Day 76/77 - Departure

I woke up with the sad knowledge that today would be my last day in Israel. Even though it was pretty early, I headed to Café Madaa for our last breakfast get-together, where I found Zvonimir, Rachel, Onur and Daniela already waiting. We drank coffee and had a leisurely light meal, after which Rachel K. arrived to meet Daniela for their day trip to Jerusalem. Rachel and I then headed to my room to grab a book I had borrowed from Noa, and she came along with me to drop it off in Perlman.

We then headed down Hertzl to the grocery store, where we both stocked up on food for our friends in the States. We both bought Tim Tams, and I got some chocolate and Bamba to go along with it, while she got assorted candy that isn’t Kosher back at home for her friends. We stopped at the change place for her to change her last paycheck into dollars, then went back to Clore to put away our foods, hoping they hadn’t melted in the boiling heat of the day.

We found a group readying to go out for lunch, so joined Jonathan, Dan, Ari, and Zvonimir, who were ready to leave. I called Asaf, and once he came down to the lobby, we headed out. For a slight change, we found ourselves at Aroma. We wanted to sit inside due to the blistering sun, but had to scrounge up some tables and chairs. Most of us got sandwiches, but Rachel got a salad which was so huge that even with the rest of us helping her once she had eaten her fill, we left more than half of it.

Back at Clore, I started packing. Ari was leaving for Greece soon, so he did the same, and as soon as he finished we said our goodbyes. Dan, too, was leaving, but only for the weekend, so we had to say goodbye as well. Asaf and Jonathan hung around, and Jonathan played some guitar for me as I worked. When he played Sweet Child of Mine, though, I felt the need to play him the Penn Band version. He and Asaf were very impressed, so we went through my whole Penn Band playlist, which includes only The Band that Rocked the Cradle and Four Score and Five Score and Several Years To Go…the latest isn’t yet on my computer. I promised to send it to them, as it has Carry On, and Asaf lamented the lack of anything “cool” like that at his undergrad. Yes, the band is COOL!

Anyways the rest of the afternoon was spent in the same way, with goodbyes (the easiest, and last, was to Rachel: I’ll totally be seeing her at Penn), and packing, and a shower. As my family’s arrival approached, Asaf and I went to the roof of Clore for me to get one last look at Rehovot. Then we waited on the steps outside. When they pulled up, we let them in, then grabbed my suitcases and brought them upstairs. I put my room key and key card in an envelope and left them in the box outside Nissim’s office, then we put all my stuff in Eli’s van and I said goodbye and thank you to Asaf.

Eli drove us to Tel Aviv, where we went to the harbor area and ate dinner at a place called Boya as the sun set. We were on the boardwalk and had a great view of the sea and passersby, and ate a great meal. Afterwards, we walked around a bit along the boardwalk before meeting Eli for the drive to the airport. We then said goodbye to him and unloaded all our luggage, and headed in.

Security wasn't a problem, but as soon as we were through, we saw that our plane was apparently TEN HOURS delayed. We thought this couldn't be right, so stood in line to check in anyways, like normal. It was quite a wait, but once we got to the front we were told this was indeed the case, and they rebooked us on a flight to Atlanta. Fine, as our car was in New York, and we live in Maryland. So we were three hours early for our flight, therefore only one hour early for this new one. We didn't dally as we went through passport control after checking our bags, then walked briskly to the gate and immediately boarded the plane.

This was a much nicer plane than the one that took me here. I flew Delta both ways, but on the way here it was direct, and on a very small plane (by international flight standards). This one was roomy and nice, and, though I slept, I believe I was comfortable throughout the flight. When we landed at 6 am in Atlanta, nothing was open yet, so we couldn't try to get on an earlier connecting flight to New York (ours was supposed to be at 12:30 pm). After a half hour of camping out at the unopened desk, people showed up and told us everything was booked solid. We decided to take our chances on standby on an 8:45 am flight, and luckily all four of us got on. This was a very small plane, but again, I slept and soon we were at JFK.

Our luggage got there too, luckily, so we gathered it and took the shuttle thing to our car. After the five hour drive, we were home again.

This concludes my journal entries about my trip. I had an amazing summer, and will continue to post a few things (like quotes, thoughts, etc) for a few more days or weeks (depending on when I get to it). Keep checking back periodically, and thanks for reading!

A bunch of the peeps at Aroma

Eating Aroma salad

A very slow water machine

And, my personal favorite picture:

Doesn't this look like it could be the worst date ever???

Day 74 - "Ezra's plunging our toilet!"

This morning I headed to the presentations far more relaxed now that my own was done. I went to grab some coffee and found myself joining Tess and Ester. Only Eszter ordered coffee, but there was some confusion and they prepared two, charging her for one only. My free coffee in hand, we left together.

The presentations today began with Tamara, and ended with Daniela. Almost everyone went slightly over, so we finished rather late. Everyone gathered outside the auditorium for an official group picture, which made me happy and sad at the same time. Here we were, bantering with each other after really getting to know one another, together, in a comfort zone that would soon dissolve as each of us headed home to our various corners of the earth. We would never, ever all find ourselves in the same place like this again.

The photographer snapped a few shots, then we all got up. After a bit of chatting and making plans for the evening, everyone went their separate ways. Jonathan, Daniela and I lingered a few moments longer, but at that point Noa and Sari, accompanied by her parents and children, came up the path. They had apparently been looking for me all day, and when I returned to the lab it became apparent why: they had planned a surprise get-together for me to say good bye to the entire group, but, being as I was at presentations all morning, I had failed to show up. I felt incredibly guilty about this, but the food and drinks were still there, as was most of the group, so we sat and chatted and made up for the lack of party in the morning. Erica, who was apparently the driving force for the celebration, had already left for the day, but I would thank her tomorrow for everything.

At around 3:15, I headed with Noa and her friend to Café Madaa for a late afternoon snack. Tali, Noa’s roommate, arrived just as we got down to an interesting conversation topic: creationism, and intelligent design, which evolved into religion and prayer in schools. This carried us far into the meal and on into my next date, which also happened to be at Café Madaa: cake with Rachel, Lisa, and Daniela. Daniela didn’t show up, which was puzzling, but I couldn’t call her because I had left my phone in the lab, and consequently didn’t know if she was calling me. We ate our cake and Rachel told a very entertaining story about the one time they let a boy in their apartment (her roommates and she are relatively religious): to unclog the toilet so they wouldn’t be late to the ballet. It was an amusing tale, the upshot of which in my mind is the following: late to the ballet + poo in the toilet = legitimate emergency according to Judaism.

When we left the café, we found Daniela had been waiting for us somewhere else. This made me incredibly sad; not only had she been waiting and not met us, but she had missed delicious cake! Only our plans for a Tim Tam party later managed to make me feel even marginally better about this. We set off towards Perlman, where I left the other three to go grab my stuff and say some preliminary goodbyes. I also opened a card signed by everyone in the lab, which was incredibly sweet, and discovered they had gotten me a gift as well: a Weizmann tee shirt and mug. I was delighted as I finally managed to break free and head towards the Garden of Science, where our KKISS goodbye tour and dinner were about to begin.

I caught up with Rachel, Daniela and Lisa taking pictures near Jubilee Square, and was just in time to be a part of an awesome one (which I can’t share because it’s not on my camera, but I am sure Rachel and/or Lisa will put it on facebook). Soon we were at the Garden of Science, which turns out to be a big park with science-like installations that are fun not only for small children but dorky college kids. We split into two groups to take simultaneous tours, and got to play with gravity, sound, water, light, and wind, among other things. I can’t explain much better than that, so hopefully the pictures below will suffice.

After the tour we had a chance to play with the exhibits on our own, then all headed up to the cafeteria where a dinner buffet was laid out for us. After eating the meal and about five different types of desserts Greta kept bringing us, she thanked us all for coming this summer and presented each of us with a backpack with the Weizmann logo and the name of the summer program printed on it. We had a ball taking a “backpack picture,” and practically had to force ourselves to leave after entering the garden more than three hours previously.

Back at Clore, everyone temporarily went their separate ways. I recruited Jonathan, Clay and Zvonimir to help me buy tasty beverages for the evening of fun ahead, and we all kicked in and got a crate containing a mixture of different beers. As we returned and set it on the table outside the music room, we found everyone breaking out either their personal stashes or new purchases for the occasion, and accrued quite a selection within minutes.  Asaf helped us set everything up.  Once we decided it was time for the party to start, we all grabbed drinks and sat down in the lobby to chat.

Since the party wasn’t yet hopping, Rachel and I decided it was prime Tim Tam time. I called Lisa, Daniela and Tamara down to the kitchen to join us. Rachel was heating the chocolate milk in the microwave as I grabbed the cookies from their safe, bug-free spot in the refrigerator. I also grabbed a few tee-shirts for us all to put on so as not to soil ourselves. Dan, Asaf, and Oren all passed through as this was going on, wondering what we were up to, and I demonstrated first, to explain.

I took a Tim Tam and bit off opposite corners. The cookie is chocolate-coated, and filled with a porous, crunchy substance. I dipped one end in the hot chocolate and used the cookie as a straw, and as soon as it filled, shoved the entire thing in my mouth to discover hot, melted chocolaty goodness. My preliminary, mildly successful trial was duplicated and improved upon by all of us girls, and even Oren tried, but only repeated it to see if he could actually see what was happening in side the cookie. By the time the box was gone, we were giggly and filled with chocolate, and I had burned my lip, but it was an amazing experience.

At around this time Nitzan showed up. He didn’t seem to surprised at our experiment, asking how else one was supposed to eat Tim Tams. As the gathering broke up, Nitzan and I went to my room to grab my computer, and then had a great chat where I showed him Penn Band pictures and he called me a dork, and then I showed him climbing pictures, making him insanely jealous, as payback. At some point he decided he was hungry, so I accompanied him to a nearby pizza place for a bit. Our conversation carried us through the meal and back to Clore, where he left me at the door and went home. I re-entered and joined the party in earnest, which wasn’t hard because it had really gotten going by this time. Large groups of people sat and stood all over the lobby and spilled out onto the lawn outside. I was very pleased, but a bit sad because I had to start saying some goodbyes.

After this painful procedure, during which I negated the farewells by setting a date for San Martin at 12:30 tomorrow and making people promise to be there, I headed out to Hertzl Bar where a few people were waiting. First I stopped back at the store to return the crate, then I crossed the street to sit at an outside table and chat with Iris, Clay, Tanmay and Alex. I was far away from everyone because of the table, though, so soon headed upstairs and found Dan H., Ari, Jordan and Zvonimir having a great time. I ordered a milkshake and sunk into the conversation, which wasn’t very linear but covered many topics. Dan’s favorite waitress brought us free shots at one point, with which we all made random toasts, and at another, Jonathan joined the group and we really got going. It was a nice way to spend the last night out.

At the Garden of Science:

Standing on a large spring...

Bubbles in oil

An instrument used by Tibetan monks

Jonathan at the other end of a big "phone"

Bubbles; or, proof of thermodynamics

The breeze makes each pipe sound different

Alissa showing that distance from the center affects rotation speed

Things to note in this picture: Oren, to the left, 

with a gyroscope, and Eszter's facial expression

Ari simulating a moonwalk

Rachel flying!

Lisa doing the same

Zvonimir!

Tamara says hi

Greta got us backpacks!

...so we modeled them

Zvonimir and our party selection

The super-secret Tim Tam eating time:

Tamara and Rachel

Lisa and Daniela...

Oren giving it a go

Simultaneous Tim Tam eating

The Tim Tam Gang...

...plus Oren

Day 73 - Quit while you're ahead!

The big day. I stopped by Café Madaa and got iced coffee to go, then headed straight to Schmidt Auditorium, where we’d be hearing each other’s presentations most of the day.

Maria Magdalena went first. I was second to last, after two breaks. When I stood up, we were actually 4 minutes ahead of schedule, but by the time I sat down, we were 5 minutes behind. I spoke a bit too long, but I think it went well, and I got lots of questions, which was really nice: among others, Ari asked about the difference in size for functionalized tubes, and Tanmay asked about the TEM. Professor Wagner and practically the whole group (Erica, XiaoMeng, and Patro) showed up, as well as Asaf and Nitzan! This was nice but rather embarrassing, especially when my whole fan club got up to leave just as I finished, leaving the hall much emptier than before.

Maciej finished up the day with his presentation on the subject of particle physics, and spoke really well though I couldn’t get everything he was saying. I headed back to work for a few hours after we concluded for the day, taking a break to meet Lisa and get some delicious chocolate cake at Café Madaa before resuming until around 6:30.

At 7, Tamara had plans to find some kosher sushi along Hertzl, so we set off once our group, consisting of Rachel, Lisa, Dan, Jordan, and Joel, had all arrived and put their stuff in their rooms. Unfortunately, we knew Tuk Tuk to be not kosher, and SameSame, which had a kosher marking on their sign, had it covered up and told Tamara something confusing involving their vegetables, or something, and that they would be kosher next week. We moved on to Buzzi, where our luck was worse: there was nothing kosher about it.

After walking a bit farther along Hertzl seeking a meet place (because Joel is lactose intolerant), we finally turned back and settled for our favorite meat sandwich place about two blocks from Clore. Not as hungry, I decided to get falafel next door, and Lisa joined me. This was a good decision not only because the pitas are of a less gargantuan size, but we weren’t part of a huge group and so got our food and ate it before many of the other group had even completed ordering. We sat and chilled until everyone had gotten their food and eaten, though, at which point Lisa and I headed back to Clore.

I grabbed some things I needed to return at the mall before heading out again. We ran into Rachel coming towards us as part of the rest of the group returning, but she joined us for the walk. The first stop was Tartufo, because Lisa had yet to partake of ice cream at all in Israel, and considered herself a snob, a purist and a traditionalist at once. She ended up getting chocolate orange, but not before she and I tried lots of flavors and Rachel tried a few of the sorbets (she had had meat too recently). We sat for a bit to allow Lisa to eat, then continued down Hertzl towards the mall. On the way, we decided on a whim to see if the grocery store had Tim Tams, and, lo and behold, it miraculously did! I bought two boxes.

As we left, we passed a lottery booth. Rachel had told me earlier this morning of her stellar 5-shekel victory, so with Rachel and Lisa’s help, I purchased a scratch-off ticket for 5 shekels. The man asked me my astrological sign and seemed pleased with my answer, and I scratched it and happened to win 10 shekels! I decided to quit while I was ahead (after all, 5 shekels isn’t too shabby), and we continued along our way.

At the mall, I made the necessary return, which was complicated because I also wanted to have them retroactively apply my (new) membership discount, but it eventually was a success, so we left. Near campus once more, we stopped in the small grocery to get juice, for now, and chocolate milk, for the Tim Tam adventure. I used my newly won lottery money to buy myself a carton of chocolate milk in celebration, and we sipped as we crossed the street and entered Clore.

The three of us hung out a bit more in the basement kitchen, where we were joined by Jordan and Jonathan, the latter of whom had the wacky idea to try to flip, with one finger and in one motion, a chair from upside-down on the table to the floor so he could sit on it. Obviously this was a failure, and was very noisy, so he soon gave up and contented to make himself a sandwich. He put it away when he heard of my plans for ice cream with Tamar later, and decided to tag along.

When Tamar texted me that she was close by, we left, and met her there. I got the chocolate orange, which is really to die for, and snickers, while Tamar stuck with her favorite flavors. This would be our last ice cream date, so we sat and chatted for as long as we could, but Tamar had to be up early to baby-sit her cousin and eventually we had to call it a night. We said goodbye and wished each other luck on our travels (she’s headed to Spain next week, semi-permanently), then Jonathan and I headed back to Clore.

We found Jordan and Joel chilling in the lobby, and sat to join them. The main discussion topic was a minority, but not rare, tendency to mislabel Jonathan’s orientation, and a dissection of Jonathan’s every aspect resulted, trying to identify the source of the confusion. The upshot: it isn’t any one thing. Jordan eventually left the discussion in favor of bed, but Joel, Jonathan and I kept at this until far too late, when we all followed suit.

Day 71 - Re-entry

Andrew and I woke up for the first time this morning to a knock and a man asking us if we were checking out today. This was inconveniently before our alarm was due to go off, so we slept slightly past it and, once dressed and packed, found our parents and Eli downstairs already for breakfast. Andrew was happy; there was an extremely large selection of breads, as well as cheeses, juices, and pastries.

Once we were finished, though, and had gotten our stuff down to the lobby, it became evident that our driver was late. Eli called him and found he wouldn’t arrive for another 20 minutes, so Dad stayed with the luggage while Andrew and I went on a quest for a bottle of Coke. After a few shops I settled for a can, and we rejoined the group just as our van arrived. After packing our stuff and selves in, we set off on the two-hour drive to the border near Eilat. Towards the end I took a nap, and woke in time for us to unload and visit the various windows necessary to show our passports and pay the fee to exit Jordan. Back through the “no-man’s land” between the two borders, we re-entered Israel, put our stuff back in Eli’s van, and within three minutes were back in Eilat. I hugged everyone goodbye and grabbed my backpack, and Eli dropped me right outside the airport.

Susan had re-scueduled my flight, which wasn’t supposed to leave for three hours, to one scheduled to depart in one hour, which was great until I saw the size of the security lines. I successfully answered all of the questions and checked in, then headed downstairs to the gates.

This is where it became slightly interesting. There was one screen which had my flight number on it, but showed a departure time about 30 minutes after mine. The screen at a different gate, which happened to be the gate printed on my ticket and the one to which the person who checked me in had directed me, showed the correct flight time, but the flight was headed to Ben Gurion and had a different number. Interesting. I sat down and waited by the gate with my flight number, which turned out to be the right move because after about twenty minutes, it became clear that this new flight time would be more accurate.

Eventually we boarded the plane. I slept the entire flight and woke up at Dov airport, where I rode the bus back to the main terminal and took a cab to the train station. Here, another interesting event occurred: I was asked for my passport. At a train station. Of course, my surprise at this request led the security guy to actually look at my passport, at which point he saw I had been in Jordan and made me unpack my entire bag. Wonderful.

Since I wasn’t, as it turned out, carrying anything threatening, I soon passed through and got on a train back to Rehovot. The humidity was fierce as I walked back to campus, and by the time I ran into Iris in the Clore lobby I was in sore need of a shower. After a brief chat I returned to my room to unpack and shower, then went to work, where I made progress on my presentation and submitted my abstract to Greta. Once I was finished with all of this, though, I went back to Clore and joined a group heading out to Tuk Tuk for sushi. I had told Stephen that Dan and I would join him in breaking the fast (for Tisha B’Av), but decided to tag along until I heard from him.

So both Dans (H. and S.), Alissa, Rachel, Ari, Iris and I walked to the science park and sat down at Tuk Tuk, at what happened to be the same table where my family had eaten. Everyone ordered different things, but Dan H. and I shared sushi, which didn’t discourage either of us from stealing tastes of Ari’s pad thai. Our order included the sweet potato roll thingie and a spider roll, which was delicious. At one point Stephen finally called and told me he had ended up joining Jordan at Greta’s house, which was exactly what I had suspected but still made me feel less guilty about joining in on others’ plans.

Back at Clore, there was chilling and talking, and for me, some blogging, in Ari’s room for a while, but I was so wiped from the weekend’s traveling that I went to bed rather soon.

Pictures today are from today and yesterday (mostly the latter).

Entering Jordan...

View of Israel from the middle "nowhere" zone

View of Jordan from the middle "nowhere" zone...

both of these were taken from the same spot to give an accurate impression of distance

The fam at an overlook in Jordan

Outside the Petra reserve...

The Movenpick hotel:

Lobby ceiling

View from the pool

Farther in the lobby

An interesting sign...marking a dish made with lots of mayonnaise

Another lobby room

Even the No Smoking signs were ornate!

A lamp on the Tea Terrace

Day 66 - Panic! at the office

I grabbed a muffin on the way to work this morning, but once I got there I realized that the flash drive where all of my work and documents are located wasn't in my backpack. I searched slightly frantically for it, then decided (/hoped) it was in my room somewhere, and walked home. I randomly ran into Asaf on the path to Clore, and we chatted briefly before I went on to my room. I looked all over my desk and still couldn't find it, which was awful. Luckily I peered underneath my desk chair, where it was. Phew.

I headed back to the lab and worked on my presentation all morning. Tamara and I met at Charlie's for lunch, where Lisa was almost done eating but stuck around to chat. I had chocolate milk with my meal, for the third time in Lisa's presence (and third total). Back at Perlman, I continued working for a couple more hours, then headed to the Physics Building for another talk.

The speaker was a professor in physics, and his presentation was titled "Massive Black Holes." It started out by being very interesting, but all the blinds were drawn and I had forgotten to take my narcolepsy medication, and together these factors led to a disaster which resulted in my not really knowing anything further about this talk. Daniela, who sat next to me, told me it wasn't too noticeable, and that she would have woken me if I had snored too loudly. I was terribly embarrassed anyway. On the walk back, though, we made plans to eat dinner the next day.

At work afterwards, Noa had found a really old sonicator in a corner of our lab, so we decided to make some more samples. I had to take some pictures of it, though, so I also took some other lab shots (see below). At around this time, Mom called to tell me they were back on campus for the evening. I told them to stop by Perlman, as they were about to walk by. They came up to the fourth floor. Between the elevators and the lab, Professor Wagner and XiaoMeng were chatting, so I introduced the fam to the Professor. I then gave them the three-minute tour of the office and lab, introduced them to Noa and Patro, and took them down one floor to meet Asaf.

Next we headed to the stairwell, where I showed them the Foucault's Pendulum as we headed up to the fifth floor. I made Nitzan come out and meet them, where there was an awkward moment where Nitzan told my mom he was kidding with all his jokes about not holding onto the rope when we climb, and my mom's blank and slightly confused face revealed I had not been telling her anything about these jokes. After this amusing occurrence, they left Perlman so I could do some more work before we met for dinner.

I had told my family we would have some of my friends as guests for dinner, but didn't know who that would be yet. Once I made it back to Clore, I ran into Jonathan, and asked him to come along with Stephen (who wasn't around, but who I called). After about a half hour, my family approached Clore, Stephen had returned to Clore and dropped off his stuff, and he, Jonathan and I headed up to the lobby. We all met on the lawn and started walking toward Tuk Tuk, the sushi/Japanese restaurant near the science park.

Jonathan and Stephen introduced themselves and such on the way. My dad complained mildly as we walked, because the science park is sort of far from campus. Finally we made it to the restaurant, where we figured out the seating arrangements and surveyed the menu. I ordered a sweet potato "photomaki" (futo maki) and a rainbow roll thingie, while my family also ordered sushi and Jonathan and Stephen ordered cooked things and/or vegetarian rolls. I think it was a great meal: the food was good and my "roommates" seemed to get along with my family. Jonathan is in applied math, so he and my dad talked about that stuff, while Stephen and my brother completely agree in their hatred of Million Dollar Baby. The latter relates to the following conversation:

Stephen: I used to be a real movie buff. I would watch all of the Academy Award winners, and everything...

Me: Andrew, you and Stephen can really agree on something.

Andrew: Is it that Million Dollar Baby is a terrible movie, and should not have won Best Film, and that you stopped watching the Oscars after 2004?

Stephen: YES! How did you know that?

So it was a good meal. We were off to our normal Goldman family roll, and our guests didn't seem to mind. When we headed back to Clore, pretty much everyone was in the lobby, so I was able to have my parents meet some new people, including Jordan, Lisa, Joel, Tamara, and Ari! We sat and chilled, then decided to try the other ice cream place, Tartufo. We all had more basic flavors tonight, before heading back to Clore. Andrew left with my parents this time, so I joined those chilling in the lobby registering for the GREs together, namely Ari, Tamara and Stephen. The registration session eventually degenerated into Ari and me watching a few episodes of The Office before I headed to bed.

Today's pictures feature Perlman:

Noa hard at work breaking ice...

...for the sonicator! It used to be white. I know because I found it online (they still sell it!)

Patro dipping silicon, held in clothespins, into solution

Day 63 - Day of rest?

As usual, my once-weekly chance to sleep late again fell on Saturday. I had no plans and didn't intend to make any, so there was no reason to get up. After breakfast, some brief blogging, and checking my e-mail, I showered and got dressed, and headed out of Clore. My destination: work, excitingly. Since I'll be missing a day during my final week and it's getting to be crunch time, I wanted to take the chance to get as much done as possible.

I was expecting to find Noa in, but instead found Patro, again. He was working on Matlab homework exercizes as he made some samples, and I just sat and processed images. For five hours. I didn't get up, or eat, or anything except listen to Kenna and measure distances in ImageJ. How I did this I don't know, but, magically, I am again, and hopefully permanently, DONE with all the images I have and plan to use! It's truly wonderful.

Once I arrived at this landmark point, I tore myself away from the screen and left Perlman. I was hungry, and learned that a group was heading out for dinner soon, so I stashed my stuff and chilled for a bit until everyone was back from the gym and showered. David, a Weizmann student, was having a large picnic outside to celebrate having been in Israel for a whole year, so I mingled with Ivonne, Maria Magdalena, Claudia, and Yovav outside and tasted a few of the many cakes which kept appearing among the other food. The picnic was really chill; music was playing as people sprawled on blankets on the lawn in front of Clore or tossed a frisbee (and later an American football, which puzzled me as no Americans were present) around. Claudia took an amazing picture of Maria Magdalena and I both making characteristic "Becca" faces, an image which I hope makes it to facebook.

Soon, though, Maciej, Onur and I joined Tanmay, Clay and Zvonimir at Hertzl Bar. I had a huge craving for meat, so got the hamburger, which is an ambitious undertaking. Onur and Maciej did the same, while the others had puny little sandwiches at the next table. They planned on seeing the Batman movie (again, for Tanmay and Zvonimir, but for the first time for Clay), and so went back to Clore to get ready and such. The three of us lingered a bit over coffee. Maciej and Onur suggested something I'd been contemplating for a while: asking the waitress whether the place had any of the coffee cups and saucers with an image of Hertzl for sale. Unfortunately, we learned they didn't have enough to sell any. Sadness.

After finishing our beverages we headed back to the dorm. I decided not to tag along to see The Dark Knight again, mostly because it was hot out and I didn't feel like walking. Maciej and I hung around at the picnic, which was still in full swing. I got a chance to catch up with Dan about his trip to Portugal with his family, and we had a discussion as to what defines cute (in his words, a large head-to-body size ratio: i.e. an iPod plugged into a TV = cute). During this discussion we also discovered that there was a cooler of liquid nitrogen at this picnic (how dorky and scientist-like). It had to be gotten rid of, so we made frozen treats out of the remainder of the picnic desserts. The frozen chocolate truffle was particularly delicious.

Eventually it got too hot to stay outside, and I kind of needed my computer adapter, which I had lent to Jordan but couldn't get back because neither Jordan nor Joel were around or in their room. When I mentioned this to Dan, though, he reminded me that his room adjoins theirs, so he helped me break in through the bathroom and get it back. I noticed some juggling pins on his floor, and of course made him show me his mad skills. He did the whole under-leg tossing thing, and other fancy stuff, and it turns out he attended a juggling conference here earlier this summer. Very cool. I had him give me some tips for starting out, but pins have always eluded me so after a few minutes and marginal improvement I called it quits.

Newly armed with my adapter, I went back to my room to grab my computer, and hung out in the lobby for a bit, chatting and blogging. Eventually I decided it was bed time, but who else was entering Clore as I went downstairs but Stephen and Ari! I made them come talk to me in my room where the air conditioning was actually effective, and Oren, Joel and Jordan came in and out periodically as Stephen and Ari told me about their weekends in Jerusalem, which had contained a few overlapping events (like Shabbat lunch). We all got tired at around the same time, though, so I kicked them all out and went to bed.

As promised, here are pictures of the Bahai Gardens. Enjoy!