Thursday Night Fever

Having been in Israel for seven months now, we'd begun to feel bad about not engaging in any Israeli dance, so tonight we went out to dance with our Israeli brethren. Salsa dancing, but dancing nonetheless. The evening began with an hour of Latino line dancing, after which those attending were split into five groups based on ability, and we had an hour-long lesson. We knew ourselves to be in a class with Israelis when the teacher used soccer analogies, and repeatedly stressed the fine line between 'assertion' and 'aggression'. Once the lesson concluded the strobe lights and fog machines turned on, and the hours-long dance party began.

Aside from the entertainment of watching Israelis co-opt yet another culture, it was interesting to see that the room was packed even following so soon after the tragedy at Mercaz Harav. Even though it has been two years since the last terrorist action in Jerusalem, the city's residents took the attack in stride and continued living their lives as usual. Still, when we discovered the news as we left the club the timbre of our surroundings seemed inevitably changed to a far more sombre note than we've seen since our arrival.