Cultural Learnings 10.0

I went on three trips over the past two weeks, and each was more insane than the one before.

10.1 First I went to Petra. This involved: a bus downtown, a bus to Tel Aviv, buses from and to the bus station since I got berekas in the extra time, a 5-hour bus ride to Eilat, and a taxi ride to the border. We crossed the border easily and got brightly colored dinars. We then took a taxi to the bus station. (Note: the bus station is a parking lot.) I wanted to pee before the 2-hour bus ride from Aqaba to Petra, so I found the bathroom. Instead of a toilet or even a Porta-Potty, there was a room with a hole in the ground. The hole was surrounded by a porcelain cover with spots for one’s feet. There was a spigot and a pitcher with which one could rinse one’s feet and the ground. Gross. We waited an hour for our bus to leave. On the way to Petra I found myself being forced to consider whether I preferred plummeting off a cliff or dying in a fiery crash. The bus took us right to our hostel.

Our hostel was the best rated in Petra. Our host was very accommodating and did everything to make us comfortable, even driving us to and from the park. The room didn’t have air conditioning, and the toilet was so close to the wall that we had to sit sideways on the toilet. There was a map of Jordan in the lobby which didn’t name Israel. We spent the rest of the day walking through the park. It was really phenomenal. Five year old children approach tourists with necklaces and postcards. Bedouin men try to sell donkey, horse, and carriage rides. I got to see a lot of different types of Muslims, including a man and two women from Saudi Arabia. I couldn’t imagine stomping around in the sun with only my eyes exposed, if that. I ended up chatting with a Bedouin vendor for a while. He and his friends really wanted us to come to a tea ceremony. None of us wanted to (I was with four friends,) but some in my group had a difficult time saying no to people. We didn’t end up going and they totally called us out on it the next day (or at least the people who suggested they would come.)

One of my friends has a giant butt and colored hair, and she got a lot of attention. The Jordanian men would glance rather than stare, which I prefer. She seemed to be mostly oblivious to it. She’s a chatty girl who speaks heavily British-accented Iraqi Arabic, so she ended up scoring us some good deals. I think her accent endeared her to the many men we spoke to. However on the bus ride into Petra, the teenager behind her slipped his hand down the back of her shirt while she was sleeping. The kid’s father was there.

Surprisingly, I found Jordanian men really attractive. The Bedouin men wear eyeliner, and most of the police and other men I noticed has chiseled features. The border guard on the way back had super curly eyelashes. I haven’t been interested in Israeli men at all this whole time. Jordanian women wear much nicer clothes than Palestinian women. The robes were nicer, and modern dresses were also way cuter. I didn’t eat much, but I was not impressed with Jordanian food.

The second day we rode horses into the park. My scout said he is a teacher and he makes 200 dinar a month. That’s about $300. He asked how much teachers made in the US, and it pained me to see the wheels turning in his head when I told him $40,000. (I completely made that figure up.) We walked for a ways, then rode donkeys up the 800 flights of stairs. It was kind of horrifying. My friends felt bad for the donkeys. I felt bad for the Bedouins. They barely even broke sweats! I had been chugging water all day, and they carried nothing with them. We saw the monastery at the top, and it was really big. We were definitely too scared to ride the donkeys down hill, so we walked. One of my friends had told a Bedouin lady selling jewelry that she’d stop by on the way down (even though she had no intention of doing so), and she totally called her out on it when my friend refused to look at the necklaces. I usually just ignore all of them.



I felt angry that the Bedouins live without dignity—exploiting their children, living in caves. I didn’t know who to be angry at, though—the Bedouins themselves or some facet of modern society which put them into that place.

We got a taxi ride straight to the border in the afternoon, and we found our hostel in Eilat. It felt like a palace! It was so clean and came with shampoo and a flat screen TV. It was 40°C outside, and it felt like sitting in front of an open oven. We tried to go to the Chabad house for dinner, but it wasn’t for tourists, and we wound up just sitting there for an hour. No one invited us, perhaps because we weren’t all modestly dressed. We spent Shabbat day on the beach. All my friends went home during Shabbat, but I waited until it was over and went by myself. I got home at 2 am.

10.2 At 8 the next day we all attended a seminar in Sderot. Sderot is the closest town to the Gaza Strip, and it gets rocketed the most, though it has been more—though not completely—quiet since the ceasefire. In a previous blog post I mentioned an article which described a caterpillar bomb shelter on a play ground. That was the first place we went. Well, we were actually going to the Chabad house across the street. The whole building is a bomb shelter. We heard a speaker talk about Gaza and Sderot. We went to the police station where some of them Qassam rockets are piled up. Some of them say “Jerusalem al-Quds,” to suggest that they will one day reach there. I used to be an anxious child and always considered how I could be trapped and killed any place I was. Almost everything is bomb shelter in Sderot, but not quite. There are plenty of places where you would not make it into a shelter within 15 seconds. Sderot is my own personal living nightmare. We drove along a street which had been hit frequently, and our guide told us stories about what had happened in those houses—stories of fantastic luck and tragic misfortune. One house was still not repaired, and the roof was shattered and the yard strewn with household items. We saw one school which was only 1/3rd covered with a steel dome—the rest was too expensive. At the Sderot Media Center (also a bomb shelter) we watched film footage of rocket attacks. One showed children at a preschool. “Tsevah adom” sounds, and they all start running into the building. The teacher calmly ushers them inside. Once in the shelter they begin to count down to 1 and then sing so they won’t hear the explosion. We saw what someone in shock looks like. In the news it will often say there was a rocket attack with no casualties, and a few people were treated for shock. I had imagined someone sitting there wrapped in a blanket saying “Wow, I am so shocked. I really didn’t expect that. I was just sitting here and then I heard a huge explosion. Just, wow. I can’t believe it.” And the paramedic is sitting there next to her nodding and handing her a hot chocolate. That is not what shock looks like.



We heard from a dialog group, and they read us poems that Israeli and Palestinian children had written. Because the Gaza Strip is sealed off, we could not speak to any Gazans directly.

In 2005 the Israeli government evacuated 9000 Jews from the Gaza Strip. Many of them are living in Nitzan in pre-fab homes. There is a climbing structure there flying a flag for the Messiah. It was taken out of Gaza by the people, piece by piece. It is the only thing that came out. We heard a speaker talk about how her husband lost an arm and some fingers in two wars, and then the Israeli government made them leave their own home. We watched a very sad video about it. Many of the people in my program thought they were crazy. I was less convinced. I couldn’t help feeling compassion for these people. I had previously supported the withdrawal, seeing it as a necessary step towards peace. But there is no peace, and these people are living with 5 or 7 kids in tiny bungalows. I felt town between practicality and ideology. It was a wild day.
The art on the bomb shelter says "We are with you!" "You expelled orange and got red!" and a verse from the Torah about how we are G-d's people.

10.3 A friend from concerts came to Israel on birthright, and I got to see her. She is in the pro-Palestinian group on campus, but she now loves Israel. She saw most of the country, met soldiers, and went to the Jerusalem Gay Pride Parade. That doesn’t mean she no longer supports Palestine, but now she has an excellent perspective on the situation.

10.4 Pride was very calm. The security to get into the park was separate for men and women, which is just inappropriate. Besides some drummers, everything was quiet. There were no chants, music, or singing along the march. The light posts flew rainbow flags. There was one protester along the route, and he held a sign that said “Gays spread AIDS.” I think he’s brave for protesting alone. I’ve been the minority voice before, and it sucks. Hopefully I wasn’t as ignorant as him. There were few children at this event, unlike in SF. Two parents carried signs in Hebrew that said "My son is gay and I am proud of him!" and "My son is gay: so what?" It was peaceful and positive, and appropriate for Jerusalem. There were some mostly Haredi protesters across the street, but they weren't very visible. Their signs said "Holyland, not homoland," "for home's sake go strait," and "strait is butiful!"


10.5 My friend and I went to Bethlehem with some of her friends from birthright. We took an Arab bus to the border. The checkpoint felt a little holocausty. We went first to the Church of the Nativity, which was very beautiful. Next we went to the market. The two boys we were with felt very uncomfortable. I don’t think people noticed us much. Our last stop was the security wall. I was so surprised at how much of it was peaceful and hopeful. As we walked along, a man started chatting with us from his front yard, which faces the wall. He invited us in for Turkish coffee. (I’m just mentioning that because it sounds exotic. He gave us Sprite.) We spoke with him and his family about living across the street from the wall. The cutest old lady ever said it was like living in a prison. She spoke French as well, and she said the nuns spoke it at school. Wow! She said the houses that were in the way were taken down. Our host said he doesn’t think Israel wants peace. He asked how a country that wants peace could … and he gestured to the wall. Sitting in this family’s rose garden literally in the shadow of the wall was one of the most powerful experiences I have had in Israel. Like in Sderot, I felt torn between the ideology of security and the practicality of doing something as crazy as building a big ass wall. I will definitely write more about this after I have had time to ponder.


10.6 Both in Bethlehem and in Petra, we tried not to mention Israel or the fact that we are Jews. I felt ashamed afterwards. I don’t want to put myself into an unsafe situation, but I also feel as though I am the Jewish ambassador to the world. I—personally—have to be an example of a Jew who isn’t greedy, who isn’t a soldier, who isn’t a settler, who isn’t JAPy, and who isn’t all the things people still feel about Jews. I rarely regret things, but I should have found a way to come out as a Jew in Bethlehem. Israelis aren’t allowed into the West Bank, so they really don’t see Jews other than settlers, soldiers, and on Arab-language TV. My adventures over the past two weeks have been eye-opening and confusing for me. And I only have two weeks left here to sort it all out!

Cultural Learnings 9.0

9.1 Israel has a kosher KFC, and my friend Leah and I made the trip to Malha Mall to experience it. I haven’t had KFC since I was maybe 12 years old, when I started keeping more kosher and began to dislike fast food. The menu was limited to chicken pieces and spicy and non-spicy chicken wings. They had mashed potatoes, French fries, and coleslaw for sides. There were no dairy products or gravy. We both got 2 chicken pieces and 3 wings. She got French fries and I got mashed potatoes. It was so delicious—for about 5 minutes. After that, we began to feel sick. But we’re not quitters! We ate that damn chicken until we had to catch the Star Trek movie. Her fries were soggy (typical for Israel) and my mashed potatoes left a funny feeling on the roof of my mouth. Neither of us made it past one piece of chicken and two wings. We both seriously questioned our capacity to properly digest the food without any projectile evacuation incidents. But we made it! We boldly went where most North Americans don’t care to go. We said we’d never do it again, but how else do you know if it makes you sick unless you employ the scientific method?

9.2 I reached the height of my movie-watching while I dated John, because that’s what you do on dates. I don’t think I made it through one movie with him without leaving to pee. Often I would go right at the end, and miss something important. I really don’t see movies anymore, and I don’t miss it much. But I heard so much about Star Trek that I felt it was worth the schlep. The theater didn’t leave any floor lights on, subjecting the movie patrons to utter darkness a few times over the course of the showing. We could see the film being loaded into the projector. The best part of my first Israeli movie experience was the intermission. There was an intermission! Think of all the awkward stepping-over-lap situations I could have avoided if American theaters had intermissions. They also assign seats when you buy your ticket, which I think is weird—especially for a country where you KNOW everyone just does whatever the fuck they feel like.

9.3 Israel did a national mock terror-attack. A siren went off at 11, and everyone was supposed to go to their bomb shelters for 15 minutes. I happened to be at my internship at the time, in the bathroom. I would have missed it if there hadn’t been cake sitting out to distract me. I hoped to hide out with the cake, but the principal found me exiting the bathroom and ushered me out of the teachers’ lounge. Damn. Sixth graders in neon vests escorted other classes into the bomb shelter beneath the school. One of them gestured at me to cover my head as I went. I descended into the bowels of the school, into a basement full of crusty art supplies and over-sugared children. I spent a claustrophobic 15 minutes standing around awkwardly, wondering if there was some English-speaking intern corner I should be crouched in, and if Israelis pick their professions based on who they want to die with. Although Israel declined to comment on the accusation, it was clear that the drill was in preparation for a potential war with Iran. That is retarded. Only Israel and Iran are retarded enough to get into a war with each other.

9.4 One evening while I was at the Ba’al Shem Tov bar, I got a call from Anna. She’s ok! I was elated. She can talk on the phone and walk around and stay awake for more than ten minutes. Unfortunately, she decided to go back to NY to recover. She left on the same day as Maliya, who finished her school year here. I still have Sara and my other less-preferred friends on Career Israel. Well, at least I thought I did until Maliya off-handedly mentioned that she’ll be seeing Sara soon. She was unable to extend her ticket, so she’ll be leaving the next day. I am not happy about this, people! My three favorite people are gone!

9.5 The past two weeks included two fantastic trips. The first one I planned myself with Maliya and Sara. Since I missed being able to hike and photograph Ein Gedi when Career Israel went there on a Shabbat, I decided to return. We took a bus through the West Bank down to Ein Gedi and walked up a hill with our bags to the Field School. Our shared dorm room was only 99 NIS per person—much better than the $400 other hotels were asking. We found a giant tube of KY jelly in the room and a latex glove slung over the door handle. Awkward. We went to the Dead Sea in the evening. The hills of Jordan were reflecting red on the water. The water was cool on the surface and warm underneath. We all hurt in different places. I was mostly fine, but Maliya had a mysterious welt across her butt that stung like a bitch. The Dead Sea is the lowest point on Earth and also the saltiest body of water. I hiked along the shore to find the mud. It was nice. I brought some back for my friends. We left as night fell. It was still warm.

The next day we hiked in Ein Gedi, one of the most beautiful places in the world. We swam in pools and sat in waterfalls. I took hella pictures and enjoyed every minute. We waited an hour and a half at the bus stop with three JAPy New York seminary girls, and it was awful. As panic and heat stroke set in, Maliya decided to hitchhike. Two haredi boys had been trying for an hour, one with success. Maliya stepped to the curb in her blue summer dress and a man pulled over within one minute. We took the other haredi boy with us. Our driver was totally not sketchy, and he offered to drive us around Ma’ale Adumim, and giant settlement five minutes outside of Jerusalem. He drove us up a mountain so we could see the police station there and get a better view of the city. He also offered us a pit stop mid-way through the West Bank. He gave Sara his number, saying he would be happy to give her and some friends a lift up to Nazareth any time. We liked him. The haredi boy didn’t speak English, and I was still freaking out from having to listen to those JAPs for so long, so Sara really kept the conversation going. She’s great at that. He drove us right to our dorms.




9.6 A week after that, Career Israel took a trip to the North. On the first day we visited Pki’in, a mixed Druze, Jewish, Christian, and Muslim town. We saw the cave where Shimon Bar Yochai hid from the Romans (that’s the guy who is celebrated on Lag B’Omer.)

We saw the Rainbow Bridge, which was fantastic.

We rode not-that-horrifying trams down a cliff to see the grottoes of Rosh HaNikra, which were unbelievable. The color and clarity of the water, the variations in the rock, and the abundance of greenery made for a spectacular setting.

For dinner we ate at the home of a Druze family. I don’t know if it was kosher, but I ate it anyway. Most meat in Israel is kosher, and they’re open to Jewish tourists anyway. My bus got lost for an hour, and the other bus got hit by a car speeding away from the cops. The people on the bus were ok, but the people in the car were not wearing seatbelts. I hope they’re ok.
On the second day most people went on a 3-4 hour hike which involved swimming and climbing a ladder. I didn’t have the ko’ach to hike with 100 people, so I went on a non-swimming hike with 8 other people. We stopped at a river mid-way through the trek and refreshed ourselves. Despite wearing a hat and drinking two liters of water, I still got heat stroke. That was pretty lame, and it took an hour of sitting on the bus before I felt better. A madricha and a program participant both bought me cold drinks which made me feel better and helped reduce the swelling in my hands. We had a medic, but he just took my temperature and then left me locked on the bus for half an hour. He didn’t have an ice pack.

Because everyone was so exhausted and cranky, we only went to Tsfat for 45 minutes. There was tons of beautiful art. I wandered off to find a toilet and found the street where my birthright bus had dropped us off last summer. I also found a toilet. B”H. Because I drank so much, I nature peed three times that day, and paid 10 NIS to buy a drink to use a toilet in a bar. I feel like that part is worth mentioning.

The third day we went to Har Ben Tal on the border with Lebanon. We heard a speaker who told us that the houses we saw lacked windows, so that Hezbolla could more safely fire on Israeli homes. He was right wing, but we liked him because he had strong principles without being dogmatic, and had clearly “lived a life.” I’m not sure if everything he said was true, but he was fun to listen to. He paused in a sentence and I filled it with “he once fought a shark and a bear.” He heard me, made me repeat it, and said “how did you know?” After everyone laughed he said, “I have fought in four wars.” Holy Moses.

We went “kayaking” on the Jordan River, and I also peed in that. It was a lot more pleasant after people got tired of splashing each other. Since my two favorite Career Israel participants weren’t on the trip (Anna went home and the other stayed in Tel Aviv for Pride Parade), I was forced to sometimes talk to other people. For the most part people on my program are chill, and I even talked with people like the freakishly tan girl from New Jersey. Ok, no I didn’t. I just wanted to mention that there was a freakishly tan girl from New Jersey because she’s such a stereotype of herself. But I did talk to fake-blonde/mascara LA girl with pleasant results. After that we visited a helicopter crash site.

We spent Shabbat on Kibbutz Misgav Ha’am, and most of the women also spent some of that time deflecting sexual advances from one of our guards. Typical Israeli. It took 4.5 hours for the Jerusalem people to get home, and I had to direct the bus driver to our dorms. As on another bus trip down from the North, this driver didn’t know if we were going to Har Hotsvim or Har HaTsofim.

Mosh Pit Etiquette

A number of live musical genres feature a raucous, wild, and sometimes violent style of dancing called ‘moshing’. This dancing is typically contained in one section of the audience area, known as a ‘pit’ or ‘mosh pit’. Particularly large music venues may have multiple, simultaneous mosh pits. Mosh pits can be found at rock, punk, ska, emo, metal, rockabilly and any other concert featuring a driving beat and frantic melodies which inspire their fans. Mosh dancing can be done independently in the pit or in a group. Independent moshing may include swinging one’s elbows, kicking, headbanging, pushing others, slamdancing, running into groups of people, skanking (particular to ska,) and absorbing the impacts of others. Groups of friends (sometimes made in the mosh pit with a handshake or other signal of solidarity) can link arms and skank together, clothes-line others, plow each other through the crowd, collectively ram the audience members on the stage side of the pit, hold hands and spin until one member falls or flies to the ground or into other audience members, punch each other (consentually), and run around in circles. Those who practice mosh dancing outside of the pit area are either given space as to avoid collision, or pushed away from their selected area.

On account of the unpredictable, crowded, and violent nature of mosh pits, moshers put themselves and others at risk for a number of serious injuries. It is common for moshers to fall or be knocked to the ground. Moshers are often hit with others’ body parts, particularly feet, elbows, heads, and fists. Conversely, moshers may also injure themselves by hitting their own body parts against some else’s harder body parts, i.e. jaw to skull. Many moshers are fond of decorating their clothes with spikes of varying potency, causing bruising or bleeding. Feet are stepped on, hair is pulled, and often the only thing supporting a mosher’s upright position is the cage of other bodies surrounding them. Dehydration is both a risk and a factor in poor judgment. Additionally, moshers may enter the pit intoxicated or with malicious intent. Bruises and stiff muscles—particularly the neck, for headbangers—are common. Broken and dislocated bones, concussions, bloody noses and mouths, and dehydration and fainting are all potential consequences of moshing.

Despite the dangers associated with moshing, mosh pits are not vacuums of anarchy. A distinct and respected system of behavior exists across venues and genres. Moshers regularly defend each other against overly-aggressive members, protect those tying their shoes or catching their breath, hold up lost articles of clothing for the owner to see, catch those who have been pushed or thrown, pick each other up, help the wounded with utmost compassion, and become friends or partners after an initial handshake, smile, or cool dance move—something that would not happen in a normal civilian situation.

Many of the behaviors listed above are not merely phenomena but rules. When someone is on the floor, you must pick them up. If someone near you is tying their shoes, it is obligatory to stand around them with arms out, both signaling a vulnerable mosher and protecting them against any incoming assaults. Traditionally, a good mosher will bring back water for others to share if he leaves the pit. It is common curtsey to tie long hair. A mosher who is overly violent is met with increased violence and fewer marks of solidarity from the others. One is considered overly violent if he has caused avoidable injury to someone, has hurt someone much weaker than himself (perhaps a female or younger mosher), or is generally reckless. Moshers who are irresponsible or show disregard for the safety of others are not supported. On the other hand, a mosher with good behavior—one who is not too violent and who defends, supports, and befriends others—is respected.

Good moshing is a balance between being in and out of control. It is inevitable that people will be injured in a crowded space of flailing fans. One can expect to be squished, hot, stepped on, pushed, and generally abused in a mosh pit. However, a mosh pit is an exercise in trust, in which each member exposes himself to others’ violent dancing. A good mosh pit will feature members who are fans of the music, have nothing to prove, and are ready to deal with anyone who loses control—either through injury or aggression. Strong communities are built around mosh pits, as the moshers’ trust and companionship grow with each song spent running into each other but not too hard, hydrating and caring for each other, and sharing the experience. Additional bonds are formed through drugs, romance, or combinations of the two. While injury is more than likely, and one may be subjected to being coated in the sweat of many people, a mosh pit can become a home, and more than that-- a happy home.