What a Week

I just returned from a week long trip in Tel Aviv and Tzfat with Anna and Aaron. We had some crazy adventures, especially in Tzfat. I feel as though I should start from the beginning, but I think the more interesting - or at least memorable - parts of the trip happened in Tzfat. I'll give a few highlights of Tel Aviv, though.

We stayed near the beach, about a 5 minute walk from the shuk (outdoor market) and a 30 minute walk to Old Yaffo. We went to Yaffo and had the pleasure of bargaining. Well, Anna is really good at bargaining. I'm not the best and needed her coaching, but I did manage to get a really beautiful piece of hand-embroidered tapestry. We had a few very funny experiences. Anna was stopped by one of the shop owners in the market and was roped into buying a piece of costume jewellery. She said that he was first asking for 80 NIS, he said he would put a lighter to it to prove that it was real, and he eventually pulled her into his shop and said, "for you, 30 shekel, but don't tell anyone." She felt badly and ended up buying it. She even said at the end of the interaction he shook her hand as if saying he respected her bargaining abilities.

We decided that we would cook all of our meals in Tel Aviv to save money, but we splurged in Yaffo and had lunch at Dr. Shakshuka. It was amazing! The lunch included bread, hummus, different salads, couscous, soup, a bean dish, lamb (kabob, etc). We ate so much it felt as though we wouldn't have to eat again for a week.

Thursday night we wanted to go out dancing, and instead of staying out all night, we ended up coming back to the hostel and talking about choseness and Judaism until 5 am. We are so cool.

Then we went to Tzfat Friday morning. It was a trip. We stayed at a Chabad-run hostel over Shabbat and then moved elsewhere on Saturday night to maintain our sanity. We got into Tzfat less than an hour before Shabbat started, so it was kind of hectic. And we missed the class. The hostel puts on daily classes about kabbalism and Judaism, which technically aren't required, but just about every time I saw someone affiliated with the hostel, they asked if I was going a class. Enough already!

They set us up with home hospitality for Shabbat dinner. With a very frum, Lubavitcher family. The husband teaches at a seminary and four girls (just out of high school) also came to the dinner. It was so awkward! Not only did they make very little conversation, but us women-folk were not allowed to participate in making any blessings, singing any songs, or really being acknowledged as human beings. I mean, the two men at the table waited for Aaron to touch the challah before they said motzi, but didn't hand any of the women benchers (kiddush and song books) or wait for Anna to say the blessing after the meal. And when Aaron tried to help clear the table, he was informed that it wasn't his place to do so. But Anna, the seminary girls, and myself dutifully helped in the kitchen. As you can imagine with two feminists, this was not the most pleasant experience and caused a great deal of discussion afterwards. It also wasn't the last of such incidents. We tried to go to services in the morning at a famous Sephardic shul, but the women's section was so small and crowded that Anna and I couldn't get in. We ended up going for a walk to the old citadel, which gives an amazing view of the city and the hills surrounding it.

The class before lunch and lunch itself didn't fair much better. But we did learn from one of the Lubavitcher Rebbes that it is, in fact, ok and encouraged for women to sing just so long as he can hear his own voice first. The men all started dancing at one point while all the women sat and watched. I was so tempted to join in (hehe).

After Shabbat we went to a different hostel, which was much better, and had a really nice Tu Bishvat Seder. It reminded me of a combination of Avodah and the Machon. We sat on the floor and sang songs (including Adamah v'Shamayim and Od Yavoh Shalom Aleinu) and talked about the origin of the Tu Bishvat seder (which started in Tzfat). We then went through the seven fruits of Israel and talked about their significance. The people were interesting, the food was good, and the atmosphere was so relaxed.

We explored the city a bit on Sunday, which mainly consisted of following the "Tzfat cheese" signs, or "Safed Cheese," "Tzfat Cheeze," "Saffed cheeze" or some other variation. It isn't a big city, but it took us a good amount of time to get through the maze and actually find this crazy shop. It was worth it, though. Their cheese and olives are amazing!

We finally managed to go on our hike on Monday. Tzfat is in an amazingly beautiful part of the country. I have really missed being among hills, trees, green. We hiked for a good 5 hours even though it took us about 2 hours to find the trail we were looking for. We hiked the Nahal Amud trail and along the way we found a number of rebbes' graves (which are painted a bright blue) and some ruins.

The final adventure occurred on our way home. A man who works at the hostel kindly offered us a ride to Jerusalem. As we were leaving it started to hail, which later turned into pouring-down rain. It's good in the sense that Israel is in desperate need of rain, but I do not trust Israeli drivers. And then he had car problems the whole way back, and he held his phone in one hand and his coffee mug in the other. And it took us about an hour from the time he said he was ready to leave to actually start driving out of Tzfat. But I'm finally getting used to Middle Eastern Standard Time, so I guess I would have been surprised by antything else.

Overall it was a great trip. A true bonding experience. We also came out of it with a lot of inside jokes. And you really can't beat that.