Up All Night

Hello, Donna and Josh here, writing a little update on Jerusalem goings-on...

Last night Josh and most of his cantorial colleagues dragged themselves out of bed in the middle of the night to attend a very special 3:00am service at the Aleppo Synagogue. "Bakashot" services take place between Simchat Torah and Pesach, in the dead of winter when the nights are long and there are a lot of specific things to pray for. The members of the congregation turn out at 3am every Shabbat to sing liturgical poetry until the sun rises. As part of a series of field trips led by Eli Schleifer, head of the cantorial program, the brave students went to Bakashot last night and ended up at Anna and Jamie's apartment for bagels at 7am. Then they all crawled home to get some sleep!

Some other updates: Donna had a really nice, relaxing birthday on Valentine's Day, and was thrilled when Josh came home with red roses -- so sweet! Donna had rehearsal for "Patience" but we were able to grab dinner beforehand at one of our favorite cafes. The show is now less than a month away, and it's really shaping up!

Yesterday we went to Rehovot (which seems now to be happening weekly) to say goodbye to Michael before he flew home to Cali on Saturday. The poor guy was sick all week and missed out on a lot of touring. We ate lunch at Savta and Saba's (of course) and were sent home with more tupperware full of food (of course.) On Thursday night we had five friends over for dinner to help us eat all the food in our fridge, and we still had a week's worth of food left after our huge meal! Thank goodness we can freeze most of it...

We are both looking forward to this coming week when we will be going to the Negev and Eilat on HUC's last tiyul of the year. This outdoorsy-type trip will consist of hiking, snorkeling, touring and, of course, educational programming. It will be nice to get out of rainy Jerusalem!

That's it for now. More soon!!