Minor bus disaster

Minor disaster today.

One of my friends from the course here is called Marijn, from the Netherlands. Most people on campus know him as the one whose name they struggle to pronounce. He's a theologian, with a special interest in the Old Testament and a good grasp of classical Hebrew - but here to improve his modern spoken Hebrew. The two of us went into the modern city centre of west Jerusalem for a drink this afternoon.

We got off the no. 19 bus at King George Street, walked down to Zion Square, found a decent looking little bar, had our drink and a chat, then headed back up the hill to get the bus back to campus. We naturally assumed that the bus home would be on the same road as we'd got off, but on the opposite side, going the opposite direction.

We were wrong. For some reason, the no. 19 northbound and the no. 19 southbound both go in the same direction along King George Street. But with the legendary Jonny spatial awareness, I only realised this after we'd gone a mile and a half along King George Street in the wrong direction without finding a bus stop.

In other news, the Hebrew tuition is going fine. We were learning about rooms of the house today. We had to get into pairs and have a little dialogue; one person has put out a classified ad for a house to rent, and the other person rings up to ask about the house. It was all "how big is the bathroom" and "how many bedrooms" and stuff like that. Good for practising adjective agreements too.

After we'd all been doing that for a few minutes, my partner and I got unexpectedly hauled up to the front of the class to demonstrate our dialogue. We managed to get sidetracked into a massive haggle over the price: she wanted 9000 shekels a month; I was trying to get her down to 3000. The teacher thought we could have spent more time on the new vocabulary and the adjective endings, but said I was clearly getting into the Israeli mentality!

I do at least feel like I can have a very basic conversation with some degree of fluency now. It's all in the present tense, and on a limited range of subjects, but I can actually talk and listen, without being reliant on the script from the textbooks, and I'm starting to build some confidence. I think I can probably achieve a respectable amount in the five weeks I'm here for. Here's hoping.

In Jerusalem

This blog has been dormant for a while. Back when I had the time and the motivation, I used to write stuff about liberalism and UK politics. Over the last couple of years, I’m afraid I got out of the habit. Now, I’m studying in Israel for a few weeks, and I’d like to keep my family and friends posted. This old blog seems as good a place as any. If my Facebook friends, Twitter followers and former Lib Dem readership want to join the party too, you’re more than welcome.

I’m in Jerusalem, on the top of Mount Scopus, watching the sun set through the window of my dorm room. If I walked round the other side of the building, I’d see the Dome of the Rock glowing red below me in the heart of the Old City. I’ve decided to come to Israel to lean the Hebrew language, and I’m on an intensive five-week course at the Hebrew University.

As a modern linguist, it'll be a great challenge learning a new language, especially one that's unrelated to anything I've studied before. As a Jew, I hope having a basic grasp of Hebrew will make it easier to explore my own culture and heritage. As someone who cares about the politics of the Middle East, I hope my time here will give me more of an insight into this complex, beautiful and war-torn region.

I flew out from Manchester nearly a week ago, and spent a few days with my cousins in Ra’anana, which is a coastal town slightly to the north of Tel Aviv. On Sunday, I got the bus over to Jerusalem, and registered at the University for one of their summer crash courses.

Hebrew U has two campuses. Humanities are on Mount Scopus, which is where I’m based. The Mount Scopus campus, overlooking the Old City, was the original home of the university from 1925, but after the 1948 war, it was cut off – a little exclave of Israeli territory surrounded on all sides by the Jordanian-occupied West Bank. As a result, the university built its other campus in Givat Ram, central Jerusalem, which nowadays houses the science faculty.

In typical Jonny style, I managed to apply for the course about six weeks after the deadline. I don’t think I would even have found the course if it hadn’t been for my brother Alex, who sent me a link to Hebrew U’s website. I rang them up and pestered them in pidgin Hebrew for a bit, and they caved in. Within three days of the first phonecall, I was getting on the plane, and my formal acceptance letter from the University was waiting in my inbox when I touched down at Ben Gurion.

So far, I’ve had three days of tuition, and it’s been a challenge. Before you start, you sit a test, and get sorted into a class based on ability, starting with Aleph (beginners), and working through the Hebrew alphabet to Heh (advanced). Aleph is sub-divided into levels 1-5. I could already read and write Hebrew script, and had a smattering of vocab, so they’ve put me in Aleph 3. The tuition is entirely in Hebrew. If I said it was intense, it'd be an understatement.

First thoughts: I need to start picking it up quickly. I hate being in a country where I can’t string a sentence together. It feels like losing a limb, especially having studied modern languages, and being able to at least get by in most of Western Europe.

Best get cracking with the homework, then. I’ll keep you posted.