Holidays of the holidays

Shalom,

December is on of the fullest month in Israel. Because of the three big monotheistic religions coexisting here, the country has a lot to celebrate. Christian Christmas, muslims Ramadan and jewish Hanukkah, all in one month. Thats why the holiday during that time is called "The holiday of holidays".

This year Ramadan wasn't around December, so we had "just" 2 big things to celebrate.

The first evening of Hannukah I spent with my dad and step monther. It was nice just to light the candles like we were doing it at home. The other days I put them on all by myself, sometimes with Luca. One evening a nice doctor invited me to eat with them. That was really nice although the family was kind of different.;) Hanukkah wasn't that special, what was a little bit sad. For me it was always a happy, funny and joyful holiday and I was kind of expecting, that in Israel it will be more than that, but it wasn't. I did not make such experiences like on Jom Kippur or Rosh Hashanah, but I were expecting them. Although it was nice to light up the candles and show the others a little bit what Hanukkah is about.

The first topic was, sadly, Christmas. Really at the end I got more annoyed of Christmas then in Germany. Of course at home it is normal to talk about it and prepare everything, but I thought here in Israel would it be different. The problem was, that we have just contact to ourself (the germans). I was hoping a little bit, that Christmas will rush over, but it was the main theme...every day...

A lot of the volunteers went home for it, for example Kathy, Mirjam, Loris and Joao. Right, just Luca, Hugo and I in the colocation. Lucas parents arrived before Christmas Eve so for the week of Christmas it was just Hugo and I. It never had been that calm in the colocation. A bit sad, but wonderful too. Imagine one day I cleaned the apartment and the next day it still was clean!!!! That never happened before. That made me happy ;). I enjoyed the time alone, but on the other side I searched contact to the others, so finally on the 24th of December I went to Tel Aviv to a house party and celebrated with them. That evening was really nice and I thought the Christmas Evening would be worse, but really bad had been just all the photos of my family sitting together. The 26th is the day, where the whole family from my fathers side went together and celebrated. They send me pictures and videos and I was kind of jealous and wished to be there. But it is like that and I knew, what would confront me and I think I could deal with it very well. It is an good experience too not to be with your family one time.

In the end, that had been my Holidays of Holidays. Finally I have to tell you that working in the hospital at that time can be really funny. Because I am working at the children department, every five seconds a group was coming in making Loud music and gave presents to the children. We (the nurses and I) tried to make a little Hanukkah Party too. I was supposed to play Piano. I got songs and wrote down the notes 2 minutes before and I must say, I gladly failed. It was horrible, but everybody was happy, that I was trying. So the time had been a challenge with some nice moments for me and I can really say: I am happy that chirstmas is just one time in the year.

Lehitraot,

SK