A Quick Rewind

Hanukkah is a very interesting holiday. If one isn’t careful, it can be tempting to associate it with Christmas or Advent or something of the sort. After all it is near the Christmas season and involves lighting candles. Unsurprisingly as a Jewish holiday, it has nothing to do with Jesus’s birth. I won’t pretend to understand all of it or know the whole history behind Hanukkah. But my take-away this year was that Hanukkah is a celebration of the recovery of Jerusalem and the Temple. It isn’t biblically based. In the second century BCE a small group of Jewish warriors called the Maccabees overtook the Greeks in unexpected victory to reclaim the Temple. The story goes that as they rededicated the temple, they only had a small amount of pure oil to light and fuel the Temple’s menorah. It should have only lasted one day, but instead it kept burning for 8 days.

To honor the miracle of the 8 days, Hanukkah lasts 8 days, starting on November 28th and ending on December 6th in 2021. November 28th happened to fall on a Sunday, so I was at basketball practice. The girls on my team are truly tender, and Chen (arguably the sweetest) was determined to find a menorah and candles for us to light at the conclusion of practice. She was successful haha, and we sat in a circle, sweating, as we lit the first candle, and they sang together. I have no idea what the song was about, but it was beautiful. Additionally Hanukkah candles aren't supposed to be blown out, you let them burn until they go out on their own. The candles are thin and burn rapidly, typically it doesn’t take longer than an hour. In our case, we broke this rule and blew them out so we could return them to their owner. It was the most perfect start to Hanukkah I could have imagined.

After basketball, many of my classmates gathered for dual purpose celebration of my classmate Taeer’s birthday and Hanukkah. Here I got a little bit more of the history and explanation of the holiday itself as the candles were lit. Another interesting Hanukkah tradition is eating oily/fried foods to celebrate the oil that lasted 8 days. Every bakery sells סופגניות (essentially donuts with filling) and they served a special type of fried potato cakes at Taeer’s party. It was refreshing to just hang out with my classmates at an event that was completely unrelated to school.

The rest of the week we lit our own Hanukkah candles at our apartment, the previous tenants were kind enough to leave a menorah and candles when they moved out. I made sure to eat a few סופגניות during the 8-day celebration. It was beautiful throughout Be’er Sheva. Businesses lit giant menorahs outside every night. One evening I witnessed a menorah lighting along with a small musical ensemble at the hospital. Hanukkah is much different from the previous Israeli holidays I have experienced because even though its origin is connected to religious events, it’s not a religious holiday in terms of observance. That means work and school continue as normal and there weren’t any big religious events I was aware of. It felt more like a time of celebration and remembering with good food, wonderful company, and candles.

A funny side story. As Hanukkah was going on, we were rapidly approaching exams. One evening we had a late zoom review session with our microbiology professor. As we were ending, he jokingly asked if we wanted to light Hanukkah candles together via zoom together. He then proceeded to show us the menorahs his daughters had made in kindergarten. He had to watch them until the candles burned out completely because they were made of very temporary materials which were all very flammable; wood, corn, paper, etc. Luckily this was not the evening his home burned down due to an errant menorah bursting into flames :)

During this time, I discovered I have free access to the fitness center since I’m technically part of the Ben Gurion basketball team. This was a pleasant surprise to me. I was mildly disappointed when I discovered the coach’s definition of “working out” before practice meant treadmill running and not any type of strength training. But the running is good for me, so I can’t complain. Continuing to practice even though I can’t play in games has had more perks than I expected. Since then, I have also received team sweats (SUPER pumped about this one) and a team bag!! They might seem like small things, but with limited clothing and bags, these felt HUGE to me. Now I have two pairs of sweats haha, and that makes a world of difference.

You may be wondering how my Hebrew is coming along. I often wonder the same thing haha. I have a short list of phrases I have memorized; I can recognize random words; I can name most of the important vegetable (it’s essential for ordering food haha); my numbers are good from 1-19, from there it’s pretty hit or miss; and I have learned a handful of basketball words that are more useful in daily life than I expected. Before the semester ended, we had a conversation assessment to determine our placement for the medical Hebrew class. I wouldn’t say I passed with flying colors, but when I was done, my examiner told me, “We can help you”, so there is hope. We will see how far I get this semester.

One of my most important discoveries during finals was group studying. A solid foundation of individual studying is necessary first, but I wouldn’t have made it through the exam period without my classmates. It helped me keep my mental sanity and reminded me of just how much I enjoy hanging out with my classmates. I honestly don’t do it often enough; I hope this can be an area of growth in the future. Some study sessions were planned, but others were impromptu meetings. There are some things we simply must do alone, but in general life is just more fun when it’s done in community. As a reminder to myself as much as anyone, if you are struggling to find the motivation and focus to do something, find a friend or many friends, and do it together. It may take a little longer, but you won’t regret it.

While there is more studying to be done during exams, there were also additional pockets of time available to do things unrelated to school. I got to meet up with Mirta (she lived in my bedroom before I moved in haha) and have a really encouraging and much needed conversation/hangout. About half of my class got ice cream together after one evening exam. It was doubly sweet ;) I went to a basketball game to cheer on my teammates and met a girl named Mayan! Incredibly, she is a messianic Jew and knows people at my church here! It’s a small world huh? I had a blast watching the game with her and Noa. They translated the Hebrew for me, and I translated the basketball for them :) I discovered an incredible café beneath my apartment building that has INCREDIBLE hot chocolate. I will most certainly be going there again. Jordan and I continued our biking adventures by going on a one-hour ride around the city. It was refreshing both physically and emotionally. My bike continues to be one of my favorite Be’er Sheva purchases. My dad will always be my number one biking partner, but Jordan is top-notch. One evening me, my roomies, plus company made a trip to the random clothing store below our building. Truly there are a plethora of different stores below our apartment haha. We have almost instant access to a bakery, vegetable stand, grocery store, cafe, bike shop, pizza place, barber, beauty salon, the clothing store, plus a few more. My companions successfully purchased socks and indoor slippers. Even in Israel, socks are the hardest thing to keep track of. Who know where they disappear to haha. We celebrated Caroline’s birthday before meeting for an afternoon study session. Caroline is a cake lover and Jack gave me a list of her favorites. I had the ambitious goal of making a cake, but between studying and stressing, I came up short. Instead, I bought a carrot cake from my favorite bakery. Everyone knows carrot cake should have cream cheese frosting. Except in Israel, frosting is hard to come by because once a dessert has dairy, it can no longer be eaten with any meals with meat. After adding some homemade cream cheese frosting, I was satisfied. Caroline loved it and I’m so thankful I had the opportunity to celebrate her.

I got to experience a very interesting church service. As I may have mentioned before, the congregation is a mixture of Russian, English, Hebrew, and Spanish speakers. Currently we have 2 services, where live translation is available during the first service. We all get little transmitters and headphones while someone translates the Hebrew to either Russian or English. One of the guys on the preaching team is a Russian speaker. He gave his message in Russian and his son came on the stage and translated the Russian to Hebrew and then it was translated from Hebrew to English for those in the audience. The Russian cohort loves it because this is one of the few times they don’t need translation (: It can feel a little more tedious for the message to go through multiple rounds of translation before it reaches me, but there is a deep beauty in it. Jesus and His truth is for all nations, all peoples, and all languages. His Church is an international church. On the day of Pentecost, it was like this except they didn’t need translation. Wow. How incredible that must have been. I have always thought the miracle of Pentecost was astonishing, but now I have a personal appreciation for what it must have been like to experience it. When Christ returns I have a hope it will be like that again. We will be able to worship and have fellowship together without language barriers or translation. I feel amazed and blessed that I get to experience a piece of what the international church looks like. In a perfect world, I would love nothing more than for each of you to be able to experience it too.

Of course, I finished my finals back in December haha. I apologize for hopping back and forth between semesters. My future posts will be closer to present time, referencing the new semester and my experiences since returning to Israel after Christmas break. Thanks for reading my ramblings. I love you all and miss you dearly.