On Friday I joined about 20 graduate students on a school-sponsored trip up to Kibbutz Yagur outside of Haifa in the north. This kibbutz is the home of our Israeli counselor. She led us around her home kibbutz to help us gain an idea about what kibbutz life is all about. The kibbutz was founded in 1922, several decades before the state of Israel was established. It remains a kibbutz today, where everyone has the majority of their property (including cars, homes, fields, and salaries) in common in a socialist system. Our guide took us to the Beit Yelidim—the place where, until a few decades ago—all the kids from age 16.5 to 18 lived together, alone, outside of their parents’ homes. Then she took us to the “nursing home” where the kibbutz’s elderly people live. There we met an older man who had been the captain of a ship that brought Holocaust survivors to Israel after World War 2. We visited the kindergarten and saw the kibbutz’s next cute generation. And lastly, we visited the place where the kibbutz had illegally stored weapons in preparation for the war of independence. The British actually found the weapons cache and confiscated all of them in 1946. For that reason, it is quite a historic kibbutz. It is also Israel’s second largest kibbutz, having 1,400 members. It was quite a fun trip, and I now feel like I know a lot more about kibbutz life.
This week was a little stressful as I dealt with Israeli bureaucracy. Let me give you an example of how wonderful the bureaucracy is here. If you remember, previously I have mentioned that non-Israelis haven’t been able to get a student bus pass. I was working with officials from the student union to fight for our right to get the discounted pass, and the plan finally succeeded this week, though it was an enormous hassle. After an entire month of fighting, I visited the bus officials this past Wednesday. They said to show up at noon to get the pass, so I was early. At 11:45, they informed us that they’d be ready for us at 2pm, so please come back. I had a few errands to run, so I ran them in the meanwhile, having to take 2 busses in the process—both of which I had to pay for out of my pocket. Remember, I was intending to purchase a bus pass from them, but since I had not yet got it, I was still having to pay for each bus ride on top of what I was about to pay them for unlimited rides… So I showed up at 2, and after about an hour of the officials trying to help me, we realized that I couldn’t pay for it there. So, I had to take a ridiculously crowded bus (again, out of pocket) to the central bus station to pay for the pass. I waited in four different lines for 45 minutes just for the privilege of paying for the pass. Few spoke good English, so that made things more complicated. One lady essentially threw me out of her office! Anyway, I finally got it paid for, and the next day returned to school to meet the first officials, where, after a small problem, officially gave me my bus pass at last! It only took one month, five hours of waiting in lines, 1,374 shekels, seven trips to see bus officials, and the entire student union fighting the bus company for me to get the pass. But now, I have it, and I was very thankful for that this week! The first day I had it, I used it three times! Anyway, I hope to never complain about US bureaucracy again!
Classes are going well. I’m really enjoying the subject matters of each of my classes. Lately I’ve been learning about the average terrorist “profile,” about the cleavages between the different social groups within Israel, about what makes French people have the worldview they have, and the political history of Israel in the late 40’s and early 50’s. I intend in the near future to make my class notes available online to you, if you are interested, and I also hope to write a few interesting things I’ve been learning to share with you soon. I’ve made a few new friends lately from my classes [you were right, Lorrie! J], including two other believers.
Not too many really significant things have been going on in the news lately. The Palestinian Authority and Hamas are trying really hard to work on a Palestinian unity government again, to unite the West Bank and Gaza. The Israeli government has been trying to make new laws lately that infringe on democracy (see, eg, this opinion piece)—limiting funding to NGO’s, making libel easier to sue for, relocating large parts of Israel’s Bedouin population, and making marriage only permissible through an orthodox rabbi. Jordan’s king visited the West Bank for the first time in many years this week as a sign of support for Palestinian statehood and a return to peace negotiations. Talk about Iran has waned in the media, though the possibility of an Israeli strike is still very real. The next batch of 550 prisoners to be released in exchange for the Israeli soldier, Gilad Shalit, will take place in the next 2-3 weeks. And Syria and Egypt are still in major turmoil which threatens the region. One last thing, there was an interesting article some months back about the persecution of Christians in the Middle East that is worth a read.
You may also be interested in watching several cool video clips from Israel: amazing footage from across Israel to be made into an IMAX movie (see below). Footage from around Jerusalem. Footage from Tel Aviv on Yom Kippur, the Day of Atonement, when no cars drive on the roads.
Jerusalem | Filmed in Imax 3D from JerusalemTheMovie on Vimeo.
Really liked that video! Glad you got your student pass ;)
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