Feb. 11

I started class and work on sunday. In the morning, I worked with Mazel. What we do is clean the Ulpan kitchen, porch, common room and the building that we live in. I literally washed everyone on the programs dish and every surface of the kitchen counter. What I learned from this experience is that we are all extremely messy. Also, I clean our toilets. It's kind of gross in the guy's washroom, but the work is not that ahrd, and I finish at around 11:45. Then that same day I had class from 4:00 until 6:30. The teacher spoke in Heberew the entire time, and I understood most of it. I really didn't think I knew as much Hebrew as I do. My only issue is speaking it, since at USDS they never erally encouraged us to speak. The class is a strange dynamic with some people who can speak, but not read or write. People who can't speak but understand. People who are basically fluent in Hebrew already. It's an interesting way to learn.
At night we had a bonfire, and roasted hotdogs.

Monday we just had class in the morning, and took a tour of the kibbutz grounds. They have some building that has drums, and we were told that furtheer into the program we can ask to use to instruments. After class, me and a few friends went to the nearby town Rehovot. The bus to get there was crazy. They arrive right on time to pick you up, load and elave in a minute, and when we arrived to Rehovot, they were rushing us off. Looking around the town, and on the route there, everything looks so different. There's palm tree's, and I saw camels also. At night, we had another bonfire. I'm guessing we'll have a lot of fires because the weather is cool at night.

Tuesday was a day off because of the elections. Most of Israel shuts down, to go and vote, aor jsut take the day as a vacation. It was cold and rainy though. I just slept in, did homework, and hung around with friends. New people also came, adding a Brazilian, and also Yakov: the first Chineese jew I have met. He speaks almost no English, and neither does the Brazilian, so it's funny to watch them try to understand each other in English. At night we wentto get fries at the pub, and play some pool. Unfortuneatly I'm awful at pool, so I lost. We have made friends with the guy who drives around the kibbutz patrolling at night, so he gave us a ride from the pub to our building since it was absolutely pouring rain. I don't like when it's cold and rainy here, but the Israelis like it because they need the water.

Today there was more class, and again, I'm feeling confident in my udnerstanding of Hebrew. My Hebrew will get better when I'm here though, when my English will probably suffer. The English I speak here is different since I have to speak with people who have english as their second language.