'sup on the way to ulpan

On Wednesday (12/9/12), we took the Metrodan bus line to our first day of Ulpan at Altchul. We've had a fair amount of time to get used to the bus system that is utilized pretty heavily in a surprisingly compact city. This time around, I was able to avoid the "standing room only" area of the bus by taking a seat at the back of the bus.

I was seated between two boys, who were riveted to the conversations I had with my fellow ITF members - I'm assuming it's because native English speakers are a bit of a novelty here. A cool moment happened when my friend Josh boarded the bus. By way of greeting, I said, "'sup, Josh?" Immediately following my greeting, I overheard the boy next to me (who had to be between 11 and 13) say under his breath, "'sup"- I knew we had unwittingly taught this kid how to greet his friends with the very informal version of "what's up?"

I've decided to be proud of the accomplishment, since it means students like him will be more eager to learn English in the classroom. Maybe. I'm most proud of myself, however, for curbing my desire to explain to the boy why I used such an abbreviated slang form of greeting. In the end, it really doesn't matter where the word comes from, just that he and his friends are probably using 'sup as we speak. Not sure if that's the instrument of change we really wanted to be, but there it is.

The Ulpan itself ended up being more of an assessment day, which is to be expected. I was placed in the beginner class, though they added a note that I know most of the alphabet. I've been working on my Hebrew study books and I hope to surprise my Ulpan instructors with my increased knowledge. As much as I'm familiar with block, I knew little of script at the time of the assessment - at the moment I now know double what I did then. I really want to take that course by storm! We also did some basic learning about Rosh Hashanah greetings (which I already knew).

Perhaps next time, I'll tell the story of how we got our רב-קו (rav-kav or bus passes). It was a bit on the amusing side :)