What's in a nombre?

I've been watching the news more closely since last week, and I'm happy to report that the top story on Haaretz.com (when I started writing this post--about Monday or Tuesday) has nothing to do with Israel--a fact that I am eager to see as a sign that, since the bombing in Jerusalem last week, things have gotten better.  Or, perhaps more likely, at least have not gotten any worse.
I spent the weekend with camp friends near Modi'in, the last stop on the train line that friends and I usually take to Tel Aviv.  The place was creepily similar to how I imagined it since I started going to camp the summer before sixth grade: the majority of residents are Bnei Akiva affiliates, everyone knows Chana Spiegelman, and on Friday nights the whole community socializes outside next to the צומת until the wee hours of the morning.  Of course, I coerced Estie into bringing me to Chana's house Saturday evening for a quick hello--I knew I would never live it down (Bubbe sighs of disbelief--and my own, in fact--would have haunted me for eternity) if I didn't pay a visit to the Rosh Mosh when I was just a stone's throw from her house.  As expected, she asked me what I would be doing this summer and, to my extreme relief, I was able to say with confidence that I was planning on staying in Israel--the one answer that, I am pretty sure, was seen as the single acceptable alternative to a summer at Moshava.  Incredibly, I'm only half joking (though I don't say any of this with disdain--after nine years in the system, I have been programmed to think similarly).
Sunday was MASA's Hallelujah Contest auditions at Beit Hatfutsot in Tel Aviv.  I think I mentioned before that I was mainly going to the audition for the experience; still true, but since they went a lot better than expected (a.k.a. they didn't cut me off after two notes), I'm awaiting the results with slightly more optimism than I had originally planned.  The audition experience itself was really neat: I was on stage, the judges sat in the 3rd-ish row of seats facing me, there was a camera positioned in front of me and one on the side (that one followed my every move, which was a bit weird), a piano man behind me, a microphone and stage lights.  It felt very professional, which in and of itself was pretty awesome.  My first verse (of the Hebrew song "Mah Avarech") was actually rather dismal, but since the judges didn't stop me, I kept singing and got much better.  The judges must have felt so, too, because soon then they made me stop and sing the song higher, and then they made me sing an English song (so they could hear what I sounded like "in my mother tongue").  That, I hadn't prepared (they never told us to!), and I chose "Seasons of Love" from Rent because it was the ONLY English song that had not exited my brain at that very moment, of course.  Funnily enough, it was also the only song that their piano man--whom the judges had claimed at the beginning of the audition to know every song ever written--did not know how to play, so I started singing it a cappella and the piano man joined in later.  Long story short (though I guess you've already heard the long story, so this is really just making it longer) it actually went well, and I'm slightly more excited to hear what they'll have to say.
Last night (Thursday) there was a party at the Technion dubbed, quite accurately, "The Champagne White Party."  Yes, there was a lot of champagne; yes, everyone was wearing some element of white; yes, there were a lot of stereotypical Technion חנונים; yes, it was fun.
Tonight, Doreen and I went to Shabbat dinner at Kibbutz Naama, an urban kibbutz in Migdal Haemek.   The kibbutz does not exist on a piece of farmland: Kibbutz Naama collectively owns/rents a number of apartments and houses throughout the area, and its ~80 members live there in their kvutsot (smaller "family" units--we were with Kvutsat Hayovel).  For those who are curious, here's there website: http://www.kyovel.org/index.htm.  Two of the kibbutz members were in my ulpan class (it was one of them--Emily from Australia--that invited me to dinner). 
Dinner was lovely--great food and great company.  Personally, my favorite part of the evening was when the older of the two children in the kvutsah, Kinneret (4), asked me to read some of her Hebrew storybooks aloud to her before she was made to go to bed (yes, you were right: we DID read the טלטאביז book twice).  Kinneret began talking to me almost as soon as she came upstairs and saw me and Doreen chopping vegetables in the kitchen, and our friendship quickly progressed: from Disney Princess talk, to gift-giving (she gave me a green, beaded cell phone charm; she took it back about two minutes later), to ''הנה מה טוב ומה נעים'' swaying, to a discussion of the Hebrew word for "Penguin" (it's פינגווין--go figure), to the our previously mentioned dive into the profoundest of literatures.  It was probably the most effortless friendship with a kid I've ever had: as soon as Emily told Kinneret that "Ariel" was coming for dinner, Kinneret--Disney Princess fan that she is--was already excited to meet me.  Never before has my name gotten me so far.  
A Hebrew thought before you (I) go: the word for "movie" is the same as the word for "ribbon," "סרט."  Tonight, with the help of one of Kinneret's storybooks, I figured out why: remember when (am I that old that I can say that?) we used VHS's, and the the movie was printed on the ribbon inside?  Genius.