Thursday before Ulpan we had a "Darfuri Dessert and Discuss" in the regular "Dessert and Learn" scheduled time--I much prefer the new, more alliterative name. We had Nic, a British man working with an African refugee relief organization in Tel Aviv, come and talk to us. We also invited Adam, the English teacher from the Darfuri community center, to come and tell a bit of his story. What he had to say was very eye-opening, and really made me appreciate being a part of Garin Tzedek. He told the story of how, on his way to Israel from Egypt, his family couldn't make it over the fence, and his wife was taken to an Egyptian prison. She was pregnant, but, when she got to the prison, they tortured her and beat her, which caused her to have a miscarriage. Although they're united again now, it was a poignant story that made me understand the importance of working with the refugee community:
In Ulpan we did the same old things, Nathan and I gave an oral presentation that consisted of a conversation about what we should do our oral presentation on. After this, Cera and I headed into Tel Aviv to go teach some conversational English to the Darfuris at the school. When we walked into the family center, however, the class was watching a documentary about the Darfuri refugee situation in Israel. Adam was featured in it several times, and it was very intriguing. I asked him for a copy and he gladly obliged. We then proceeded to teach the class--I had them work on using English verbs in the past tense (which can be fairly hard--there is the standard "verb+ed" construction, such as walked, talked, laughed, but there are many verbs that are irregular in the past, such as ate, ran, swam, fought, understood, etc.) Each student talked a little bit about their day in the past tense. Last Tuesday, when I was there, I tried to teach them the future tense, but then realized that, in English, the future tense is the simplest one--you just say I/you/he/she/it/we/y'all/they "will" and then the present tense form of the verb. If you've never studied another language, know that much of the time (especially in Hebrew) the future tense is one of the hardest ones. That Tuesday one of the Darfuris also used the sentence in class "I don't like this country." It's strange to think of how many of these refugees are forced here out of circumstance. Every one that I talk to has said that their ultimate goal is to go home, once the violence stops.
The only bad thing about Thursday night was that, because of volunteering, I missed out on going out to eat dinner with Noah's parents, which everyone told me was fantastic (AND FREE).
After volunteering, we went to Max Brenner, a shmancy-fancy chocolate and dessert place, for Jackie's birthday. We then went to Moses, which was, as always, delicious. On the way home, the rain started to come down again. Cera and I decided to take the 18 to its final stop, which was supposed to be the cemetery. When we got out, though, it was raining a ferocious deluge, and we walked a couple blocks without seeing the cemetery before we gave up. We had some very interesting conversations while waiting for a bus in the other direction, and then walked home after it didn't come for an hour and the rain let up a little.
On Friday I woke up at about 12. It was still raining heavily, and, later that day, I actually saw a taxi that was in water up to the bottoms of its doors and couldn't move. I went over to Eli Cohen 24 (previously known as Simon's/Nathan's/Scott's/BenJirik's/Aaron's/Ohad's apartment) for a little while for some reason I can't exactly remember, then headed over to the Hangar to buy some clothes for a costume. I bought a pair of novelty Israel boxer-briefs, as well a pair of surprisingly comfortable man thongs. In terms of the costume, however, I got a 6 XL red shirt. I went home and wrote on it "You wouldn't like me when I'm the wrong color!" and wore my red shorts that night so I could be the incredible hulk in the wrong color. Kind of a lame costume, but whatever, it's Halloween in Israel. The party was okay, the club it was in was kind of small and it sucked having to take a taxi there and back, but at least Felicia, Adam and I went to a delicious restaurant after (Olive was the name I think). Scott had a really clever costume--he wrote on a white t-shirt "Ceilings, ceilings, go ceilings! 2, 4, 6, 8, who do we appreciate--CEILINGS!" (he was a ceiling fan). I also helped Shirit a bit with some of her essays for UC and got to see Omri, who I haven't seen since last summer (before the party). Halfway into the night, I ripped several parts of my shirt open, and whenever someone asked me what happened, I told them that I morphed into the incredible hulk for a minute and ripped the shirt. Lame, but what I am going to do with a 6 XL shirt that says "You wouldn't like me when I'm the wrong color" on it???
This morning I woke up late and the sky was clearing up. It's still chilly outside, though, which is amazing--I love the temperature right now. Shirit came over and we worked some more on her UC essays before I walked her to her Grandma's place in Holon. I then went down to the beach with a large group of people, and some of us had pizza while others enjoyed falafel and shwarma. Then we walked back hurriedly, because the sky was getting dark with looming storm clouds (although it didn't end up raining tonight). I hung out at Eli Cohen 24 (previously known as Simon's/Nathan's/Scott's/BenJirik's/Aaron's/Ohad's apartment) for a while, then Scott and I went for a run. I returned, had some dinner there, showered, and then Scott, Simon, Omri, Shirit, Cera, Emilie, and I watched "The Nightmare Before Christmas." After all, it is Halloween night. Anyway, now I'm back here and going to bed. Happy Halloween everyone!
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