One long day

We got on the bus at 430 this morning, and were at the top of our first ridge davening by the time vasikin rolled around. We had an amazing day out on the trails. I am literally falling off my feet. I took some time to get the awesome pictures out for you so that you will have something to look at while you should be working. ;-) I am uploading about 35 of my really good pictures and the rest will come later. Good night,

PS. The link for the gallery is www.holylandphotos.smugmug.com

From The Wilderness

We are camped out in the middle of no where, and I still have service.  Day 1 of Hike.  We drove for a long time, and saw a few places.  We stopped at the border of Jordan, Egypt, and Israel.  It was amazing.  I took tons of pictures and will have to upload them later.  

We also stopped at a crater which was from a meteor.  It was a massive canyon, which means that was one huge crater.  Dinosaurs much?  

Now as the sun sets over the camp, and night deepens around us, the cold creeps within us.  The bbqs are lit and we are going to have a big bon fire later.  

Have a good night, I will post in the morning.

Night all,

Hope we dont loose anyone in the dark......  muahhahahahahahahaha

Shabbos In Jerusalem Part 2

Shabbos was a great experience. I was staying in the hotel Lev Yerushalayim, and eating at the Citidel. We davened at the Kotel on Friday night. When I got to the Kotel, the crowds were piling in and it was starting to fill up. As we were davening, I was looking around and I see one of my good friends (FE) coming towards me smiling. His Yeshiva was there for their Jerusalem shabbaton. So I switched to their minyan because it was Ashkanaz, and they were the loudest group there. It was awesome. Then after that I ate at the Citidel hotel, where the food is amazing. Absolutly incredible. I had lamb and potatoes and it was soooooo good. Then sleep. In a big bed. Sweet. The next morning we went to Rav Kahana's Shul. We were walking there and someone approached and asked if we needed a minyan. We said no, and as he was walking away we said we were going to Rav kahana's shul. The guy did a 180 and said perfect your the minyan. It was awesome. Then after shul we walked around the old city and ended up at the kotel. Then we went to the Citidel for lunch. The food was amazing again. So all in all it was a good shabbos. I am writing this quickly cause it is 11:15 pm here and we have a trip in the morning. We have shacharit at 7 am and then we leave on a 3 day hike to Eilat. It is going to be amazing!! I shall be taking tons of pictures and uploading them as I go. Have a good night all,
Jesse

Update

Shabbos was incredible.  I will post tomorrow my adventures.  I am exhausted now.  Good night,

Jesse

Good Shabbos

Hello,
This Shabbos I will be in Jerusalem and saturday night I will be hanging out in Jerusalem. Usually people go to Ben Yehuda, oooooo Ben Yehudah.  I got bored of it.  It is so buy food, buy clothes, by stuff, and eat.  With a little hanging out in there as well.  I prefer the better kept secret, what is popularly known as Amek.  This is the street Amek Refaim.  Much more civilized, fancier resturants draw a different polulation of people, the Talpiot mall (bowling and movie theater and mall) is close by, and it is just a better hang out place.  I might go there depending if I can get a crew together.  If not there is usually someone I know hangin out there anyway. 
I am on a bus right now going into Jerusalem, this mobile internet is amazing.  I have a USB modem that gives me internet over the Celcom cell phone network.  The speed is amazing especially on a bus.  Everyone in the tech world in America is making a big deal out of WiMax the new up and coming 4th Generation mobile internet service.  Well guess what, the cell phone network here is advanced.  I am getting 7.5 megabytes per second, and it is amazing.. I am right now on a us downloading a large file, streaming music over the internet and writing this post, while having 14 tabs open in firefox.  It is great!  lol.  Random tangent.  gtg thats my stop!
Good Shabbos!
Jesse

Jews for Judiasm

Good Evening,
We just had a very interesting presentation by the director of the Jerusalem Jews for Judaism and she had a very interesting story. She was a Christian Missionary, and step by step became Jewish. She is now working for Jews for Judaism as the director. Her story is great, and she spoke about some of the ways to counter missionaries. Very interesting. She is going on a speaking tour in America and has a few places on the East Coast. If anyone would like to have her come and speak at your shul or otherwise, contact me and she would be happy to add a stop to her trip. If you dont have my email, its ytu159@gmail.com
Otherwise it was a pretty normal day. In response to the comment, I went to the Kotel to daven Vasikin because it is an amazing thing to do. Between doing the mitzva first thing in the morning, to the sunrise you see, it is awesome. I was in Jerusalem the night before and was able to go from there, then went back to Yeshiva. Unfortunately I did not meed any blind people to assist.
I will again be at the kotel this Shabbos, as I will be in Jerusalem again for Shabbos, just me.
Thats all for now I have to run to shiur, maybe I will post later. ttyl,
Jesse

Long day

Today was a long day. It started with Vasikin minyan at the Kotel (sunrise prayers at the Western Wall. I had to be up at 5am. I am so tired. lol. I am going to sleep now. Sorry it is a short post but I am collapsing. Have a good night.
Jesse

Shabbos In Jerusalem

Hello,
Shabbos was amazing. We stayed at the Diaspora Yeshiva in the Old City, which is the famous Reb Shlomo Carlbach Yeshiva. We davened (prayed) at the Kotel on Friday night, and in the yeshiva for everything else. After davening we had a tour of the muslim quarter. Don't worry we had 24 hour security. We walked all over the old city and went up onto the roof of some family. From there we had an amazing view of the city, as well as straight into the courtyard of the dome of the rock. Interesting. Then we walked to the Kotel Katan, which is the other side of the Kotel a little bit further down. It is one of the closest places to the Kadosh Kedoshim we can get to. There were guards there watching the door. Then we sang Am Yisrael Chai, and other songs by the Kotel Katan. It was amazing. Then we had Shalut Shaddus on the roof of the Yeshiva. Then we davened Maariv by Dovid Hamelech's Kever, and sang Havdala in the same place.
On Friday night we had Rav Mati Berger speak to us. He was amazing, and talked about the inner child and the choice we have to be adults or children and stuff like that. He gave a lot to think about.
Saturday, we had an interesting speaker named Gil Lox. He has an amazing story all told in his book Coming back down to earth. I think that was what it was called. He was a good Jewish boy learning knife fighting in Japan. And thats how the story starts. I have to go to sleep so I will write more on him later.
Then Saturday night I had an interesting experience, that I want to tell over.
I was in the main bus terminal in Jerusalem, when a blind guy about my age comes over to my friends and I, and asks if we can help him. So I say "Sure, what do you need?"
So he says I need to get on my bus to Gilo and I dont know where it is. So I said sure. I took his hand and led him upstairs to the information desk. He asked the lady in hebrew to tell me in english where to go and what time the bus was. Amazingly I actually understood the Hebrew. So the info lady told me where it was and we went. We had to go down the 3 floors, outside, across the street, through the underground tunnel, across another street, and then to the left. As I sat him down in the stop he was thanking me like I was going to leave, and I told him I wasn't going anywhere. After all how can a blind guy know when his bus is there?
So I stayed with him, and we were talking the whole time. It turns out he knows 4 languages; English, Hebrew, French, and Arabic, and he is learning German. He was asking me about American politics and how do Americans vote while they are in Israel. So I explained to him about absentee ballots and the works. And then we were talking about studying for the year in Israel. His thirst for knowledge was incredible. He goes to Hebrew U and learns everything there. He was so inspirational, and I felt so good after that. So I just wanted to share that with you,
Have a good night,
Jesse

Concert!!!

Well we just got back into the apartments from the concert at the Yeshiva. It was amazing!!!!
I am processing the photos and videos as I write this. There are a lot of them, so I hope to have them up by tomorrow. We had Shlomo Katz play for us, it was a really moving show. Tonight, and tomorrow is the Yortziet of Reb Shlomo Carlbach, and Shlomo Katz's music is greatly influenced by Reb Shlomo. The pictures of Shlomo Katz are uploading now, and by the time you read this, they should be online in the gallery. The link is once again www.holylandphotos.smugmug.com
So, Thank you to the amazing Shlomo Katz for visiting and playing such a moving concert for us.
I will upload the videos later, I have to edit them a little bit. OK, it is late here and I have to be up early tomorrow, so i'm callin it quits. Have a good night,
Jesse

Much going on

Hello,
Things are starting to get busy as Yeshiva is in full swing. We have full shiur every day and this Shabbos we have a Jerusalem Shabbaton. The whole Yeshiva will be going to the old city for Shabbos, and it will be amazing. I will update you on that trip when I we get back. Unfortanately I cant take pictures. O well. I am working with JCorps here in Israel to set up events and help run everything. An event we are working on is a English speaking comedy event. If anyone has any contacts here in either newspapers or otherwise please send me an email. All help is appreciated.
Thank you,
Good Night All,
Jesse

I fixed it

Guess what?  I fixed the internet.  Thank G-d.  lol I was starting to go crazy already!  I am going into Jerusalem tonight as my work with JCorps continues.  For those of you who don't know, JCorps is an organization that gets people 18-28 together to do Chessed (acts of kindness), while hanging out.  For more info check out JCorps.org 

I am on the planning team for the Israel region, and I work doing technical stuff and anything else that my wide range of interests enables me to assist in.  ;-)  So tonight the 4 of us have a meeting, and I am heading into the big city.  Should be fun.  Till later,

Jesse

Internet down

heyo,
My internet is not working so I am writing from the computer room in school. Therefore my posts will be shorter and probably grammatically incorrect because I dont know how to type on a regular keyboard anymore. ;-) gotta run, I will write more later.
Jesse

Choppers

Hey,
There are choppers that fly overhead every once and a while, and every so often I hear the familiar sound of fighter planes screaming overhead. I have just learned that apparently we are on a flightpath to a base close by, as well as if there is gonna be an operation in Gaza they fly over us. Interesting tidbit.
In other news the weather still cant make up its mind, although it has been nice weather for a few days now. I found a store here that sells Cheese its yay!
For those who would like I have put a chat with me on the side bar of the blog. Any time I am logged into gmail you can chat with me through that, regardless if you have gmail or not. Just start typing, then wait for me to respond. If I take a little bit its cause I haven't seen it and just say hi again or something like that. Be creative. ;-) Enjoy!
Jesse

Time for some campaigning

It is happening on a smaller scale closer to home, for me anyway. The town which we are living in Bet Shemesh is having elections for Mayor. The yahoo group is full of people talking about who is good, and who knows what. It's interesting watching it happen in Israel, as it is the development of a large and fairly new town. We are expanding, and one of the candidates is talking about a full medical center with its own emergency room and everything. It's really intense.
Anyway that was just a small part of the holy land brought to you by the letter Alef and .....
Ok, going to sleep now, till next time,
Good Night

New Photos

Hello,
I have just put up new pictures. More to come later. The link in case you forgot, http://holylandphotos.smugmug.com/
Enjoy!
Jesse

Palmach

Today we hiked the path known as the Path of the Lamed Hey. This is the story of the Palmach soldiers who went to help the besieged Gush Etzion. They never made it. We hiked the mountain they hiked to get to the city. It was one heck of a hike. We are all exhausted. It was straight up and right back down again. The view was amazing though. As soon as I figure out how, I will upload all my pictures. I am having some trouble uploading. I am working on it and will let you know as soon as I have new pictures live. Later,
Jesse

My mistake

It was pointed out to me that Obama is only 8 years younger then George W was when he took office. I had forgotten that Ol' Dubya has 2 terms under his belt. Oops. ok.
In other news the world is also in love with Obama, and Asia, Europe, and others welcome him. Interesting.
Tomorrow we will be going on the path of the Lamed Hey soldiers. I will have a better description tomorrow, as well as pictures.
Looks like we get to do the whole election thing all over again, as the Israeli government prepares for elections. Fun. I will keep you all updated on that as it unfolds.
There is a bit of fighting going on in Gaza lately. The IDF went into Gaza and took out 6 militants, and royally pissed off the arabs. The arabs were planning a large kidnapping operation as well as getting ready to launch rockets on Israel. They retaliated by launching those rockets into Israel. 40 rockets and shells were shot into Israel, and thank G-d no one was hurt. More on this story as I get it. But for now, I shall go to sleep,
Good Night America

New President

An interesting process took place yesterday, with record number of people coming out to vote. Over here it was just as interesting, everyone running to the computer to check the news, the interactive maps, just trying to see if there was any change from when they looked 15 minutes ago. Everyone was watching with bated breath to see what was going to happen. There was an interesting statistic on one of the sites, I don't know if I believe it, 78% of Jews voted for Obama.
With a friend base of Muslims, and not the greatest outlook on the scenario here in Israel I would think it would be otherwise. Or maybe it was just that everyone wanted another young Kennedy type in office. Kennedy was 43 when he was elected into office making him the youngest elected president, and definitely a vibrant one. He was the 6th most popular according to a survey taken a few years back.
Obama, who is actually 47, looks 30 and holds a commanding youthful air about him, seems popular on those reasons alone, but lets see how popular he will be behind the presidential desk. He is more then 20 years younger then Dubya was when he took office, and has a young family that people can relate too. While McCain would have (according to analysts ) been better for Israel, Obama does have good qualities as well. He actually went to Columbia and Harvard Law, and seems like a good guy. So try to look at the bright side on this one and maybe he can actually do some good. All we can do is just wait and see. Or you could organize a massive rally against him on the White House lawn..... lol. We shall see how America and the rest of the world reacts. Till later,
Jesse

Internet Issues

Now that I finally got the internet setup in the Yeshiva I can use the school computers to post. The reason I have to do that is because my laptop is messed up and needs to be fixed. When I use the internet on my friends computer and try to access the blog Google thinks that his computer is a spam bot. So this also explains why I have not posted in a few days. Been kinda stuck in a pickle. Any way what has happened in the past few days.... We went to a Tefillin and klaf factory which smelled terrible. The reason it smelled so bad is because they were dealing with skin of cow. yuch. In other news we are in full swing back in yeshiva and are learning again. I have lots of pictures to post and will do that shortly.
In other other news I have effectively taken over the tech end of the Yeshiva and will be working closely with them to bring many of our Shiurim to you via the website. We will also be launching a new video section so that new people looking at the yeshiva as well as alumni can see whats going on here. Well, thats all for now folks, ill post more later!
Jesse