My boyfriend got us tickets to the Madonna concert here in Tel Aviv last week - which also happened to be the last night of her "sticky and sweet" tour, so it was an extra special night. I had never seen Madonna live before and I'm not sure what I was expecting - some "like a virgin" and impressive dance routines, but I wasn't expecting much more than that. How wrong I was! I left Madonna's concert feeling so inspired. She just came across so human and yet so incredibly accomplished – making us in the audience feel like we can be anything we want to be. It’s always a shock to me when I see celebrities in person – like they suddenly seem so human and regular. Anyway she put on an amazing show and I’m posting here one of the videos I took at the concert for your viewing pleasure. :-)
My days continue to be Hebrew-packed and I’m just trying to swallow up as much Hebrew as I can, as quickly as I can! The ulpan is advancing and extremely tiring, but I have a very good teacher and I’m grateful for that. From five hours of class I move on to my babysitting job for the next five hours of my day, with an adorable Israeli girl who understands English but refuses to utter a word. It can be funny and it can be frustrating (often depending on the mood she’s in). A lot of times my Hebrew bumbling just makes her laugh and we even try sometimes to read books with difficult Hebrew just because it’s so hilarious for her to hear me stumbling through the words. But sometimes she just wants me to understand her and shuts down in frustration when I don’t. And it’s the most frustrating feeling in the world for me, because with everyone else I interact with here in Israel, we can always turn to English when in need. The girl understands English but for whatever reason refuses to speak it. For example, she’ll ask me if I know what a certain Hebrew word means, and I just keep guessing English words until I get it right. And she can correctly identify once I’ve said the right word. But she can’t seem to come up with the English word on her own. Now that she’s started school she has homework every afternoon, and one of my babysitting duties is to sit with her and help her with the homework and check her answers. This is seriously the hardest Hebrew experience I’ve encountered yet!! First of all, I’m helping her with her MATH homework, and for anyone who knows me well, you know me and math! For one thing. For another, math in Hebrew. I have yet to learn the Hebrew words for “integer” or “multiplication” etc so yeah, the whole experience is a little amusing to say the least. I literally sit there with her Hebrew math book and a dictionary and visualize the situation as if from up above looking down on myself, and simply laugh.
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