I flew into Tel Aviv on Shabbat. Bad timing. Maybe this is why my flight was cheap lol. Since I arrived at 4am, I figured there wasn’t much point getting a hotel for the night, so I found myself a good bench on the third floor of the airport, stuffed my suitcases underneath, and curled up in my sleeping bag on the floor. You know, it was probably my most comfortable airport sleep…the camping stuff makes a big difference.
Finally, around nine I bit the bullet and got a taxi into town. Busses, trains, etc. don’t run in Tel Aviv on Shabbat, so it was either stick it out at the airport until 6pm or pay for a taxi. I DID THE TAXI. I know, surprising. It was $40.
I dropped my bags at my hotel and wandered around for the day. Spent some time in Jaffa, the old city which was a port at one point, Jonah’s chosen run-away-from-God location and Simon the Tanner’s house (the place where Peter became an eater of all the meats). So some things happened there. Wikipedia also mentions, at the end of a long list of significant events, that Jaffa is more recently famous for oranges. Important stuff.
I ate some hummus. Sat on the beach. Brought my warm boots and I’m so glad because my feet have been cold! But Tel Aviv was beautiful on Saturday, perfect for the beach. WHAT A BEACH.
Israel has beautiful clouds, just so you know.
Honestly, though, my first few days in Israel were rough. Like way more rough than China. I think Asia was so crazy and different that I was sorta in disbelief that I would someday be used to it all. But I can see myself feeling comfortable here. My appearance fits in, people are so kind about using English, and the geography feels really normal.
My school on top of Mt. Carmel aka that place where Elijah poured water on an altar and God lit it on fire, take that other dudes whose fires didn’t light (1 Kings 18:20-40)View from that tall building on campus, see the SEA on the left?!?
Anyway, so I was all depressed the first few days, and when I woke up on the first day of class I was so unhappy, but then I realized I had a headache, and once I took some medicine and it went away, everything started to look up.
My roommates have turned out to be amazing. They’re all Israeli, and I love the mixture of Hebrew and English. They speak perfect English to me, but when they mess around together they speak Hebrew, and I can already feel how much that’s going to help me learn the language faster.
Today, after class, I went on a little stroll to the national park which borders the university.
I can get to this view point (no zoom, no edit) faster than I walked from my freshman dorm to the Quad. Wild, right?? I zoomed up on the pic below just so the port is a little clearer.
And GET THIS:
The view from my room! The very light land behind the mountains far away is Lebanon, I’m pretty sure! But like super super far away, like a little over thirty miles lol. Which is not quite as far as a thought before I just now looked it up.
SO YES.
I’m beginning to be thriving here. It’s taking time. But it’s coming!
Okay first things first. The title of this post is a reference. To a show. That real people watch. I know, it’s really wild. I remembered a reference! To be fair, had to google the phrase “London baby” before I remembered it was from Friends, but let’s not let that detract from my total cultured-ness!
Here I am in London. I am writing from a Starbucks near Westminster Abbey. Before you judge me for being at Starbucks (lol does anyone actually judge Starbucks or is it all a joke? I’m honestly not sure, let me know), I came here because I had gift cards. Starbucks gift cards ONLY work in America! You’d think I would know this since I messed up in China too. So I had to pay $3.50 for a coffee. Whatever, this has been a cheap visit.
I started out at the British Museum. I’ve been to London three times (okay but only two times long enough to actually like tourist), but I’ve only done a cursory rush through this museum. To be totally honest, I wasn’t feeling it today. I’ve been super caught off guard by my attachment to China. I guess this is my first time out of America since leaving Chengdu, but I just hadn’t thought that through. So I actually spent the majority of my time at the British Museum people watching Chinese tourists (trying to pick up phrases from their conversation haha I heard a lot of 这个 (this one) and 那个 (that one) and 中国 (China), which you might expect at a museum).
This sudden longing for China, specifically Chinese, made me wonder if I did the wrong thing ripping myself away from the language at such a sensitive point. I’m losing it fast. I don’t really desire to learn Hebrew yet. It’s been a long time since I had something academic that I really desired to achieve. I think Chinese is the first subject I worked hard on since high school (shhh don’t tell my dad that my electrical engineering degree is a scam). I’m legit sad not to be working on Chinese again. Maybe I should go back some day. Hey here’s a plus though (and this is why I chose China!): over 1 billion people speak Mandarin, so lots of room to practice everywhere.
This is a Babylonian tablet telling a story of a flood the gods sent upon the earth. Some British dude translated it in the 1800’s and apparently he was so excited to discover a biblical-similar narrative that he started stripping off his clothes (yeah I’m also a little confused by that?). But okay look at this thing! It looks unintelligible, and yet this dude decoded Babylonian (whatever language they use) enough to read it! And here I am stumbling around in Chinese which is super well documented. Linguistics are fascinating.
I took this picture solely because it reminded me of all of Ellie’s plants in our window sill. Hi Ellie!
I spent a bit of time in St. Clement’s Dane church or something like that. It’s new bc it was bombed out in the 40s, but it was warm and had these beautiful, hand embroidered cushions for kneeling.
Yes. Yes I did discover portrait mode. I’m also alone. So here we go, some portraits of statues. Is that normal?
Basically though, I’ve been church hopping and bench sitting today. Seriously hours outside on benches people watching. And cloud watching. Good clouds. It just got really cold, so I decided better a coffee shop downtown than five hours in the airport 🙂 I’ve been watching people walk. Really isn’t that the most interesting part of a city? The types of people?
ANYWAY
here we go! 走吧! off to Israel!
xoxo
ceci
p.s. for some reason the picture quality looks bad here but it seems like they uploaded? idkkkkk i guess i can replace the photos if they post poorly haha
p.p.s. i am not at all nervous for getting to israel, i think for two reasons: i) i don’t feel like my identity depends on how i’m perceived in israel, esp since i have such awesome friends already, like how lucky am i? and ii) i guess i’ve been in enough uncomfortable travel situations that public transit/taxis don’t phase me anymore. i know i’ll be confused and have to logic out what to do, but it’s like whatever. i was confused 24/7 in china, i feel like!
Ft. my freshly burned hand, a passport which was released from captivity only yesterday, and my 12th plane of winter break
I’m sitting at A37 Denver International Airport watching dudes in orange safety vests probing the belly of this giant double decker plane. It’s navy and white, looks surprisingly classy, probably because it’s a British Airway plane.
This move doesn’t feel tangible to me. It’s not like I’m a veteran study-abroad-er or anything (with a whopping one semester under my belt lol), but here I am with my little backpack and a jacket. In Terminal A (usually el cheapo terminal).
Feels like I’m about to get on a Frontier flight with only a personal item. Which I’ve done six times in the past three weeks, plus another time when I had a cancelled flight, plus a layover. Me and Frontier are BFFs at the moment.
I haven’t let myself get excited for Israel. I had a nightmare of an experience getting my visa. I sent my passport to the Israeli Consulate in LA (which has jurisdiction over Colorado) two days after I got back from China, which gave over four weeks for processing. As reference, getting a Chinese student visa only took five business days from when I mailed my passport to when it showed up on our porch.
I began calling the consulate regularly ten days before I left, but I got a nice mixture of either no answer or “hmm you’re not in the system, I’ll poke around and see if I stumble upon your passport”.
Finally, on Friday (six days before my flight on Thursday), a woman told me the visa was done and my passport should be mailed that same day, which was great because I’d enclosed an envelope with three day trackable shipping and I had exactly four business days until my flight.
I called on Monday to confirm my passport was sent because the tracking on the prepaid envelope hadn’t kicked in. No answer. I just looked at my call history: I called the LA consulate twenty-four times over Monday and Tuesday. Additionally, I emailed six times. Finally, I got a reply to one of the emails saying that they had sent my passport on Monday, so it should arrive today (Tuesday).
It didn’t. I was in a pretty bad mood that day lol.
BUT I got it on Wednesday with a whole twenty-six hours to spare before leaving for the airport.
All of that clouded any other thought. I didn’t even start packing until this morning lol (and I’m a big packing fan so that really shows the damper this whole passport thing put on my normal preparations).
Hey I didn’t make a packing video for Israel, but I do have a list of all the junk I’m bringing. I legit feel like a hoarder. I idolize minimalist packing a little too much. It has been nice knowing what I actually used and wanted in China. Like facewash? Not fun to choose in a foreign country, so I brought a whole bottle this time.
I’m also bringing CAMPING STUFF!! Yes I know so exciting (and space consuming). I think I might bum around Europe starting in June, so I had to do a bit of open-ended adventure packing. Plus I’m flying to America for a wedding so I was like, “Huh I should have some nice-ish things for that.” Hoping some family visits in May so I can send back my little carry-on roller suitcase lol.
Clothes
Three athletic shirts
Three gray t-shirts
Two of those silk-ish shirts that are “fancy” but actually $5 from H&M
Puffy coat (I missed this SO MUCH in China)
Rain coat
Gray sweater
Black melanzana sweatshirt
Light windbreaker (I know I had so many jackets, went overboard FOR SURE but no regrets)
Black summer dress
Black maxi dress
Striped pencil dress
Short maroon skirt
Green maxi skirt (will I ever wear? tbd)
Alabama baseball hat
Leggings
Black jeans
Jesus sandals
Chaco-ish sandals
Running shoes
Boots (rain, snow, bring it on…I needed these in China, my feet were SO COLD)
Four bras (t-shirt, sports, bralette, strapless)
Swimsuit
As many pairs of socks/underwear I could find in my drawer (dubious if any match?)
Small purse
Foldable string backpack
Two necklaces and two sets of earrings
Two watches (athletic, fancy) & ancient fitbit
Hat and gloves
Toiletries
Full-size shampoo & travel size bottle
Conditioner (travel size)
Toothpaste (travel size)
Toothbrush
Face soap (full size)
Face lotion (full size)
Face astringent (full size)
Face masks (@Raina Lee wins for that Christmas gift)
Face sunscreen (ughhh my face is so sensitive)
Meds: DayQuil, NyQuil, ZzQuil, motrin, excedrin, tylenol, some stomach medicine that I’ve never used
Lipstick
Concealer
Mascara
Comb
Floss
Brush
Hairbands, bobby pins, clips
Deodorant
Febreze laundry spray stuff
Razors
Bookish Things
Four pens
A planner/journal/notebook
Full sized Bible (I missed this in China)
Travel Bible
The Blue Book
Kindle
Hebrew phrase book
Stapler, sticky notes, scissors
Adventure
Two person backpacking tent
Backpacking sleeping bag
Watertight bag
Water purification tablets
Small backpacking blanket (for picnics and stuff)
Small backpacking towel
Hammock (SPLURGE bc it’s heavy, hopefully trees exist lol)
Backpack rain cover
Headlamp
Backpacking pillow
Electronic
Chinese phone (with Chinese SIM)
Real phone + two chargers
Airpods
Headphones (for when I probably lose my airpods)
Phone tripod (maybe I’ll get into Youtube?)
Wall converters (one for Israel, one general)
External hard drive
A new SSD for my mac (just have to find a pentalobe screwdriver so I can open my stinkin’ mac lol)
Mac
Mac charger
External charger
Misc.
Watercolor paints, palette, brushes, sketchbook
Three crochet hooks (haha maybe will use?)
Three pieces of piano sheet music
Sheets for my dorm
Stationery (I’ve decided to write letters home this time! Missed that in China)
Playing cards
Wallet, passport
Photos to hang in my dorm
Water bottle
A ziplock bag with an aloe leaf bc I burned my hand so badly right before coming to the airport! Boiling water, rip. Did you know that when you burn yourself, your cells basically explode and that’s why you put cold water on there, to try to stop the explosions? True fact my mother told me (in more medical words than I used) and she’s in nursing school soooo…..
Anyway there’s a long list of junk I own. Since I’m trying to budget more tightly in Israel, I had to like actually bring stuff which I bought for cheap in China (hairbrush, scissors, sheets, ya know, stuff like that).
Israel costs almost twice as much as China so uggghhh.
Anyhow. I don’t know what else to say. I’m going to a place. It’s touristy (maybe). It’s historical (maybe). Apparently it’ll be cold for the winter. A lot of people go there. That’s new. I only knew a single-digit amount of people who had ever been to China, but I feel like everyone and their aunt has been to Israel.
So yeah okay that’s all for now. Bout to hop the pond, maybe I’ll post about my layover in London, we’ll see if I have motivation 🙂
(shhhh don’t tell anyone but I haven’t finished this post. i’m leaving for israel in two days and know i won’t keep writing it then, but maybe someday! anyway, here’s what i wrote at one point or other, published and incomplete)
We’ve got a lot of stuff happening in this post, so here’s an overview if you’d like to skip around!
My favorite places in Chengdu
My favorite trips from Chengdu
The transit situation in Chengdu
Bank cards & SIM cards
USAC classes: the DL
Campus & dorm situation
Weather (fall semester)
What to Pack (and NOT pack)
Survival Chinese phrases (and how to survive characters)
Communicating with America
The Great Firewall
Best Apps for China
Misc tidbits about Chengdu
If you have questions about anything on (or not on) this list, email me! My email is ceciliajoylee@yahoo.com.
Cecilia Joy 