Well, That Was a Surprise

Woke up crazy early this morning and couldn't control myself from checking the news and seeing how the election results were doing.  Ended up just staying up hitting the "refresh" button on the computer for two hours until the wake-up alarm went off....The final result was announced while we were in ulpan and let's just say it was hard for some of us (cough cough) to pay as much attention in class as we would usually....

Learned something interesting about the news in Israel (at least the news from Kol Yisrael): it's not updated every hour.  You can get 7 a.m. or 11 a.m. because, "there's not enough news to keep updating it every hour" ;).

For those of you interested in practicing your Hebrew, here is the lead story of the 7:00 a.m. broadcast.

דונאלד טרומפ על סף  הבית הלבן. חסרים לו שישה אלקטורים כדי לזכות בתואר נשיא ארצות הברית הנבחר.

That was good--now I got to practice my Hebrew typing :).  (translation: "Donald Trump is on the threshold of the White House.  He is lacking 6 Electoral votes in order to win the title of President-elect of the United States")

In other news, yesterday was a new holiday in Israel: "Aliyah Day".  This was the first year it was celebrated, and I hadn't even heard about the holiday until they took the entire ulpan for an assembly that was all about how the Israeli government was ready to assist people with finding jobs/getting retraining and helping those who want to make their own businesses (I loved the promo material for this program: "I made aliyah and all I got was this lousy t-shirt.  And a 125,000 NIS loan from the government to start my business!").

Coincidence that the new holiday is just before election day (my Facebook feed was filled with people musing about making aliyah)?  Maybe.....

In one last bit of election-related news, I'd like to share this picture of Susan B. Anthony's grave covered with "I Voted" stickers:

And, from an article sent to me by Nancy B.N.:

• Susan B. Anthony attempted to vote in Rochester in 1872 — and got arrested. She was publicly tried and convicted, but refused to pay the $100 fine.
• She was the first woman to appear on US currency who was not a fictional character.
• Anthony went before Congress every year from 1869 to her death in 1906, asking them to consider an amendment allowing women to vote. When it was finally passed in 1920, it was called the “Susan B. Anthony amendment.”