Living life at Livnot

Monday:

We got up early & had breakfast- liv'not has jars on jars of PEANUT BUTTER, so I love them already.

We then hopped on a bus and headed a bit north for our day hike. We hiked through this incredibly beautiful valley and up the sides of the mountain. Our guide maier was great. The hike was amazing because there were no other people around us, and the land was untouched-- it was a really special place. We went up unpaved paths to get to some hidden caves which were super neat. He reminded us that even though being in the valley is beautiful, sometimes we should make our own path for a different perspective. 

We then continued along to some other caves where I got to wander and climb and monkey around a bit which was very fulfilling for me. I found a spot on top of the cave that everyone was in & enjoyed the beautiful, peaceful environment. We had lunch in the cave- pita with hummus, tahini, cucumbers, and red peppers-- so yummy! We also had some bamba-- which is an israeli snack that looks like a puffy cheeto but has peanut butter on it- needless to say I'm obsessed. Also learned that people who make bamba are always required to go to work no matter if conflict is happening or not- similar to a doctor, they are always on call. This country cannot survive without bamba. 

We then began our decent and the bus picked us back up! We got back to livnot & I took a shower before heading out to explore town with one of my roomies, Anna. 

We went to a fruit market and got some amazing nectaries, peaches and plum, then found some 5 shekel iced slushie coffee. The exchange rate is about 3.6 shekels to the dollar. We then stopped in the best bakery in town and I got a bunch of Danishes, crosaints, and a cinnimion roll- supposed to last me a couple of days and I've already eatten 4/5 in one day. Whoops. We then wandered through the streets and found this art studio so we went in and started talking to the lady working. Her name was Orna and she was a firecracker. We talked to her for about 2 hours and pretty much learned her life story. She is from Israel but she has lived in Long Island and San Diego, and her kids live in San Francisco. Well, one of her kids still lives in SF. She recently went there to surprise her daughter for her wedding!!! It was such a great story. 

We chatted with her about mindfulness, technology, studies, and everything in between- the woman loved to talk. And then we headed out to grab some dinner. We had some Yemen food that was pretty good- it was dough with cheese, veggies, and spices wrapped in there!

We had a workshop at 8pm where we talked about our "jewish journey" and sang some songs. Everyone here is very nice so I'm excited for the weeks to come!

Tuesday:

I woke up early after my my first full night of sleep in Israel. I went to our roof patio for a mini workout and some yoga- it was so lovely up there! 

We then had breakfast-- our group takes turns making meals and this morning the girls made a fruit salad with yogurt and granola-- it was delicious! 

Our morning consisted of a service project-- we went excavating! Tzfat, like I mentioned before, is a city in the mountains. The homes and buildings were all built on top of each other whenever the buildings started to collapse. Last week, the group that was digging/ excavating found a new room! We continued to dig and get out the dirt and rocks in order to make our way into the room. We made some progress but still have a ways to go. We also found some cool artifacts while digging such as old metal plates and bowls, and I found an old broken glass bottle which I plan to use as a candle holder. The work was hard but fun-- anything can be fun when you have music playing!

We then had some snacks and had a small discussion about digging deeper to find new perspectives. After that we had a tour of tzfat and learned a bit more about the history of the city. We learned that just under 70 years ago the city was divided between the Arabs and the Jews-- the Jews were not allowed to cross into the Arab quarter or they would be shot. The British came to help get the Jews out of the city because the Arabs threatened to kill them all, however, the Jews refused to leave and they eventually won the city. We walked around the town and then all went to get lunch.

It had been three days since my last falafel, which is three days too long. I got falafel and an ice coffee for lunch & it was so yummy! 

We had a break so I decided to walk up the gallery street and talk to the artisans. It was really neat to hear their stories. Some of them were not the artisans but rather represented the artisans. When I told them I was from Chicago, a few of them said, oh where, skokie? Evanston? Northbrook? I laughed because they knew exactly where the Jews come from in Chicago, a few of them have family there. One of them even said he sells products to the store hamakor in skokie- small world.

We then had a group talk with an artist names David Friedman- he is originally from Denver but now lives in Israel. His work is very geometric and from the Kabbalah, which is like the most intense book of Judaism. His work revolved around the Hebrew alphabet, repetition, numbers, and symbols. It was very intricate and beautiful.

After then talk I wandered a bit more and found myself in a winery. I talked to the manager who is from Canada and learned a bit more about their vineyard. 

I then headed back to livnot and helped the group prepare dinner. We made shakshuka, which is an egg and tomato sauce dish. I had it without the egg & it was yummy! I made some banana ice cream for everyone for dessert which turned out pretty good!

After dinner we had an intro to Kabbalah class with this rabbi from LA who pretty much traveled the world and then ended up wanting to become a rabbi in Israel. He talked a lot about the oneness of everyone and our unity and I won't go to into it, but we sat there for about 2 hours discussing how Judaism relates to how we connect with each other. I still don't buy into a lot of the religious themes but it was interesting to listen to & debate.

We then did a Bon fire in the Forrest and made smores and sang songs as gabby played her guitar!

Sending smiles from tzfat,

Rebecca

Wednesday:

This morning after breakfast we went on a hike. We started walking out of our rooms all the way to Meron which was a little more than 6 miles through the Forrest and rocks. A little over half way we stopped at these little pools of water for a swim. The water was so cold & lots of fishes inside, but it felt incredible because we were hiking in 80+ degree heat. It was a great hike with nice views and fun rocks to climb along the way. Played a lot of music, drank a lot of water, and kept on waking. We walked all the way to Meron, another town, and ate lunch at a hummus place there. The hummus was amazing!!! They had multiple kinds but my favorite was the hummus mixed with tahini- I filled a pita pocket with that and some israeli salad (cucumbers and tomatoes). People at the table claimed its the best hummus in Israel, and I wouldn't argue that.

We took a bus back to tzfat where I ran into my tour guide, Asher, with his new group! I also ran into a friend from home who was on her birthright trip!

I then grabbed some ice coffee because I was feeling a bit tired, but the coffee didn't help much because I ended up taking a nap.

After my nap I took a wander around town and stumbled across a sign for a women's art co-op. I walked down a set of stairs and the sign of the door said open so I walked in and felt like I was in someone's home. I was and I was also in a studio. Only one woman was there and her name was Judy, she was an American who had moved to Israel about 20 years ago. She and a few other women use the space to make art and also teach art. We talked for about an hour about her ceramics, her journey to Israel, and her life. It was cool to hear her story & all of her work was amazing. She said she hosts people to come and make their own piece. I have been looking around all the galleries to buy myself a mezuzah but I think I'm going to make one with her! :)

I then headed back to campus where we all met up to head to a music circle. While waiting to go to the music circle, I was talking to the owner of the Yemen restaurant across the street. He told me life is limitless and we are in charge of who we want to be, and to keep the commercials out of our head.

We headed down to the building where we were excavating, so it pretty much felt like we were in a cave. When we arrived there were tea light candles set up and we all sat on pillows in a circle. We each brought an item that we would be able to make music with. The man and his wife explained what we would be doing- silence for 5 minutes, clapping and screaming for 5 minutes, and then making noise with random objects for 5 minutes. We made a lot of noise, had a lot of quiet, and a lot of fun. He said that we should be childish and pretend like we're 5 again. We ended with him playing guitar and singing a song, sharing feelings, and we headed back to campus.

I was on food duty for the next day, we all share food making and cleaning dishes responsibilities, and tomorrow I was up with two other girls. We decided we wanted to make pancakes for breakfast so we thought we could make the batter that evening. We whipped up some batter and then joined the rest of the crew outside to hang out, and a few of us walked to the top of tzfat for an incredible view of all the surrounding towns lit up at night.

Lilah tov! (Good night!)

Thursday:

I made pancakes with two other girls for our group of 20. Our morning activity was going to a senior center and singing to them. Gabby brought her guitar and we went to 4 different rooms in the senior center and sang some english and some Hebrew songs to everyone. It was really fun to sing and dance with the seniors, although most of them did not know english we still shared smiles and claps over the music.

Did a little acro yoga after our singing session at the center and then we all walked back to town for lunch. I had some yummy falafel and then walked around with Anna and Antoinette going to some different artist studios that were not on the main artist gallery strip.

We talked to a few different artists studios and chatted with the artists and learned about their stories.

We then had a group activity of talking about why jews keep kosher and what keeping kosher means. There are a lot of rules, but it's mostly surrounding how to kill animals that we eat, what parts of the animal to eat, not eating animals that are already dead, and not mixing meat and dairy. I don't keep kosher, but I pretty much do because I don't eat meat. There are even rules about how fruit and veggies have to be kosher by the farm allowing a portion of the crops to go to charity.

After the activity we started preparing for shabbat dinner, which is tomorrow. My job was peeling and chopping sweet potatoes but others made a kugel, salad and other things as well. We food prepped for a while and then I volunteered with a few other people to prepare "food for the soul" and talk about jewish wisdom. I picked the topic of making your career benefit society- which I managed to find a Judaism quote that relates to that.

After, we all had dinner & then I cleaned a massive amount of dishes from dinner and shabbat prep. We then all walked up to the top of the hill, same as yesterday, and had a couple of beers and SAW A PROPOSAL up there. It was magical.

Friday:

We started the day off with a challabration-- we braided challah down in the kahal-- which is an old ancient room with an ancient oven from 500+ years ago that still (kind of) works! Had to hold a button to keep the flames going so we were not able to bake our big challahs in the oven but we were able to make some mini pitas and bake them in the old oven! We were able to eat the pitas right away and they were so tasty!

We then went to meet an Artisan named Daniel who is a potter from England but has been living in Israel for a while now. His work was incredible!!

We then had a discussion about the importance of Shabbat-- it is so amazing that the town is able to completely shut down every Friday afternoon until Saturday evening or Sunday morning each week!! Shabbat is a day of reflection and enjoyment with friends and families. No cars drive on the street, no technology is used, no dishes are washed, no light switches are switched, nothing is baked or cooked (hence why we did shabbat prep yesterday!). I definitely don't think I could ever slow down that much in my life back at home. I love being active and going out and doing things, so using my weekend to just rest would be really difficult for me! I did enjoy resting this shabbat though-- I put my phone away and didn't turn it on until the sun set on Saturday.

We lit the candles to bring in shabbat as the sunset, and then we went on the patio to sing and dance--boys were not allowed to dance with girls, so there were about 12 of us girls in a big circle and then 4 guys on the other side dancing together-- orthodox rules.

We then went "shul hopping" as in bar hopping but with shuls (synagogues). We went to the house of love an prayer for a bit and then some of us left to just wander around Tzfat and absorb the shabbat spirit. It was neat to see everyone super dressed up for shabbat. The ultra-orthodox men wear large furry hats, some wear all black and others wear all white depending on their denomination.

We got back to campus and had our delicious challah and the yummy dinner that we prepared yesterday. After dinner we had an oneg/ party upstairs with beer and cake. We had some lovely conversations and I also had some nice reflection time outside on a hammock that had randomly appeared that day.

It's been a while since I've celebrated shabbat so it was nice to get to celebrate for the first time in a while in such an incredible town.

Saturday:

Shabbat is a day of rest and and a day of eating good food-- and that's exactly what today was.

I slept in and relaxed in the morning hours before going to Shabbat lunch at a local family's home with a few other girls from livnot. We were all given directions to get to our host family's home and then we set off to explore tzfat and find it. 

We got to our home and it was a family of 7! Mom and dad- mom originally from England and dad from New York-- had been living in Israel for 10 years and have 5 kids with ages ranging from 9 years to two months.

We had a lovely lunch and we played with the kids for at least 3 hours! The girls were so cute and had me throw them around, play with them, read to them-- it was fun but exhausting!!

We headed back to Liv'not and had some rest and then an "intimacy" discussion with Yifat. We had a late dinner which was leftovers from yesterday.

We then did a small tubeshavat celebration even though it's not the actual holiday. We also celebrated the end of shabbat which is called havdallah, where we lit a candle, had some wine, and sniffed spices.

We enjoyed each other's company for one last night because many people were leaving livnot the next day.

Sunday:

Sunday is the day of switching groups so many people left livnot this morning. It was very sad to say goodbye to many of the people I met this week. A lot of us grabbed breakfast together in town for one last meal before everyone headed out.

Since there was no programming during the day, myself, Sarah, and Lauren went to Tiberias to swim in the Kinneret/ Sea of Galilee. It was so so hot so the water felt great, unfortunately it wasn't really a beach, but more of a rocky shore. We swam and soaked up the sun but it was so so hot that we were drained from the sun-- it was upwards of 100 degrees-- and we decided to head back to Tzfat.

We met some of the new people at Livnot and had dinner together. We then all went to a local pop up bar at the khan of the donkey. The space is an awesome renovated horse stable and is rented out to different people in the community. On. Sundays a brewery opens up and sells their microbrews. The beer was very good and it was fun to meet the new people in the program! I also chatted with the bartender and his friends -- it was really nice to chat with locals and spend sometime with them even after the bar closed.

It was a great first week at Livnot and I'm excited to see what week 2 has in store :)

Sending smiles from Tzfat,

Rebecca