I didn't post on this the whole time I was in Israel...no internet unless I was using my smart phone, which was not conducive to blogging.
The trip was fantastic, I made some good friends and worked really hard to not isolate myself. What made the trip interesting was that it was a good social experience for me, beyond being a spiritual or exploratory trip. Broadening the social horizons is always something I need to work on. As far as exploring Israel, I saw a little bit of everything, from the northernmost part near Jordan (the Golan, absolutely beautiful) to the very southernmost tip near Egypt in the Red Sea (snorkeling was fantastic!). I hiked Masada, a random mountain in the middle of nowhere, also in the Negev, and in Golan. I felt so active! I stayed the most time in Jerusalem, the holiest of cities. I would have preferred to have a more introspective trip, but the company was nice and now I know what to do the next time I go. Wandering the streets of the old city was probably one of my favorite parts of the whole experience, it feels like a time warp. Seeing all the people who have so much trust in Hashem in one place gives me more hope than having faith in him myself. I stayed in Haifa with Carmel, an Israeli friend who was on our trip. She's in the IDF, but she's on an education mission so she doesn't do any combat or have an AK47 hanging around or anything. It was a good experience and her mom was a great cook! Unfortunately, the last week of my travels I got really sick and didn't enjoy the experience as much as I probably could have...
I'll digress here into my most striking memories and acknowledgments about seeing Israel. First, it is so incredible how interwoven the Israeli life is with warfare, terrorism and security. It is just an every day occurrence when missiles are fired into Israel, when buses are bombed and when people the same age as myself die in combat for their country. In the US, sure, people die for a cause their country is fighting for, but they do NOT die for their country. No one attacks the United States day in and day out. We don't have to quite literally fight to exist. It astounds me how much these soldiers have to fight for. There is no cause that all of my peers are willing to die for. There is no cause that is worth so much to us. I was completely moved walking through the cemetery in Jerusalem and seeing the names and ages of all the soldiers who had died for Israel. They were all my age, not a soul there over 50, most being between 19 and 25.
Fighting to exist is no new concept for Israelis. (Prepare for a marginally organized poorly worded diatribe about Middle East politics). The day after Israel became a state, war was declared on them and it has been going on ever since. Palestinians use terrorist tactics to bomb Israel, and yet Israel is constantly portrayed as a bully in our media. Is it because the Palestinians are the underdogs? Is it because Israel violates human rights codes (do they really though?) Honestly one of the most interesting things I learned was the nature of the IDF, Israel's "army." It's a defense force. They never are on the offense! Sure, they take out terrorists and innocent Palestinian lives are lost, but the Palestinians live under a terrorist regime that uses tactics which force citizens to harbor terrorists that fire missiles into Israel, a nasty tactic that forces Israel to target citizens and look like the bad guys.
I feel for those innocent Palestinians, but at the same time, no matter how many "peace treaties" or land accords are granted, they continue to attack the Jewish state that was awarded after Holocaust to the millions of Jews with nowhere to go. And I understand that the Palestinans lived in many areas of Israel before the British gave the territory away, and I whole heartedly believe they should have a state of their own as well. But not at the heavy cost of Israel. Let's move on.
Returning at 3:00 am on Monday night (Tuesday morning?) and allowing myself an astounding 2 hours of sleep, I began classes yesterday. They're all great, especially African American Music. It is quite possibly the best class I will ever take. I worry though because I am taking a really low credit load and I see myself falling into the 'oh this shit is easy' trap. I have yet to attend an Anatomy lecture; today I felt like death so opted to sleep instead and on Friday I was still in Israel. So there's some catching up to be done. I looked over the lecture though and all it really is is learning the real word for all those body parts I already know the name for (e.g. my pigeon chest is actually my epigastric area and my right and left hypochondriac areas, my leg is actually my crural region, the back of my leg is my sural region and my thumb is a pollex).
I couldn't complete this post without a nod in the direction of my new friend the Neti Pot. Sinus infection, prepare to be dominated! Seriously though, have you not tried a Neti Pot, now is the time. Now is the time.
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