Thursday, classes, blah. Was getting sick. Yuck. Then! around 6, Sarah and I headed up to the Kfar to have a planning session with Tammy. We hung out in her room and figured out the most amazing plan for the weekend...I had looked earlier online for a hostel and found...........MONGOLIAN TENTS. Yes, you heard me. Mongolian tents. In the Golan (the mountains in the North of Israel). Sweet. We called the lady, got info, called some boys to invite them to come with us so the price would be lowered...and got a tent! and a plan! And then we listened to Tammy read her amazing amazing novel in progress to us, and it is amazing, and she should be published like NOW even though it's only four pages long. the girl's got talent! and an amazing reading voice. anyways. after we left her we were supposed to eat with Leah but she cancelled on us, so Sarah and I went by ourselves to Domino's and got cheesybread (me) an
d pizza (her). Then we walked home. And watched the first two episodes of House, season 1. Happiness.
Friday morning I got up, showered, packed, ate...Sarah and I caught the 11:15ish bus to the Central Bus Station, although the others missed that one and caught the next one. We got to the station and bought Challah for Shabbos, then walked around a little and then found our platform for the bus. We waited and waited...finally Tammy, Uriel (Argentinian) and Hebi (Chinese) showed up, though there was no sign of Tessa (Australian...ain't we a multi-cultural bunch?). The others left me with the bags and went to buy tickets. Then I went to pee. Then we got on the bus, but still no Tessa!!! She was coming from
Talpiot and I dunno what happened, but basically the bus was supposed to leave at 12:15 and somehow Tammy made them wait and Tessa got there at like 12:16. It was scary! But crisis #1 was averted, and we all settled in for the ride.
A few hours later, we passed the sign for Givat Yoav, where the hostel was located, and I was kind of worried, so Tammy called the lady and basically we had missed our stop. We got off at the next one and the lady, Sara, was super-nice and came to get us...All six of us piled in, Tammy on my lap, Tessa in the trunk with the bags...got to the tents, Sara showed us around and then took everyone but me and Sarah to the supermarket to buy foodz for the weekend. like i said, she was super-nice. They came back, we settled in and munched on food and read our books. Then Tessa went in search of internet for a project, and the rest of us headed off on a walk. it was AMAZING. There was the most spectacular view of the Kinneret, or the Sea of Galilee, and the sun was shining in such a way as to make a piece of the lake SILVER. here, look!
It was...just...wowwwww. I took maybe 20 pictures of it. most gorgeous thing i've ever seen everrrr. we kept going for a while, then turned back and found Tessa. Hung out for a while more, singing and just chilling. Tessa and Hebi started cooking, but the main stuff--the barbecue stuff--had to wait til after 9, when one of the barbecues was free. Then we dug in! the center of the tent, the table and floor, were covered in dishes...it was amazing and happy and great. After dinner we cleaned up and sang and I brushed Tessa's inSANEly long hair and it was amazing and happy and great. Eventually we went to bed around 1am. I didn't sleep very much, because the pillows were too hard and tall and people snored. Oh well. Around 9am we all started moving...Got up slowly, sat outside with our books and had a simple breakfast...well, all except Uriel and Hebi, who had eggs and eggplant and such. We then got our act together, and headed out on the trail! We hiked for a good four hours...We went off the real beaten path and waded through some weeds/wildflowers...Tammy and Tessa broke off in search of a distant path we could see, and the rest of us made our way back to a more beaten path. We ran into some other hikers, including this guy leading a group of kids who had a bucket full of ice water and let us dip our hats! so nice. We wandered, made some random decisions on which way to go, stopped and had lunch, got more lost, saw SPECTACULAR views...eventually, when we were running out of water and getting really tired, we found our way to the highway! From there it was easy to get back to Givat Yoav. There was a convenience store open, even on Shabbos, which was seriously heaven-sent. We had soda and used the facilities, then the other girls called and said they were back so we headed back to the tents. Once there we just hung out more, rested, ate some snacks, and figured out how to get home. At 8 o'clock a taxi came and picked us up and drove us to Tiberias. Even though it was dark, there were certain points on the way where i was like, oh, we saw this from the mountain today! it was surreal. we got to Tiberias and found where the bus to Jerusalem went...got on with no problem...i sat with Hebi, who told me a lot about life in Shanghai. It was really interesting, I didn't know a lot of what he was telling me. He's a really cool guy, not even Jewish but decided to come to Israel because he liked the spirit. he got here last february, spent a few months on a Kibbutz, then started at Hebrew U...and he's already in level Heh (5)! He's quite amazing. He wants to go to college in Canada next year (he's only 19, hasn't gone to college yet besides this), because it is cheaper than the US, and unlike Uriel who got a scholarship to Yale, Hebi for some reason does not qualify for enough aid to make it possible. I listened to some music for the second half of the trip. We got back to the CBS around 11:15 i think, caught the 23 bus home, and yeah. Crashed. loaded pictures. ate a can of tuna in like three minutes flat. Talked to Kimo. then sleep.
Today I woke up late because I hadn't set my alarm right...Em came in from being at her cousins, and was like, shaina are you going to class? it's 9:53! and i'm like...guess not. I felt/feel like shit anyways, cuz i have a shitty cold. i called my boss at work and told her i couldnt come in, and she was very understanding. so i basically had a weekend day! I made banana pancakes which i'm sure were very yummy but i couldnt really taste. I took a shower, which hurt my sunburn. I wrote my midterm that's due tomorrow. I talked to the boy and the parents. I hung out with Sarah and made chicken and cheese sandwiches in her roomie's panini maker. i loaded my pictures from yesterday. good times.
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it sounds like you had a lot of fun! Hostels are great. I had never been in one until I came to Korea. The one I go to in Seoul has bunk beds for 10 people but there are curtains for each bed to give you privacy which is really nice. that seems like the exception though.
ReplyDeletei will definitely be looking more into hostels if i need to go somewhere and dont have a lot of money.
Glad it went as well as it did! You deserve a good time