It's Time to Catch Up

After a really busy few weeks, I thought it would be nice to divide my update into two posts. Last Thursday night, to celebrate the nearing end of ulpan (which ended today...more about that in post 2!), we had a Beit Cafe (Coffee House) talent show. So I can't juggle, do magic (I should of kept my magic set I had as a kid), or lift a car, but I can do one thing well: make jokes. What's interesting about what I actually did for the Beit Cafe is that I turned something horrible that happened into something that I can laugh about....

About a month ago I couldn't sleep and woke up early to try and find coffee to start my day. While I knew where I wanted to go, I didn't know exactly how to get there and I ended up getting lost. I was on the phone as I was trying to find it and two police officers stopped me and questioned me. The asked for my name, what I was doing, where I was from, etc. After telling them I wanted to get coffee at the local shop, they pointed me in the right direction. When I found that it was closed, I ended up heading back in the other direction. The officers again questioned me and began to interrogate me (they really thought I could have been a terrorist or something). They didn't accept my ID, copies of my Passport and Visa, or my Insurance Card. They ended up hand cuffing me and putting me in a holding cell at what I've learned to be a part of the President's Residence (score! I got a VIP tour...ha, ha). I felt like I was in an episode of 24...I was sweating, scared, and they really were breaking me down.

What was the end result? They let me go eventually, but I was really thrown off by the entire thing. It appears that the officers were just wanted to have fun with a foreigner, and they did.

And while I was scared and had a hard time with the whole thing for a couple days, I finally can joke about it. How could I, PJ, be a terrorist? So, for the Beit Cafe, with a lot of help from my roommate David, who did stand up comedy in college, I did a comedy routine with a top 10 list: The Top Ten Things PJ Learned in Prison. While some of the jokes may not seem funny to you, it has great references to my program or life in Jerusalem.

Below is the transcript (all rights reserved. David Gerber. 2007)

Hello everybody, as you all know my name is PJ Schwartz, and I am up here tonight because I want to talk with you about my experience in Israel so far.

I’m from Greenville, South Carolina, which I am proud to say, is ranked 49th in literacy and 48th in Math, and 53rd in Geography.

I have noticed that Israel and South Carolina are a lot alike. The only big difference between living in Israel and living in the south is that in Israel, more people hate Jews.

This is my first trip to Israel, so naturally I am impressed with all of the amazing sights. The Kotel…David’s tomb…the Shuk…the inside of a jail cell.

If you didn’t hear the story, or notice my shiny new prison tattoos, I, your fellow classmate, had a little run in with the law this summer.

But I am not bitter about this experience as you might expect. Instead, I would like to use this experience as a way for us all to learn, should you find yourselves in a similar situation.

So here we go…here are the Top Ten Things PJ Learned in Prison

10. There is no 10 o’clock break in prison Ulpan
9. I am not saying that I escaped from prison, I am just saying that in the future, people may or may not be exploring PJ-Kiah’s tunnel.
8. The only difference between being behind bars in jail and being in bars on Ben Yehuda street is that people in jail have better bathing habits.
7. There are surprisingly few other people in jail with the name PJ.
6. If you don’t give them the information they require of you, you have to watch a video of Condoleeza Rice and Benjamin Netanyahu making out in a hot tub.
5. There are better ways to break the ice with the other prisoners than by saying “Hey guys, I’m American.”
4. Ahh, so this is what the other side of the mechitza looks like!
3. In Israeli prisons, you get the same kind of abuse as in America, only here it is from right to left.
2. They arrested me because they needed a Rabbinical student to lead their Shabbat services. They let me go when they found out I was Reform.
1. Prison? I thought I was at Jerusalem day!