We spent all day running around and getting ready for shabbos... I polished my nails, which is always a group effort because I couldn't move for a good two hours (and then obviously I still managed to mess them up). Then we went looking for things for havdalah - we ended up buying three candles and box of matches, a orange (for the smell), and figured that crystal light was good enough for a drink...
We went to "el court ingress", a supermarket and I bought soy milk.
I know, gross, you're telling me - but all I want is coffee and there's one fridge for so many kids that I'm not buying a carton of milk for other people to use!
After spending a good twenty minutes trying to figure out what to do with our key, since there is no eiruv (and no I will not tell you where we put it!), we left for the Chabad house. We got there so quickly, we went into a few stores first because we were nervous to be there so early!
We met the family and felt very awkward until thankfully some women named Debbie from Monsey showed up.
Really, thank Gd for her!
Shul was weird. When we got there, we needed to wait on line to get in. A security guard (who looked 16), interrogated us before actually letting us in. When we finally got into shul and hiked up a thousand flights of stairs to the women's section, we scouted out for all the frum Jews and found... NO ONE.
We found one women and when we went over to her, we realized that she too was going to the Chabad house... so there went nothing!
After davening which was a little weird - only because we're not used to Sefardi davening, there was a big kiddush for everyone. It's really crazy how these people are so not in touch with their yiddishkeit (not religious at ALL - wear pants, use their phones, etc.) yet, they make it to shul every single friday night, shabbos morning, and shabbos afternoon.
We then met other girls who were going to the Chabad rabbi:
3 girls in Florence for the summer - Emi, Jordy, and Pam
2 Australians backpacking - Miriam and Michal
1 Ba'al Tshuva in Music School - Laura
The rabbi told us that dinner wouldn't be for another hour and sent us to look for a park, so we did exactly that... we all walked together, and hung out for a while; Laura told us her story and Miriam and Michal told us what they had been doing and where they are continuing to (keep in mind that they are fresh out of Israel!)
Dinner was fabs! We made sure to sit next to the Chabad Rebbitzen, so we could ask her where to get Kosher food from so it was very helpful.
They told us that for the last 34 years, they have been living in Spain.
They know enough spanish to get by and most of the food they have is shipped to them by one of their 14 - yes 14! kids...
The food was great; The rabbi made his own wine... everyone was saying it tasted like scotch, but how should I know!? and the rest of the food was real heimishe yummy food that I was actually full by the time we got to desert.
Sadly, there was no singing...
The next morning, we set an alarm for 8:30 - shul started at 9, but we were too tired so we slept until 10 instead.
We ran to shul, davened, and then just like at night, there was a big kiddish.
We sat with Miriam (from Australia) and the "Madridians" for a while.
Miriam was sitting next to a guy named Alejjandro who was hitting on her. He's about 35 years old, and she's all of 19 so it was really funny... until it got weird and he showed up at the chabad house for lunch AND sat next to her!
Lunch was cholent.. what else do you need??
The chabad rabbi was great; he was telling stories the entire meal about the rebbe and when there were no stories being told, Alejjandro sang for us.
Some people liked his voice, but I was more disturbed by his creepiness to enjoy his singing.
He offered to take Miriam to Toledo the next day, but she only said that she would go if we all did, so he was okay with it! He also walked us back to our dorm, when his apartment was around the corner from
the Chabad house.
Miriam, Michal, and Laura spent the day by us. They couldn't get into their hostel (because they didn't have the key). We hung out in our room and talked for a while.... Miriam and Michal were discussing the rest of the trip. Sunday night, they were planning to go Pamplona - the running of the bull (bulls are let out of a pen and people need to run away from it). It is not my idea of fun, but to each is own!
We got hot and bored inside, so we went to a park for a little - I scouted KOSHER ICE CREAM! It was the best day of my life, so we need to go back there one day... and then we were bored (and hungry) that even though we had already davened mincha, we decided to go back to shul to see if there would be food.... - what Jews!
It's really crazy how although the people of this shul are far from religious (carry, drive, use phones on shabbos), they all made sure to be at every 'service.'
They came to kabbalat shabbat, shachris, and shabbos mincha/maariv.
I was shocked! But, it was so nice that they were all there!
When shabbos was over, the girls came back to our room.
Laura who plays the chello decided that she would play in Plaza del Sol to see if she could make money.
The girls dropped off their stuff at us, and with the chello on her back, we all went to plaza mayor.
She needed a chair to sit in on while playing, so Miriam took a chair from a restaurant and at the count of 3, we RANNNN.
After 45 minutes of playing (it was 2:00am), she had made 15 euros - just enough to come with us to Toledo the following day...
The entire night we were calling Alejandro to make a plan with him for Sunday in Toledo, but we were out of luck... he didn't pick up his phone.
We: emailed him, called him (a million times), and even facebooked him - but he never answered.
No comments:
Post a Comment