Clean Clothes!

Yesterday I woke up late for volunteering, at around 9:40, and hurried over to the school, only to find out that I wasn't  needed for an hour and a half or so because the class was taking a test.  So I only worked from 12-12:45 with a kid, Adir, who has a particular amount of trouble with his English.  After volunteering I went home and hung out in the apartment a bit before Ulpan.  We had a brief גרעיו צדק (Garin Tzedek) meeting.  After Ulpan, Cera and I went shopping for some materials to renovate the Darfuri family center in Tel Aviv, which we did today.

More importantly about yesterday, I got clean clothes! This is the saga of what happened over the past week with my laundry situation:

Last Wednesday
I brought my clothes to the man who lives under Eli Cohen 24 (previously known as Nathan's/Simon's/Scott's/Ohad's/BenJirik's/Aaron's apartment), and he told me that they would be done in two days--just like last time.

Last Friday
I went back to the man's laundry shop at 5 P.M. and he said "Oh, you're quite late!" To which I was happy and apologized, only to find out that he thought I was someone else and that their dryer was broken.  He said to come back on Sunday for my clothes.  By this Friday night, I already think I have only one clean shirt left, and it is a plain white T.  On top of this I wear another, only clean, button-down green shirt.  I think I am fucked.

Last Saturday Night
I go into Tel Aviv to go to the club called "Tel Aviva" and discover, much to my surprise, that I will not have to wear my disgusting white T (that is, by then, somewhat gray)--I find another shirt in my closet, one of those false tuxedo shirts that are mainly for kicks.  I wear this to the party.  This is literally the last shirt I have.

Last Sunday
I come on Sunday at about 5:30 and get turned away by the man's wife, with only the word "tomorrow."  Still wearing the tuxedo shirt.

Yesterday, 12:55 P.M.
I come in and the wife tells me "come in the afternoon."  It is one o'clock, bitch.  I know you work in a rundown laundry service store, but this is the afternoon--almost an hour after.  Of course, I don't say this--I just say "OKAY."  Still wearing the tuxedo shirt.

Yesterday, 6:15 P.M.
I come in and finally get my laundry.  It weighs ten kilograms, and thus costs 80 shekels.  No discount for waiting twice the estimated period of time. I go home and change out of the tuxedo shirt, for once and for all.  I am never wearing that for more than 2 hours again--it is clearly only for partying.  I can't tell you how many people made fun of me for coming to informal events "in a tux."  "Why so classy, Ittai?"  Har har.  Although, in their defense, I always think it's a tux for a second when I first look at it.

קצר, Anyhow, today, we painted one of the rooms in the Tel Aviv Darfuri family center baby blue and made a lot of signs to hang up in order to make the room ideal for small children.  We hope to set up a kindergarten-type daycare in the family center, where Darfuri kids who are not yet of school age can be dropped off near the beginning of the day.  Thus we made lots of posters with the names of things in Hebrew and English, and plan on hanging up the letters of each alphabet.  For now, however, all that is done is the paint job.

Although most people left today at 1:30 or so, Nathan, Emilie, Cera and I stayed, since we had to volunteer in Tel Aviv at 6:30 anyway.  Adam, the adult English teacher and director of the family center, cooked us some gristly meat, which was delicious.  We then went to ice gelato, a great ice cream place by the beach, and split up into our pairs to go work with kids in their apartments.  This part was okay, my kid had a lot of difficulty reading, but at least he was more motivated than most of the kids I help in the Israeli schools.  I feel like it was very hard on both Cera and Emilie to teach the kids, because the children primarily speak Hebrew with us.  It's not that bad, though--after all, that is why we split into pairs, so there is at least one Hebrew speaker with each pair.  What was really fun was after the tutoring of the children--we then returned to the family center and taught the adults, who are highly motivated.  Adam, the English teacher, simply gave me the book and had me start teaching the class--he left to do something else.  Although this was a bit of a shock at first, and kind of hard, I quickly figured it out and thoroughly enjoyed it.  I felt a sense of accomplishment at the end--all of the people in the class were very appreciative and I could tell that they'd all learned at least a bit more English today.  It just feels good to teach people who want to be taught.  Unfortunately, most people don't.

We returned home at about 11, I went for a jog, and now I'm going to bed.  It's been a long day, and I should actually get some sleep for once.  I hope you, whoever you are, are doing well! :)