the best chicken dinner and Sederot

Here I am again, thanks to Laurel bringing me to school with her so I could use the internet, which never seems to stay connected at her apartment long enough to write a sentence let alone a whole entry. While she is taking a Hebrew test, I am sitting in the Library feverishly typing away to share with you, my faithful readers, our most

recent adventures.

Monday night Laurel and her friend Annie were invited to dinner. The Meal was at 8pm, in the backyard of a small art store owned by an Arab who lives in the Old City. He cooked (what Laurel claims was) the most delicious chicken she has ever tasted. After one very large chicken leg she was full, though he insisted she eat 3 more! Not only that, but she didn't even think to bring any back for me. In the middle of dinner she heard sirens, saw a firetruck, police cars and an ambulance speed by the shop. Turning to the host, Annie asked him what was going on. he replied, "it is probably just another attack."

Here is a strange phenomenon. For those of you living in America, the idea of an attack of any sorts is shaking. Here in Israel attacks happen, and life goes on. A very worried Laurel and Annie left dinner at 12 midnight, to see people sitting at cafes and continuing with daily life. The attack was near the Old City where a Palestinian resident of east Jerusalem hit a group of Israeli soldiers with his car, wounding a total of 15 soldiers and four civilians. Even though it was scary, life goes on.

The next day Laurel went on a field trip to Sederot, about a mile outside Gaza. I, wanted no part of it. She invited me along, though I appreciated the gesture, I was content to sit at home. Thank you very much. Sederot is a town that has had Qassam rockets falling on it for 7 years. Though there is a cease fire with Gaza, extremist groups from just within Gaza continue to fire missiles into Israeli populated areas. The people of Sederot have to live with the ever present fear that any moment there could be an alarm signaling an attack. When an alarm goes off the citizens have 15 seconds to get to a bomb shelter. A women who spoke to the WUJS group told a story of a girl who heard an alarm go off when she was in class. The whole class got up and ran to a bomb shelter. When she returned to class there was a Qassam missile in her seat. Another story was about the children who have to grow up knowing nothing but the fear of falling

missiles. It is not as though the missiles came one day while they were growing up, it is the

only life these young children have known. Every playground has been bombed, so they have build the only playground in the word made out of bomb shelters.Laurel told me after that she had butterflies in her stomach the whole time. The feeling she had for 7 hours was the only feeling the people of Sederot have known for 7 years. After the group left Sederot they drove up to the top of a hill that overlooked Gaza. The view was magnificent. There was a wind chime memorial for a fallen soldier providing soft background music, while the group stood in silence and looked out over the strip of land where so

much violence has stemmed. From the hill Laurel could see the Mediterranean, and her professor told them that Egypt was directly left of the area. If she turned her head to the right she saw Israel, and straight in front Gaza. Such a small area to fight over.
-Mo the Shalom Gnome