Shabbat Shalom!

Hello everyone!  It’s Friday afternoon before Shabbat and the city is really bustling. I spent about an hour pushing through hoards of crowds on the street thinking “don’t any of you people have jobs?!” until I realized it was the weekend here. Really though, even on non-weekend days I’m amazed at how many people are out and about at all times. Almost every bar and restaurant has outdoor seating and no matter the time of day there are always groups of people sitting outside eating, drinking, smoking and having loud, boisterous conversations.

I’ve been here 4 nights so far, and gone out 3 of them, barely getting to sleep before sunrise. People here party late! Even my “early” night had me asleep around 2am. Granted this is the first week of the program and the end of summer so everyone is quite excited, but things generally run much later here. On Tuesday we went out to dinner at 9pm and the restaurant was packed with a 25 minutes wait.

This week primarily consisted of introductory things. We took walking tours of the city, had seminars on the Israeli workplace and panels with different employers and previous interns. People who haven’t yet cemented their internships are going out on interviews and we are doing many group activities.

My group consists of 24 people, and I like everyone very much. The majority of the participants are from the USA, although there is also people from Chile, Denmark, Canada and Mexico.

One cool thing about Tel Aviv is that everyone here is very social. All of my Seattle friends are very familiar with the “Seattle Chill,” that is you typically go out and socialize with your friends but it can be difficult to expand your friend group or meet new people in a sincere way while out. Tel Aviv is the opposite. Everywhere you go people want to talk, hang out, exchange numbers, etc. Several of my friends here have Tel Aviv connections from Birthright, family, or traveling and this has helped us already begin to build a community around us.  On Tuesday night, for example, I was walking outside to find food and came across my friend Mike. He had just met up with a friend he met on Birthright who lives in the area. They hadn’t eaten so we all went to dinner.  I added his friend on facebook and the next night we went out for wine and gelato. Another guy on my trip had a friend who he met through a friend while in the US who lives in Tel Aviv as well.  This friend was a promoter for a club and got us all in to an exclusive Halloween party last night. 

So in this way I am already meeting many people! As I previously mentioned almost every restaurant has outdoor seating on the sidewalk so even just walking through the streets you are likely to see someone you know to sit and talk with. Even if you don’t, people are very inviting and would not find it strange if you asked to sit with them.

Tonight we are having a group Shabbat dinner and then I am going to lay low. Thursday is the big party night here and after last night I am quite tired.  Tomorrow since most things will be closed I plan to finally make it down to the beach and on Sunday I will hopefully have time to do some much needed shopping for things for my apartment.

I hope everyone at home had a lovely Halloween and I will talk to you soon!