Jan 24- Second Day of Trip, and my Cousin’s Bar Mitzvah

The second day of my road trip was much more exciting. We’re here in the DC area because a cousin of mine is having his Bar Mitzvah. I all woke up super early, in order to make sure that we would be on time to the service. Well, we got there exactly when the invitations said it started, but it turned out the service didn’t really start until about an hour later. This was fine, except that it left us exhausted by the end of it, around lunchtime. My cousin did really well, as did my dad who was layning at the service. My sister, my uncle, my great-uncle and I all had aliyahs too. The shul was much bigger than our at home, and had two rabbis. It also had a bunch of religious men who were convinced that I was a boy, and who kept telling me that I had to wear a kippah. Which was slightly weird, but not particularly bad. But the shul was really amazing for one thing: they had an ASL interpreter! Apparently Gallaudet students come sometimes, and there were a couple of Deaf people who were regulars. The interpreter knew English, Hebrew and ASL, and would interpret both the Hebrew and English into ASL. I couldn’t understand the parts that were Hebrew-ASL, but I got the English-ASL parts. I had been wondering how services would be interpreted for some time, so it was nice to finally figure it out. After services we went back to the hotel room, where I finished my Artemis Fowl book and repacked my bag (I wanted to make sure all my stuff fit before this road trip!)

The really cool part of the day though was when we were leaving for the party. We had to take an elevator down to the parking garage, and we got stuck in it. I guess it wasn’t very cool, and it definitely wasn’t that much fun, but it was exciting. It also wasn’t that scary, as we got rescued within 15 minutes, and had cell phones and such. But it was my first time getting stuck in an elevator! The hotel wasn’t that responsive to our predicament, and I’m not even sure they purposely fixed it— it’s possible we got out by pure luck. So, the hotel fails for letting us get stuck in an elevator (and charging for internet— I mean, really?), but it kind of wins for having these cool hybrid iPod speaker/alarm clock things.

Tomorrow I’m meeting a friend of mine who goes to college in DC for lunch, and then I’m leaving on the first part of my road trip! I leave at 4pm from DC on the Capitol Limited train, and arrive in Chicago at 8:40am (if it’s on time.) I’m nervous, but also pretty excited!