Special twist last post

I am only writing this last entry because I stumbled acorss my ISP on the Internet:

http://digitalcollections.sit.edu/isp_collection/643/

So there it is, for the world to read. I was pretty excited to find it there, right next to Yoshi's!

I am doing well at home. The blog missed the entire Spain and Portugal trip-extravaganza-reunion of last month, but I'll put a few pictures here just so it can be recorded in the blog chain-of-events.

Now I am here in Mevasseret, writing from the couch with Maddy right next to me. I have spent some percentage of the last 3 weeks I've been home trying to find something to do for the 4 I have left. I've met with the deputy mayor for the Environment, worked with VolunteerJerusalem by writing a database of Jewish environmental organizations, met with Pearl at SPNI, and will probably end up teaching English to Ethiopian girls in the Mevasseret absorption center and helping to write foresty curriculum for a Jewish-funded youth village in Rwanda. Special twist!


Mostly I am just looking forward to getting back to my last year at Brandeis, where I will ride my bike to my internship at Waltham Fields Community Farms, work on campus, finish my classes, and live for a whole year with my friends. Sounds pretty good to me.

Back in Hong Kong

This might be the last post for the blog for awhile, so I basically just wanted to leave the links to my two facebook albums full of pictures from the trip. I am back at the Hong Kong airport enjoying lots of free and fast wireless and all is very well. I cannot believe I will be home tonight! The semester is done, everything has been done, I am retracing my steps back home... and life is good.

Album #1: 3 weeks in NZ

Album #2: Christchurch or bust

New Zealand!

All is so very well in New Zealand! Internet is rough though and I don't have much now either, so I will just post a few pictures from the last few days. We started out in Christchurch last Friday, and have since then headed south to Lake Tekapo, Mt Cook, Dunedin, the southern scenic route to Te Anau, Milford Sound, Queenstown, and now Fox glacier. We have about 4 days to make our way back to Christchurch before my flight out all the way back to Israel! Everything is wrapping up, I cannot believe it. But I think we've done pretty well with Jimmy and Jah (our pre-named campervans) and this whole thing should wrap up on a high note. Here are pictures! See everyone soon!!

We are so very done

Bangalow week ended on a very high note. I finished my paper, I went to get it printed and bound, and Michelle, Susie and I had wine and free tapas at a restaurant in town. The paper is DONE! And it is great. Not only is it done, but we gave presentations the last two days, and mine went beautifully. The highlight of it must have been at the end, when Peter asked about setting up a Transition group in his area. Peter wants to start a Transition town. ha.

So that was the adventure of the last few days. Last night we went to the newly opened Earth N Sea pizza place to celebrate being dooooone, and it was great. Now in my last few days in Australia, I can really appreciate this life, the people who are in it, and everything that I have done. Which has been a lot. I cannot believe I found this project, I did it, and it is all done.

Oh right, this is a funny picture....one of the ways me and Michelle survived the winter nights in Bangalow. No but really, everything is great here and I am looking forward to the last few days of the program. Tomorrow we are going ocean kayaking as a group unless the weather is bad, and Wednesday we have a final group meeting in the morning, and a group dinner at night.


Thursday morning we leave for the airport! And that afternoon is me, Kendall, Epps, and Michelle's flight to Christchurch, New Zealand! Soon we may start talking about plans, or we may really be going in with two campervans booked and a general goal of making the loop around the island! I am very excited for what I think will be a really beautiful trip.

This is a ridiculous picture I had to add from Susie's house... why don't all phone books emphasize the 'hi' in white?? Good one Australia. Anyway... Internet has been a little rough in Byron this time around, so in case this is my last post from Australia.... everything is great here as this life is wrapping up, and I will write next from New Zealand (is there Internet in New Zealand?)!

Bangalow week

I am here in Bangalow week, with only a few days left to go until I turn in my paper and meet up with the group for the last few days on the program. I only have a week left in Australia!! And my paper is pretty much....done. 50 pages and it looks good. I have a few more things to put together here and there, but basically, it is done. I am quite excited, but I do have a few more days here in Bangalow to think about that.
So this is where I live. Michelle and I have been living very happily with yogasusie at her house (the old office of Sustainable Futures Australia) in the middle of an industrial estate, across the highway from fields of cows. Since we got here Thursday morning from Holy Goat, we have basically been sitting around and working on our papers.

Other adventures include walking along the highway 30 minutes to get to Bangalow village and wireless at Utopia cafe (current location), going to the Channon Markets, and starting to take Susie's yoga classes at night, across the parking lot in a room near the warehouses.


It is a beautiful area of the world here in Bangalow, and we are basically just enjoying where we have found ourselves again as we get through work retreat week. In the next few days, we'll finish up...everything.. and eventually find a way to print and bind our reports. Then Friday we head back to Byron Bay, our 5 weeks are up! Next Thursday in New Zealand, 4 weeks until home, 5 weeks to Spain!
http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=2076811&id=9803563&l=1190a33e12

Mayyyy

I just wanted to update about life these days, but I have no new pictures since last time. I'll just add a few random ones I didn't post from Sydney. All is well with me. I spent most of my last couple days in Sydney at the state library, because I had to take advantage of being in civilization before I came back up here to nature. It was a very successful idea, and now I am at a really good point with my project (already 35 pgs written!) I also wrapped up Sydney time with a second-to-last-night cooking dinner & and a movie with Meg, and actual last night dinner out with Meg and Jenni. I walked around the city and went to the harbor one last time, and was overall just totally satisfied and happy with my two weeks in Sydney- two of the best this semester!

I left Sydney Sunday morning at 7am, and took a 12 hour train ride up to Casino. I made it to Lismore that night, where I met back up with Michelle and went to Margaret's house. It is so nice being back here, I'm really glad I decided to do this. It's almost like my house in Australia, and there is a comfortable bed and Internet and I am happy. Yesterday, we had a celebration breakfast at Mecca cafe, and played at Pacific Bulk Food Store, before spending a couple of hours trying to be productive at the library. We had dinner at Erica and Kendall's motel room (two girls on the program) and it was so great seeing them, and seeing how incredibly different everyone's experiences have been this month, and how totally satisfied that my experience was exactly what it was.

This morning we went to the car boot market with Margaret (a farmer's market where they just pull up their pick up trucks and sell out of the back of them). I had my last phone interview for the project, we had a fun lunch attempting to celebrate cinco de mayo (turns out the Magic Mexican restaurant closed last year...so we just had nachos at a cafe) spent another couple of hours at the library, and now are back home, about to cook dinner and hang around here for the night.

Tomorrow we head to Holy Goat, an intentional community in the hills nearby where Michelle stayed the last few weeks. There is a community dinner tomorrow night, and in the morning we'll get a ride to Bangalow, where we will be staying the final week of ISP, to finish up our reports.

The campervans have been booked for New Zealand, and so me and 3 others from the program -Alex, Kendall, and other Michelle- are on for driving around for 2 weeks in the south island! I am starting to get very excited for the plans of the future! I hope everyone is doing well, and talk to you soon.

The last days of April

The last few days have been really excellent. I took a ferry over to Manly harbor to interview two Transition people, and through that experience (the ferry part) got many, many pictures of the Sydney opera house as we sailed around it. I will add some of these to Facebook. I also walked across the Sydney harbor bridge (this picture here) which was great, and went to the Contemporary Arts Museum and Museum of Sydney. All in all, Sydney time has been a success.

Tuesday I took a train to Katoomba, a city in the Blue Mountains about two hours west of Sydney. From the second I got off the train, it felt like the mountains-- cold, crisp, smells like campfire and winter-- it was very exciting to be out of the city. Katoomba was so beautiful-- this picture to the right is of the iconic 'Three Sisters' rock that you can see from the outskirts of the town.

My friend Meg came to Katoomba as well, and we did a few hikes in the area, in addition to spending most of Wednesday at the Jenolan Caves. We went on a tour that left Katoomba at 11am, drove an hour and a half to get there in a van with a Spanish-speaking family and two Japanese couples, and then spent about an hour and a half in the Orient cave at Jenolan.


Not only where the caves incredible- the Orient cave is ranked one of the 10 best in the world- on the trip back, our guide Mark randomly took us to see this herd (?) of kangaroos that he knew grazed in a field nearby. How did Mark know this?

All in all, an excellent day. I was also in Katoomba (the main reason, actually) to meet a few people from Transition Blue Mountains. I met Clare and Jed -both great and very helpful- and went to an event the Transition group was hosting, a film about retrofitting homes in the Blue Mtns.
The movie was a little boring but I would say close to 100 people were there! I couldn't believe it! It was very inspiring to see what Transition could look like, and how people were intrigued and inspired by the practicality and hope of this concept.

I am now back in Sydney for my last few days here- I am leaving on the Sunday morning train and heading to Lismore! I think I will be going back and staying with Margaret for a few days, before heading to Bangalow with Michelle for the last week of ISP.

I have so many great pictures from the last week, but a bunch of them are not uploading to Facebook and it is very annoying. Once it starts working, I will add the link here. Hope everyone is doing well!

http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=2076811&id=9803563&l=1190a33e12