so i have just gotten home from my first year at university. on a scale of 1-10 i would rate my first year an 8. socially it was amazing, i met a ridiculous amount of people, and made so many new friends from so many places. though i had a bit of a rocky start with getting along with new people and not having my mom to make sure i go to class or do my homework or eat something, i was happy i was forced into growing up and forced into this world. something else i loved so much was pledging a sorority. i pledged, and i loved it. i dont know if anyone has heard of what pledging a sorority is like, it is called hazing most of the time. but the pledging i went through was amazing. it was an experience i would never give back in a million years and i will never regret as long as i live. i spent 24 hours a day 7 days a week, for 7 weeks with 18 girls i knew nothing about and they are now truely my sisters. we have gotten so close and it is such an amazing bond. if anyone is questioning pledging a sorority or fraternity please ask me about it because i will make you want to do it so badly it hurts. i have never felt so much like i fit in and like i have finally found my place. it teaches u things about urself and other people that u will never learn. anyway regardless of pledging i wanted to discuss the real university life of education, not all the drinking and partying that goes on, but what goes on in the lecture halls, labs, discussion classrooms. i was not so happy with the education because i have always felt college to be the place where u finally get to learn what u want to learn, things u are interested in and it seemed to me, i was taking such boring classes that i had no conection to because of "requirements". Requirements is the most dreaded word in college curriculum. there are so many of them in order to graduate, or in order to declare a particular major, its appalling that i have to take so many extra classes just so i can get to the psychology classes which i want to take. now dont get me wrong, i love my school, i cant wait to go back and some of the classes that i was required to take were actually very interesting. anyway..point is...the first year is over, i survived and i learned so much about myself and now it is time to go back to reality. this is something a friend from school actually sent me...so those of u about to embark on the journey of college, wanting to know what it feels like or those of u who already been there and want to reminisce a little bit, here u go...

A year has past and now we stand on the brink of returning to a world where we are surrounded by the paradox of everything yet nothing being the same. In a few weeks we will reluctantly give our hugs and, fighting the tears, say goodbye to the people who were once just names on a sheet of paper to return to people that we hugged and fought tears to say goodbye to before we ever left. We will leave our best friends to return to our best friends. We will go back to places we came from and go back to the same things we did last summer and every summer before. We will come into town on that same familiar road, and even thought it has been months, it will seem like only yesterday.

As you walk into your old bedroom, every emotion will pass through you as you reflect on the way your life has changed and the person you have become. You suddenly realize that the things that were most important to you a year ago don't seem to matter so much anymore, and the things you hold highest now, no one at home will completely understand. Who will you call first? Where are you going to work? Who will be at the party Saturday night? What has everyone been up to? Who from school will you keep in touch with? How long before you actually start missing people barging in without calling or knocking? Who will get breadsticks with you at three in the morning? How long until you adjust to sleeping in a room by yourself, or how long before you realize your three best friends aren't in the bed next to your room?

Then you realize how much things have changed, you realize the hardest part of college is balancing the two completely different worlds you now live in, trying desperately to hold on to everything all the while trying to figure out what you have to leave behind. In the matter of one day's traveling time, we will leave our world of living next door to our best friends, walking across campus to eat, instant messenger, 8:00 classes, and perpetual procrastination to a world that will seem foreign to us despite the fact that we have lived in it for nineteen years.

But it is different now... We now know the meaning of true friendship. We know whom we have kept in touch with over the past year and whom we hold dearest to our hearts. We've left our high school worlds to deal with the real world. We have had our hearts broken, we've fallen in love, we've helped our best friends through the toughest times of their lives, something their even best friends at home couldn't be there for. We've stayed up all night just to be there for a friend. We've partied the night away, doing stupid stuff, but we were always there for each other afterwards. There have been times when we've felt so helpless being hours away from home when we know our families or friends needed us most, and there are times when we know we have made a difference.

A few weeks from now we will leave. A few weeks from now we take down our pictures, and pack up our clothes. No more going next door to do nothing for hours on end. We will leave our friends whose random emails and phone calls will bring us to laughter and tears this summer. We will take our memories and dreams and put them away for now, saving them for our return to this world.

A few weeks from now from now we will arrive. A few weeks from now we will unpack our bags and have dinner with our families. We will drive over to our best friend's house and do nothing for hours on end. We will return to the same friends whose random emails and phone calls have brought us laughter and tears over the past year. We will unpack old memories and dreams that have been put away for the past year.

A few weeks from now we will dig deep inside to find the strength and conviction to adjust to change and still keep each other close. And somehow, in someway, we will find our place between these two worlds.




so i am now adjusting, as i go into the summer, i will be teaching swimming lessons once again, and i will be getting back into the swing of things, but its an adjustment that takes a lot of work..especially with parents being around now.

for those of u who will be starting college at the end of this summer...welcome to your life, take as much as u can get out of it, take all of ur memories with u, meet as many new people as possible, laugh as much as possible, try new things, and dont be afraid to grow up...because ur gonna be forced to...

so i have just gotten home from my first year at university. on a scale of 1-10 i would rate my first year an 8. socially it was amazing, i met a ridiculous amount of people, and made so many new friends from so many places. though i had a bit of a rocky start with getting along with new people and not having my mom to make sure i go to class or do my homework or eat something, i was happy i was forced into growing up and forced into this world. something else i loved so much was pledging a sorority. i pledged, and i loved it. i dont know if anyone has heard of what pledging a sorority is like, it is called hazing most of the time. but the pledging i went through was amazing. it was an experience i would never give back in a million years and i will never regret as long as i live. i spent 24 hours a day 7 days a week, for 7 weeks with 18 girls i knew nothing about and they are now truely my sisters. we have gotten so close and it is such an amazing bond. if anyone is questioning pledging a sorority or fraternity please ask me about it because i will make you want to do it so badly it hurts. i have never felt so much like i fit in and like i have finally found my place. it teaches u things about urself and other people that u will never learn. anyway regardless of pledging i wanted to discuss the real university life of education, not all the drinking and partying that goes on, but what goes on in the lecture halls, labs, discussion classrooms. i was not so happy with the education because i have always felt college to be the place where u finally get to learn what u want to learn, things u are interested in and it seemed to me, i was taking such boring classes that i had no conection to because of "requirements". Requirements is the most dreaded word in college curriculum. there are so many of them in order to graduate, or in order to declare a particular major, its appalling that i have to take so many extra classes just so i can get to the psychology classes which i want to take. now dont get me wrong, i love my school, i cant wait to go back and some of the classes that i was required to take were actually very interesting. anyway..point is...the first year is over, i survived and i learned so much about myself and now it is time to go back to reality. this is something a friend from school actually sent me...so those of u about to embark on the journey of college, wanting to know what it feels like or those of u who already been there and want to reminisce a little bit, here u go...

A year has past and now we stand on the brink of returning to a world where we are surrounded by the paradox of everything yet nothing being the same. In a few weeks we will reluctantly give our hugs and, fighting the tears, say goodbye to the people who were once just names on a sheet of paper to return to people that we hugged and fought tears to say goodbye to before we ever left. We will leave our best friends to return to our best friends. We will go back to places we came from and go back to the same things we did last summer and every summer before. We will come into town on that same familiar road, and even thought it has been months, it will seem like only yesterday.

As you walk into your old bedroom, every emotion will pass through you as you reflect on the way your life has changed and the person you have become. You suddenly realize that the things that were most important to you a year ago don't seem to matter so much anymore, and the things you hold highest now, no one at home will completely understand. Who will you call first? Where are you going to work? Who will be at the party Saturday night? What has everyone been up to? Who from school will you keep in touch with? How long before you actually start missing people barging in without calling or knocking? Who will get breadsticks with you at three in the morning? How long until you adjust to sleeping in a room by yourself, or how long before you realize your three best friends aren't in the bed next to your room?

Then you realize how much things have changed, you realize the hardest part of college is balancing the two completely different worlds you now live in, trying desperately to hold on to everything all the while trying to figure out what you have to leave behind. In the matter of one day's traveling time, we will leave our world of living next door to our best friends, walking across campus to eat, instant messenger, 8:00 classes, and perpetual procrastination to a world that will seem foreign to us despite the fact that we have lived in it for nineteen years.

But it is different now... We now know the meaning of true friendship. We know whom we have kept in touch with over the past year and whom we hold dearest to our hearts. We've left our high school worlds to deal with the real world. We have had our hearts broken, we've fallen in love, we've helped our best friends through the toughest times of their lives, something their even best friends at home couldn't be there for. We've stayed up all night just to be there for a friend. We've partied the night away, doing stupid stuff, but we were always there for each other afterwards. There have been times when we've felt so helpless being hours away from home when we know our families or friends needed us most, and there are times when we know we have made a difference.

A few weeks from now we will leave. A few weeks from now we take down our pictures, and pack up our clothes. No more going next door to do nothing for hours on end. We will leave our friends whose random emails and phone calls will bring us to laughter and tears this summer. We will take our memories and dreams and put them away for now, saving them for our return to this world.

A few weeks from now from now we will arrive. A few weeks from now we will unpack our bags and have dinner with our families. We will drive over to our best friend's house and do nothing for hours on end. We will return to the same friends whose random emails and phone calls have brought us laughter and tears over the past year. We will unpack old memories and dreams that have been put away for the past year.

A few weeks from now we will dig deep inside to find the strength and conviction to adjust to change and still keep each other close. And somehow, in someway, we will find our place between these two worlds.




so i am now adjusting, as i go into the summer, i will be teaching swimming lessons once again, and i will be getting back into the swing of things, but its an adjustment that takes a lot of work..especially with parents being around now.

for those of u who will be starting college at the end of this summer...welcome to your life, take as much as u can get out of it, take all of ur memories with u, meet as many new people as possible, laugh as much as possible, try new things, and dont be afraid to grow up...because ur gonna be forced to...

so today is my birthday. i'm now 19 years old. honestly i dont feel any different than i did yesterday so i dunno maybe it'll hit me in a while. so since i'm in israel my birthday is not what i was expecting obviously if i was home with my friends. when i get home we're going to do something. but it was nice here too. last night we were out, my sister, my cousin and my "friend" and we went to a bar and hung out and stuff and they brought me ice cream and candles and sang when it hit midnight which was nice. so i liked that. i dunno i've never celebrated my birthday with anyone other than my immediate family and my best friends from new york. but this year was different and i cant complain about any of it....

so this tsunami that has taken place...i dont know how many of you have had a direct connection with it but i would like to share how my family was effected....after people are released from army duty in israel, most go on trips, mainly to thailand. so my aunt was released from the army about 6 months ago and after she got some money together travelled to thailan. a day before the tsunami hit, she was to start her next adventure, through sri lanka. my 26 year old aunt is quite the adventurer and was travelling alone but meeting people along the way of course and having a great time. that sunday at about 9 was when it hit. she was in the room of her hostel with an american boy named matthew, right by the beach. the following is just what i remember her telling me about the 4 days of hell that she recounted to my family last night. so sunday morning they were a little bit hung over from having partied the night before and sue and matthew heard the beach rather close to their room, a lot louder than it should be. sue woke up and all of a sudden saw water coming through the door into the room of their guesthouse. so she woke matthew up and thinking it was just a flood they put all of their bags on top of their beds and than started to walk towards the door. all of a sudden sue saw matthew trying to close the door because water was coming in and than it hit them, the tsunami had entered their room. sue and matt were knocked against the wall. she didnt know which way was up or down and thinking she was stuck under the bed sue didnt panic and reached for matt but he was nowhere to be found. than sue realized that the guesthouse was gone, it was crushed, she was stuck under the water. struggling to find a way to pick her head up to breathe after what seemed like forever she finally took a breath and saw matthew had been carried to the opposite side of where she was. she kept being carried and thrown by the water, against trees against cars, anything that was in the way and at one point the spoke of a bicycle actually was stuck in her arm and in order to keep with the flow of the water she needed to grab onto a tree and pull the metal spike out of her skin. she showed us the hole it left. for what seemed like a lifetime sue was thrown about by the water not knowing where anyone else was, matthew nowhere to be found. finally she found herself in the jungles of sri lanka and once the water came down a little bit in a village somewhere. she said she doesnt think she could've lived if the people of the village hadnt helped her so i personally thank anyone involved in the aid during the time of this terrifying experience. sue was screaming, she was in so much pain. her back was all scratched up and bruised, her legs were bleeding all over, full of gashes and swollen to ridiculous sizes, she could not walk. 2 people carried her to higher ground and sat her in a room with other injured people but she was screaming so loudly of pain that consumed her body that they had to put her in a different room. she tried to describe it to us but i can't even imagine how much pain she was in. all of a sudden she saw someone using a cellphone and yelled to them to let her use it. they said the lines were down and it wouldnt work anyway but sue insisted and in some miracle it went through. she managed to call her mother but all she could tell her was that she was alive and than the phone died. the minute her mother ronnie heard her voice and knew she was alive she got on the phone and started calling everyone. she made sure that everyone and anyone knew who her daughter was, exactly what she looked like and that she was alive. she called every israeli news station, every friend of a friend of a friend and even got someone to help get that el al flight to sri lanka to pick up all the israelis they could find and bring them home. sue didnt know that any of this was happening but in her heart she knew that once her mother knew she was alive, that she needent worry, ronnie would do everything she could and everything she had to do to make sure sue would come home right away. so sitting in this room, once the water went down and the streets were kind of clear to go through a man took sue on a bike over to a hospital. at this hospital it smelled so bad because the first floor was all dead bodies and sue said it was terrible. she couldnt walk so she was taken in a wheelchair upstairs and put into a bed. all of a sudden she saw matthew and than from that momment on they never separated. after 5 hours of sitting there, neither of them had gotten any help and they went to the bathroom and washed their wounds and than went outside because the smell was unbearable. they sat down on in the parking lot where they met 3 more guys and stayed there until someone came to help all of them. all of a sudden a car came up and said, "are u sue?" and she knew ronnie had sent for her. it was a doctor and a driver and there was a bus waiting to take more people to a hospital in colombo. sue rode in the car with ronnie's friends and everyone else got on the bus and was safely taken to colombo. at the hospital there was a bag waiting for sue with an israeli news crew, filled with clothing some food, her favorite chocolate and a letter from her mother. as soon as sue read the letter she broke down into tears that lasted for hours. the news crew got her in touch with her mother on the phone. some people might have seen her on some of the news shows. she's that blonde girl they kep showing with the bruised eye. everyone she was with got the treatment they needed and hopefully they will all recover wonderfully. than the airplane was set to arrive and another bus came to take all the israelis onto the el al flight without worrying about passports or anything. sue wont be able to walk without crutches for about 2 months now and her mother has to help her shower, but she's just happy to be alive and happy to be home. i left a lot of stuff out obviously because the ordeal she told took about 2 hours to pass on to the family the night we went to see her but really who cares. she's alive. it really is a miracle and i dont know what i would do if i would've heard that she wasnt alive.

i am extremely sorry for people who's family members did not make it through this terrifying ordeal and i extend every inch of sympathy and love that exists in my body out to you. this is something that will go down in the books...so remember it.

so thought i'd follow up on my israeli problems. lol. today i went to the office where u get passports and they fixed everything for me, i have a paper that says i'm allowed to use my american passport when i leave on saturday and that i can renew my israeli passport at the embassy in new york. so yaaaay good stuff. about the army, i'm going to the office for that tomoro and will try to get out of having to do some time as a soldier. my cousins came home from the army this past weekend for shabbat and it was so strange to see them cuz they're only a year and 2 years older than me, 2 boys and one of them is like my best friend we spent hours talking and catching up. i havent seen them for 3 years!!! thats just unacceptable. anyway so he was wearing his army clothes and he's an intense soldier, guns and stuff, tanks, everything it was so scary seeing him hold a gun. it really scared me. i hope he doesnt get hurt and is careful cuz i know he's a crazy kid and loves trying everything. it was sooo good to see him i miss him sooo much. he loves it in the army. my other cousin is reeeeeeally smart so he does some kind of computer stuff there or something, anyway uses his genius to help out but he still has a uniform and stuff which is weird to see him wearing. anyway i love them soooo much and i hope they're ok, they have about 2 more years to be in the army and than hopefully they'll come visit me at college in new york. all i know is i dont really want to be in the army but if there is a draft in 2005 cuz that silly bill gets passed i will be on a plane to israel so quickly haha and in a second i'll be in the israeli army, at least i would be fighting for something i believe in....