Day 42 - Shabbat

I slept rather late today, missing shabbat morning services, and waking up and showering just in time for shabbat lunch. Again, the apartment was full of people and stuffy, so we all grabbed some food and/or drinks and paper goods and headed across the street to Bar Ilan's campus, where Itamar had cleverly reserved a room (with *gasp* air conditioning!). We pushed a bunch of the double-desks together to form one large table and set up the food on another smaller table, said kiddush, and began. Lunch was a rather roudy affair, with people arriving in waves. More than 30 people showed up, all tolled. Again, the food was delicious.

After lunch and cleanup, which took a bit more effort this time because we had to wipe down the tables and leave everything as we found it, Dave, Itamar and I all took nice afternoon naps to help make up for the sleep lost with the intriguing discussions from last night. We woke up in the late afternoon as Josh returned, and more frozen grapes emerged to fuel further discussion. Shabbat in this apartment is rather chill, I have to say.

After a while, though, Dave began getting ready for havdalah, and I decided to call a cab to take me to the central bus station. Itamar, Dave, and Josh waited with me for it to arrive, and we were joined during that time by Omri and Michal, who happened to be walking by. I hugged them all goodbye when the cab pulled up. It was a great stay and I hope to see all of them again!

The bus station was packed, but I had no trouble finding the Rehovot sherut. One was about to leave, so I got on. For some odd reason there was a spectacularly large amount of debate over the pricing (people usually pass up money to the driver once the van starts on its way, and the fare is pretty static, from my limited experience). I really don't get why: you ask how much to your destination, the driver tells you, you pay. This did not seem to occur for at least 4 of the passengers. I think it would be interesting to have been able to understand the debacle. But they all got off at Rishon, and I managed to convey to the driver that I wanted to get off right in front of the main gate of Weizmann. Success!

I called Ari as I approached Clore. He said dinner was about to happen, so I put my stuff down and joined Ari, Jordan, and Joel for an outing to (guess where?) Hertzl Bar. Zvonimir and Onur were already there, so we sat at the adjacent table. We had a leisurely meal, mostly due to rather, um, relaxed service. There was a great deal of math talk, but I survived. Afterwards, Jordan and I stopped in Clore for moolah and walked to the mall in hopes of catching a showing of wall-E, but missed it by about 3 minutes and found ourselves in a gigantic line. We decided to put it off and go CD shopping instead. After lengthy deliberations, Jordan got a Lauryn Hill cd, while I purchased a DJ Shadow album and a relatively cheap 4.0 gig thumb drive (without U3, so my computer should be happy!). The girl working there and I bonded a bit over our musical taste. Hopefully we will find each other on facebook and prolong the musical sharing!

Jordan and I then walked back to Clore. On the way I began a call with Mom and Dad (and even Andrew!), which I continued in the lobby. Next I talked to Ben, which was much needed as well. For some reason sitting with me while I was on the phone was a must, because Joel and Ori decided to grab chairs near me. After both calls were over we talked, then Zvonimir broke out his guitar and we played around for a bit before I decided I really needed to go to bed.

Here are some more pictures from the weekend:

The streets of Tel Aviv

The shook by the craft fair

Some odd wares... Competing juice stands
A cool building near Dizengoff center
The sunset from Dave and Itamar's window

Day 41 - Art!

Today I woke up relatively early and met Lisa in the lobby at 10. We left Clore and grabbed a sherut to Tel Aviv, getting off at the central bus station and grabbing a local sherut to our first destination: the Tel Aviv Museum of Art. Since a few of the rooms were closed for repainting and renovation, we got in for half price! Lisa also ran into a couple she knows from home as we were buying tickets at the front desk. It's a small world...

We wandered through the museum, which actually had a very extensive collection! There were a bunch of works by Picasso, Monet, Renoir, and other staples, and a section devoted to Chagal which we both really enjoyed. Lisa isn't a huge fan of very modern/nonrepresentational art, but I actually enjoy it, so there was one room which I think I was more reluctant to leave than she was. My favorite one was...well I don't remember what it was called, but the medium was soot on a wall, and it was an impression of two bookshelves full of books, as if the shelves and books had burned and left a slightly smeared outline of where they had been. I loved it.

Our next stop from there was the more classical section. It happened to be housed in the basement, which Lisa and I both found sort of odd, but it was great. There was also a room full of fully furnished and decorated doll house rooms, which Lisa got a huge kick out of. Once we finished the basement, we were basically done, so we exited and grabbed some iced coffee before moving on.

We then walked from the art museum to the Nachalat Benyamin, a craft fair every Tuesday and Friday downtown. Before walking along the tables, we took a detour through the shook, which turned out to have some very interesting items for sale (I'll include pictures in the next entry). I bought a pair of aviators, because I had forgotten my sunglasses (and everyone should have fake Ray Bans). We continued down the narrow walkway until we came to the next block, and walked one block left to find ourselves in the middle of the craft fair.

Lisa and I had a great time looking at jewelry and other fun stuff. We decided to walk up and down the entire length of the street before buying anything, then as we backtracked made our final decisions. Lisa bought a necklace and earrings at different tables. I bought a necklace at the same place, but earrings at another seller's table. There was some really cool stuff which I would have liked to get, had I had an unlimited budget (including some beautiful long silver earrings and a ring fashioned from a bolt) or unlimited space (some vintage/retro canvas posters in Hebrew), but we both had to pass up a few appealing purchases.

After we had wandered the whole thing twice, we got a call from Rachel, Barbara, and Alissa, and waited for them at the entrance. As we hung out, we were solicited by two adjacent juice-stand operators, both yelling and hoping to win our business. The others arrived as Lisa and I were still debating, so we decided to each go to one. Lisa got strawberry orange, which was very refreshing. I got mango banana strawberry, which was delicious but very thick. Daniela also walked by as we were sipping our juice. It's crazy that how many people you can accidentally run into here. We chatted for a few minutes, then she moved on and we decided to walk back towards the mall at Dizengoff center to cool down for a bit. Lisa and I then caught a bus back to the central bus station, so she could head back to Rehovot and I could catch another bus to Bar Ilan University for Itamar's going away shabbat extravaganza.

[As background, Itamar is the composer/clarinet player who is Dave's roommate. Dave is Stephen's friend from MIT who is living here for three years to decide about making aliyah. Stephen, Joel and I ended up at their place for my first shabbat in Israel. Itamar is moving back to Canada after 9 years in Israel, during which he got two bachelor's degrees at Bar Ilan, to pursue a master's at McGill.]

I think the bus I got onto was the last one, as the terminal was deserted. It was a local bus, so was on the seventh (!) floor of the bus terminal. The ride was rather long, as it wound through downtown, and let me off basically on the side of a highway. Luckily I surmised that we were on the southbound portion of the highway, and I knew that Bar Ilan was to the east, so I crossed on the pedestrian overpass and called Itamar. He told me I was on the right track, so I continued, eventually finding the main gate, from which I knew how to reach Itamar's building.

We went up to the roof so he could have a last(ish) cigarrette before Shabbat. We stood there talking, contemplating life and gazing out over Tel Aviv in the distance past the campus. One brief interruption came in the form of a "neighbor" of Itamar's who finds his rooftop cigarrette conversations noisy and disrputive. He opened the door to the roof and asked Itamar, "I thought you were moving to Toronto." Itamar jokingly replied, "Nope, changed my mind." "OH. Hope you leave soon," said the neighbor before going back inside. We moved to the other side of the roof and resumed our chat for a bit, then headed back downstairs.

Itamar had packed most of his music, but found a book of clarinet duets where the bottom parts weren't so bad, so we broke out his clarinet and bass clarinet and played about 8 of them. It was really fun! I haven't played the clarinet in so long because of conducting and stuff, and it was really nice to sightread and play with someone else. People were coming in and out of the apartment the entire time, dropping off food for dinner and just saying hi. Eventually it was time for services. We made sure there were enough chairs in the living room (25) before heading out.

Afterwards, as everyone filed into the apartment, it was almost unbearably stuffy. Someone suggested eating in the nearby park, and the majority voted to adopt this plan, so we washed our hands, said kiddush, passed challah around, and then everyone grabbed something and we headed to the park. There were many benches, so we lined the food and drinks along them and everyone dove in. People really made an effort to cook, and everything was delicious. There was a temporary issue of missing forks, but once this was solved the meal was complete.

I tried to meet as many people as I could as we ate, but I am horrible with names. I sat to eat with a group whose names I mostly remembered, but after many people finished they shed their shoes and started playing on the playground equipment. There was a beam on two springs, and the challenge was to walk across it (which I failed to do). Another popular item was what Dave, Ariel and I decided was a swing-see saw-viking ship-glider thingie.

Eventually things calmed down a bit and got slightly more serious: serious in that we settled into a large cirgle and went around saying some sort of goodbye to Itamar, only slightly in that we used an empty Prigat bottle as a "microphone." It was really nice. Most of the people had known Itamar for years and had great things to say. On the other hand, many people, like me, had only met him recently, and said so. Itamar is the kind of person who brings people together. The group was large, and composed of many smaller groups, but all were conencted by Itamar's shabbat dinners and his contagious charisma. He will definitely be missed.

After the speeches we all cleaned up. Many people broke off at this point, but a core group stood near Itamar's building chatting for even longer. It was at this point when a particularly interesting discussion about teleportation came up: Josh (a former roommate of Itamar's), Dave and I debated whether teleportation would be considered ok for shabbat. The verdict is that it depends on the mechanism: if it's through a wormhole, fine, but if it involves disassembling a human and assembling him from different protons, neutrons and electrons in another place, it constitutes building and is definitely not kosher.

Finally Josh, Dave, Itamar and I went up to Dave and Itamar's apartment. We sat around, eating frozen grapes (a delicious treat which is new to me!) and talking for what ended up being a few more hours before finally heading to bed. It was a great evening.

Pictures!

The Performing Arts Center near the art museum

The Tel Aviv Museum of Art

The museum atrium

A particularly dense blurb (click to enlarge)

Museum construction...

A sculpture outside the museum

Day 40 - ...which made up for almost everything

Another newsflash/shoutout: congrats, Dad, on your first comment! Voila, you get a tag too!

Work today was actually strangely productive. I plotted things and am beginning to actually be able to make SigmaPlot do what I want, which is a plus. I plotted and did regressions and sent some of them to Professor Wagner, and was very busy all morning. Lunch was spent with everyone at San Martin, and was made particularly interesting when Jordan started a movement to grab the leftover ice creams from a cooler behind some barriers in the lunchroom to set aside that part for a summer program to eat in. Clay and I, being the big ice cream fans we are, followed suit, but we all discovered rather soon why these were left over: they were basically cola popsicles, and were inedible. Clay and I therefore resolved to make up for it tonight with some real ice cream.

The afternoon was spent contemplating my data further and checking out various hilarious links and e-mails with Noa as she waited for her sample to cure in the oven. She left when this was over, at about which time I remembered that it was Perlman cookie/snack time (4:30 on Thursdays). I went up to the 6th floor to grab Dan, and we chilled for a few minutes before walking down. The food was actually not so great, but we hung out and were soon joined by the other Dan (who also works on the 6th floor...and who no longer can really be "Dan with the hair" because he just got a haircut that makes him almost look like a normal person!). We chatted for a half hour, then returned to work.

For some reason I thought this would be a good time to try to plot my data in 3D (!). I'm sure this will be a great way to look at the data, once I figure it out, but for now there is something going seriously awry with the mesh plot and there are these odd peaks I can't seem to trace, so I struggled with this until around 6:15 before realizing I was meeting Clay in 15 minutes! I therefore headed out and changed into shorts before finding Clay in the lobby. Dan would meet us there, so we headed out.

Our destination: the four-flavor falafel place. Now, you may ask, what flavors of falafel could you possibly want or need, besides original? Well, I don't know how to explicitly answer this because I am not really sure what the four flavors are, except that I'm sure original is one of them, and that one other one was spicy, and another was sort of greenish in color. What I can say is that I got a mixture of all of them, as did Clay and Daniel once he arrived, and that all were scrumptious. After we were done eating we backtracked a bit to Benny's, Clay's favorite ice cream place (which he talks about all the time), for frozen treats. I was pleasantly surprised; I got cookies and cream and a milk/white/dark chocolate mixture and both were excellent.

After sitting for a bit we headed home so I could change for climbing. I headed to the main gate, where I met and sat with Tamar and Michal to wait for Nitzan. We went to the top-roping place, and Tamar and I belayed each other on some top-roping routes. After a bit Nitzan gave me a refresher on lead belaying and supervised me as another friend climbed. I also tried the yellow lead route again, and managed to not only reach but hold on to the last hold for about three seconds. There was not chance I could clip in, though, so I came down. I then belayed Nitzan on lead for what he referred to as a "stupidly hard" route, which was a success (in that he is still alive), and we all rested and ate some pretzels before heading over to the bouldering area.

Nitzan and I constructed a pretty fun problem, and Tamar somehow came across a tee shirt which she gave to me which has both Hebrew and climbing on it! Soon after we all decided we were tired, and so headed out, but the trip home was a much happier one than Tuesday. I don't know that I will be so anxious to return to Performance Rock, despite my loyalty to bouldering. But we'll see.

When I returned to Clore, I found Ari, Dan, Zvonimir, Rachel, and Asaf in the lobby getting ready to watch a few episodes of How I Met Your Mother. I put in a load of laundry and went across the street with Ari to buy some snacks, and then we watched the pilot and second episode, which were very amusing! I definitely want to see some more. By this time it was very late, so I switched my clothing to the dryer, chatted with Asaf, retrieved and folded it, and went to bed.

Since you've been photo-starved, here are a few random shots from the past week:

Yovav and his beautifully-decorated cast (/etc)

Views from the foot of the accelerator:

Day 39 - GT (Girl Talk)

To start off with, congrats to my mom for her first ever comment on my blog (see Day 36)! Instead of a gold star, she will receive a tag. Way to go, mom! Ok, moving along.

Today turned out to be a much better one than the last. Work was more satisfying, for the following reason: while this is definitely a temporary state, I am now officially done processing every image I have taken (i.e. watched someone else take for me). This is monumental. Applause, please.

Once this was done it was time to graph, graph, graph. I added the final data to the file in my new favorite program, SigmaPlot, and while things aren't being proven conclusively, at least they now look attractive and professional. Who says I don't have goals?

I ate lunch at lunchtime (a good time for it, usually) with Sari and Noa at the Stone cafeteria, which is a dairly place at which I've never eaten a meal. It was actually rather good, and our ongoing conversation with Sari was entertaining as always.

After lunch I continued working on plots and organizing my data, and just before 4 pm I headed with Xiaomeng to the TEM to look at some tungsten disulfide "nanotubes" we recently acquired, for free. This freeness turns out to be key, because after what we saw, they can't really be called nanotubes (hence the quotation marks). For one thing, most of them are more like rods. For another, the ones that do have hollow middles have a whole bunch of crap in them that is very interesting but not really identifiable. Anyways, it was a fun session, because XiaoMeng kept finding new areas which had such completely odd-looking things in them that we couldn't help but be equally surprised at each one.

After about an hour, though, I had to go grab my stuff from Perlman and head to Cafe Madaa (literally, "science cafe"), a restaurant on campus very near to our dorm, for a summer program meeting. Greta talked briefly and then introduced us to our "scientific advisor." We learned a bit about how our final presentations will go, and looked over abstracts from last summer, while munching on fruits and pastries and sipping coffee and tea. Since we all are getting to know almost everyone in the summer program better now, it was great to see everyone all at once, and a nice break from work.

As we left for the 100-meter walk back to Clore, Zvonimir asked me to come with him to a small music shop down the street for him to purchase a cheap guitar. He wants to have one for the summer so he can practice, and he said I would be welcome to borrow it for the same purpose, so I said of course! Rachel, Dan, Jonathan, and Daniela decided to join in on this plan, so after Jonathan gave her a quick tour of Clore House (she lives with a friend off campus) we were off.

The shop turned out to be a small room and an even smaller recording studio-type room on the second floor of a building just past the police station on Hertzl road, about three blocks from the main campus gate. We barely fit inside the place once we had all grabbed guitars and started playing them. Jonathan showed off a bit on a regular guitar but he and I both had a great time with a 12-string guitar (which was a tuning test I fortunately passed). Zvonimir asked the owner to hook up an electric guitar for him to try in the small studio room, and I tried this one as well. It sounded good but even better with a pick. Maybe that's motivation for me to start using one? In any case, despite the lack of a whammie bar the distortion on the amp was very entertaining.

As this was going on, Jonathan was receiving mandolin lessons from the owner, and Zvonimir purchased a relatively inexpensive (blue, due to my request) guitar and case. Dan and I decided not to try the saxophone or clarinet on display (they both read "japanese technology" on the bottom and sat, alone, in a corner), but the owner showed me some Vandoren 5's he had in stock. The best part about them was not the dustiness of their box, nor the fact that they were actually dark brown, but the bright purple color of the plastic reed-cases themselves. He only wanted 13 shekels each for them (around $4), so I am considering returning to get one, just because.

We finally all tore ourselves away from whatever fascinating thing we'd found (Rachel had been playing an electronic keyboard, for instance) and exited the shop. The boys headed back to Clore, but Rachel and Daniela decided to accompany me on my Israeli linen capri quest. The first shop we entered had some for 29 shekels, in a lovely mauve-ish (ISH - Zvonimir's new favorite thing to say) color. They were sort of funky in the fit, in a manner I can't explain with words but will show you sometime, but I decided to go for it. The other girls browsed briefly, then we continued. We walked on Hertzl almost to the mall, our next goal a bag for Daniela. The problem with her quest was that she had a specific, and, as it turns out, nonexistent bag in mind, so we were unsuccessful.

As we walked back, we approached a Kosher pizza place and stopped for some slices. We waited for a fresh cheese pizza to emerge from the oven, then each bought a piece and sat and chatted for what turned out to be a couple of hours. At some point Iris walked by and joined us, and we had a number of great conversations, including one about the most evil biochemistry professor in Austria, climbing, pigeons and other bird incidends, keeping Kosher, falling down, getting married in Israel, trampolines, and other fun stuff. Jonathan called at some point, apparently on Zvonimir's orders, and told us about the plans for the rest of the evening. Ari walked by as well, accompanied by his friend Talia from Princeton who is also spending the summer in Israel (and was visiting him for the evening). Eventually we headed back to Clore, and Daniela went to her place to change.

Back in my room, I put on the weird pants, which I think I like, and we played a bit with Jonathan's guitar before gathering in the lobby to head to the Kukula (the bar on the Hebrew University's Rehovot campus, just down the street) for 10 shekel beer night. As we entered the campus Daniela texted me, so I told the others to go on and backtracked to meet her. The Kukula is tucked in the back corner of the campus, so it's best to have someone to show you the way your first time. We found it and the rest is history. All in all, a very satisfying day.

Day 38 - meh

These weekdays are beginning to blend together. Today I worked, and ate lunch with Dan, Tamara, Jordan, and Clay at Charlie's, and then worked some more. Somewhere in there I met with Professor Wagner, and the rest you can probably guess at.

Afterwards we took the sherut (because the trains to Tel Aviv aren't running due to track maintenance this week) to Performance Rock to boulder. It was a very large group, as it turned out (Zvonimir, Elisha, Nina, Yaron, Nitzan, Tamara, Mena and Jesse), but the place was very busy. They had also changed every one of the problems, which meant I couldn't continue work on the ones I'd been mentally practicing. Some of the new ones were fine, but there seemed to be nothing at around the level I need to be working.

We hung out and climbed until around 9:30, when we all grabbed a sherut back to Rehovot. I ended up watching a really cute movie called "The Baker" on TV with Amir and Zvonimir before heading to bed. Very very very exciting day.

Day 37 - A case of the Mondays?

This morning the summer students had a talk/tour of the "submicron" building on campus. We met in the lobby at 9:00 am and a man named Nissim introduced himself, gave a brief description of the phenomenon of interference, and then took us on a tour of the upper floor.

< .science >

This included many clean rooms where various lithographies are performed (optical, photo- and e-beam) as well as his lab, where he tests samples at 10 micro-Kelvin. Brrr.

Afterwards, Maciej and I stuck around to ask some questions, me about why this building falls under the category of physics and not materials science, and Maciej about the quantum Hall effect. Nissim answered, then showed us some more equipment, like the chamber for performing molecular beam epitaxy and a JEOL electron microscope with 40-nm etching resolution, before we said our goodbyes and headed off to work.

< / science >

Pretty much as soon as I sat down and began working on more images, Professor Wagner came in and said the following, which I quote verbatim because it was highly amusing/devastating (depending upon your state of mind...me, I began the day in a good mood):

"We need to meet later, do you have some time, because I don't understand everything you did."

I think he meant that he understood some things but not everything. Or maybe by "think" I mean "hope." Whatever the case, this reconjured my nerves from yesterday, so I told him I was "relatively free," which I meant as a joke because of course all I'd be doing all day was image processing and data manipulation. He smiled and told me "late afternoon." Goody.

So I worked, then went to lunch at San Martin, meeting Ari, Zvonimir, Anya, Onur, Jordan, and later Joel. It was nice to shoot the breeze for a bit, but I was still stressed, so I headed to Stone cafeteria for an ice cream bar, and chatted with Nitzan and a friend of his. I then returned to work and continued processing. Until 7 pm. When I decided to pop my head in and see if this was the time he had in mind to meet. He told me he didn't have time, but that I wasn't doing what he wanted. Huh. So I grabbed my notebook and we discussed it. Turns out it's not so bad; I have the data he wants, but wasn't plotting the right parameters. Anyways that is how I will spend tomorrow morning, certainly.

Shortly after this meeting I left work. When I returned to Clore, I blogged in the kitchen, which bothered Zvonimir until he discovered he was being mentioned. I also chatted with Ben online and with Rachel, and after a bit we decided we wanted pizza. Jordan and Jonathan had just returned from frisbee and decided to come with us. We walked down Hertzl until we came across a kosher place (surprisingly, the first two didn't satisfy this condition), and ordered slices. Soon Dan and Maciej joined us, and we would have pushed the tables together to form one big happy group had they not been bolted to the wall.

On the way back, we stopped in a convenience store to purchase tasty beverages for the evening (Zvonimir had given me some of his money for this express purpose), then set everything down in the piano room in Clore and hung out until people began arriving for the party. Around 11:00, people really began to stick around, and soon after someone broke out a guitar and people stopped playing the piano. I hung around for a good while then headed to bed.

Day 36 - What a hilarious misunderstanding.

Today was the most draining day at work I've had since getting here. I arrived before 9 am and began processing images until Professor Wagner entered and asked for the slides we'd discussed last week. Only his recollection had me giving them to him in the morning, and mine had us meeting in the morning, starting work on them in the afternoon, and sending him a copy tomorrow afternoon. Thus began a fun two hours in which I learned roughly how to use Sigma Plot, tried to make my data look less like nothing, and constructed 4 powerpoint slides summing up my five weeks here. Fun. I sent them to him at around 11 am and resumed image processing, which I continued with a few breaks until leaving work arounf 5:30. For the rest of the day, though, I was just waiting for an e-mail in my inbox telling me I had to start all over again, or something.

I had lunch with Asaf and XiaoMeng at Jubilee, and my mini-pizza was satisfying but nothing really calmed my nerves. After work on the way in to Clore I ran in to Nina and her two friends from home walking with Rachel and Barbara, and they all invited me to dinner at Hertzl Bar at 7:30. I happily accepted, and rested for a bit until that time.

On my way up to meet them, I ran in to Dan, who seemed to think I didn't want him to come with me (when really I wasn't sure because it wasn't my outing), but when I went upstairs the girls said of course he could come along, so I called him. While Nina's friends returned their keys to Nissim, Dan and Ari emerged from the basement, then we all headed out.

We sat outside and looked over the menus. Dan was overwhelmed with the choices, and my suggestions didn't help narrow it down.

Meanwhile, Ari got a call from Zvonimir, and answered in a worried voice because he was supposed to let Zvonimir know if dinner plans materialized. Ari suggested, and we agreed, that Zvonimir is pretty much Ari's girlfriend (for whom else would Ari look at his ringing phone and decide he was "in trouble?"). Let the records show this as the origin of this hilarious idea.

Anyways, we placed our orders, and soon Zvonimir arrived, with Tess and Onur, and sat at the next table. Ben called around this point, and I left the table for a chat which wasn't nearly long enough but which I ended after a little because I felt sort of rude. Our food arrived bit by bit, and rather slowly, but was all fine and they forgot to charge Ari for his (which we concluded was the least they could do to make up for the fact that Rachel's salad didn't arrive until most of us had not only given in and started eating but actually finished our meals). Rachel, Dan, Barbara and I decided to try "Aroma," a coffee place and cafe that functions as Israel's Starbucks, for some cool drinks before heading back to Clore. I got an "iced chocolate," which is exactly what it sounds like.

When we got back to Clore, some people were heading out for a walk, but I sat with Dan and Zvonimir, and after a few minutes Tess, chatting, until I felt my eyelids drooping and decided to call it an early night.

Today's post was brought to you by the number 1, and the letter J (for Jerusalem!).

Scenic overlook of the old city

The group!

Jonathan and a camel. Obviously.

Zvonimir and Joel

The sun setting outside Yad Vashem.