The Seventh Plague

כבר הגעתי הביתה וירד הברד והיוּ קוֹלוֹת וברקים בשמים

I figured some Hebrew was in order, even if it is possibly erroneous. So I got back from the Ramah Poconos reunion at the Goldstein Center (where Seminar takes place) (more on this later), and was talking on my cell phone below a relatively clear sky, although I see what I think is lightning (though I hear no thunder, so discount to be some messed up street lamp. I go inside and upstairs and I begin to hear loud clanging. I open the window, and sure enough there is a massively heavy hail falling with thunder and lightning in the background. As our Torah reading cycle has just passed the first seven plagues of egypt, the seventh being hail, I got to thinking as I stuck my hand out the window and was painfully pummelled by grape-sized hailstones. I was thinking, "that hurts...".

Anyway, the Ramah thing. So I didn't actually know about any Ramah things until last week when I found out after the deadline about the Ramah Shabbaton. There is a waiting list so what can I do... I didn't find out about the Poconos reunion until this very afternoon. There is also a California one on Tuesday. Nobody knew I was in Israel. Actually, I technically never left Canada as I never got an exit visa stamp in my passport. So I know of people that didn't make even the waiting list that are going to crash but I don't want to deal with it, I want to עוֹשה רוֹשם טוֹב, make a good impression on the Ramah Israel people and crashing a Shabbaton might not be the best way to meet them. So my Shabbat is going to be a שבּת שבּתוֹן, a Sabbath of complete rest. Hopefully I get 12 hours of sleep like I did last week. Tgat was awesome... and sorely needed.

It was really nice to see so many people from camp, including many of the Israelis who I missed talking politics with (Israeli politics is one of my passions, you see, and we discussed it often this past summer). I actually ran into most of the Americans at the שוּק, Shuq (sorry, that's how you translate it; I guess you can say "open-air market") two weeks ago. However there were also a lot of people who I didn't know were in Israel and it was great to see them.

In other news, I am subletting an apartment for a month beginning tomorrow on Yochanan Ben Zakkai. Finally I can unpack my bags and sleep on a relatively normal bed!

I watched Law & Order: SVU and F*R*I*E*N*D*S last night. And you thought Israel wasn't civilized...

Shabbat Shalom, שבת שלוֹם,
Matt משה