שנה טובה ומתוקה

Year (Sha-nah) שנה
Good (To-vah) טובה
Sweet (Me-Tu-Kah) מתוקה

I realized that it has been an extremely long time since I have posted here, so bear with me, as I have a lot of things to say! The two main reasons that I haven't posted to my blog is that I had two major technological catastrophes: my computer battery and charger dying both within the same week, and spilling some lovely milk on my computer. Luckily, my computer loves me and is still functioning!

We are now into the think of our fall semester. I am finding all of the classes really enjoyable, and all of the professors are really great. One of the nicest things about being in a small class, and on a small campus, is that each of us really gets the opportunity to know our professors on a much more personal level than I ever had the opportunity to do at Indiana University. It is not that I didn't have great professors at IU, because I most definitely did, but here we are able to sit and have one on one discussions. There are even times when our professors come and spend their lunch hour sitting with students and getting to know us, rather than staying among the faculty. I know that these are people that will some day be my peers, but it still amazes me that they are willing to take the time out of their busy lives to spend time learning about us!

Two of my favorite classes are the History of the Zionist Movement and our Israel Seminar class. The history class is meant to discuss Zionism from before there was even a word for Zionism, all the way through the present times and what Zionism means today. I think that I find this particularly interesting because I spent the past year working for the American Zionist Movement, which is the American branch of the World Zionist Organization. I think that until I was done working for the AZM last year, I didn't realize how much of a Zionist I really was. No, that doesn't necessarily mean that I will be moving to Israel any time in the near future, but it does mean that I care very deeply about Israel, and will continue to develop what my connection to Israel really means. As a part of our Israel Seminar class, which I will talk more about in a minute, we have monthly meetings where we answer a prompt and then discuss this within our small groups. The first prompt had to do with the land of Israel, and I chose to write about my struggle to connect to the physical land of Israel. You can read the response here, for anyone who is interested.

Our Israel Seminar is a class that we have once a week. The purpose of this class is to explore, in greater depth, different aspects of the history of Israel, as well as contemporary issues in Israel. One of the things that I like most is that at the beginning of every session, we have an opportunity to discuss the ongoing issues within Israel. That can be anything from the social justice protests to the Palestinian's application for statehood in the UN. These are all issues that can tend to be incredibly complex, and while some parts of it may be easy to understand, in a world where everything can change at the drop of a hat, it is nice to have some Israeli insight! One of the other reasons that I particularly enjoy this class is because it is not just lecture based. Every week we either go on a field trip, or have speakers some to talk to us. These speakers are not just your average run of the mill Israelis (although they are perfectly interesting to talk to) but instead they are people like Natan Sharansky. So far, we have had two field trips. The first was a look at Jerusalem, based on walking along one particular street, King David Street. We talked about the pre-Israeli military forces and what they did to try and get the British to leave Israel. We also go to walk up to the top of the YMCA in Jerusalem, which a)used to be the tallest building in Jerusalem and b) was built by the same architect who built the Empire State Building.

A view from the YMCA sign from the top of the YMCA tower.

The second trip that we took was to Tel Aviv. I was not particularly looking forward to this field trip, as we were leaving early and I had been to all of the places that we were going, but by the end I found it incredibly interesting. We spent the day working our way through the history of Tel Aviv, from the time that it was first established as a city through the Tel Aviv of today. One of the most interesting places that we went to was Rabin Square. Unfortunately, we were not able to enter the actual Rabin Square as it is under construction, but we were able to sit outside and discuss the events surrounding Yitzhak Rabin's assassination.

Part of the graffiti that memorializes the place where Yitzhak Rabin was assassinated. 

I found this particularly interesting because the day that we were there was 9/20, the day that the Palestinian Authority was supposed to decide whether they were going to submit their bid for statehood to the UN General Assembly or the UN Security Council. I found it particularly interesting that on the day that we were sitting there talking about a man who gave his life trying to make peace in Israel (and the one that has been the closest yet to making peace with the Palestinians) Israel was facing some major implications based on the decisions of the Palestinian Authority. Of course, nothing has been decided yet, but here, it is definitely something that people are constantly talking about. There is a lot of general speculation, but no one will really know what will happen until decisions are made, or votes are taken.

In a time when many things are uncertain, we can do nothing more than to watch and hope that decisions are made that can appease both sides, and help everyone to move onto a new chapter in their lives, one which involves a peaceful existence.

 שנה טובה ומתוקה - May you have a sweet and healthy new year, and may you be inscribed in the book of life.