I'll finish the 10 day-family trip now:
We went to Linda Gradstein's house for Shabbat/Thanksgiving dinner. It was a lot of fun. So much fun in fact that we invited them over the next day! My dad and I walked home together and the rest of the family took a cab. It was about a 35 minute walk. Much faster than over an hour when I went myself mostly because I actually knew where I was going this time. Big difference for sure. We got back to the Citadel and slept well that night.
The next morning, we went back to Shira Hadasha. Excellent service, as always. Jordana joined our family in the afternoon at the Citadel. We had lunch together, then went swimming and just hung out. My mom loved being with another girl, and I enjoyed spending time with the person I've known longest on Nativ (2.5ish years, and besides the Chicago people of course).
Jordana mentioned to us that there was a protest going on that night and that Nativ was invited. It was a protest against the Hareidi movement in Israel. We decided to join them and protest. It was reported that over 2000 people were at the protest. We walked down King George street and, of course, turned right onto Ben Yahuda. We decided to leave after about an hour and get back to the hotel a little early before they left. Tyler came with me to say goodbye to the family. It wasn't as emotional as when I left for the first time. I think I felt more comfortable because I walked up the street, and I was home. When I left in September, I was leaving home. Here, I wasn't going anywhere.
SO THATS IT! Wow.... I'm really happy that I'm all caught up.
So let's talk about today?
ITS FINALLLYYY OVERRRRRRRRR! Filming for the IC video officially took over my life in the last week. We filmed an unbelievable amount of scenes in sooooo many different places. I want to share a story about it...
Sunday was the start of crazyness. We filmed a few scenes in the lobby and some more at the basketball courts. Jordana Gilman and Aaron Leven are the stars of the video. Ally Turkheimer, Shira Kafker and I are the Directors (and Miles Berson but he didn't really do anything.) They are D'vora the Explorer (Dora) and Boots (her monkey friend). Monday, we filmed at Hebrew U on Monday. It was super stressful because the taxi driver stole the camera man (Ian, he's on the ulpan track and left school early to film at Hebrew U. So that was a bit tricky getting him into Hebrew U. Whatever. Filming was crazy, we staged a class (Israeli Lit) in which all the extras aren't even in that class. Funny.
Today is where the reallll crazyness starts. We got out of Ulpan at noon. There's a bus at 12:15, gets us to Ben Yahuda (where ulpan is) by 12:35, filming at 12:45, done by 1:15, Yeshiva by 1:45, done by 2:30. Tight schedule but do-able if everything goes to plan. So the first thing that goes wrong is the bus doesn't arrive until 12:25. No biggie. The bus won't start. Adds on a few extr minutes. Start to get nervous. The bus eventually starts and we make our way towards downtown Jlem. Behind schedule but not much. In the MIDDLE OF A VERY MAJOR ROAD the bus breaks down for good. IT JUST DIES. We are all told to get off the bus. Its 12:40 at this point and we're realllyyyyyyyyyyy freaking out. I call Elkana and ask if we can take a taxi on Nativ for the video. He agrees, so we hail a cab and yell at him "drive faster, faster FASTER!!!" We ended up doing the filming very productively because we had 2 days of experience under our belts already. We actually ended up finishing Ulpan by 1:15 and had time to get some pizza before going to the Yeshiva. jackpot.
Yeshiva filming was fine. nothing too stressful. Ian (cameraman/editor) shira and I edited the video for a little bit. Then I watched LOST with Seffi Adina, Debbie, and Rachel. We then had all of the Nativers (and by all I mean like 85%) of Nativers participate in the final scene. We all ran into the lobby as if we came back from the girls football game screaming and yelling LOUDLYYY. We all chanted "Nativ! Nativ!" over and over again. It was sooo much fun. Its a great scene. We then interviewed the past regional presidents to let them give shoutouts to their region. This includes Seth and a shoutout to CHUSY REGIONNNN! Sweet.
It's now 12:40. I really thought I was getting to bed early tonight. Guess not.
I'll write again soon. And when the video is done I'll definitely post it so everyone can see :)
-Josh
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