Getting a Feel For it

well, what can I say?
I LOVE this city. I love this flat, this neighbourhood, this area, the streets, the shops, Eli... it's so crazy!!! Everything's totally insane here. Eli calls it a zoo and a 'jungle' in the mornings. It's all happening. I love that I have everything within walking distance to my place as well. Plus things are quite cheap here.

Eli dragged me to some Tai Chi thingy. There is one white 'master' in the world, and he's an Israeli guru guy who turned religious. And he was in town and Eli's friend told him it's worth going, so we went and we sat there for an hour just listening to him speak and answer people's questions. I kept thinking about the purple shirt guy in the park at Coogee who Jord and I jog past all the time whilst he does his funny movements and we make fun of him... and then I thought to myself- hang on, I dont wanna be like that.. what am i doing here??? I couldnt even understand what he was saying... I thought we were going to actually do something, so i went dressed in my get-up especially.. tights and sneakers.. I was such a dag- for nothing!!! All I got from it was this guy showing us how he could floor a guy 'like this' and 'like this' or 'like this' or even 'like this with 2 hands'... (this 'like this' business has become a running joke now between me and Eli.) Eli turned to me at one stage, half asleep, and said "i don't even understand what he's saying.. fucking shit."

Everyone here says "fucking shit". It's really funny. I'll walk down the street and here hebrew jibberish... blablablafuckingshitblablabla.... cracks me up.

Our place is funny. We live on the rooftop. Up 4 floors. So it's quite a work out coming home.. I like it. It's like I got me a gym and a place in one. Our livingroom and bedroom have shutters and windows which can completely open up onto the street outside, so basically the 4th wall of the place is one long massive window which can slide open. I can sit on it and just look at whats going on in the street. And LOTS goes on in this street. It's like Khao San Rd in Bangkok- Israeli style. (Which, I guess, is pretty close to khao san rd actually, if anyone's ever been there before? yes? no? Beuller??.)

Anyway, it rained the other night (it's winter here, but it hasn't really hit yet), and our roof is made of tin, so it's really loud. It was beautiful. When Eli plays his sax and trumpet, you can hear it all the way down the street, because the windows are always open. This is the story of our life... me hearing Eli play his music from a few streets away. It's how we met, it's how I used to come home in Waverley, and now it's happening again. Especially on Saturdays here, Shabbat means death to city life, so when I go for a jog in usually busy streets I hear Eli's sax reverberating from blocks away.

One guy has yelled up from the street to shut Eli up- he said 'people are trying to work here' (in hebrew of course) and Eli just yelled something back and continued- that's the way things work here. Lots of yelling.

I went into a shop with eli to buy a drink, and the soccer was on the tv, so eli told the woman to turn it up, and then someone else came into the shop and saw the soccer and started yelling something, and then someone else came in- it was this tiny corner shop, and everyone was yelling all around me?!

We live on top of a furniture shop. The guy who works there, Jacky, (he calls me "sara-le"?!) always asks me in for tea. And he's become my designated direction-giver. As I said in my last post, my luggage didn't arrive on my flight, so i had to wait for it to be delivered to me the following day, so when it arrived, Jacky was downstairs and he saw me emerge from the building for the first time and immediately said "hallo hallo.. i dont recognise you, are you our new neighbour? Are you Sara? Welcome... lucky us... I'll help you with your bags... You're the saxophone player's girlfriend right.. I'm Jacky...If ever you need anything..." blahblahblah- and this continued non-stop up 4 flights of stairs. All in hebrew.

My hebrew picked up rapidly in the past week. Im making a conscious effort not to speak in english. But it's hard, of course. I'm convinced Eli speaks the fastest hebrew out of anyone in Israel. I understand everyone else better than I understand him. Im practising now and reading lots of childrens stories.

I went to Haifa over Shabbat to Eli's mum's place- it takes us about 2 hours to get to Haifa. Some of Eli's relatives came for dinner. One of his cousins, a 23 yr old girl, threw an absolute fit- the biggest tantrum I've ever seen- because she didnt want to move over. she was yelling and yelling like a maniac, and they just laughed at her. I was in shock. Her behaviour is indicative of a lot of the behaviour here. Eli told me later- "you should see when she gets angry.." No matter how well my hebrew improves, no matter how comfortable I get with Eli's family, I can predict I will always be the shy one in that family. No matter what, I will be quiet. I can't compete with such big characters, I really dont have it in me to yell the way they do. Moroccans are loud.That's all there is to it. And they kiss 4 times?! what is with that??? I thought that was French.

I find it amazing that Eli didnt know anyone before we moved here, and in such a short time he's met everyone. I mean I knew Eli was a friendly guy, but I love to see him here in Israel, where he's smooth and totally in his element. It's unbelievable how different he seems. Maybe it's my imagination. It's impossible for him to go into any shop and not start a conversation with someone. He just talks to everyone. And everyone's happy to talk back. I'm beginning to think Eli is the friendliest person I know. He'll talk to so many strangers on any given day. And my very initial impressions of him was that he was rude and forthcoming.... Who would've thought?

Today I went with Maor's (Eli's bro) girlfriend, Meital, and her friend to Carmel markets, Israel's biggest markets. Right next to it, every tuesday and friday is the arts market. Its where artists go to set up stalls and make and sell their crafts. I saw clocks made out of sudokus! And cool things made from cinammon sticks, and cool things made from match boxes and dice and buttons!! I live about 10 mins walk from it all. I live in the best part of the country! I am surrounded by excellent cafes and cool bars and shops.. -the way the shops work here is very interesting- you have a street which is the furniture street: Every single shop sells furniture. Then another street is the fabrics street. Another one is the lights street... then there's the bead street.. every kind of bead..then there's the sweets/lollies street, and the toy street, the belt/leather goods street... the nuts/olives/pickles street...

I like it. I'm happy.