It's been just over 2 weeks since I got back from Birthright, a program that pays to send young Jewish kids to Israel for 10 days. It was like sleep away camp meets college meets The Amazing Race and it was great. To be honest, I still can't fully process what all we did or how I feel about it because they kept us in a weird, constant state of psyched-exhaustion (little sleep but consistent coffee breaks and cool stuff to look at) and when I got back, I replaced my Israel exhaustion with every day exhaustion so basically I will never be fully rested ever again in my life.
With that being said, this post is going to be a surface level recap of some funny situations that I encountered in Israel. If you are looking for new life philosophies or personal reflections, you will just need to give me a call or send me an email or leave a comment or tweet at me (see, I'm giving you options!)
We all know how I travel; incredibly well by foot, car, train and bus but not so well by air. Writing about my travels, not so much the destinations, but my actual act of traveling is my favorite because I seem like an OCD, panic ridden weirdo. A fun departure from my normal sensible, no-mess persona. I'm proud to announce I took four long flights in 12 days with little to no panic. Yes, I did have a minor “this could be it” moment when my roommate of 10 days asked me if I had any secrets because, “this could be our last chance,” (honestly, a pretty weird question no matter what was to follow) but other than that it was smooth sailing. And by sailing I mean flying and by smooth I mean raucous. But not because of my inner mental workings, because of the 12 hundred screaming babies onboard.
I, on the other hand, I behaved admirably. And for that, I have to thank my newest flying distraction: thinking of all the really dangerous things I could be doing instead. People have done things much worse than flying on a commercial airplane and reminding myself of their survival puts me at ease. The activities that soothe me include, but are not limited to: cliff jumping, joining a gang, sleeping with the doors unlocked and overeating. Of course I can't just spend 10 hours imagining and re-imagining someone eating a really big sandwich so, in order to get a more consistent visual and one that I could not control, I read The Hunger Games. This was a good move on my part because that book is crazy dangerous! It allowed me to really put things in perspective. Sure, I'm in the air, thousands of miles above the earth, but at least I'm not living in a post-apocalyptic US being forced to compete in a televised fight to the death.
The security to fly into Israel was intense. We were asked a ton of questions, many of which seemed completely irrelevant. I think this was a tactic to lull terrorists into revealing themselves, but really flustered a few of our participants to the point of being flagged for extra screening. The heightened security kind of scared me, not because I thought my safety was in jeopardy but because I didn't want to do anything that seemed suspicious. I didn't even want to comment on the heightened security for fear that an observation like that meant I must have some reason to notice something like that?
I tried so hard to blend in that I succumbed to people cutting me in line at the metal detectors. I didn't want to look like a hot head, but I would never have taken that lightly on a domestic flight (that's a lie, you all know how I am with confrontation.) I instinctively and accidentally answered “no” when asked if I had bought anything at the Duty Free shops (I had!) which led me to simmer with anxiety in my seat, pondering whether I would seem more or less suspicious calling the flight attendant over to clear it all up. Yes, tight security was definitely on my mind, and it didn't stop at the airport. Just to make sure I wouldn't be flagged as someone for some reason, (notice how vague I am being, this is because I have no idea what I thought was going to happen or why; I just knew I didn't want it) for the duration of my time in Israel I refused to use the word “terrorist” and opted instead for “crazy person.” Which isn't helpful because I use the word “crazy” for anything cool, interesting, weird, silly, genuinely insane or scary. Needless to say, the vocab switch up made for some crazy conversations.
In my somewhat adult life I've only been out of the country to New Zealand, Jamaica and English speaking resorts in Mexico so a language barrier has never been an issue. It still really wasn't that much of an issue in Israel, but that's because I covered up my lack of Hebrew with excessive pointing and a pretty consistent use of English. I couldn't help it! Damn my parents for raising me to have my please and thank yous automatic! My be'vakasha and todas took a backseat to my American manners. And surprisingly I was only blatantly ignored once when I asked for the bathroom in English. Spoiler alert: I found it anyway.
The best part of going to different countries is getting to live a completely different life and experiencing a new culture. I loved pretty much everything Israeli culture had to offer. I could get behind the sliced cucumbers and hummus for breakfast, I was semi okay with the lack of belief in forming lines for food, bathrooms and ATMs, I was even allowing myself to support paying money to use public bathrooms that rarely had toilet paper, hand dryers/soap and, in one instance, stall doors that closed, but I could not, for the life of me, get on board with their showering situations.
We encountered a few curtained showers that had the appearance of many showers I have come across in my day. Except for one difference. Instead of having an angled floor below to funnel the water to the drain, or some sort of lip to enclose the space around the curtained area, they had a squeegee broom. While I didn't appreciate the squeegee broom, I almost had to respect the sentiment behind it:
We know this shit ain't gon' work, but we'll be damned if we'll clean up your own dirty water after you.
I imagined this being said in a southern, almost Sling Blade voice, which is not fitting at all for a connection to an Israeli creation, but feel free to use any voice you choose. When we weren't using the showers that were one step above opening a skylight and waiting for a rainstorm, we were using handheld shower heads. These are totally awesome and kind of almost spa-like if you aren't actually trying to clean yourself.
So there you have it my top three memories of Israel. Taking sensitive security to a whole new level, being the stereotypical American who can't/won't speak the language, which I will again blame on the constant state of psyched-exhaustion, and showering in weird showers. We did a bunch of really cool stuff other than that like riding camels, sleeping in a Bedouin tent, eating a Bedouin feast, hiking Masada, visiting the Holocaust museum, going to the dead sea, sampling wines at a vineyard, freezing at the top of the Golan Heights, spending nights out in Jerusalem and Tel Aviv, and much, much more. I couldn't possibly recap this entire trip because I continue to remember experiences, thoughts and feelings about it daily.
While it is just truly not my style, nor is it the style of this blog, to dig deep, I do think that I would be doing my trip a disservice by not being serious for a few minutes. I didn't have a ton of expectations going into Israel but I thought Judaism would be everywhere. I was worried I would stand out, not just within my group, but within the country, for being a non-religious Jew. And as ignorant as it sounds, I expected everyone in Israel to have an extreme and one sided stance on their country's political past, present and future. I thought I was going to be pushed one way or another politically and religiously while on the trip and what I got instead was a full, beautiful, hands-on experience of Israel. I respect and admire the Israeli people to an insane degree. I am beyond thankful for the experience I had; I think it is a place, Jewish or not, that everyone should see.
