I didn't expect to....

• consume 3 liters of olive oil
• have insider-access to the Knesset
• help my friend Anna F. be shomer-shabbas
• buy an evening gown in Beer Sheva
• not miss TV.  I didn't even watch all the DVDs that I brought.
• always have to run in sunglasses
• read 39 books
• wear out my socks.  I thought I would wear sandals most of the time, but I walk so much that I wear running shoes almost every day.
• have my laundry dry overnight inside my apartment (I don't have a balcony).  That's the desert!
• fall in love with halvah.  I had some a long time ago at college, but it must have been stale.  I eat halvah almost every day.  I think it's great survival food, so I usually have some in my purse.
• lose my Kindle at a bus stop.  Or my hat at En Avdat.  I don't usually lose things.  Don't worry, I replaced the Kindle, and hats are easy.
• need my cool travel towel on the last few days.  I brought it for the first few days, but Shlomo and Devorah had outfitted the apartment with some basic linens for my arrival.  But I want to leave everything clean, so I'm washing and drying their towels, and using my travel towel and microfiber cleaning cloths in the last days.
• have my citrus juicer needed as one of my last kitchen tools, but I never used fresh lemons so much before. 
• only know two of the four compass directions.  I live in the south (דורם), and generally go north (צפון).  I see the signs over and over.  I have only a vague remembrance of east and west, although the Kotel is הכותל המערבי, and the Middle East is המזרח התיכון.  I never see those signs, right??  Hmm.