If you knew all that I knew, my poor Jerusalem...

My guidebook describes a phenomenon known as “Jerusalem Syndrome,” whereby visitors to the Holy City become so steeped in Biblical history that they begin to have Messianic delusions. A Canadian woman insisted she was the virgin Mary and she had to get to Bethlehem to retrieve the baby Jesus. A teenager on a school trip became overwhelmed from the stress of his obligation to save the souls of everyone he met.

Jerusalem Syndrome is sufficiently well-documented that the city has designated a small wing of its psychiatric hospital for incarcerating the afflicted. According to the guidebook, Jerusalem Syndrome generally lasts for about a week, upon which the individual “becomes very embarrassed and never wishes to speak of it again.”

In my case, so far the only symptom of Jerusalem Syndrome has been an inability to get the “Jesus Christ Superstar” soundtrack out of my head.

"Poland? I LOVE Poland! What were you doing in Poland?"

Circus Ninja is sad today. She just wrote the funniest post of her career, describing a social faux pas she committed at a dinner party. But she's afraid to put it up because there are well-known Israelis involved whose good name should not be sullied by association with ninjas.

Suffice it to say that Circus Ninja gushed about how great Poland is to an adorable older gentleman who turned out to be a Holocaust survivor and a major Israeli diplomat.

Stay tuned for the next episode, in which Circus Ninja tells Menachem Begin that his corned beef sandwich would taste so much better with cheese on it.

Israeli Bus-Boarding for Intrepid Beginners

Invited to visit Noa's family, I attempt to board the bus from Jerusalem to Golani Junction. “Are you ready for this?” the woman behind me asks. She’s Israeli but speaks excellent American-accented English. “You’ll want to keep your elbows out. Every time I visit my brother in New York I just watch in amazement at the orderly little lines people form to get on the bus!”

I make a pact with myself. No shoving. I will not push ahead of anyone who has been waiting in front of me. But I will damn well hold the line against the people behind me. As soon as the bus pulls in to its assigned slot, I place my hand on its still-warm front window, creating a neat barrier against the black-hatted gentleman to my right. The crowd begins to press forward and I’m well-positioned to mount the stairs. From my left, people begin weaving into the breach created by the less-assertive. I slip my left hand around the large backpack worn by the teenager in front of me. I won’t push ahead of her; I’ve made a vow. But after she goes, I go.

Holding my arms out firmly, now the shoving of the crowd only serves to propel me toward the steps of the bus. It’s working. Just behind my left arm stands a young woman holding two bicycle wheels. I’d seen her husband earlier, carrying the bike frame and using it as a plow to part the crowd. With unbelievable gall, the woman raises a wheel over her head and inserts it in the space between me and the person ahead of me, clearly intending to follow the wheel right on past me. Not gonna work, I resolve. I’ll ride this tide up the stairs behind a bike wheel and a severed hand if I have to.

And I basically do. I hold the line; she can’t insert her body into the space she created with her wheel, nor can she extract the wheel. Not my problem. That was a decision she made. The crowd presses us forward and my feet find the stairs, triumphantly. Shuffle shuffle, shuffle shuffle. She follows on awkwardly, giving me a half-hug, her wheel wedged against my knees. I hand my ticket to the driver, wriggle past the wheel, and take a seat - a good one, in the front, unassigned. Seated comfortably, I prepare to give Wheel Woman a politely apologetic smile, but she moves past me without so much as a reproachful glance.

I guess she’s boarded this bus before.

My neighbor's dog has a bark that is the auditory equivalent of vomiting up a school of piranhas.

Shmone Levenstein Hardware, closed Saturdays

Jacob and his fiancee invite me to spend a day with them at the Dead Sea.

When I was twenty-five, I took an unforgettable vacation across Italy with my then-sixteen-year-od sister. When we got to the Tower of Pisa, I was amazed by this fact: that mo-fo really LEANS. I thought people were just exaggerating for effect when they depicted it in cartoons and stuff. But no, man, it’s sideways.

So it is with the Dead Sea. It’s not just, “Oh, neat, I’m sort of float-ier here.” You are flippin’ FLOATING. It is impossible to drown accidentally in the Dead Sea. You have to really, really want to drown in the Dead Sea. You have to have a will of steel, and a very high pain threshold, to drown yourself in the Dead Sea.

Seeing as how I had, at no point, any intention of drowning myself in the Dead Sea, I used my time floating there to practice my Hebrew numbers.

“Efesssss” I breathed, having trained myself to remember the word “zero” as one long exhale. “Achad”…Jacob joined me, counting out two through five. I rejoined him at six, seven, eight. Shesh, sheba, shmone.

Ah, shmone. Let’s talk about the number 8 for a minute. In my opinion, when you name a number “shmone” you are just begging me to visualize that number as an eighty-five-year-old Lithuanian who runs a locksmith shop on Pine Street. He has sparse white hair and a peppery-grey goatee, and though he only wears a kippah once a year on Yom Kippur, he somehow manages to look naked without it. He insists that he should be called “Simon” now that he lives in America, but no one can bring themselves to call him anything but Shmone.

A casual observer might accuse me of letting my imagination run away with itself, and I suppose I’ll only confirm that when I tell you what happened when I learned the word for the number five: khamesh.

Khamesh is Shmone’s half-Arab grandson, a precocious nine-year-old with thick-fringed eyes so dark they seem lined in kohl. Though Shmone can understand the temptation, he’ll never forgive his son for marrying a Druze.

I suppose you’re going to argue that logically Khamesh should be five years old, not nine. To which I can only say, in your mnemonic for the Hebrew numbers, Khamesh can be whatever you want him to be.

Although presumably in your mnemonic, the numbers 8 and 5 are not a Lithuanian locksmith and his preternaturally intelligent grandson. Because presumably, you are not completely f*cking nuts.

mastering the aleph-bet

You know what, "resh"? F*ck you. You used to be my favorite letter; you were so gently rounded and recognizable. Then I discovered that you are virtually unpronounceable for most Americans. What a snake in the grass you turned out to be.

reader participation!

A poll: buy a plane ticket directly home from Israel for Christmas, or spend an extra hundred bucks to detour to Scandinavia for the six days preceding winter solstice?

I think I know the answer to this one, but it involves investing in some thermasilks and a wool coat. And maybe night-vision goggles.

swimming for grownups

I would like to state that I think the backstroke is just irresponsible when the pool is this crowded.

Just 'cause you're an old lady doesn't mean you have the right to keep hitting me in the face, you know. I'm not above a well-timed reckless breaststroke. There, I said it.

what would Cheapskate do?

Since August 5th, Circus Ninja has been to eleven countries. She has searched far and wide for her fabulously wealthy benefactor, to no avail. No rich relatives have died, despite repeated poisoning attempts. Aware that her spending habits will only accelerate the dreaded day when Circus Ninja has to sit still and get a job, Circus Ninja has created an alter ego: Cheapskate.

(What happens when your alter ego creates an alter ego? If you met in a dark alley, would you recognize each other?)

Many a frivolous purchase has been avoided by simple repetition of the mantra, "What would Cheapskate do?"

Cheapskate would never take the bus in nice weather!

Cheapskate would buy a bag of pita bread and a few containers of yogurt and feed herself for the day!

Cheapskate would make herself a cup of coffee at HOME rather than buying that latte! (This one is a significant sacrifice, as Latte Maker Man is absolutely dreamy. He's interested, too - he really swept me off my feet with that now-familiar pickup line, "Are you Jewish?")

Cheapskate would totally lug that roadside box of free books up to the secondhand bookstore to trade them for cash!

Cheapskate will cover her grey hairs with mascara until dyeing them is absolutely necessary! (Wait. I mean, she would do that, if she had any grey hairs at all, which she most certainly does not.)

Cheapskate will sweet-talk the YMCA into giving her a student discount!

Don't worry, Mom, it's just a game. I'm not depriving myself of fun experiences just to save a few shekels. Bear in mind, Cheapskate was not above dropping a hundred bucks for a hotel in Akko when the only other housing option was a youth hostel that smelled like feet.

SO beautiful, Michelle!

Thanks to everyone for your comments, here and via email.

I hope you all got the punchline to that post, which is to look at it from the Israeli perspective. They invite some American chick to spend New Year's with them. She eats her dinner and then sits there grinning silently for forty minutes, at which point she blurts out, "carrot".