Planning for a weekend trip

I was trying to find an inexpensive hostel for me to stay in this weekend in Tzfat, and I think that I did. There's this organization called Ascent that is a combination of a hostel/brainwashing centre, that sounds like it'll be perfect! At the very least, the website had an option that asked if we wanted to be put up in a local Tzfat-ers house for a Shabbat meal (meaning, that I'll be getting free vegetarian food out of it.)

For my non-Jewish friends, there are many organizations in Israel and out that try to get "lost" Jews become more orthodox. And they're scarily successful at what they do.

Don't worry, Ema (means "mother", in Hebrew, which is what me and my siblings call her), I'll try not to get brainwashed. I'm so cynical, I think that I'm actually resistant. But check out this website:
http://lubavitch.com/Article.asp?Article=92&Section=60
The picture is beautiful, but I found the story of Rafi Kaplan particularly inspiring. Maybe there's hope for me yet to become a super-Jew.

This trip marks the end of my weekends in Jerusalem. I'm sick of them. I keep on making plans with friends to travel, but they invariably fall through, so I'm going to start traveling around Israel more by myself. And next weekend is going to be the much anticipated, but much delayed, trip to Petra, Jordan! I'm going with my roommate and some friends. Wooohooo.

I'm actually getting worried that I'm going to run out of pages in my passport, because I've been getting a lot of stamps/visas that are BIG. Sure, it's cool, but not so much if I run out of room when I'm trying to get from Siberia into Mongolia, and they won't let me in because there's nowhere for them to stamp it, and I have to stay in Siberia for the rest of my life, and wild Russians attack me and steal my winter coat, and I turn into a Leora-popsicle until I genetically evolve to be a half girl/half Polar bear that scientists find and bring me to New York to do "experiments" on until the circus can take me to be part of their touring show. That would not be cool.

And finally, speaking of cold weather, my friend tried to stump me with a riddle, but of course, being the geek that I am, figured out the answer. Let's see if you know!
Why don't polar bears eat penguins?
Polar bears don't eat penguins because polar bears live near the North Pole, and penguins live near the South Pole! They would never naturally meet!

And speaking of the South Pole, check out this website:
http://www.breaking-the-ice.de/t_gallery.htm
A relative of one of my mom's clients took Israelis and Palestinians to Antarctica (sigh), to get them to work together despite their differences. Following Ema's "suggestion", I'm going to e-mail the expedition leader and ask if he's speaking anywhere in Jerusalem, and if not, if I can meet with him personally one time. But in the meantime, you guys can look at the slideshow to see some absolutely gorgeous pictures of Antarctica (sigh). And be honest with me--doesn't it almost physically hurt you guys when you see those pictures, because you want to be there so bad?!! Or is it just me?