week two so far

After one week living in Tel Aviv, I have already gotten to love the city. Our apartment in Kiryat Shalom is great so far. All of the people living in the apartment are great. My roommate Sam is very different from everyone else. As a Jew from Alabama, he loves his American football. He loves the Alabama Crimson Tide and says "Roll Tide" all the time. I am going to have to tell him to cut back on the "Roll Tide" though because quite frankly I really don't care about college football. Besides living with a Southerner, life in the apartment is great. Everyone gets along with each and looks out for each other. We are one big happy family. The kitchen might be the hottest place in the apartment. Whenever someone is cooking it becomes awfully hot. My first meal that I cooked was lemon chicken. It was delicious. All of the food I have had in Israel and in Tel Aviv has been amazing. Everything is very fresh, colorful, and full of flavor. I have not been eating a lot of pasta and potatoes, but i have been eating a ton of pita with hummus. Hummus is served with everything here. It is sort of like the Israeli ketchup.

We have started our Ulpan, which is Hebrew immersion classes. I am in the beginners class even though I know everything we are going over. After this week I might join the intermediate class. Our teacher Dina is very nice and takes her time with the class because many of the students have not learned Hebrew before.

In Tel Aviv, I have taken the bus everywhere, or I have walked to where ever I need to go. Soon I will be hopefully purchasing a cheap used bike to get around. We have started going around to visit the places where we might be volunteering. Some of the places look amazing and I am definitely interested in volunteering there. Other places have been not what I am looking for.

The market culture here in Tel Aviv is very interesting. Most people will say that the HaCarmel Market in the city center is the best, but I have found it too touristy. There is a market in Hatikva neighborhood that is authentic and you will not find tourists there. Everything is fresh and delicious at the shouk. I went to a place where they had ready made food. They had moroccan cigars, which are cigar shaped pastry filled with meat. They are delicious. Chicken schnitzel was delicious as well. The best though was the kibbe, which is fried bulgar wrapped around a meat filling.

A couple of nights ago my friend Ian and I went to Red Hot Chili Peppers in Hayakron park. It was well worth the money we spent on the tickets. Since it was in the park, there was no assigned seats and it was a free for all. Everyone was dancing and singing and having a wonderful time. Over 50,000 people were crammed into this small area in the park. It was a wall of people. The only words Flea said in Hebrew were L'Chaim and Mazel Tov. The band members were grateful to play in Israel because their first guitarist Hillel Slovak was from Haifa. They dedicated "Otherside" to Haifa. They played all of their classics. Hey Oh(Snow), Cant Stop, Around the World, Californication, Higher Ground, Under the Bridge, By The Way, Suck My Kiss, and Power of Equality for instance.

It is going to be Rosh Hashanah soon and I will be heading to my family friends up in Pardesiya near Netanya. It will be very interesting spending the holidays here in Israel. I cannot wait. More to come soon so stay tuned.Lehitraot!