in Terezin? In that tiny synagogue? I hear this sentence in my head, "With all of this we have not forgotten your name and we hope you have not forgotten us," and I wonder how that is possible.

We cried. I saw our tour guide Shlomo tearing up, and I lost it. Sometimes it takes emotion from someone else to draw it out of myself. I thought about all the other places I had been with those songs, all the other people I had been with. I thought about the men who stood huddled in this room years before sining the same words.

It was the only time I really cried in Europe. There were a few times when my face got hot or my throat closed up or I managed to squeeze a tear from the corner of my eye, but this was everyone together, shaking.

The Terezin Cemetery:

It started raining a little bit during the ceremony, and I am chilly now but I don't mind. The rain and wind blew out the candle during Mourner's Kaddish. Everyone is crying. The cemetery didn't affect me like the synagogue did.

Remembering Europe

I am ready to face my experiences in Europe over this past summer, and I will do that by typing up my notes from the places we visited. The notes may be disjointed, and I am not going to include personal details. But hopefully going through my "Notes and Quotes" book will help me understand my journey through Eastern Europe and--distantly, because I don't believe comprehension is possible--the Holocaust. If this is hard for you to read, sorry I'm not sorry. People need to know what happened.

Berlin

6/29/11

Today we sat on benches in Tier Garden where Jews were not allowed to sit under the Nurenberg Laws. We ate kosher bagged lunches. I asked about the German coke and Jules Gutin said it had a lot of gas. Ha.

Gay Memorial: Each group's story is different. Just imagine that-showing love and affection was criminal.

Memorial to the Murdered Jews of Europe(cement boxes): What do people passing by think they are looking at?

It's like the maze in Harry Potter IV, you lose yourself in it. It looks like a cemetery. You can't tell what's going on from the outside. Suddenly it feels like you don't know how to get out. Isolation, no writing, no names, lost identity.

[Resist War, Defend Peace.

Through science to justice.]

Only 2% of visitors at the Jewish Museum in Berlin are Jewish. Our tour guide's name is Karsten Kreiger, "The Christian Warrior." He is fantastic.

Humboldt Universitaet: Where they burn books, eventually they will burn people.

Why do Christian Germans serve as tour guides at these places?

"It happened, therefore it can happen again. This is the core of what we have to say." -Primo Levi

Our tour guide's grandfather was a "Nazi until the day he died" but still he loved his grandfather so much. This was extremely difficult for our tour guide to reconcile.

"Why war still? Why hunger still? Why a world still?" Oskar Rosenfeld

"For what and for whom do I carry on this whole pursuit of life, enduring, holding out--for what?"

"We would so love to live but they won't let us and we will die."

How should we react to the grandchildren of our enemies??

Grunevald Station: In 1944, it was written, "From this place, people were sent away." Well, yes. 56,000 Jews were sent to their deaths.

On the road: bathroom attendant at a rest stop in Germany speaks Hebrew

View of Dresden from the bus: long, red buildings, old castles, churches, beautiful

Praha, July 3rd, 2011

We met up with a group of Israeli girls who are here for a dance competition. They sang happy birthday to Jessica, and Zach took pictures with them. Then they danced for us, they were very cute.

"You cannot be passive about your Judaism; you cannot be passive about making the world a better place." --Shlomo Molcho

At Chevre Kadisha: Sickness represents a call to help one's fellow human beings. This is why medical intervention to heal the sick is not seen as a negation of God's will but as a religious duty.

My subgroup was invited to write down notes in my journal. Here is what they wrote:

"When we were at the Vansee Conference location, people were annoyed about how pretty it was and were saying things like, 'I wish it was ugly or rundown,' or, 'we should spit on it.' But would it really be better that way?

"How can we celebrate our birthdays if we know that so many people suffered on those very same days?"

"How did 15 people in a room at Vansee determine the fates of millions? How did they feel they had that right?"

Terezin, Czech Republic, 7/4/11:

Population 2011: 7,000

30,000-40,000 Jews lived here by force

Jews had their own currency system in the Ghetto. There was a propaganda movie made in the Ghetto--Holocaust denial during the Holocaust. The city was moated and walled.

Subconscious thought brought to the surface: in the scope of 6 million, 5 is nothing. 50 is little, 500 is not that bad.

Men and women were not allowed to live together or have intercourse.

I saw a bird in the town square picking at an apple core. That would have been a person.

Starvation in the ghettos: people became weak, susceptible to disease, 196 average deaths per day.

SO MUCH DECEPTION

Jews focused on education in the Ghetto. The intelligensia read to the kids and taught them in private.

Once the commander of Terezin found out all the Jews were destined to die anyway, he let them do what they wanted, cultural life flourished.

In the sleeping quarters: up to 400 people lived in this room, but we (50 of us) can barely fit into a third of it, standing. No showers, no bathrooms, no radios. Lice. Hanging from a bed post--a pale blue dress with a Jude star on it. They wore colors?

While they made their beds and got dressed in the morning, they also had to remove dead bodies.

Jews here had a secret newspaper. The children put on operas, there were classical music concerts, people wrote original songs, poems, plays. A lot of creations were brought with deportees to the camps because they didn't know what was going to happen.

Survivor of Terezin, Irene: This woman was touring the museum at the same time as us. Our tour guide begged and pleaded with her to come and talk to us. Once she started talking, she couldn't stop.

Those who can, sleep. Those who cannot, blog.

It is past midnight and I have a prelim in Human Biology and Evolution tomorrow (what up lactase promoter sequence mutations) but there is just oh so much excitement in my life that I cannot sleep!

What is all this excitement, you ask? Wellllllll

1. I might appear on MTV across from sex columnist Dan Savage

2. Kappa Delta just announced that I have TWO WEEKS to find THREE GIRLS attractive Jewish dates for date night

3. I changed my profile picture today (thanks Rachies!) and I've been refreshing my facebook frequently in the hopes of receiving positive feedback

4. I have 5 classes tomorrow, including a lab, and an E-Board meeting for Hillel, and lab makes me nervous

5. When I say lab makes me nervous, I actually mean that my blood pressure remains in the "heavy workout zone" for approximately an hour after the chemistry has been completed and cleaned up

6. I am simply not ready for it to be October

7. I need to learn my Torah portion for Rosh Hashanah!

8. I've selected my wedding song (but not the person I'm wedding)...hope my groom likes Rascal Flatts

9. I went to see "Midnight in Paris" with Adina on Saturday and we sat in the couple's seat in the non-profit indie movie theater

10. I've attended so many meetings in the last week my head is going to explode--enough with the opinions, people! If you feel strongly about things and have many opinions, do what I do. Get a blog and shove the link in everyone's face LATER, don't talk your face off at a meeting when everyone's got shit to do

11. I attended Sammy Date Night last night (thanks for taking me, Andrew!) and it was exciting because....I ATE SALMON AND I DIDN'T HATE IT! I even put salmon on the fork with mashed potatoes all at the same time and it was BETTER than each of those things on their own! Wow!!

Eleven seems like a pretty solid number so I'm going to end it here and hope that my cyber rant has alleviated my mind from the burden of trying to sort out all of the excitement in my life.

Laila tov

Riding the Struggle Bus

This morning I woke up with a start at 7:35am, which appeared in my mind as 8:35am. I got dressed in a huff, checked my email before I ran out the door, and noticed that my morning alarm had just started to beep. At this point, I was not an hour late, but an hour early.

I attempted to go back to sleep for a half hour and failed, probably due to trying to maintain my hair and make up, which I'd already done. Now I have an extra half hour in my day so I decided to blog about my other struggles.

First of all, let me say that this whole 9am class thing is not ideal. I did it last semester too, and said I never would again. I am just bad at waking up. The good news is that my first class is physics and the professor is beyond adorable and has a great Swedish accent, so that's okay.

Second of all, I do not really understand the electron orbital stuff we're doing in chem right now and I need Juhi to teach me. This girl literally stands at the Struggle Bus Stop every day and picks me up after school. What would I do without her!

Third of all, I have about 80,000 emails I need to send for my responsibilities as an RA, on Hillel board, and trying to find a research position. Sending one email is nothing, but the daunting task of sending 80,000 just seems like it will take forever and I am putting it off. BUT NOT TONIGHT! Tonight, I message!

Fourth, my ear is still plugged. I don't know if this is something I am just going to have to learn to live with or not, but it is a little annoying to always have your left ear popping in and out and then returning to a plugged state. Hmph.

Fifth, the Palestinian Authority is unilaterally declaring statehood at the UN tomorrow. We'll see how that goes. I just want peace.

Sixth, I dreamt about my kitties last night and I MISS them ever so much. I know it isn't realistic for me to think that I could care for animals while at college, but I so wish that I could keep some kitties in my room. (Now that I think of it, I also dreamt that I went to a tzniut dress shop and a video rental store, I visited my mom's old dorm at UB, and the elevator flipped onto its side halfway through the ride and began to go sideways as part of its route. Hmmmmm)

Seventh, I forgot to stock up and now I am left without a hun-cal Chewy bar for my breakfast.

Sit with me on the Sruggle Bus?

WE'RE BAAAAAAAACK

Title of this post dedicated to Adina II because she likes to make fun of people who make "WE'RE BAAAAAAAAACK" the title of their back-to-college facebook albums.

Here are some fun things going on:

1. I am taking physics, chemistry, human biology & evolution, and statistics

2. I am tutoring a biology supplementary class--the same one I took last semester and LOVED

3. I am eating my dinners at Kappa Delta and enjoying sorority life greatly (Chef Wendy is an angel in disguise)

4. I went to an Episcopalian service yesterday evening and I recognized several items on the agenda: a) Joyful Joyful from Sister Act, b) "Sing a new song to the Lord, for He has worked wonders" from Kabbalat Shabbat (mizmor shiru la'shem shir chadash), c) We read a portion from Exodus! I really appreciated what was going on during the service and I liked the organ. It was a cool vibe. The Reverend gave a sermon on the part of Exodus where God kills all of the Egyptian first borns. He said, most of the time I just skip over this passage because it is hard to understand, but today I will attempt to grapple with it. He gave a few different perspectives of fellow Christian leaders and it seemed like it was a rare thing for him to question a word of God. This made me really fall in love with Judaism again for a few reasons. First, it is the entire POINT of Judaism to question the word of God. Second, we have such a long tradition of commentary that there is no letter in the Tanach without a second and third meaning. I wanted to raise my hand and say, well, Reverend, did you check out what Rashi has to say about that line? Or any number of other commentators? Third, I really appreciated that my Jewish upbringing has included youth group and college services, which both include STUDENTS giving dvrei torah (sermons) to STUDENTS. It means so much more to me now that there aren't rabbis calling the pages at our services or giving us speeches on what THEY think the Torah means. It's awesome that it all comes from other students.

5. I'm working with the Women's Organization At Hillel to plan amazing Rosh Chodesh programming this semester!! Including leading a session at the Women of Color Conference at Cornell in November!

6. Kappa Delta mixed with Sigma Alpha Mu last night and it was epic.

7. All I want to do is listen to country music all day erry day.

8. Being an RA in Risley is A-MAZANG. I love it. I love this building, I love the people, I love the art shop, I love living in a single, I love my residents, I love making bulletin boards, I love everything. Except getting called to do a lock-out.

9. Human Biology and Evolution is a sick class. We are learning about HIV and lactose tolerance and creationism and all kinds of really relevant topics!

10. My position on Risley RA staff is faculty fellow coordinator, so lately I've been dining and meeting with some of the most fantastic/bizarre/cultured people on campus. Did I mention I love my job? Oh yeah, also my boss, Barnaby, is super duper funny.

11. Meeting freshmen is great. I feel like I have such a grip on my life when I explain to them how I got involved in stuff and what I'm doing now. There are so many little Jewish gap-year girls that I am getting close to! I feel like I have a special connection with them, but also other freshmen. In general, I really like the new students that I've met!!

12. My best friends from freshmen year have scattered, but the good news is: we still see each other, we still love each other. The long distance is hard (Rachel and I used to be about 20 rooms away on the same floor and Adina was just below us), but we are figuring it out. And using cars!

13. Babysitting for L- again is great! She teaches me so much about life.

14. Went "swimming" at Treman State Park with Adina, Julia, Maddy, and Sam, and last week I walked up a waterfall with L-, also there is a gorge behind Risley where we ate lunch once!

15. Highlights from Risley: Soul Power Dance Party, Bro Night

16. Currently crocheting a kippah, soon I will start crocheting gold wire!

Basically, everything feels really under control right now and I'm having a lot of fun. I have many problem sets and lots to read, but it's okay because I still have enough time to see my friends and frat it up. Conveniently, those activities often occur in the same place at the same time. Life is good, Ithaca is gorges, my friends are the best, Cornell is perfect.

World Traveling!!!

Places I've been in the last four weeks: New York, NY, Somerset, NJ, Berlin, Prague, Krakow, Lublin, Warsaw, Jerusalem, and Modi'in

City with the coolest vibe: Berlin
City I wish I didn't like: Berlin
Best photo op: highway turned parking lot in Germany and look out over Prague
Prettiest: Prague
Creepiest: Terezinstadt (Czech Republic) and Lublin (Poland)
Sickest: Majdanek-literally IN Lublin, the crematorium smells like fire
Home: Jerusalem
Best museum tour guide: Krakow
Worst tour guide: Auschwitz (she had a thick Polish accent, spoke quickly, and was so desensitized to the whole thing I didn't even realize at first when she said in a monotone: "Here the SS doctors conducted illegal medical experiments")
Best Holocaust memorial: Berlin-concrete boxes and Majdanek
Best memorial in general: John Lennon wall in Prague
Flashback locations: padlock bridge in Prague and Beit Nativ in Jerusalem
Unexpected favorite: Polish shtetl of Tincochen and surrounding countryside
Most communist: Warsaw
Worst customer service: Praha (simply RUDE!)
Least interesting: Somerset, NJ (but staff week was SUPER FUN because of all my friends!!!!)
Best food: Modi'in (I'm staying with a phenomenal family who also happens to be vegetarians, and I went to Yossi's house for lunch today--all wins)
Worst food: Poland in general
Greatest night of my life: in Warsaw on Roxy's birthday (we sang karaoke to If I Were a Rich Man and the crowd joined in for yubby dibby dibby)
Rainiest: Krakow
Sunniest: Israel
Homiest: Jerusalem

Books I've read recently: The Help, E.L. Doctorow, Middlesex, 2.5 Minute Ride, and Adjusting Sights (by Haim Sabato)
ALL RECOMMENDED!!!

Defiant moments of being Jewish in places where there was a Holocaust: sitting on benches in the Tier Garden in Berlin, a place where Jews were not allowed to sit under the Nuremberg Laws. We ate bagged lunches and sang the Grace After Meals; breaking out a Cliff Bar outside Majdanek; walking on the tracks as we exited Birkenau; praying in synagogues that were abandoned or ruined during the war

Frequent photo symbolism employed in Eastern Europe: trees, flowers, barbed wire, butterflies, fences, crows, guard towers, Israeli flags, Jewish stars, candles

Random encounters: befriending my neighbor on the plane to Berlin and learning her life story over the course of several hours, angry Israeli woman in Berlin who didn't want us to do a tour where she was also touring because it would distract her, bathroom attendant in Germany who spoke Hebrew to us, Israeli Dance troupe in Prague, woman in a picture in a synagogue in Tincochen who looks identical to my mother

Movies I'm supposed to see: Counterfeit, The Last Train, Conspiracy

Books I want to read: The Magician of Lublin by Isaac Singer, other works by Isaac Singer, Mila 18 (we were there!)

Average hours of sleep I get per night: 5 hours

Average number of liters of water I drink per day: 2

Average number of liters of sweat I sweat per day: 1

Average number of pictures I take per day: 100

Rediscovered hidden talents: wiggling ears, not picking the skin of my face, telling military time, drawing and sketching

Proud purchases: pretty scarf from Praha and crocheted gold wire earrings from Tel Aviv (Nachalat Binyamin)

New favorite song (not actually favorite but definitely a winner): Jack Sparrow by Lonely Island

Favorite part about this trip: MY KIDS AND MY COS!!!!!!!!!!!

shalom from berlin!!!

more on this later...but what an amazing city!!!!

The Ads...

Just a quick explanation about the weird Jewish Funeral ads that keep popping up on the side of my blog:

Google AdSense picks up keywords from my blog and places "relevant" advertisements on the site. The effectiveness of these ads will be measured on a per-click basis and will supposedly earn revenue.

The main point I wanted to communicate about this new addition to shalomfromhome is that they are not dangerous to your computer and they are not a permanent fixture.

Should you ever have some free time, though, feel free to click!!

About time

It has taken me a long time to return to this post, and it's about time. Because I like to make my titles clever, I will also argue that this post is actually about time, and what I do with my time. So, pun intended.

On Thursday of Pesach, I don't remember exactly what I did during the day, but I know that we had an Executive Board Meeting for Hillel and then...NOODLE WITH THE CHINESE STUDENTS ASSOCIATION! About 30 students, half Chinese-American, half Jewish, gathered in the Kosher dining hall after dinner to watch Noodle, an Israeli film about a Chinese boy in Israel. I have mentioned it before (see September 2009). It was AMAZING. We laughed at the same things, we went "awwww" at the same things, and we nearly cried at the same things. When the little boy was speaking Mandarin, the people sitting next to me translated, because there were no subtitles. Glorious.

After Noodle, a few of us ran out to participate in the Sigma Alpha Mu Road Rally, a "scavenger hunt" of sorts. I decided that I didn't want to get in trouble, take off my clothes, drink alcohol, or get dirty, so I didn't participate in many events, but I was a vital member of my team. I contributed highly to morale, designated driving, and photographic documentation. My team WON! Shout out to Jocelyn, for taking one for the team..you were the woman that night that I could never be <3

On Friday, the multi cultural hubub continued with the Freedom Seder. Seven members of Black Students United joined ten Jews at a table upstairs for Shabbat dinner. We read through the hagadah from UMASS Amherst, schmoozed, sang, ate, and got to know each other. Adam's parents were there too so that was extra special. What great people. We taught them about the Shabbat rituals and about Passover, and they sang the Black National Anthem for us and we talked about race on campus. So Complex[shun]s of us!!! I nearly cried when we were all singing "Redemption Song" by Bob Marley together.

That weekend, I'm sure a lot of really exciting things happened. One notable event was "The Party You Can't Pass-Over" at the Sammy Annex. The gang was all there, complete with potato vodka and Manischewitz. Great board pics were taken, fun was had by all. Adina brought the disposable--so vintage.

The next week was my academic hell week. I had two six page papers, a plant lab practical, a calc prelim, a unit test in bio, and regular homework on top of all that. It was somewhat of a surprise whether I would finish it all or not! I did, though, and everything went off all right. I've gotten my grades back from all those assignments, and nothing blew up or anything. Still going to medical school!

That week was also the end of Pesach, which means the pizza party and Rent-A-Greek auction! The auction was great and we raised over $800 for Autism Speaks. Woo Hillel!!! I really do aspire to be auctioned one day! So now I have another goal in life (other goals: start an inside joke that goes on the back of a group t shirt, be one of the 161 Faces of Cornell, have the New York Times discover my blog and ask me to be a guest writer...)

On Friday of that week, I got together with Emlyn and Katie to celebrate our Oneness. We had such a phenom time talking and eating chocolate covered pomegranate seeds (Rachel the First I miss you). I am going to miss Emlyn so much!

That same day, the Center for Jewish Living hosted Charity Shabbat, where each person donates to the selected cause. This year's cause was Japan, and the event was really beautiful. Four a capella groups came to sing, and Japanese students spoke about their losses. One girl, who was a great speaker, actually began to cry. The room of 200 people was completely silent.

Sometimes after a big disaster like Japan, there is so much media coverage and talk about it when it first happens that when the talk dies down, people stop considering it or even think that the conditions have improved. But they have not improved for many people, and it is just sad that our nation cannot keep focused on an issue long enough to see it through. We get bored of reading the same thing in the papers every day and move on to something else, like Donald Trump. So what I'm trying to say is that this girl, who started crying, really brought us all back. We realized that we've neglected Japan for the last month or so. And she was so appreciative of the whole community, and there were a lot of non-Jews at Shabbat dinner. Everyone was united through a good cause. It was the most Shabbat-like Shabbat I've had here.

Sunday was a really big day. In the morning, I interviewed a couple for the position of Jewish Learning Initiative on Campus, along with the rest of the committee. The interview, as the others were as well, was an interesting exercise in what matters in a person, in a couple, in a rabbi. We have our couple for next year and I could not be more excited! They are wonderful, beautiful people inside and out.

After the interview, I went to brunch with Lisa Kron and her partner, Madeline George. Adina, Jesse, and about five other students/grad students were there. We talked for hours about being Jewish, about theater, about identity, about life, about family. I was star struck.

That afternoon I spent driving around Ithaca with Jesse (THANKS JESSE!) and then with Adina to track down the ever elusive mini-DVI-VGA adapter. The search was futile. Three hours, 33 dollars, and one return later, I was adapter-less. Still, the show went off without a glitch. Mama came for dinner (THANKS MAMA!) and then for the show, which was the best treat ever. Then Lisa Kron performed a concert version of her play "2.5 Minute Ride," about visiting Auschwitz with her father.

The show was funny, provocative, sad, tragic. At the end, we skyped with her father, a survivor of kindertransport and an American GI. His parents died in Auschwitz. He said, "it was a blessing to have been born Jewish so I could never be a Nazi." Every word that was said during the presentation made me think about the Holocaust a little differently. And I was so happy to share that experience with my mother, because I knew that she related similarly.

The members of the Cornell community who attended the event really found it meaningful as well. The notes/texts/emails of graditude I received from people in the audience made the whole thing so worth it.

After the Lisa Kron event, I changed quickly and set off in Rachel's car (THANKS RACHEL!) for my formal at the Boatyard! Ace was an excellent date (even though he tried to wear Sketchers Shape Ups at first), and we danced the night away (well, about 45 minutes) and took many pictures! I was kind of channeling the Mean-Girls-ending-where-she-shows-up-to-prom-in-a-mathletes-jacket energy. Success.

Then I changed back out of my fancy clothes (THANKS ADINA!) and went to set up hundreds of flags on the Arts Quad (see picture!) with Adina, Ben, Ben, and Adam. We were out there on a Sunday night from midnight until two in the morning, just so that we could have a display for one day that commemorated those who died in the Holocaust (the different flag colors represent different groups of people who were persecuted).

In the morning, I helped set up a name-reading station on Ho Plaza and I read names of people who died. Other people continued that task until six that evening. Also on Monday, I went to a talk by Dan Senor, author of "Start Up Nation," about Israel's economic success. It made me miss Israel a lot.

On Tuesday, I tried to be academic.

On Wednesday, it was YOM HA'ATZMAUT AT CORNELL! I took pictures of people riding a real camel (her name was Virginia, she was lovely) for an hour and a half. There was a bedouin tent and a bouncy house ("hike Israel!") and pita and falafel and hookah and the like. ACHLA!

Then I went to math for twenty minutes and then Daniel et al picked me up for THIRD EYE BLIND.

We listened to 3eb the whole way to Rochester. Then we took a pee break and jumped in my car to go the rest of the way. When we arrived in Buffalo, we ate at Anchorbar, which is apparently the home of the chicken wing. I ate a caesar salad.

Then, the concert. It was at the Town Ballroom, which, despite the ghetto we had to travel through to get to it, was really a gorgeous, perfect venue. We got there with the perfect amount of time to spare. We missed the lame openers and yet we had enough time to scooch to the front.

Opening chords. Motorcycle Drive By. The crowd goes wild!

Dan and I sang the night away. We were in a group of pretty rowdy fans, but fans all the same. Everyone knew the words, and everyone could identify the song by the first two measures. There was crowd surfing and drunk fighting and people getting belligerent, but Stephen made a speech in the beginning that got us all united and excited. There was such good energy.

The concert ended with a great encore-Don't Believe a Word, Semi-Charmed Life, and God of Wine. I had chills. It was a religious experience.

The next day was a big day also! A bio unit test, a calc problem set, an e-board meeting, Jesse's adaptation (pretty sure I know what happened...either way it was excellent), and TIE DYING WITH THE ONE! Katie and Emlyn happen to be excellent people but out of the three of us, no one had the patience to do the tie dye properly. But we will still proudly wear our blotchy sweatshirts!!!

The next day was the best day of all days: SLOPE DAY. This is the day that Cornellians dream about from the first night of Orientation. Slope Day is when all dreams come true. I woke up early to look my frattiest and head over to Amy's apartment with Adina to get things started (quick detour to drop off my calc problem set on the Engineering Quad-I felt smart). Then we headed over to 120 for a MAJOR PARTY. Everyone I know was just chilling in the sunshine loving up life for hours. The pictures are GREAT.

Then we all moved over to the slope (after some irritating encounters with security-Adina couldn't bring in her camera because it's "professional" and I couldn't bring in my bag because it was "too big") and frolicked there. There was a concert and a festival and kosher hot dogs. Everyone was there!!!

That night, Adina and I hit up "Hungover Shabbat." Table Minyan was beautiful of course (I led!) and dinner was really nice too. Then we headed over to see Brightonians in C-town and Adina met Gabe, which really should have happened earlier. And we were introduced to Chris's Office, a major highlight.

The next morning I babysat and slept slept slept. Finally I dragged myself out of bed to do Hebrew homework with Adina and we grabbed dinner on West. I went grocery shopping at Wegmans (how I wish it was a portkey, and I could just walk into Ithaca Wegmans and walk out into Rochester) for Hillel with Becky and Rachel. We sat on lawn furniture for about half an hour.

Then Rachel and I ran into Ankur at Nasties and decided to make an appearance at Sammy. The appearance consisted mainly of reading/singing Kipling aloud in Daniel's room. There was a party but we were not interested. Oops.

The next morning, we had the Jewish Student Leadership Brunch! We set tables, we took beautiful pictures in the garden, we gave awards! It's not quite the same as high school or USY, but I am truly sad to see the seniors go. They have really given me something to look up to and admire. I will miss them!!!

Then I just studied for six days. and Adina left.

On Friday afternoon, I went to get pedicures with a few of my Kappa Delta Sisters. Jess, Emily, Rebecca and I hit up the mall for some spa treatment. My toes look GREAT, but I really almost keeled over and died on the spot when the man asked for $27. Just thinking about it now is making me a little nauseous, in fact. Oh dear.

I made it back in time for Table Minyan and CIPAC Shabbat dinner. Everything was great. Sam and I quoted Animal Crackers. All was right with the world.

Yesterday I babysat and we walked up a waterfall!!!! Then I packed and watched Glee and enjoyed life. I went to Mincha, Seudah Shlishit, singing, and Maariv with Koach. I led Maariv! It was really great. I love singing with Matt, but it made me miss Nativ unbearably. After Shabbat, the Hillel board went to Friendly's and we got ice cream (hunka chunka peanut butta fudge whaddup) and played together! I am especially in love with my board and I enjoy getting driven around by Susu, it makes me feel really cool, I can't lie. They are the best!! I'm so excited for next semester.

That finally brings me to today. I had play date with Adam and we talked about Hillel and I tried to convince him to date me but he's not willing to make an exception for me. I'm going to continue working on that. My strategy today involved singing to him one of my favorite Third Eye Blind songs, One in Ten. Still no progress.

Then Katie and Maggie and I went to Banfi's for brunch with the house mom and chef for Kappa Delta! What a glamorous morning! Maggie and I spoke about L a little bit. It's nice to have someone babysitting her that I know so we can talk about it together. It's a great learning experience, and Maggie has such a big heart, I love to hear her perspective. Katie won a TA award for the Hotel School so that's why she took us all out to brunch!! It was delicious! And great to be eating at the Hotel not as an employee but as a guest : )

Then I tracked down books about Myrlie Evers-Williams, Coretta Scott King, and Betty Shabazz, the widows of the Civil Rights Movement. I cried in the library.

And now here I am, my last night in Donlon, listening to "For Good" from Wicked and being sad about freshman year being over.

I surely can't compare my year on Nativ to my year at Cornell. But I will say that when I left Israel, I really thought I'd never be so happy again. I have definitely been that happy this year, and I have had incredible experiences. Even though I haven't hiked all over a country or trekked over Italy with my four best friends, I have been incredibly challenged and stimulated here, and I have met absolutely INCREDIBLE people. I have no doubt that each one of the people I have become close with this year will go on to do amazing things in this world, and that we will push each other to be our best as the years go on.

Donlon has treated me very well. Once I got over my holier-than-thou-gap-year thing I had going on, I met the most perfect people at Cornell. The friends I made here will be ones I keep forever. Jasies, Jeffies, Kim, Alyssa, Mandies, Rachies, Adina, and of course, my roommate Hannah. I don't know what I would have done without their humor, support, beds to cuddle in, arms to be embraced in, frequent towel encounters on the way to the showers, and just stopping by at night to chat about the day. I loved procrastinating with you, having pillow talk, showering in the stall next to you, brushing my teeth at the same sink, stealing your candy from Big/Little week and tampons while you weren't home, and loving you up.

Peace out, freshman year, it's been real.

Last Year in Israel...This Year in Ithaca. A different kind of Passover

The week leading up to the festival of Passover was almost as exciting as the holiday itself has been. So I can focus on the juicy stuff, I will briefly mention all of the wonderfully exciting things I have been up to here at Cornell as part of my fabulously adventurous life:

On Tuesday of last week, I read a Hebrew poem at "Poetry and Pasty: an elegant soiree of Near Easter, Francophone, and World Poetry" in the Johnson Art Gallery. What a classy affair! I read a beautiful poem by Yehuda Amichai called Jerusalem.

On a roof in the Old City
Laundry hanging in the late afternoon sunlight:
The white sheet of a woman who is my enemy,
The towel of a man who is my enemy,
To wipe off the sweat of his brow.

In the sky of the Old City
A kite.
At the other end of the string,
A child
I can't see
Because of the wall.

We have put up many flags,
They have put up many flags.
To make us think that they're happy.
To make them think that we're happy.

The hebrew is more beautiful, without question, because it is a very rhythmic language with easy rhyming. To be honest, I really enjoyed my poem and the other Yehuda Amichai poem that was read, but I didn't really connect well to the other poems. I think that my generation of Americans is out of touch with poetry for the most part and it is hard for us to appreciate it. I want to relate to poetry and feel deep and artsy and hipster, but it just isn't there. I still loved the Poetry and Pastry atmosphere though!

Then on Wednesday, besides my regular slew of excitement and my introductory meeting to being a Residential Advisor (!!!), Rachel and I attended another Multi-faith Ambassadors Meeting. The group is really taking off. Besides planning for events and creating programs for other people to enjoy, I really feel as though the core group is becoming close. I see my new Muslim and Bahai (Bahai!!) friends out and about and it feels totally natural to stop and chat with them, and then when we are at the meetings it is also natural to talk about our faith and religion and what we value in life. So it is not just a surface friendship, but we really dig into topics and I feel like these people understand more about me and my faith than many Jews on campus. Sometimes religious people have more in common with other religious people, even if they call God by different names.

On Thursday, the real adventure presented itself. My friend Alyssa was hosting a pre-frosh and I instantly saw myself in her. Sophie was a nice Jewish girl from the DC area deciding between Barnard and Cornell, and she was going to be pre med. We all had dinner together and then afterward, Alyssa needed to do her own thing for a while, so I said I'd play with Sophie. I took her to Kinkeldey, the most beautiful study room on campus, and I gave her "2.5 Minute Ride" to read by Lisa Kron. She loved it. Then, when I was finished with a reasonable amount of calculus homework, we set out for Collegetown. The goal was: to visit a boy she had a crush on during middle school who then moved away and then she ran into him outside the Cornell store earlier that day, and he was staying at his brother's house in Ctown. Seemed easy enough. We trekked in the rain to the address on Linden and the boy let us in. There was a dog and a couple of seniors chilling around a tv watching 30 Rock. I was down with that.

I let Sophie and Eli talk for a while with all of us in the room, and then the "grown ups" moved into the dining room to give them some added privacy. In the dining room, I met Dylan, to whom I had already been introduced via the installation art that adorned the house walls. Dylan was a fire cracker/hippie/magician/ego maniac/wonderful human being who completely dominated the conversation. First, he made me go turn off the tv because he doesn't believe in tv and the frequency of sound coming from it was bothering him. Then he showed me a mind boggling magic trick and made fun of me when I couldn't figure it out (the solution came to me about two days later while I was walking to class..I can't wait to perfect it!). Then he suggested we all play spoons (the card game) but they didn't have enough spoons so he insisted we play with knives. The night went on like this. While we were playing spoons/knives, my friend Ariella came in the door with Eli's older brother (they might be dating, still unclear). It was great to see her! It felt very sitcom-esque and I basked in the glory. I saw Eli bringing Sophie a beer from the kitchen and I taught her about not letting boys open your drinks for you. People made fun of me for it, but the girl didn't know, and come on, if your parents are completely clueless and think you'll never drink (aka Sophie's parents), then they aren't really going to be bringing up the date-rape drug convo if they don't have to, right? So I was pleased with myself.

THEN Eli asked me if he could walk Sophie home at a later hour because it was a school night for me and I needed to get home soon. Umm...hell no, do I appear to be completely useless as a person? Obviously I wouldn't stand for that. We get too many forcible touching incident emails for me to just let some boy bring Sophie back willy nilly. He doesn't even GO here! They could have gotten lost. Anyway, I was feeling extra responsible that night. And she thanked me later because she actually wanted to walk home with me in the first place but wasn't going to say anything to Eli. Two points to me.

Then, thank you Karma, we ran into my friend Josh who was just pulling out of a driveway in Ctown and heading back to North Campus with a pile of people in his car. So naturally we piled in and we were delivered in style to Donlon. Sophie was, needless to say, pleased and amazed by her Cornell adventures.

On Friday, Adina convinced me to go see Far Away, a play that was showing at the Schwartz. It only had three actors in it. For a while, I thought I knew what was going on. It was some kind of creative way of showing how the normalization of violence in our society is bad. Ok, got that. But then, they started referring to animals as if they were on teams or allies in some war. So then I thought, ok, this is just a metaphor for some world war or something. But then it didn't fit any of the main wars that I know about and it seemed to just be artistic use of animals as war allies or enemies and it was really quite impossible to sort out which team all the alligators and cats and deer and raccoons and monkeys were on, and I was boggled. So although I wouldn't say I enjoyed the play exactly, I do feel as though I got my $3 out of it because it provoked thoughts for a few hours after the show ended.

Then it was time for a lovely Shabbat and a mixer at Phi Sig during which I relived our USY glory days with Joe. Plus beer pong. I really couldn't be worse at that game.

Saturday was full of more adventures. L and I set out for our usual walk around Ithaca. We stopped at Green Star Oasis as usual to pee and collect ourselves. For the first time, I really had to pee and simply could not wait for L to be finished. Well, I really could have, because when I got out of my stall, L was no where to be found. I spent about 10 minutes looking for her in the Dewitt Mall. This was a stressful time in my life. Finally, I found her seated at a table in the grocery store, chomping down on ice cream she had removed from the dairy section. Ok, great. So I paid the clerks (they were very understanding) and brought her coat and hat back to her, and cleaned the ice cream from all over her face. I scolded her a little bit but it clearly made her feel terrible so I stopped. We still made the hike up to Ctown so she could burn off some of those ice cream calories, but I wouldn't let her pause on the way up because every time she slowed down, I was afraid she was starting to poop in her diaper. So we made it to Ctown, and I got a hot chocolate in Starbucks, and on the walk back we ran into about 6 people that I know, and it was a lovely morning.

Saturday's excitement was only just beginning, though. Mama picked me up from babysitting and we went to have lunch at Kappa Delta made by Katie and Kate and it was soooo delicious and since I went to farm school I ate that moz and tomato right up! Then we went to meet Ilana and Joe O at CTB, and I was reunited with Nativ 29!!! Then Ilana and Mama and I went to see Holi, the Hindu festival of colors, which was occurring in a messy fashion on the Arts Quad. Jesse met us there, looking extra colorful for the occasion. Then we went to the Johnson Art Museum and saw many cool exhibits and views and learned many things thanks to Elyse's unfailing caption read alouds.

Despite the rain trying to ruin our plans, we forged ahead with the day's itinerary. This included grazing at a classy dinner reception in Terrace with other Kappa Deltas and going to see the Cornell Fashion Collective Fashion Show! The show started late and was really long, but other than that, it was really incredible! We very much enjoyed critiquing the outfits and walks based on our expert knowledge gained through Project Runway and America's Next Top Model. I practically AM Michael Kors, please.

After the fashion show, we collected Adina and went to Madeline's for some dessert! The restaurant is so pretty and delicious it really felt like a portkey out of Ithaca. Adina's presence was extra appreciated due to the fact that my together-time with Mother had just about reached its limit and I no longer felt her striking similarity to me to be funny or cute but really it just made me want to throw myself out the window. Or her, for that matter. Anyhow, Adina was a great buffer and a great conversationalist and person in general so dessert went well (the dessert itself was also fabulous!).

The next morning, I had three brunches! First, the traditional Sunday morning Meinig brunch to discuss our research presentation, then a brunch with Mom at Kappa Delta, and THEN a brunch at CTB with Ilana and Joe and Jesse as we tried to relive our Nativ happiness. It was just so comfortable and natural and fun to be with them all together. What a good group.

On Monday, PASSOVER BEGAN AT CORNELL UNIVERSITY. I was a "seder monitor" at Super Seder, which was in Barton Hall (a gym that originally functioned as an aircraft carrier or something...whatever, its huge). Although over 400 people actually did show up for seder, the room looked somewhat empty because the seders were set up for 800 people just in case that many people surprised us. But in general the seder was a positive experience. I led the Freedom Seder, which is an incredible hagadah and I encourage you to explore it!! The link is here, and it is from UMASS Amherst. Although there were many people there who were chatting and seemed like they wanted to get out of there, when I asked for feedback afterwards, it was overwhelmingly positive and even the most unengaged girl (by my estimation) said she thought it was super meaningful and was really happy with the seder and so appreciative. So although I would have loved more participation from the seder, I was really happy that my guests got a lot out of it.

On Tuesday, I had a plant lab for four hours and I learned about plant ovaries and how we are eating them when eating fruit! Wow!! And then I led the Freedom Seder again, this time on North Campus, for several freshman Sammy boys and several senior AChiO girls. Again, they seemed chatty and impatient, but when it was all said and done, they were really happy we had done it and genuinely appreciative.

After that seder, Rachel and I went to the Sammy seder that the Emily and Sam (sister and brother team) were leading with the help of another family team, Emily and BJ. The seder was incredible. I am going to petition to be adopted into Emily and Sam's family because I really can't even describe how much joy there was at the table and how we were all laughing during the songs and how Emily was patient and firm and loud enough when trying to lead a room full of impatient and hyperactive fratty Jews. Amazing. I hope to channel her energy when I have to lead a family seder of my own (or not lead, just contribute to, whatever, I'm not making any assumptions about my future husband) because it was motherly in a comforting and firm and smart way but not motherly in an overbearing New York mother nagging way. I fear that escape from becoming an overbearing New York nagging mother is going to be my greatest challenge in life...forget about medical school. I have my work cut out for me.

Wednesday included another beautiful Multi-faith Ambassadors meeting, and Thursday was the ultimate happiness.

To be continued!!!