Life in the center! -----!!החיים במרכז

Aaaaaaalright, so! Where the heck do I begin? My apologies again for losing track of time and not writing anything in here for what it seems like forever. Ani mitztaeret (I'm sorry). I guess I will start by briefly filling you in on the closing ceremony of my five month experience of Tikkun Olam.

After lots of deliberation of when to have the party, we all agreed that it would make the most sense to have it the same day as official five month closing ceremony by Bina. It was going to be brutal getting everything together but we had a great team so we knew that we would do it. Our plans were the following:

Potluck
Slideshow
Talent show
Karaoke
Flip cup -----Great right???

The party was going to be on Jan 24th. The night before that, Lisa, Adam, Dante and I stayed up until about 3 in the morning doing different things. We were cutting out decorations to put up for the next day, working on a slideshow, Lisa was working on that and every time she came up with something knew I laughed harder and harder every time. We also made superlatives, which were great. So yes, all that and we had to be up by 7AM the next day to be at the ceremony by 9AM.

We were a little late to the ceremony, there we had breakfast and shared some things that the people that were leaving learned throughout this time. I have to admit, the people at Bina are sort of stoic, they don't really have any emotion so it was difficult to connect with them and share much with them. However, throughout this time, I have developed amazing relationships with the staff so they have known how I felt for a long time. Our director had a good bye talk with us and told us that we can do the group events and participate in Ulpan, which he had already told me before and I was reeeeally excited for that part. It was good, we were getting antsy to go because we had ordered T-shirts for everyone and we had to cook and decorate the house, all that had to be done just a few hours from then.

We decided to divide and conquer, Dante went to get the shirts, Lisa and I went home to cook and decorate and work on slideshow and Adam went to get the booze, yofi! We hauled ass around the house and somehow pulled everything together pretty much before everyone got there. The house was decorated in bright colors, hearts, stars of David, superlatives, rings hanging from the ceiling. It was beautiful. The thirts were here and Lisa and Adam were finalizing the slideshow because they were going to MC the whole event. Right before we kicked off the party, the party organizers changed into the Tikkun Olam Tshirts and covered them up with zipups, and went to Adam's room and took a shot of tequila, to congratulate ourselves and to wish it to be a great party!

We got into the living room and welcomed everyone, the people were there, the Aliya coolade, the food, and then we unzipped our sweatshirts and the party began. It was amazing! Lisa and Adam were hilarious. They redid the version of "Twas the night before Christmas" into the summary of the program and made sure to include everyone's names and rhyme them with something. I was crying because I was laughing so hard. Then the slideshow came and even through I had seen it over a million times, the peoples' reaction brought tears to my eyes. It was so amazing. I am hoping to get a copy of all that was mentioned. After the slideshow was a talent show was ridiculous. We were all dying! I didn't realize how talented my peers were but I always knew that they were effin hilarious. The talent show ended by Katie Vogel's renactment of the MASA propaganda of Make Aliya, have a 1000000000 Jewish babies, you had to be there understand but it involved crossdressing, confetti and just overall amazingness!!! So as you can tell the party was a major success, I didn't expect it to be so amazing but it was. The party then morphed into Sara's birthday which we kicked off by some awesome games of flip cup and then a lot of us went out to Markid, a dance club which plays amazing music but the bouncers suck. It was a great night!

The next day was our day of cleaning and also when Marissa and I had to meet with Reut, our guide for the trips who was going to help us create a path through the north of Israel. We had a great time cleaning, we divided and conquered, turned on the stereo and played some oldies like "Shout" cranked up the music so that the whole neighborhood would hear, but we didn't really care because everyone was working or something like it. By the end of a few hours, the house looked 100000000 times better than it did when we first moved in. It was so great to see it and we left the decorations up. Elin, our madricha came over and so did Tamar to have our last personal talks. It was nice and sad but I knew that I would see them again because I was sticking around for another few months.

After we cleaned, Marissa and I went to meet with Reut. She was so amazing and helpful. Chick chock and we had our whole tentative plan. I was really excited and nervous because I didn't know what to expect but only time would tell in this case. The next couple of days were really chill. There were only four of us left in the house. Anna Rose had moved into her new place so it was just Nancy, Lisa and Katie and I and it was wonderful to have the house all to ourselves. Nancy's dad flew in from NYC so we had a night of tomato soup and grilled cheese and invited whoever was left in the coutry. It was sooooo nice. The rest of the time that I spent in the apartment I was packing and tying out loose ends. It was a weird transition but I was ready.

On February 1st, I was moving into my new apartment. We went out to breakfast to Benedict and then Nancy's dad was kind enough to drop me off with my bags. When I got there, Ariana, the subletter was sitting there and Lisa and Katie helped me roll the suitcases. They both LOVED the places and that got me even more excited about my place and the new chapter of my life, living in the center!!!!

The next few days I was getting settled in and pretty much moved out of the south TLV house. It was weird not to live there anymore but people get used to everything. Matan, my new roomate decided to celebrate me moving and we went out one of those nights. It was soooo fun but I got a little tipsy but it was great roomie bonding time. The next week or so I was just exploring the area more and enjoying life in the center. It was so nice to go out with friends and not have to take a bus anywhere and walk, oh yes, sooooo nice.

I was getting really anxious and excited for mine and Marissa's upcoming trip. She was in NYC up until the 15th so we had to send out our Couch Surfing requests while we were skyping with each other which was not a big deal. Accepts and Declines started pouring and we were starting to get an outline and it was so exciting! We were purposely picking people that spoke many languages, French, Spanish, Hebrew, English and Russian. It was going to be so great! In between that, I was helping promote the program to Taglit groups, volunteered some, talked to fundraisers for Bine - the program that subsidizes Tikkun Olam and just hung out and started reaching out to NGO's in the states. I started zoning in on jobs that require me to use my languages, even though Hebrew has completely replaced my Spanish at this point. But I love it so much! It's such a tachless (direct) language, it's hard to give it up. In any case, I am promising to stay true to my passions and to what I am good at, and I hope I will continue going this route when I am living in a box on the street. Staaaaaaaam! (Kidding.)