Dude, where's my car?

On one of our recent wood collecting trips Vlad and I passed this bizarre scene in Ramat-Hasharon. Needless to say I ran and grabbed my camera.

Super Mushi

You won't believe it, but even in the United States of America there are mice! And here is the proof:

























BTW, Mushi is the name of the cat. My roommate name is Santiago.

A bonus question: can you recognize one of my birthday presents in the photos? ;-)

Oren

Nostalgy Corner

1993... Anti-Yoki Signs Language
1994... Fish Talks
1994... MOP Yearbook
2001... Fishterix#1

Anti-Yoki Signs Language

With this post I'm starting a "Nostalgy Corner" - a page, that will list all the past-related posts. A static link will point to it from the main page, so it could be easily found any time you feel like going back in time. If you post something nostalgic - please ask me or Ofer to link your post to the nostalgy page.
So... Anti-Yoki Signs Language
For those who don't know or don't remember: this signs language was developed in 1993 (yud-alef) during various lessons, and it contains all the terms we needed at that time. Its main purpose was the usual: making laugh about Yoki, but it grew and developed and made it possible also to laugh about teachers, each other, and for other kinds of information exchange.
The meaning of those signs, and even the very existance of some of them, was kept secret and was heavily guarded - especially from Yoki.
The last written down version contains 42 signs and they are all shown here. Though I remember some more signs, that were never recorded, for example the famous "Star Trek" sign.


Enjoy!

Lo kol yom kipur

Here's a reminder of our yom kipur night - I took this just after you left my place and just before I went to sleep :)

Here's to many more such nights!

One last pic from Canada

As I promised - here is the picture of the little snow man that was waiting for me on one of the mountains near Banff.

Isn't he cool?

i don't even have a title :)

hi everyone :)
as u all know, its quite impossible for anything interesting to happen to me, since I cant remmeber the last time I went outside (besides throwing away the garbage).
I got a little worried - who can u make fun of now, when I don't supply new material???
so, as usual, when I have nothing, I can always entertain with some weird animal stories - this picture is real. I came across it while studying (in the five secs bfore the comp crashed down again).
if this didn't make u smile, u can always laugh at the spelling mistakes that im sure im making...
c u all in a few weeks, when im healthier, a lot "smater", and hopefully have a Dr in front of my name.
love u all,
gal

Things I Didn't Do For a Long Time

On last Sunday we had a corporate trip to Negev at work. The trip was nice organized and we had fun. Among other attractions I found myself doing 4 things I didn't do for a very long time:

1. Snepling

Notice the OL56 T-shirt :)

2. Playing chess

3. Riding bicycle

4. Playing "Machanaim"

It was kinda nice to be involved in so many nostalgic activities in one day :)

How to get ahead in life

Most of you have already heard about the little “incident” that took place where I work. For those of you who are just joining us – one of the VPs in my company hit another member of the management (who just happens to be my boss). Surprisingly the root of the problem can be traced back to our pool table (go figure).
I guess most of us want our bosses to be smacked around every once in a while so in order to commemorate this event (and after an inspirational conversation with Vlad) I made the following:

My final thoughts about this matter:

Keep dreaming, because what you wish for may actually come true ;)

Winter's here - light that fire one last time

We are going to have another kumzitz today, one of our better traditioins :)
Here's a reminder from the last one we were all there (well, almost all of us).

Hmmm, maybe I too should learn to play the guitar.

Getting old, are we?

See you soon

A small reminder from Brazil

Oren just reminded me of something we had seen when we were in Brazil. The TV was on and "Who wants to be a millionaire" came on. It was the Brazilian version of course and things seemed to be similar to our version. There was, however, something very different about the show. We weren’t sure about what we were seeing – it was something like this:

It may take you a moment but you will eventually ask yourself: “is that a microphone?” which will be immediately followed by the even more interesting question “where the hell is that microphone coming from?”
Both of these questions are valid and were the topic of discussion in our little Brazilian room.

It is indeed a microphone and it is mounted on his chest using a metal strip. He walks around with this contraption for the entire show never seeming to notice the cyborg implants grafted onto his body.

And people ask me why I found Brazil strange :)

Canada posts - end of the trail

After visiting Victoria we headed back to Vancouver. From Vancouver I made my way to the Rockies. It took me a couple of days but eventually I made it.

I went to a small town called Banff. It’s a very tourist oriented place and it was there that I first met with other tourists not from Canada or the USA. I even met a couple of Israelis (which I didn’t really like ;) ).
When the weather cleared up I hiked along the river and it was magnificent.

I went off the main trail and found myself on ever smaller trails running through the forest and along the river.
Every couple of minutes I found my way back to the river itself where every bend reveals new scenery.
After leaving Banff I went to Calgary for my flight back. I had several days to spend there and I thought there’d be a lot to do. I was wrong. I probably have some pics from there still in my camera so when I have that film developed I will post any interesting photo I find there.

That’s it. That’s how I spent a month in Canada. And now I’m back and I’ve postponed my next trip for about 6 months (the reason for this can only be discussed offline J)

Canada posts - island hopping

After exploring Vancouver for a couple of day I hopped on a tour to Vancouver Island. One of the main attraction points there are the Butchart gardens. As we were going in I noticed this well equipped dog parking – free throughout the week :)

The gardens are on a huge piece of land and there’s a whole bunch of flowers there. It started as an attempt to hide the ugliness of a quarry site and now it brings in millions of dollars a year to them Butcharts.
In addition to all the flowers they also have fountains, a Chinese garden, a Japanese garden and I’m out of breath. So I sat down to take a picture of myself. After the gardens we went to Victoria which was also nice. Maybe I'll add some pics of that in a later post...

Some more photos, just when I came back from South America. Or was it after one year in the states? Anybody remembers?

Just some old picture I found from my trip to Oxford (not the last one, but the one before!). BTW, an open question to Ofer - Do you have (or can put your hand on) the "fishy" movie we shot with Giraf and Liran for English class?

Canada posts - to the west coast

Well, after a couple of weeks in Canada I decided it was time to head to the other side of the country. I went to the airport and went to Vancouver. For some unknown reason my bag came there on another flight. Maybe it was traveling on first class. In any case me and my backpack were finally united and I made my way down town.
I rented a car and picked up my parents and sister and together we went to see the world's longest suspension bridge. And man was it long :) The problem was that since we were in Canada you weren't allowed to jump or run on the bridge. Damn!


Across the bridge there's a nice forest - it gives you trek views without actually going on the trek. These Canadians - they set up a system of small bridges between the trees so you can walk above the forest, eh!


Vancouver itself is great. The forest comes straight up to people's houses and there are great natural parks all over the place. The downtown area is full of skyscrapers but it's mostly residential so it feels kinda nice. I even helped carry a couch into a new student appartment.

FAQ

There were some questions asked by different people about this blog, that repeat themselves:

1. Why in English and not in Hebrew?
I felt that it will be more accessible for those, who are abroad, for reading and publishing. Not every computer has Hebrew encoding installed. Almost none have Hebrew keyboards. Especially those who travel would have difficulties with Hebrew. Since the whole point of this blog is to keep in touch - it must be accessible for everyone all the time.

2. Can this blog be private, i.e. invisible for non-members?
No, I didn't find such a possibility within it's settings. But I assure everyone that is concerned that there is nothing to be afraid of...

3. Can we get an email notification about each new item published?
Yes! Although there is no such an exact option within the system, I found a way to do it by means of a mailing list. I've sent you all an invitation to join it.

Any more questions?

Canada posts - back to Toronto

After Oren went back I continued exploring Montreal. I found a lighthouse where you can climb to the top. The stairs inside are numbered so that you see how many are left until you reach the top. I was looking forward to stepping on the 56th stair from the top and as I got nearer I was eagerly following the little signs on the floor... 60, 59, 58, 57... and.... NO 56! The numbering stops at 57!



There's plenty to do in Montreal and one afternoon I decided to go up the "Mont" of "Montreal". When you get to the top there's a large square overlooking the city. I decided to wait for night to fall so I can see the city's nightline. While I was waiting I saw a guy there with a lot of exercise equipment. I wasn't sure what exactly he was going to do with it until a group of people arrived - his students. They started working out and were bitching all the time about how difficult it was and how he was being tough with them.When I went down I met a French couple who were pretty lost. As we were walking I found out that they did Aliya to Israel but after two years they went back to France. They were very excited to find someone to try their Hebrew on and they didn't let me go for a couple of days :)



After spending several days in Montreal I went to Ottawa. I couldn't find a place in a hostel there so I had to stay in a B&B. Ottawa was pretty nice, more so then I had expected. After two more days there I made my way back to Toronto to catch my flight to Vancouver.



To be continued...

Shana Tova to All!

Shana Tova!
Just wanted to share with you this:
Some time ago I bought a T-shirt. Without looking what was written on it.
One day Ofer saw me in it and opened my eyes :)
Pity it's not his size...

Shana Tova

Hey everyone, shana tova!

Just ran across this pic today while i was sorting out some stuff here :)

Here's to many more of these...

Canada posts - me & oren

I met up with Oren in a place called Kingston. We went on a boat cruise there to see the "thousand islans". There are many many many islands there, some big enough only for a tree to grown on, some big enough for a house. There are many people living there - they each have a little island of their own with a house and a little pier on it.

After the cruise we went back into town where we stayed on a retired ship called the "Alexander Henry". We even ended up sleeping in the same bed ;)

After spending the night in Kingston we continued to Montreal and walked about a little. Oren showed me a great place to stay right in the middle of the old city. Everything inside is made of wood and was constructed by the family operating the place.

We wandered the streets a little and after that Oren went back to the states and I stayed several more days in Montreal (more on that later)

Canada posts - toronto and niagra falls

Now that we have this blog going i thought we'd start with a test posting. I am actually in Israel by now but lets pretend I'm not :)
This is Toronto's CN tower - highest free standing building in the world. I went up there but the view isn't worth mentioning. The good thing is that you can stand on a glass floor and look directly down, that was kinda nice.


After wandering Toronto's streets for a while I met up with my parents and sister and we spent some time together. We also went to Niagra falls, but I'm sure you've heard enough about them by now so I won't go into any boring details right now. It was pretty cool and the cruise to the bottom of the falls was also great fun - if you ever go there I would recommend it.

The Renegades' Notes

Four years ago, when Oren and Ofer went to their trip to South America, I had this idea to make a site, through which all of us - those who stayed in Israel and those who travel - could share news, pictures, comments or just thoughts. This would provide a better way of communication than email, since everybody would be able to see what others posted. But such a site was a lot of work to build.
The blogger site, however, provides such a possibility in zero-work. So now, when even more of us are abroad, I thought it will be a good idea to open such a blog.
Some old stuff will be there too, like old school diaries and 56 jokes.
About the blog's name:

Ren·e·gade (rĕn'ĭ-gād') n.
One who rejects a religion, cause, allegiance, or group for another; a deserter.
An outlaw; a rebel.adj.
Of, relating to, or resembling a
renegade; traitorous.intr.v., -gad·ed, -gad·ing, -gades.
To become a deserter or an outlaw.

Well, obviously, we are all a bit of "renegades" :) Not in a bad meaning of the word, but still. Some for going to the other places, some for staying when they were supposed to go (that's would be me, when I didn't go to SA)

So, you are all invited to contribute. I'll send you invitations to join and some guidelines.
The design of the page is not final - I'll be working on it, comments and advices are most welcome.