One Long Day

One thing I have found fascinating about Jerusalem is the fact that there are tons or arts activities, often. There is an Arts/Jazz event off Emek Rafayim that happened a few times each week this summer, there was the two week Art Fair and concert series near the Sultan's Pool and tons of others that I've missed.

Last night there was an arts fair on Emek Rafayim. They closed down a few blocks of the street and people set up booths all over the place. Personally, I didn't do any shopping at the booths selling earrings or scarves (surprise surprise). However, I was very much engaged by the various street performances. We stopped to watch some really cool fire dancers and some performance troupes putting on a few shows. We stopped to listen to a band performing, which was completed with a sweet fiddle solo, and paused to watch a "monkey" climbing around a tree.

I wish I had some pictures, but my camera is broken... bummer.

Tuesday was a really long day, and it was good to unwind after that.

In the morning, my Hebrew class took a little trip to one of the old neighborhoods in Jerusalem. It was one of the earliest ones to be built outside the walls of the old city. Today it is just off the edge of Ben Yehudah Street. There were some really cool buildings including the Ticho House, two Synagogues right across the street from each other, the old hospital that became Hadassa before Hadassa was moved across the city, Rav Kook's apartment building and many more awesome places. It was one of the first times I was able to spend time looking at the history of the area instead of running around trying to find a restaurant to meet people.

After the normal Biblical Grammar class we had a large group project. In my History of the Zionist Movement class we have been looking at Russian Zionism around the turn of the 20th Century. We were all assigned different parties to be apart of and prepare a song, posters, a speech and questions to challenge the other parties. Dressed up in costume we conducted a mock Duma. I was very skeptical at the start of the process, but it was really fun by the end.

Almost everyone embraced the project and it was pretty hilarious to hear some of the period-appropriate slurs being shouted at each other during the speeches and the question section. Someone in my group even had the great idea to bribe the party leaders and the other attendees of the Duma. The challenge was getting this all together in less than a week.

Yesterday was a pretty good day!