Tammy Weekly. Edition 1

Ok. So I figure instead of barraging people with facebook posts about Israel....so if people want to find out how I am doing, they can just check this thing. Anywho, so I went to Arad this weekend and went hiking in the Judean desert. First thing we get there and its pretty bright sun so sunglasses have become my new permenant facial attachment in Israel. The whole place is so blindingly beautiful...you have to wear sunglasses everywhere...even inside. We went up so high into the mountains that we ended up climbing down ropes and ladders to get to the bottom. It was pretty cool, since we were repelling off the wall using nothing but rope and strangely enough it wasn't so scary. Granted I didn't look out...but that was rather hard anyway. Anyway so it was a really long hike...pretty incredible, so I decided to go for a tiny walk, as a breather almost absorbing the rolling desert mountains surrounding me...until I see a sign in all three languages english,hebrew, and arabic...DANGER LAND MINES!!...I am like...ok. Turning around...now. I wish I had this blog earlier so I could post stuff about Sderot, but I guess I will later. When we went to the youth hostel in Arad I was so tired, after the shabbot meal and activity, I passed out for a good 13 hours. It was lovely. The next day we went walking to different places in Arad, of course avoiding all the spectacular views and desert. So me and andy went for a walk on our own. This time, I am happy to say, we were not pelted with rocks by Palestinians, unlike a couple days ago when were were walking around our university, and three palestinians guys about our age, threw a rock at us, hitting andy in the shoulder. Yeah...just got here. So anyway, we walk out into the desert in Arad, and it felt like the sound of music, except without the rolling green hills, but dunes of sand. Absolutely breath taking. I couldn't stay away from there, so after having a stuffing, delicious meal at the hostel, and playing an unreasonable amount of taboo (which I happen to stink at but really like), and israeli jeopardy, I went out to the desert again on my own. I walked on a bit farther into it, and being the only person for a ways, was pretty thrilling. I sang out there for like 20 minutes until I had to go back with the sunset in time for havdalah. And on the hill in front of me I saw antelope, like 5 or 6 or them running about on the hill. Truly incredible. I picked up shells on the desert floor, which was littered with them and took them back to show to people. I will have to show people when I come back. I guess that's it for now.