Another "I Cant Believe I Actually LIVE Here" blog

So you've had fair warning.  If you're tired of hearing me drone on about loving living in Israel, just politely go to another website, I won't even know. [Heh heh, you THINK I won't know...]

So a couple of things happened in the last week or so.

1. Trip to the Galil:

We went to the Galil with an organization called English Speaking Residents Association (ESRA) which runs great travel programs throughout the year.  The trip took us WAY up north (as far as Metullah) and the highlight was visiting the Hula Valley Nature Reserve and watching the migration of the birds on their way from Northern Europe to Africa for the winter.

Are you laughing yet?  The thought of nature-hating me going to watch birds?  For those of you who don't know me well, just know that the very thought of camping makes me ill, I hate bugs, am afraid of basically every animal, and would MUCH rather sit inside and play a game on my computer than take a hike somewhere.

However, I had gotten interested in bird migration when we saw the movie "Winged Migration" years ago - I mean it is scary how organized these birds are.  And how hard working.  Makes us all seem kinda lame and stupid.

Anyway, the bird thing was super cool.  And what is really amazing is that the Hula Valley is exactly the midpoint for the birds, and they have always stopped over there on their trip south, and just watching literally tens of thousands of them hanging out, knowing they'd be there for a day or so and move on, was super duper awesome and cool.

2. Concert in Jerusalem

Nope, not chazzanut.  Not Israeli music.  

Sixties music.

That's right.  There is a great Israeli group that plays Beatles, Rolling Stones, etc. music and they do at least one concert a year. They were amazing. 

We drove into the city with friends and happened to drive by the walls of the Old City.  The thought that the center of our religious history from thousands and thousands of years ago is less than 1/2 hour from my home, always gets me.  I live here!  I really do!

3. Chanukah

So I live in Modiin.  MODIIN, people!  Where the Chashmonaim lived, worked and played...and also fought, and died, and got buried.  Nuff said.

Also - we have been to the "Hasmonean" gravesite, but people say it's not really their gravesite.  Just sayin.  

4. Normal day to day stuff is cool

So during this week, we needed our water filter replaced, our dud (hot water heater) went bust, and we needed our carpenter to come and repair something.  Each of the worker guys had a kippah on.  And I happened to look outside when the sanitation truck was coming by - the three guys coming off the truck had kippot, one had tzitzit flying.

I'm not saying this because it matters so much to me that they wore kippot or not, but knowing that so many people around us, everyone doing all kinds of work, keeping the country going, are Jews, is super duper cool. 

Ben-Gurion once said that it will REALLY be a Jewish state when even the garbage collectors are Jewish.  

So those of you who went to another site, nyah nyah nyah you missed a good blog.    The others - congratulations on your good taste and excellent decision making.