...we broke into dance in the middle of the...

This past month, Jersusalem has been celebrating "Hamshushalayim".  The name has two parts "Hamshush", and abbreviation for Thurs, Fri, Sat, and "Shalyim" the second part of the city's name in Hebrew, Yerushalayim.  It is a essentially a celebration of culture.  There are concerts, discounts at restaurant, free tours around the city, and extended, FREE hours at museums with special exhibits and performances included.  I took part in Hamsushalayim three of the five weekends.  I went to the Science Museum once and the Israel Museum twice; there were different exhibitions open each time I was at the museum and different performers as well.  The first time I was at the Israel Museum was a bit less exciting than the second.  The highlight was the Mariachi band.  The second time I went, there were dance shows, a play about the end of the world, and then the icing on the cake, a great Klezmer band . It was so Israeli when we all broke into dance in the middle of the museum.  It was great!  Luckily, Jerusalem is working on becoming more cultural, and this will be the first of many outings.

...we planted an indoor garden.

Israelis are obsessed with fresh spices: fresh mint, fresh coriander (cilantro), fresh basil, etc.  You would be hard pressed to find these spices dried in a jar.  On that note, many people grow their own.  In the spring, summer, and fall at Hebrew U, the spice garden is in full swing.  There are chives, lots of good tea herbs (mint, lemon grass, lemon verbena),  and good salad spices (sage, hyssop, etc.).  In our office we also have a bit of a spice garden.  Last year it was just mint and lemon verbena.  It was so Israeli when, we expanded our indoor garden: about a month ago, we added some basil, and this week, we planted some green onions!  The onions sprouted well in our sandy soil (we're actually learning a thing or two about gardening), and the basil is doing well too.  Our mint is a bit dusty, and we don't know if it is from all of the building going on or if it's because of a parasite.  Hopefully with some diligent care, we'll get it back on track.  In the mean time, we are trying to decide what to do with our pepper seeds.  The thought is that because the vegetable was genetically engineered, it won't grow, but someone told us from experience, that we might be successful.  Our sandy soil isn't good enough for peppers though.  My goal this week is to hunt down some compost (not the raw materials I bring every week, but the finished product) to enrich our soil!

...or at least un-Feldman family when...

Thank goodness Hanukkah has finally come to a close. If it lasted any longer, I might have been forced to walk around pants-less.  While everyone talks about the "Festival of Lights," the "Festival of Oil"  and the "Fry Fest" are usually less talked about.  This does NOT mean, however, that they are less celebrated.

I grew up in a house with a two-doughnut-per-year rule.  During the few years that I followed it (sorry Mom), that would mean that I couldn't get a doughnut both times throughout the summer my camp bus stopped at Dunkin' Donuts if I had already had a doughnut once before (which was usually the case come summer).  Luckily by the time we went to New Orleans as a family, the rule was on hiatus.  I think we reached our two doughnut limit within the first four hours sitting at Cafe du Monde.  When we returned a few years later, the rule was still no where to be seen.  And in Israel, I think it just doesn't exist.

My parents came to visit a few years ago during Hanukkah, and we had quite a few sufagniot (doughnuts--often filled with jelly or other yummy fillings).  It is a holiday tradition to eat food fried in oil (potato pancakes too!) and Israelis go all out with the doughnuts.  This year, they crept up in OCTOBER, even before Christmas decorations and sales in the States.  I, like last year, executed immense self-control, though, and did not partake of the holiday treat until the holiday itself--until the second day of the holiday, in fact.  But from there it was downhill.  I decided I was going to bring sufganiot to work, so of course I had to taste one before investing in two dozen.  The first one I tasted (a chocolate one) was rather disappointing, so I had to have another (a caramel one).  This one was pretty good, so I stocked up.  The count was already at two--done for the year.

The next day, the stock of doughnuts came to work with me.  Vanilla cream-filled doughnuts go really well with a cup of coffee (3), and a doughnut before class is always delicious (a friend and I went halfsies on a caramel one and a chocolate one; 4).  A half of a sufganiah heated up in the microwave while cutting the communal salad  made for a great appetizer (4.5), and the other half for dessert (5) was a must.  And of course, that night at a party I couldn't not have a bite of a fresh doughnut from a well-known bakery (5+).

The next day, there were also sufganiot at work (7+), followed by a short one-day reprieve (if I remember correctly).  The next day though, was a killer.  I had two sufganiyot tasting parties.  At the first, I had halves of four different doughnuts (pistachio, cream, chocolate, and a frosted and sprinkle-y one with an unidentifiable filling; 9+), and then I went out with a friend for the "best sufganiot in town."  And they were delicious.  I had a Belgian chocolate one (10+) and my friend had a halva one.  It was a good note to end on!!  At a party the next night, I opted out of a sufganiah, and I even saved a very highly reputed bakery's sufganiot for next year's taste test.  While two doughnuts a year is a bit of a low allowance, I think staying under ten( or at least 10++) is a good goal.  Below are some pictures from the end of Hanukkah.

...he offered me his lap...

As you can see (pictures below), Hanukkah is still in full swing.  But so is typical Israeli bus etiquette (which could actually include a number of behaviors).  Here is a brief rundown of my week in buses.  (I think I should have made a list, though, because I forgot the middle story.  Hopefully it will come back to me.)

Picture from this site.
It's actually my bus stop!

At the beginning of the week, I was waiting for a bus in the little bus stop, and I had a spot on the bench, which is quite a luxury.  The majority of the stop is covered but the bench only spans half the enclosure.  My bus route is busy in the mornings.  Sometimes we have to get in at the back because the front is so crowded. (Then we don't have to pay.)  This morning was just like the others, and there were a number of students waiting for our horrible late bus, the 14.  A few minutes later, though, an older man came into the enclosure too.  I quickly go up and offered him my highly coveted seat.  He took it with pleasure.  The bus came just a few minutes later, and it was packed!  We got on in the back and squished as much as we could.  When the older man boarded, another student who was already seated got up and offered him her seat.  I was standing near him (and everyone else because there was absolutely no moving or breathing room), and I had my lunch in a container in my had.  It was so Israeli when he offered me his lap to hold my lunch.  I demurely declined but his kind gesture made me smile the rest of the day.

MIDDLE STORY HERE  (Hopefully I will remember it and add it in soon.)

Taken from here.

This morning, as I was waiting for the bus, I was reading an article in Scientific American about autism and its genetic basis as correlated to genetically based technical and systematic intelligence.  An older, religious woman was also sitting at the stop, and It was so Israeli when she saw what I was reading and decided to strike up a conversation.  She asked me if I studied autism at the university and if I could explain the basis of it.  I explained to her as best I could (before reading the article) about linked genes and co-inherited traits.  I went back to reading thinking that the conversation was through.  It was not, though.  She continued the discussion and applied the rifts between siblings or between parents and children in which communication is cut off for years to be a sign of autism.  I disagreed with her and cited anger or hurt as a main cause for a break in communication.  The conversation continued in a philosophical direction, and somehow we came to the topic of the goats she owns and how even in them, there is an innate instinct to motherhood.  I wasn't sure how this tied in to autism, but I just went along with what she was saying. Luckily the bus came just a few minutes later, and I was free of my philosophically minded, Hebrew speaking companion.  It was a challenging, interesting, and spontaneous way to start the day, but I still haven't gotten through  the article.  Hopefully I'll get through it on the bus ride home.

On the bus seeing the city lit up with decorations

The third night of Hanukkah.  I am a bit late in my picture taking.
The let and right candles have already burned out.

The menorah at the community garden where I take my
compost.  I guess the previous night's candles
blew out because they were still there in the morning.

The fourth night, at the grocery store.

 

The fourth night, outside my apartment building.

...she asked us to get in her car...

Tonight is the first night of Hanukkah, and with Hanukkah comes candles, fried food and a ton of parties.  I took a few pictures on my walk tonight to the first of two parties.  It was amazing to see menorahs lit throughout the town in all shapes, styles, and sizes.  The first picture is of my menorah that I bought last year.  Tonight my roommates and I all lit candles together.  Then as I began my walk, I saw a menorah lit at the International Christian Embassy.  They had one too many candles lit, but it was nice to see.  I also passed a yeshiva on my walk and saw all of the bochurs (young men studying Torah) lighting their candles.  Then I walked through a family-friendly neighborhood and saw windows full of menorahs and colored candles.  It was a sight to see.

After a delicious eating (and social) extravaganza at the first party, I headed to another party.  Throughout the walk, we passed smells of food frying and heard Hanukkah songs from the windows.  It was truly magical (I know it's cheesy  walking through the neighborhoods of Jerusalem, and I just felt such a sense of joy that I live here and can see and be a part of such celebration.

And celebration there was.  After a second celebration of more friends, food, and fun, I was ready to head home.  I stood outside with a friend for a few minutes though, catching up and waiting with her for her ride.  It was so Israel (?!?!?) when a woman who had been idling in a huge SUV across the street asked us to get in her  car...and just sit in it for a few minutes.  She wanted to run into the party because the person she was picking up hadn't come out yet.  I guess she had heard us speaking English and saw that we came out of our friend's apt.  It was all very strange.  She said she assumed that we wouldn't drive away (we joked that the car was too big and scary to take anyways), and then she dashed into the party.  We though it was weird that she didn't turn off the car before leaving it...if she was nervous about getting towed or ticketed, we could have prevented that by standing next to it.  The only other option is maybe there was a kid sleeping in the back seat.  She looked like she could have been a mommy, but she didn't mention it.  I guess we'll never know...

...we gave up on dinner to watch a car chase...

Immediately after recovering from my stomach bug (as referenced in my previous post), I went into overdrive.  The following weekend we were hosting an international workshop at our campus for the DIP (Deutsch-Israelische Projektkooperation) Stork Project.  It would be a meeting of German researchers from several cities and institutions and Israeli researchers from our lab as well as another one.  We are working on the stork project together, and the DIP is a big source of our funding.  This would be my first time meeting the whole team, and it wasn't until this meeting that I really understood how big the stork project is.  The goals of the meeting were to assess progress thus far and plan for the coming breeding season.  The three-day workshop was meant to be intensive, and just about a week before it started, while in the throes of the flu,  I found out that I was meant to give a presentation.

A large chunk of my presentation was easy.  I made a few slides with background information, highlighted my objectives, hypotheses, and predictions, and then discussed the methodology for my research.  I was also expected to present some results, though, and results were something I was lacking.  I spent the majority of the week (read 14 hours a day) making results.  I analyzed data that I had planned on saving until the spring, drew connections where I hadn't thought to draw them, and threw in a few graphs and charts.  Somehow, I pulled my presentation together, got the okay, and pulled it off!

The meeting started well.  Our Spanish counterparts chose not to come to the meeting due to the situation in Israel (although a cease-fire had been reached by that time), but everyone from Germany had arrived, we had eaten a delicious first dinner, and the first morning got off to a good start.  We had a fun "welcome" presentation, made a few introductions, and got underway.  By the time my presentation came around, some clashing opinions had begun to come out, but we'd had a lot of productive discussions and brainstorms.  I presented (within my time slot!!) and was able to answer all questions directed towards me.  My research proposal was received well (unlike some other proposed plans), and I was given the go-ahead to continue my work in the coming breeding season.

The documentary we watched.

After my presentation we heard a few more talks and then were supposed to end the day with dinner.  It was so serious and scientific and dedicated when we decided to forgo our dinner reservations and instead order in pizza so we could continue with plans for the upcoming field season.  It was so Israeli when instead of planning, we watched a documentary about one of the researchers in our group.  He and his father went on a stork chase!  They took a fully equipped car and followed a stork with a GPS transmitter through Europe and Israel on her way to Africa during the fall migration.  The documentary was hilarious even though it was in German, and a night that seemed like a loss (who gives up on dinner?!?!) turned out to be a fun one with pizza, beers and a movie.  The rest of the workshop was busy, and we fell behind schedule a bit.  We sacrificed some of the talks and presentations for the much needed planning time, but in the end we progressed well with our research plan and left as a much stronger team.  My first academic meeting was both fun and successful.  What more could I ask for?

...when our car broke down and we all...

Please excuse the delay in posting.  I was sick with the stomach flu for the better part of a week, and since then, as you'll read in my next post, I have been extremely busy.  The day before I came down with the stomach flu, though, was so Israeli.

The night before, I got a call asking if I'd like to go down to the Negev to help with the vulture project.  Everyone in the lab had been talking about vulture field work and how it is the field experience to have.  I didn't have classes, and I knew they needed help, so I decided to go along.

The next morning we left Jerusalem around 10am.  We drove down in two cars: the old jeep, and the new pick-up truck.  The jeep had already been retired, but we got permission to take it out once last time--we were nine people and lots of equipment.  The pick-up had just been initiated a few days before.  We had a pretty easy drive down; we made one quick stop to pick up pita, hummus, and veggies for lunch (so Israeli).  A little after noon, right on schedule, we pulled off the road and onto the dirt path (well, not really a path and not really dirt--the previous days' rain had left huge puddles throughout the desert-scape), and began the 15 minute drive to the research site (open only to researchers and a few nature preserve officers who feed the vultures).


As soon as we passed through the gate to the study site, the jeep stopped.  For no reason.  And we couldn't get it to start again. It was so Israeli when we decided to just grab all the gear from the jeep, put it in the back of the pick-up, and then jump in the back too (the cab was full already).  I guess to us, it didn't seem like such a bad idea to be off-roading in the back of an open pick-up.  We would just have to deal with the jeep on the way out of the study site.  We transferred all the gear and a few people started to jump in the back of the truck, but before we drove, someone decided to give the jeep one last try.  It started, that time, but the people already in the back of the truck stayed.  It was quite funny (and a bit scary) driving behind the pick-up and watching my lab-mate and the gear bounce around.

We made it safe and sound to the study site, though, parked the cars in their places, and began unloading gear.  Everyone had a job.  Some people built up the study site, some people counted and surveyed the caught vultures, some people cut up our veggies and made a nice lunch spread on the back of the pick-up (so Israeli), and I got a crash course in data-entry.  I was in charge of keeping the excel spreadsheet (in Hebrew) updated.  Over the past three or four days, vultures had been attracted to a large enclosure stocked with food (read carcasses) in a location that was normally used as a feeding site (without an enclosure).  Once the vultures entered the enclosure, they couldn't leave on their own.  We then came, took them out one-by-one or two-by-two and recorded all sorts of information about each bird.  I was in charge of the recording.


As the afternoon progressed and we were taking out more and more vultures, Hebrew number and colors (details on the ID bands and tags) were being yelled out from all directions.  I had such a hard time keeping the numbers and colors straight because I heard them in Hebrew and had to record them in English within the framework of a Hebrew spreadsheet.  There were definitely occasions where I wrote the Hebrew color in the spreadsheet in English letters and didn't even realize.  Aside from ID tags and rings, I recorded weight, age, and technological specifications for the GPS transmitters. I was also in charge of collecting feather (from which DNA can be extracted). Then the birds' wingspans were photographed and released.
It was amazing to be part of the ringing effort.  I can't even explain what it felt like to be so close to such a strong and powerful bird, holding it down, taking feathers, watching it fly off into the distance.  It was an unreal (and slightly very stinky) experience!

We put in a good 4+ hours of work and finished just as the sun was setting.  As if on cue, the rain clouds that had been threatening all day burst, first into a drizzle while we were breaking down the study site, and then into a heavy desert storm.  It was magnificent to see.

Getting ready to release on of the vultures

It was a bit less magnificent to drive in.  We made it out of the field a bit muddy but all in one piece and drove for about an hour before stopping to have dinner (more pita and hummus and olives, so Isareli) in a gas station parking lot/rest area (also so Israeli)  Right as we pulled off the highway towards the gas station, the jeep  went dead, we coasted to the shoulder and sat just a stone's throw from the gas station.  We were in dire need of gas, but lucky for us, that wasn't the problem.  It was the same problem as in the field: an unexplained one that corrected itself after five or so minutes of sitting.  After our sit, we tried to and successfully started the car; we made it to the gas station, refueled, and waited for the pick-up so we could all eat together.

We ate a quick Israeli dinner and the headed back to Jerusalem.  I drove the last leg of the ride in the jeep, and as it turns out, that was the jeep's last field trip, so I was the last official driver!  We got home safely, and I am even starting to know my way home.  I really took it for granted that I know my way around in Deerfield, Chicago, Champaign-Urbana, and a number of other places.  Learning a new place is hard.  It was a great day, though, and it left me excited for my next field outing and a chance to drive the new, big pick-up.

..we day drank in the lab...

Some of you might think that I am confusing America with Israel.  On American college campuses, day drinking in a huge thing.  It usually happens at bars, in apartments, or in other venues not associated with the university.  Here in Israel, we do day drinking a little bit differently.

Not once, but twice this week we had day drinking experiences.  One was organized. the other, less so.  Let's start with the less so.  We (the department of Ecology, Evolution, and Behavior) had just finished our weekly meeting.  Each week, a guest lecturer comes and presents to our department. These meetings are accompanied by coffee and cookies (so Israeli) and afterwards, we all usually go our separate ways for about a half hour before reconvening for lunch.

After this week's lecture, though, we (our lab, not the whole department) decided to make a toast.  A visiting researcher from the Czech Republic had brought us a bottle of Becherovka herbal bitters a few months back, and another Czech researcher was coming to visit later in the week, so the time had come to drink the bottle.  We wouldn't want to slight our collaborators by shunning their generous gift.  So we all gathered around in a circle in the lobby of our building at one in the afternoon with mugs and cups (we don't use disposables in our lab) and made a toast: "To finishing grant proposals!"  Spontaneous drinking was a nice treat and a good way to bond.  We plan to reconvene again the day before grant recipients are published (and hopefully again after).

This wasn't the first time that we did a bit of day drinking.  At the end of last year, in honor of grants received and awards won, we had a toast with wine in our department, and we had another this year to kick it off.  These were both classy events: a small cup of wine for a worthy toast.

Today's organized drinking, though, was not so refined.  The whole School of Biology had a beginning of the year kick-off with beer for students and professors.  There was hardly even a speech (unlike at the department toasts).  Instead there was free beer (a cup--not Solo Red--a person), snacks, and even a sax player.  Who would have thought that twice in one week we (my lab/all of biology/professors/30+-year-old PhD students) would take a break, just for fun, and have a drink in the middle of the day.

People always ask me if college in America is like the movies, and I usually say yes.  Israel isn't doing too badly either, though!

...I tried to figure out what it meant to be a...

There are some key differences between students in Israel and students in America.  There are also some key similarities.  Most interestingly, there are key differences between me as a student in America and me as a student in Israel.  I don't know if I am so Israeli  or so American..

Additions will be made as they come up.

...I started classes in Hebrew

It was so Israeli when I started grad school, as a real student with courses taught only in Hebrew.  It is so American, however, that I don't have courses on Sunday this semester.  I am preparing for my second week, and I couldn't be happier.  It is a lot of fun being a full-time student and taking courses in Hebrew.  Just sitting in a course and understanding it makes me feel really accomplished, and I have a light enough schedule that I don't feel overwhelmed.  I am taking a statistics course, a course on animal behavior, and the final level of ulpan (Hebrew language learning).  For the most part, my classes are interesting and engaging.

The statistics course is my least favorite, but there is a mutual dread from my fellow classmates, and many of them study in my department.  I am sure we will have a number of study sessions together and friendships will form while commiserating.  Animal Behavior is great; the professor is in our department and has been very considerate about the language challenge.  Not only is the textbook for his class in English but also all of his PowerPoint slides are in English.  He has also offered to go over any parts of the lectures that I don't understand.  So far understanding hasn't been a problem, but it was nice to have such a warm reception on the first day of class.  My last course is ulpan, and I think it will be my most demanding.  For all three of my courses, the only grade that counts is the final exam.  In the first two, there is only a final exam--no midterms or homework--and in ulpan there are assignments, quizzes, presentations, and projects, but because this is the last level, if I don't get at least a 75% on the final exam, I need to retake the course.

The semester has started out quickly but solidly, and I am excited to be back in school.  I have also had a lot of time in the lab and have caught up from the summer.  Hopefully I will keep progressing with my research and find a solid balance between lab-work and course-work.

...she wouldn't let me leave without her...

It is important to stay hydrated wherever you are, and as most Americans (or at least those in my social circle) understand, the easiest way to do so is with reusable water bottles.  Camelbaks, Nalgenes, Polar Bottles, the free ones from the bank, your sister-in-laws company, or the fourth of July parade.  All of these options work, and like a true American, I carry my water bottle of choice, a Camelbak, with me wherever I go.

Today, I had just finished a delicious dinner (Cafe Calla!) and was about to set out for the grocery store when I realized I was running low on water.  We had a jug on our table with a bit of water left, so I poured that water and the water from my cup into my bottle.  Though my bottle was only about half full, I was satisfied with my efforts and ready to set out.  The woman (not so old and pretty hip but very Israeli looking in style and posture) sitting at the table next to our was not so convinced.  It was so Israeli when she wouldn't let me leave until I took the pitcher of water from her table to finish filling my bottle.  I tried to argue with her telling her I had enough for the walk home, but she wasn't having any of it.  She handed me the jug and I had no choice but to take it.  So I filled up my bottle to the brim, thanked her, and started to head on my way.  As I was leaving the restaurant, I could hear another table giggling about my water incident, but I must say that I was a happy, hydrated camper.

...we ran a quick errand...up Masada...

Although my master's thesis focuses on white storks, we study a number of birds in our lab.  Recently, I went out in the field with the vulture team.  My lab-mate and I had a "quick" errand to run for our project, and it was in the direction of the Negev where most of the vulture research takes place, so we teamed up for a day in the field.

The day started at a relatively reasonable 8:30am.  We packed up the jeep, jumped in, and drove down to Masada via Arad.  We drove the long way because there was an entrance to some sort of pulley system, and we had a HUGE antenna that we had to retrieve from the top of the mountain.  (This was the quick errand.)  It was so Israeli when we pulled right up to the pulley system, parked our car, and took a quick hike up the mountain to one of Israel's key tourist attractions.  In so many other scenarios, going to Masada would be a big deal or even an all day adventure.  We simply climbed up the mountain, climbed some more onto the historical ruins, disassembled our antenna, sent it down the pulley system, hiked down, and left.  Rather anticlimactic, but still breathtaking, if you ask me (pictures of the ordeal below).

Our next stop was Sde Boker, a kibbutz and research site in the Negev.  We dropped off the antenna which had been strapped to the roof for our drive from Masada over an hour away, and then we continued on our way.  Our way, though happened to be off-roading on a road that is only accessible by jeep.  People pay hundreds of shekels to go off-roading in the Negev, and we did it as part of our research.  I even got to drive a bit (though I did opt out of most of the off-road driving).  At various points along the jeep "road", we stopped to listen/look for vultures.  The technology on the vulture project is the same as that of the stork project: pingers, antennas, etc.  We found a few, downloaded some data, and observed a bit with telescopes and binoculars, but the ultimate goal of the outing was to find a GPS tracker (half the size of my palm) and a harness (some black rope) that had fallen off of a vulture.  We had it's general location from a text that the device sent (like in the stork project, the GPS trackers send texts a couple times a day), and using a GPS navigation system, a topography map, and some common sense we set off to look for it.

We had just pulled over (not that there was really much of a road to pull off of) to begin our hike into the desert to find the transmitter when a worker from the Nature Protection Society stopped us.  Apparently there is a new law that you can't hike more than 25 meters (don't quote me on that distance) from the marked trail.  Our lab has special permission to go beyond this limit, but the worker still needed to check.  After a quick phone call we were in the clear with the warning that we had to vacate the park/nature preserve an hour before sunset.

We began walking over hills and into ridges, zigging and zagging our way towards a peak about 800m away.  The transmitter was supposed to be somewhere 100m above us, and the peak seemed to fit the GPS coordinates and elevation data reasonably well.  We came to a good vantage point and all sat down, one with a telescope, one with the pinger, an antenna, and a map and two with binoculars.  We sat in the dessert heat for a while (34+ degrees) searching high and low, scanning for anything that looked to be out of place.  The sun began to set behind the peak giving us a nice break from the heat.  After about an hour of looking with no luck, we hiked back to the jeep and began our bumpy drive out.   The vulture team plans to head back with climbing gear and other supplies to try again.  The sun was quickly setting but we didn't think much of it until we got to the exit of the park.

There, waiting for us, was the park ranger who we spoke with before.  He began to yell at us about how we didn't make it out of the park in time, and we explained that we tried our hardest but didn't realize how far we had hiked.  He wasn't letting up, so someone in our group got out of the jeep and walked over to his pick-up.  It was so Israeli when things were suddenly fine after just a few minutes of calm chatter and name dropping.  Protectia is an amazing thing.  The ranger was not happy, but we got by without a fine.  We finished our field day with a sunset picnic and then headed back north to Jerusalem.  I got in a fair share of driving, and I am also starting to know my way around Israel a bit more.  Also no complaints about a bit of a tan and a day of fresh air!

...I came back to my office to find a cat sitting on my...

As some of you know, there are no squirrels in Israel.  Instead, there are cats.  Lots and lots of cats.  And the cats of Israel are just like the squirrels of America...well at least the campus ones.  The squirrels at U of I would fight another squirrel or another student for food.  They were known for stealing snacks from those sitting on the quad, and they also broke in to quite a few apartments, usually during breaks.

The cats here are just as crazy.  Today I was sitting in the grass with a few people from my lab.  The four of us were having a quiet lunch.  Because of the holiday, the campus is more or less on vacation and we were the only people sitting outside.  Also due to the dearth of people on campus, trash cans are running low on "salvageable" food.  As we were eating, a crowd of seven cats closed in on us, each one creeping closer than the next.  As any good ecology students, we fed them our leftovers tossing a bit here and a bit there.  Of course as the feeding began, more cats came to our little circle to see what the fuss was about.  One cat, though, kept its distance.  My lab mate noticed and tossed him some food.  As soon as the cat made contact with the food, he took off in a dead bolt in the direction he came from.  It was quite a sight to see.  Especially because the caloric value of the nibble of food probably didn't sustain his sprint.

Sadly my cat encounters for today didn't end there.  Today, as I do every day, I opened my office window when I got to work.  We have bars on our window, maybe about four inches apart to keep people out, so I usually keep it open even when I am working in the lab.  Today I was in the lab most of the day, but I was just about finished for the night.  It was so Israeli when I came back to my office and not only was there a cat there, but she was curled up on MY chair, the farthest one from the window.  I looked at her for a minute, I listened to her for a minute, and then I decided to bring in some reinforcement...a lab mate.

I went back to the lab to find someone to help out.  I said that a cat came through the window and that I am not really a cat person, but it didn't sound too healthy.  They knew immediately that it was Mitzy.  The cat that adopted our lab (apparently she sleeps in the lab in the winter too).  They new it was her because she is asthmatic, and when I described a sick cat, it had to be her.  Even though they told me she was friendly, I asked one of them to come bring her away.  She was really enjoying my chair though; it took a bit of effort to get her to leave.  Finally I thought I was in the clear only to sit down in a still warm seat.  That was too much for me, and I switched chairs with someone else.  Maybe from now on, I will keep my window closed.

The final cat encounter of the day was even worse.  One of the students in our lab has been raising a bird which she is hoping to imprint and train in a number of different homing techniques.  Today she took the bird out for a bit of practice, and out of nowhere a cat came along and ate the bird.  (Now you see why I hate cats?!)  They were able to free the bird and make an emergency visit to the veterinarian, but it is still unclear if the bird will make a full recovery.  Days like today make me miss squirrels.  Or at least the suburban ones!

...well actually Feldman Family American when...

From this site

In Israel, we are in the midst of Chaggim, High Holy Days.  Recently we celebrated Rosh Hashana and Yom Kippur.  For about the past month, and for another few weeks, greetings of a sweet New Year can be heard on the streets, and smells of cooking come from every apartment.  Pomegranates are in season, and even the buses are spirited.  Next up is Sukkot, and sukkahs (huts) are springing up all over Jerusalem: on roofs, in parking places, on balconies, on sidewalks, at restaurants, and in parks.  The days are still really hot, but the afternoons are perfect weather for eating out in the sukkah.

A lot of my friends go home for chaggim or visit family in Israel. I stayed in Jerusalem and although I was apprehensive at first, I had a really really nice and meaningful holiday.  I made a meal and a few other friends made meals too.  There was lots of eating and celebrating (on Rosh Hashana, not Yom Kippur), and that holiday time made me realize how successful and complete my transition to Israel has been.  Celebrating with my friends and making new traditions (this is already my second Chaggim season) makes me feel really connected to my country and my community.

The shul (bottom)
taken from my balcony

Some old traditions don't need to be changed though.  This year, I went to a synagogue literally across the street from my apartment. It was a minyan of mostly young people, many of whom were English speakers.  I went with friends and saw tons of people I knew.  It was such a nice feeling, but the proximity was also a huge huge perk.  Walking home after my fast on Yom Kippur took all of three minutes (across a street and up 142 stairs).  It was so Feldman Family American when I broke my fast with bagels and cream cheese.  My roommate thought it was kind of funny but partook as well.  The breakfast-for-break-fast tradition lives on. The only thing missing was my family and Aunt Cindy's cinnamon rolls.  Maybe next year I will do a bit of pre-fast baking so I can continue to merge my American and Israeli customs into a meaningful blend of traditions and customs for the years to come.  Until then, though, I will enjoy the continued eating during Sukkot as well as a bit of time to relax now that ulpan is finished and before classes start.

...my bus driver...

Bus drivers in Israel play a central role in the country's culture.  Everyone (or almost everyone) uses the bus/public transportation system, and everyone (yes, everyone everyone) complains about it.  But sometimes those goofy bus drivers can make your day.  This morning, I went to work instead of ulpan (yay, I'm done!!), a first from my new apartment.  I haven't figured out exactly when my bus comes each morning (obviously not on schedule--so Israeli), so I planned on leaving my apartment a bit before 9a and hoped I would get lucky.  As I was coming down the stairs, I saw my bus.  My stop is just down the hill about a block from my apartment and across the street.  I took a run for it (dead sprint!).  The bus passed me up as I was waiting to cross the street, but then it slowed.  The traffic light up ahead must have turned read.  I kept up my sprint but the bus started going again.  It pulled into the station, and I wasn't yet there.  Luckily, there were a few people getting on at the stop, and the last person had just paid (with that silly RavKav) as I came up panting.  When I jumped on though and put my RavKav in the machine, the green light didn't go on.  The driver mumbled something that I didn't hear, so I asked him if my card had worked.  It was so Israeli when my bus driver sort of chuckled and said, after that long of a run...it worked.  Of course it worked.  I'm glad that he appreciated my early morning sprint!  And I'd like to think that he might have waited for me if my sprint hadn't quite been sprint-y enough.

Unrelated, the weather is finally starting to cool off here.  It is still pretty hot in the noon-time sun, but the nights are getting chilly.  It makes for great walking-around-at-night weather.  Last night after dinner (to celebrate the end of ulpan), I was walking around the neighborhood with a friend, and we were caught off guard by beautiful piano music.  We looked around and tried to identify the source, and right above our heads we found it: an open window with an elderly man sitting tall and play piano with verve and passion.  It was a pleasure to stand below his window and watch him, listening to the music as we enjoyed the first breaths of fall!

...we executed a navigation mission using the stars...

(Continued from this post)

After the police showed up, we reexplained ourselves, waited while they entered who knows what into the computer system in association with our ids, and tried to scope out our surroundings.  We knew that the stork was not in the location of the last received SMS, and we knew approximately where it was based on the signal from the pinger.  We just had to figure out how to get to it.  The trails off the restricted road were rocky, and although the army and the police gave us permission to continue our mission in that direction (away from Jordan), they didn't seem promising.  We decided to drive back down Rt. 90 a little ways (perpendicular to where we were on the restricted road).  We pulled over to listen for the stork with the pinger, and as we were listening with our antenna raised, another police vehicle came to a short stop next to us to find out what we were doing.  My lab-mate explained again what we were up to, and once again we were in the clear.

The pinger told us that we needed to head into the bush, the area between the two roads that was full of trees, sand, rocks, and ponds.  We pulled off the main road and drove a little bit on the rocky trail before stopping again to listen with the pinger.  We were about 30 feet from the car, on a hill, and the car was about 15 feet from the road.  As we were listening for the stork signal (which we heard) and trying to download data with the other antenna (which wasn't successful), we heard a car zoom by with music blaring.  We then heard a screech of breaks; the car proceeded to reverse and stop parallel to our seemingly abandoned vehicle.  We could tell that the drivers were assessing the situation and deciding what to do about this abandoned car.  We quickly realized what was going on and began shining our flashlights towards our car to make our presence known.  Seeing this, the other vehicle zoomed back on its way.  We, however, decided to get back in the car and drive it farther off the road before we went for a hike, thus preventing others from seeing it and thinking about breaking in.

My lab-mate did a bit of good driving and a bit of scary driving, and after a few bumps, a ton of rocks, some bushes, and dust, we came to a stop.  Out we went with our gear to try and find the stork.  We listened to the pinger and made an estimate of the stork's location. We needed to get close to the stork but at the same time we needed to avoid interference like tree.  A hill near the stork's roosting spot would have been ideal.  There were several such hills, but in order to get to them, we would have had to cross through thick brush.  We decided that it might be wiser to try from the other dirt roads we saw off of the restricted access road.  There was no way we could drive down them in the car, but at least the walking might be a bit easier, so we climbed back into our dented car and retraced our bumpy tracks.

When we got back to the first dirt road, it was already 2:15a.  We only had 45 minutes left to find the stork.  The car was not in a secluded area this time, and although my lab-mate and I didn't discuss it until much later in the night, we were both nervous.  I took my wallet and binoculars along with me although I didn't need them and would thus be carrying extra weight because I was too nervous about leaving them in the car.  We were also each equipped with an antenna and attachment (the pinger and the data download-er) and our flashlights.  We drank some water and then were off at a brisk pace.  

We quickly came to two large salt water ponds (we were very near to the Dead Sea), and joining them was a little channel.  It was too wide to cross so my lab-mate decided we should go around.  Looking to the left and the right, we picked a direction and started to walk.  About a minute and a half into our walk, we saw a pile of wooden pallets stacked on the ground.  I suggested to my lab-mate that we build a raft-bridge type thing to use to cross the channel.  He was quite skeptical, especially when the bridge was a bit short and we had to take a big jump, but we pulled it off and saved a good twenty minutes which was important because time was running out.  

Once we made it across, we listened for the pings and continued on our way.  The pings led us through the thick brush we were trying to avoid, through reeds and mud and sand, over hills, and through more dense shrubbery.  At one point we lost the stork and had to retrace our steps.  We weren't making much progress, and at 2:45a my lab partner said that we should probably just head back to the car.  I wasn't taking that though because we had already almost been arrested twice, crossed a pond, collected ridiculous amounts of twigs in our hair as we passed through the reeds and trees, and climbed small mountains.  He agreed, and we continued on until we saw a few tall hills.  We climbed to the first one (they were sandy and it was hard to get footing because there was no solid ground), listened, tried to download, and failed.  At the second one we listened and saw that the signal was pointing strongly in the direction of the third one.  We were minutes away from 3a and decided not to waste time trying to download there.  We practically ran to the third hill and got there just in time to hear the last pings.  We had a direction in which to aim the antenna for downloading.  The question was were we close enough and high enough?

At first it didn't seem like we were.  After about five minutes, the device recognized that the stork was nearby but it wasn't downloading anything.  My lab-mate told me to sit down and relax and that he would keep holding the antenna in a last ditch effort (usually recognition and downloading happens pretty quickly).  As I was sitting and watching the screen of the downloading device, I suddenly screamed with joy.  The data from the stork had started to download.  Without moving a muscle or wiggling the antenna, my lab-mate also celebrated as we waited for the data to finish downloading.  Then we had a big hug and a rest before heading back to the car.  Or attempting to head back to the car.

It was so Israeli when we had to plan a full-on navigation mission to find our car.  We saw the lights by which we parked and we saw all of the trees between us and those lights.  We looked at two alternative routes to the left and the right, picked the left one, and mapped it in the stars.  We began walking and got off to a good start.  The ground was sandy but not too soft or wet.  We came to some bushes, but they weren't too dense.  We did get turned around a bit, but with a look up at the sky, we straightened ourselves out.  Then the going got a bit harder.  The ground got softer and slipperier.  At one point we had to cross a small valley.  My lab-mate went first and warned me that it was wet.  I went a different way hoping for more solid ground only to feel myself sinking.  And then, as I struggled to pick up my foot, my shoe was sucked off.  My lab-mate is the best though.  He found a place to recross, trace my steps and find my shoe.  I was covered in mud, and so was my shoe, but I had it back and couldn't be happier.

As we continued along, we came to more slippery, wet sand.  My lab-mate told me not to follow too closely.  Later he told me it was because he was nervous he might fall in, and he didn't want me to get sucked in with him.  We came to the point in our journey to the left where we needed to cut right to get to the car.  We tried to do this but the cut-through was similar to the channel we crossed earlier, only this time, it was wider and we didn't have any pallets.  I was getting exhausted and praying we didn't need to turn around and take the right path; my lab-mate was getting dispirited too, but we pushed on, and finally came to the restricted road.  We were definitely back at the part where we should not have been, but we were on solid ground and could see our car.  The last ten minutes or so of the walk we discussed our fear that the car would be gone, and seeing it in the distance was such a relief.  When we got there, we loaded up, drove to the nearby gas station to wash up and celebrate with ice cream, and then headed home.  We got back in the car a bit after 4a, and I got back to Jerusalem around 5:15a exhausted and filthy, but it couldn't have been a better night.

Saturday night, we weren't so lucky...

...the soldiers who stopped us with guns raised were disappointed that...

Fall migration has begun for the white stork (the ones not living in Israel, that is), and while they have a strong presence in Israel during the spring migrations, during the fall migrations, the fly-over time is quite short.  In spring, thousands of storks fly over Israel. They do not have a distinct path; they can be spotted throughout the country; and some stay for a week or more.  On the return trip from Europe to Africa, they fly south over Jordan, cross into Israel near the dead sea, sleep one night in Israel and continue south to Africa.

We know this because for the past several years, we have been GPS-tracking white storks from several populations in Germany.  This year, we are using newer, even more advanced technology--GPS trackers that not only track the location of the stork (and send 2 text messages a day with the stork's location and tag number) but also the movement of the stork.  From the data on these transmitters, we can understand where the storks chose to eat, sleep, nest, etc.  We can track their lives and also identify the causes of their deaths.  The machine is solar -powered.  It transmits signal location 12 hour a day, from 3p-3a, and the rest of the power is used to collect data.  Survival rates of new-born storks are rather low (two have already died this year, in the first weeks of migration), so instead of waiting until next year's breeding season in Germany to download data via antennae (a relatively easy process due to the nest location and road networks in Germany), we are hoping to download data via antenna as they pass over Israel.

The idea is quite simple in theory.  In practice, it is another story.  At 3p and 9p every night, a text is supposed to be sent with the storks' locations.  They fly in flocks, and rest in the dark hours, usually without much movement.  Thus, the 9p location is a very important one.  By following the texts we can roughly predict when a given stork will be in Israel, and then on any given evening, at 9p, we can definitively know if it has arrived.  On Thursday, a little bit after 9p I received a call from my lab-mate that there was a stork in Israel for the night.  The flock was sleeping very close to the Israel-Jordan border near the northern tip of the Dead Sea.  He said he would be able to go alone, but if I wanted to come along, I was more than invited.  I wanted to come along, so I changed into my hiking shoes and hiking pants, packed a bag, and met him at the entrance of the city.

Once we were on the way, he explained to me how he thought the night would go.  With one device, the pinger (in Hebrew and in English), we would located the stork.  The device pinged at various intensities depending on how close the stork was to the antenna that we pointed.  Once we were close enough, we would use another antenna-ed device to download the data from the stork's transmitter.  If, for whatever reason, we spooked the flock, and they flew across the border, we would sleep in the car and try to download data when they crossed back over in the morning.  We would not be able to use the pinger in the morning, though because the GPS trackers stop transmitting signal at 3a.  We would do it by sight.

I had already told my ulpan teacher that I might not be in class on Friday, and I was quite excited for the adventure.  The We're Going on a Bear Hunt song/book was playing in my head (see the video below).  My lab-mate and I get on well, and it didn't seem like it would be too hard.  It was though.  We were headed to the Northern tip of the Dead Sea, and when we got to the intersection (where Rt. 90 makes a turn to the right at a big gas station and there isn't a road straight and the road to the left is an army road), we drove straight.  We got out, plugged in our pinger, and listened for the stork.  There was a lot of feedback because we could see the Israel-Jordan border, there was a nearby army base with a number of antennas, but we did pick up a faint signal.  It was NOT in the direction of the GPS coordinates sent via SMS a couple of hours before.  Because of all the feedback on the pinger, we decided to try the original location before beginning a more extended search.

The initial location was down the left road a ways past the army base.  My lab-mate told me that it was a restricted access road, but he reassured me that we would have no problems.  Needless to say, we had all sorts of problems.  We put the GPS coordinates into a GPS finder and got as close as we could to the expected location of the flock.  The point was across the fence (which was maybe ten feet away) somewhere in the no-man's land between Israel and Jordan.  We couldn't hear a signal with the pinger, though, so that meant we had no chance of downloading data.  With another listen, we were able to pick up the same signal as before though, weak and with feedback, but present.  It was behind us somewhere in the bush (Georgie, thanks for teaching me important vocab)!  We repacked our gear into our little, compact rental car and drove back the way we came looking for a trail or path into the bush to find this stork.  As we were driving, we were suddenly met by a jeep with blaring headlights.  We stopped and got out of our car just as four soldiers, with guns raised climbed down from the jeep.  It was a pretty scary sight, but I guess we weren't any less suspicious with our antennae near the border on a restricted road.

My lab-mate began to explain the situation, and the soldiers were in shock.  At first they didn't understand...wait birdwatchers, at night, with weird high tech stuff...but then they started to catch on.  They asked for our ids and told us we had to wait there until the police came and sorted us out.  My lab-mate wasn't nervous, but he was upset by the stall.  We only had about two and a half hours of GPS transmittance left.  As we were waiting, my lab-mate got to talking with the soldiers, most of which were younger than him and on reserves duty.  It was so Israeli when it came out that the soldiers who had stopped us, with guns raised, were disappointed that we were just bird watchers.  Nothing more exciting or threatening.  They joked about spicing up the story for the newspaper, and we all laughed a bit.  Lucky for us, the police pulled up a few minutes later, our waiting game ended, temporarily...

(to be continued at a later date...it's a lot of reading for one night)

Substitute "bear" with "stork" and "day" with "night".  This was playing in my head as the night started, and it is a pretty good forecast of what's to come in the next post.

...I combined watermelon with Bulgarit...

Watermelon is a yummy summer treat in America, Israel, and probably a number of other places.  Something Israelis do a bit differently is they add a bit of Bulgarit cheese (a form of feta).  The sweet and salty is a perfect blend.  When I was visiting the States a couple of months ago, I brought the idea with me, and my mom was also a fan.

This shabbat is the first one that I will be hosting a meal in my new apartment.  I still haven't bought a plata, a hot plate to keep food hot during shabbat (during which cooking or using electricity to turn on a stove or oven is prohibited), so I am serving only cold foods, which is really perfect for a hot summer day.  I made a sushi salad (channeling Japan), a Caprese salad (channeling Italy), and a green bean salad (channeling my friend Alex).  But something was missing from the meal.  It was so Israeli when I combined watermelon with Bulgarit in soup form.  Last summer, I tasted an amazing watermelon gazpacho, and while I did not try to recreate it, I was definitely inspired by it.  Mine came out a bit zesty and totally delicious.  My roommate even said he would pay money for it in a restaurant.