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So I have a whole lot to catch up on. Instead of going through every little boring thing I've done I think I'm just gonna summarize and tell you guys the stuff you'll prolly find interesting.

I need to catch you all up on the last week and a half of Bat Yam and the first two weeks of Arad.

Sunday 2/21
Arts did their "Winter Event", a series of songs and skits and the visual people displayed what they made. (As I'm sure my mom would know I would remember) they had yummy little fancy crackers and such.

Tuesday 2/23
Shevet had a mask workshop with an Israeli actress. We learned about the different basic masks and she had us try to act in them. I was pushed into wearing one where you aren't allowed to speak and you have to use body language to convey emotion. I was unsuccessful.
Went to Dialogue in the Dark. We got there (by cab which YC treated) and walked through a series of rooms with no light led by a visually impaired woman. It was kinda scary at first but super cool.

Wednesday 2/24
Tried to frantically pack, but ended up napping.

Thursday 2/25
Shuk in the morning, then got amazing chummus in Yaffo with Katie. Had a "Cultural Evening" where we saw a group called Tararam preform some crazy drumming and dancing and then went to a Subliminal concert. The concert was eh, they're not so great live. But it was still fun and something to do.

Shabbat 2/26-27
Shevet Shabbat. The schedule I have doesn't say where we were and I can't remember the name. Ein something. We had some purim classes and did the usual shabbat stuff. Saturday night was a Purim/Birthday party.

Sunday 2/28
Went to Benedicts with Katie and got pancakes.
Seudat Purim and Megila reading for Shevet.

Monday 3/1
Adloyada parade in Holon. It was amazing. Started out crappy, I was tired and cold and hungry and annoyed. It wouldn't stop raining. But we did the parade anyway. I was on a bike with a huge man made of chicken wire and fabric on the back of it. It was supposed to be the Israeli version of Hansel and Gretel, Max and something. But in this version the kids are super dirty and they get eaten. Yea. So I rode the bike in the rain and it was glorious and people were so happy and I got all these compliments, even though I looked like wet poo.

Tuesday 3/2
Had our final peula with Ami. Kinda sad but we made it fun. I somehow wore the exact same outfit as someone else. A boy someone else. I was wearing the shirt we got from scouts weekend and Katie's black genie pants and flip flops. Yoni was wearing the same exact thing. What are the odds? It made me laugh all day.
Had a "Farewell evening from Bat Yam and Tzofim" I got an award for Best Volunteer. The award was a balloon. It was beautiful, but I decided to leave it in Bat Yam with Shira. Hung out with Shira and with Yoni. Wanted more people to hang out but everybody was packing.

Wednesday 3/3
Moved to Arad. Cried like a baby. Moved into my apartment. Ben Yair 7. Live next to Ale which is wonderful. My room: Me, Katie, Julia. It's nice and cozy, not too small. I got bottom bunk and I hung pictures from Heather and letters from people and photos. The other bedroom is Allison, Nikki, and Katie Frankel. Their room is pretty tiny but they go on Marva soon so I think it'll be allright. We have one bathroom and a living area and a kitchen. The layout is pretty weird but it works. I fell asleep when we got home and Katie brought all my stuff up the stairs, we're on the third floor. Super nice of her. We went to the school where we will have classes and met our madrich, Alex. He's also the Shevet Madrich. We ate mass amounts of crappy pizza and got to know each other. Somehow Emily and her acne came up. Yea, didn't take long for people here to realize I'm not so normal.

Thursday 3/4
Got up around 8 and got our pots together. Ate some crunch cereal. Got our stuff koshered. We had an orientation of sorts and learned about the rules we've already heard three times over. I went to the doctor with Ale and Julia. My eye was bothering me and I thought I prolly had a throat infection. Got eye drops and throat spray. More orientation I thnk.

Friday 3/5
Scavenger hunt. Ale and my apartment versus a couple other apartments. We had to go around Arad and find various things. We won :) and go to know the area. Went shopping for Shabbat and started to cook. Had a peula in the desert with Alex. Went home and finished cooking, had our first dinner together.

Saturday 3/6
The whole group went on a hike together to somewhere in the desert. Realized what we thought was a broken fridge was actually an unplugged fridge. I was pissed, but nothing spoiled.

Sunday 3/7
Went for a walk with Katie before class. Thought I could keep it up and do it every day. So far it hasn't happened. Had our first Ulpan. It's a really small class. Oh wait, so basically my schedule is
sunday-wednesday
ulpan 9:45- 1
lunch 1-2:30
jewish medical ethics 2:30-4:15
intro to tanach 5:30-7
thursdays: shevet

anyways. So my hebrew class is pretty small. The teacher's name is Michal. She's a student at Ben Gurion. She's very nice and a pretty good teacher. It's a long class but we only have this schedule for this month and then we switch to volunteering. I went to a place called Amigos in the mall with Ale for lunch and we got burritos. Not the best but pretty good. Had Jewish Medical Ethics next. Interesting teacher. He goes by Yeruham but his given name is Frank. Next I tried basic concepts of something or other with this Canadian teacher, but I've switched since then to the Tanach class with the Scottish teacher.

Monday 3/8
Went to the Arad shuk with Katie during our lunch break. It's cute, it's no Machane Yehuda or Shuk Hacarmel but it has tons of produce that's fresh and cheap. Some of the people aren't very nice, Katie and I got to hear the words prostitute in hebrew and russian, but it's fine. Some people just don't like it when you don't buy their stuff and keep walking. Switched into tanach. I like it a lot. I actually like all my classes in Arad a lot. They are crazy long but the teachers are all great and the material is interesting. A few of the scouts came to visit that night. Yay scouts. And Joe Cohen was here. Idk if I've mentioned him on here but he's my friend who lives in England that periodically visits Israel.

Tuesday 3/9
Class as usual. Afterwards we made cookies with Alex for our neighbors, which ended up just being for us, which I didn't get any of. Sad day. Went to Kadim with Joe and caught up some. Had an apartment crisis relating to people being stupid and irresponsible and alcohol. Narrowly avoiding getting in trouble for other people's stupidity.

Wednesday 3/10
First Lunch and Learn! It's not like it was in Jeru or Bat Yam since now it's this Rabbi instead of BG but it's still nice I suppose. The food is very eh but hopefully this will change. There was a big party I didn't go to, ended up talking to Ben for a few hours and that was pretty much my night.

Thursday 3/11
Kfar Chabad with Shevet. Saw the Matzah factory and the etrog field and learned a bit about the Rebbe and such. Got dropped off in Tel Aviv so we (Rachel, Katie, Jessica, and I) took a bus to Jeru and stayed in Katie's place in Rechavia for the night.

Friday 3/12
Friday morning we walked to Emek and met with Mike for brunch. He surprised us by bringing Ami. It was so nice! Took a bus after to Har Choma and got to Jenene's. It was so hot I thought I was going to pass out. Napped for a while and then we ate and eventually sleep again. Yay family :)

Saturday: 3/13
Tanned with Joanna for a while. Then had shabbat lunch. Amazing, as always. More tanning. The British kids from my section were all in Jerusalem that weekend for a Masa weekend and they had a coach leaving for Arad that night. I could go on the bus with them so long as i got to the bus before it left. They were at the Judean Youth hostel in Givat Masua. I was a good 40 minutes away from where they were when they told me they were leaving in 20 minutes. I bit off all my pretty fingernails :(. I got a ride to Pat and then took a cab to the youth hostel for 24 sheks. I made it! So that was great. We got to Arad and I went to dinner with a few of the Brits. They all got fish and chips. I got chocolate mousse. Yum. Went to Ale's after this with Orly and did my hebrew homework. Then went home and went to bed.

Sunday 3/14
Watched an Israeli TV show in Ulpan about a secular Russian family moving into Benai Brak. Went home for lunch and I was going to make Katie and I eggs and she was boiling potatoes. Somehow we ended up making egg drop soup. It was actually delicious. Medical ethics as usual. We had Tanach class outside. It was a nice change, but it did get dark halfway through. Spoke to my mom on the way home. Apartment meeting was after class. Found out about an iPad competition that year course is doing that I'm going to take part in. You post pictures on YC's facebook wall and the more you put the more chances you have of winning. You can do three a day until April 15th. Katie and I went grocery shopping. We went with Ale and Orly to Muza's, there was something going on for this girl Evie's birthday. We stayed for a while and then came home.

Monday: 3/15
Woke up at 8ish and did my hebrew homework. Had some cereal and went to class. Ulpan until 1 and then went to the shuk with Katie. We got a buncha nice produce and were hardly harassed. Went home to drop off the food we bought and we had lunch together. Ate a ridiculous amount of corn in a very short period of time. Went to medical ethics. I uploaded photos for the Year Course iPad competition on Catelyn's computer in between classes. I went outside to wait until Tanach started. I dosed off and no one noticed me on their way to class so I was a few minutes late. After Tanach came home and started to cook dinner. Made meat sauce with Katie but we realized we weren't very hungry so we will eat it later. She went to see Jessica and I was supposed to shower, blog, do my hebrew homework, and upload photos. Some of these things happened. Will hopefully be able to post this blog tomorrow, as of now I'm working backwards from now until the last week of Bat Yam.

Tuesday 3/16
Ulpan as usual. Had a delicious peach yogurt. Apparently it is the only kind of yogurt that I actually like. I went with Ale to the mall to meet up with our film teacher from Jerusalem for lunch. Katie and Jessica and Ami came as well. We ate too much pizza and chitchatted. He told me to rethink my college plans. I don't know if FSU is still in my future. Miami? Gainesville? ...Out of state? (Prolly not) So after lunch had Medical Ethics. We spoke about organ transplants. Then I went home and washed my hair so people could check and see if I have lice without having to pick through dirty hair. Went to Tanach and we discussed some Judaism. After class we had a movie and pizza night with the madrichim. Then did some hebrew homework with Ale and now attempting to catch up on blogging. Jessica, Rachel, Leah, Tamar, Charlie, a few other people, and Katie have lice. This is bad. I was checked by Charlie and Leah and they didn't see anything...

Wednesday 3/17
Had a lice scare. Tamar found three nits in my hair, about an inch and a half from my scalp. People were mean when I told them I thought I had lice and they made me cry. Rude. Did some lice research. The internet told me that if you have nits in your hair but they are more than a cm from your scalp that you don't need to treat. So I've been combing and checking and conditioning and I haven't found anything else. Probably will have to get treatment eventually but really don't want to deal with the time and expense and mess with my already pretty crappy hair. It's now Sunday and I still haven't found anything else in my hair so I'm prolly good.
At midnight Katie gave me a letter and put posters all over my bed and gave me this necklace that I really wanted.<3

Thursday 3/18
Birthday.
Katie made me eggs and pancakes and OJ.
Shevet siyyur to Kibbutz Ketura. There was only ten or so of us. It was pretty awesome. Played in sand dunes and made pitas and painted and had a bbq. Camera does not want to work. I think sand got in it. I don't know what to do :(. Got dropped in Be'er Sheva, took a bus to Jeru, walked to Katie's apartment, showered and checked for lice (none!). Went to take out my contacts before bed. I only had one. The one weekend I didn't bring my glasses with me. Crap.

Friday 3/19
Walked to Beit Ar El in the morning. Got on a bus for Desert Queen. Went to a forest somewhere near Mova Modim. Got a Desert Queen shirt (they had sweaters but not enough, sad.) Met some cool Australians. Did random games/activities. Got a goodie bag full of random stuff. They had keychains in them with the chagal windows from Hadassah hospital with the tribes names on them. I switched with Ale so I could have Benjamin :). It's so pretty. I got a ride from a woman who lives in Jerusalem to Har Choma so I didn't have to take a city bus. Yay. Got to Jenene's and did the usual eating and sleeping and eating and sleeping. I was so happy when I got there, it had been a sorta stressful couple of days.

Saturday 3/20
Hung out with the family and ate and napped. Left right after Shabbat so I could try and catch the 7:50 bus Katie Rachel and Jessica were going on. i missed it but Ale waited for me and we got the 8:10 to Be'er Sheva. Nikki and Katie Frankel (my apartment-mates) were also on the bus. Ate apple cake and cookies from Jenene's :). Took another bus to Arad. Came home and did more blogginggg. Almost caught up now, just need to find the schedule from the first week in Arad. Getting in and out of Arad is crazy expensive and annoying. poo.

Sunday 3/21
Normal day. Tried to fix camera. Might have resulted in further hurting camera. Will probably need to wait until I get home to see if it can be repaired. Sad day. But I can still take pictures on the iPhone. Finally caught up on my blog!!
A bird made it's nest on our kitchen windowsill. Cool. Alex says we are going to hate the noise when it hatches, but we refuse to throw it off.