Trip with Temple Beth Abraham

This week I've been on a big trip with my synagogue, Temple Beth Abraham.  I'll write more later, but here are some cool pictures.

Hezekiah's Tunnels with my buddies Ethan and Leah

At Western Wall

Floating in the Dead Sea

Ein Gedi

Masada

Synagogue in Safed

With my brother Micah and some Israeli soldiers.

With some older girls who liked my singing

                                                 

I'm on the Radio!

This is the host of the morning show which I was on.  His name is Adam.  

So, for the last two Sundays I have been on an English radio station called Rusty Mike Radio.  I had a private Hebrew lesson with the person who is trying to make a business out of the Ulpan (Hebrew language school) that my parents are going to, and he's on the radio every morning.  So I got to be on the radio.  He does "K'tzat Ivrit," which means "a little Hebrew," and he teaches the listeners a word.   The first word was l'hishava, which means to swear.  Not like to curse, but like to pledge.  They recorded me saying:  "Hi, this is Jonah, and you're listening to Rusty Mike Radio."  Every so often they play it during the day.

This Shabbat we did a sleepover trade with the family below, called the Greybers, who we knew from Camp Ramah.  My friend Benjamin slept over at my house, and my brother went to their house with his friend Alon.

The Bloom and Greyber boys on Yom Hazikaron,  Israel's Memorial Day

I'm starting to learn more Hebrew in school.  I met a friend from school at the park the other day.  His name is Benyamin, and he speaks French.  But we played some soccer together, so we didn't need to say much.  Then I said I wanted to go home because I was hot.  At that moment, when I was walking I felt something coming out of my nose.  I wiped, and there was blood on my hand.  We had no tissues to wipe it with, so I just had to pinch the bridge of my nose, and that stopped the bleeding.  

Our Little Mini Trip

Ok, so we've been on a trip for the past few days, and we went to a few places.  First, we went to the desert, called the Negev and rode camels.  On the way there we stopped at a tank museum.

 Next, we went to a kibbutz which is a place where people live and it is like a mini-town.  The first thing we did was settle in and we had a great Shabbat dinner which was very big.  I ate chicken schnitzel, also meaning breaded chicken.  The next morning we went to Shabbat services which is a place where Jews pray.  We met some very nice people that my dad and mom knew.  They were from Cranston, Rhode Island.  Then we went back to the kibbutz and we had another BIG meal except it was lunch and the people who were were staying with invited their whole extended family and there were about 14 people there.  In the afternoon we just hung around and in the night we did a special holiday called Lag B'Omer.  We made bow and arrows out of sticks that were lying on the ground.  And there was a huge fire and they put a huge block of wood on there and it got even bigger.  Then I played soccer with some Israelis who were only six and they were better than me.  Israeli talent, I guess!

The next day we left the kibbutz and went to Tel Aviv.  And then we went to some museums which were very fun but were sad too.  The first one was the IDF Museum.  It had tanks and other cool army stuff.  The IDF is Israeli Defense Forces.  Then we went to the Yitzchak Rabin Museum.  He was a famous prime minister and he made peace in Israel.  We had these little headphones and a tour guide and it was translated into English.  Then we went home.

The Next Few Weeks in Israel

I love the food in Israel, especially a place called Waffle Bar.  It's a really good Waffle place that has waffles covered with all kinds of treats like chocolate, apples, and bananas. 

This is Waffle Bar, and they have chocolate and vanilla chairs!

Another place that I really love is Max Brenner's Chocolate, but the one closest to us is fake.  It's really just an ice cream place called Aldo.  Except we found a real one, luckily, in a mall, and they had chocolate syringes, my favorite.

These are the chocolate syringes at the real Max Brenner's.  It's pure liquid chocolate, very good!

 Of course, we're also eating lots of falafel, and I really like this place called Felafel Doron.

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So, we went to Ben Yehuda Street, which is one of the most famous streets in Israel yesterday to celebrate Yom Ha'atzmaut, Israeli Independence Day.  We went to a concert and got shaving cream and silly string on us.  That part wasn't too fun.  We also stayed up very late, until 11:30 PM, to watch Fireworks.  It was supposed to start at 10:30, but it didn't. We were walking home because we had given up and were too tired, and in the middle of crossing the street we heard a pop, and we looked back and saw the fireworks. 

These are the fireworks, except they were way cooler in person.

We also observed a holiday called Yom Hazikaron, which is Israel's Memorial Day.  On both the day of and the night before we heard sirens, and we saw people get out of their cars in the middle of the road for the siren, and everybody had a moment of silence. 

We also went to a museum called the "Underground Prisoners Museum," not because the prison was underground, but because the prisoners were people who fought in the Underground for Israel. 

This is what the prison cells look like.  They had to sleep on the ground, wow!

That's it for now.  Bye.
 

Life at School in Israel

Well, today I am writing about my school.  I call it a "school-pan," but it's actually called an Ulpan.  That means it's a school where we learn just Hebrew.  There's no science or math or social studies.

There I am in front of my new school. with the name on the sign.  It means"School for New Older Immigrant Students"

We're so happy to be at school, we're jumping for joy.

It's very tough, because everybody reads in cursive Hebrew, and I can't even do English cursive.  I have friends, a  few of them.  One's name is Chaim, the next is Benjamin, and the last is Daniel.  They all speak English, but some kids in my class are French.  There's only 6 kids in all in the class, all boys.  The girls are in a separate class.

That's it for now.

My Next Post About Israel

First, it was about a week since I posted last.  After that Shabbat, we got ready for Pesach by throwing away all the bread in our house.  Then we went to a Passover seder and learned about Jews escaping Egypt.  The next day we had dinner at a friend's house. It wasn't Pesach seder but it was a very big meal.  Then the next morning we went to a Bible museum about the Bible.  We had a worksheet to do.  On Friday we went to Ben Yehuda street which is the most famous street in Israel.  We had kosher meat at McDonald's - Yay!  On Saturday we went to an Orthodox synagogue which means religious, very religious.  We played at Liberty Bell Park which is a park that has fake exercise kids' equipment.  yay.  On Sunday we went to the Time Elevator which was a "4-D" movie experience about Jerusalem (Yerushalayim) and its history and it was really cool.  Today we went to another Orthodox synagogue for seventh day of Passover services.  It was really fun because we played Homomo/Chaye Sarah with three kids there.

Shabbat in Israel

Well, last Friday and Saturday we have been observing Shabbat.  Shabbat is a time of rest and we got to rest a lot. Last night we had dinner at our house and we had chicken.  Then we went to a Shabbat service which is kind of like church.  Today we went to a service with a lot of ruach which means spirit.  After that we went home and met some friends of ours. Then we walked with them to meet some other friends of ours. We did Havdalah, which is another Sabbath thing that you do.