birthday and zoo

one post: two things: talking about my birthday and then my trip to the zoo . . . and then ill put pics on yahoo so you can see them both!

my birthday was...perfect.
had services in the morning - and at the end they all sang yom huledet samech to me. my teacher gave me a pretty bracelet. after class karen and i went to tmol shilshom and relaxed studied and ate. then i finally bought a copy of the runaway bunny in hebrew (!!!!) and found a kippah that i approved of for karen to wear. came home and talked to some people. then went over to the concert.
i think i can comfortably say that i think that it was one of the best concert ive ever been to...idan raichel clearly loves his music and what he's singing about. and his band and back up singer peoples are passionate about what they are singing also! they put so much sincere energy into each song. it was an amazing 2 hours.

had my last hebrew test of ulpan on wednesday which went fine. i think im finally getting somewhere with this dikduk (grammar). debra and edie got here that day so i got to spend the afternoon helping them get a little situated in this crazy city. thursday was our final tiyul of the summer -- we went to somegreat caves and then to the beach in tel aviv. where i sat in the shade and read - just a preview of next week's beach visit :)

Yesterday i went to the Tisch (yeah they are here too!) Biblical Zoo In Jerusalem. I had wanted to go -- and karen was interested. so we borrowed our classmate's boys. Robert is in his early 40s and in my kitah. He brought his wife (family doc) and three boys (Isaac, 9 - Theo, 5 - and Abraham, 2 1/2) here for the year with him from Minnesota. They will go to Cinnci after this year. It's been interesting getting to know the whole family and watching the boys deal with this change. Isaac is clearly the most aware of the change and has been open with his parents about his discomfort, etc. Robert said that as much as he'd love to hand us all three of the boys, it would be easier to take just the older two . . . so we picked them up at 10 am yesterday - hopped in a cab and 30 sheks later we were at the zoo. it was a good time - clearly made better by having kids with us. it's a huge piece of property with all sorts of animals. there's a section with slightly more obscure animals that are found in biblical passsages. interesting comment i saw there -- noah was the very conservationist. weird thing to think about...
there was also a description at one of the bird exhibits about a bird who was 104 years old and he still likes to curse off the nazis. yes. that was printed. in a public place. in israel.

ridiculous.

it ended up just being an amazing week. we went to jerusalem open house last night for services...so i finally got to experience it. and it's too cool. so ill finally getting my ass involved with them after break.

going to eilat on sunday til tuesday. 011 972 54 7325684 if some reason anyone needs me.

and a reminder - - my vonage number works both ways. stop bitching if you dont hear from me. you can call me too - 305 677 2210. we've all been hearing funny things from people in the states who seem to forget that you can contact us! but of course remember the 7 hour difference and please be understanding if it takes me a few days to get back to you.

anyway. yes, eilat. then will be here relaxing and getting ready to start school a week from tomorrow! WOW. im like, officially a grad school student.

crazy shit.

check out the pics on yahoo.