we just spent 2 hours cleaning our apartment and now it smells like a swimming pool

My dad’s cousin, Moshe, lives in a suburb of Be’er Sheva and therefore served as my host family, Hebrew tutor, personal chef, and laundry service while I was living at the absorption center for the first three months of my program. He randomly called me today and our conversation went something like this:
Moshe: I’m having dinner with my mother in Jerusalem right now.
Me: Is everything okay there? I heard there were some riots in the old city today.
Moshe: Oh, were there? You’re probably right.
Yeah, it’s kinda like that. Shit goes down with tear gas and stun grenades in the center of J-Ru, and a few kilometers away in a quiet neighborhood you have no idea. Way up here on the border, we heard shots or bombs or something loud last night but I didn’t know it was anything serious until my mom called to make sure I wasn’t pissing my pants terrified. So before ya’ll start flipping out and saying things like “20 minutes is not far enough away for bombs” or “please be careful with the whole bombs business and the protests in Jerusalem- its all over the news today,” keep in mind that my life here isn’t anything like how it looks on CNN, otherwise do you think we’d really have to hitchhike to kibbutz parties because the cabs stop running on Friday nights? I appreciate your concern, but seriously. I walked to Lebanon. I am invincible!
That being said, we went to the Syrian border today – the actual border, not just the pre-1967 one. We also went wine tasting on a moshav, dined on borekas and herbal tea while gazing at a breathtaking view of the snow-covered Mount Hermon, and sampled some Druze jam at a fruit stand on the side of the road… but I have no idea what kind of jam it was because I wouldn’t admit that I don’t know what “avfwerjlksdclkjwelk” means in Hebrew. What now.