final thoughts

Here I am, sitting in the Zurich airport on my way back to Chicago. It is hard to believe that my days abroad have come to an end. At the same time that it feels as though I haven't been home in forever it seems that I just began my journey from O'Hare to Madrid only recently. It has been a year of new experiences, travel, and growth. I have caught the travel bug, says Papa Bill, and he's right. I have to say, though, that towards the end of my time in Israel I no longer felt like I was traveling; it felt like home. I have mixed feelings about returning to Highland Park, and it is not easy to describe the individual pangs in my stomach, heart, and head. I miss my family a lot, and it has been difficult to hear about the milestones I have missed from across the world (to name a few: Leora's graduation and final concerts, my dad's promotion, Paul's successful adaptation to big HPHS and new braces colors, and my mom's concerts too). But I didn't feel right leaving Israel just yet. People ask me continuously, "Which was better, Madrid or Tel Aviv?" It's not an easy question to answer because these cities are not really comparable in my mind. Last semester was so exciting for me, starting off not knowing anyone in the country to being able to travel around europe with my eurailpass to learning about and living in a completely new culture for a few months. I learned a lot about myself and how to travel. This past semester was different. From the moment I stepped off the plane at Ben Gurion Airport I felt instantly happy and comfortable, surrounded by people like myself, many of whom share the same passion for the state of Israel. I felt healthier eating Israeli food, and enjoyed the freshness of the fruits and vegetables one can buy so cheap in the shuk. Perhaps the fact that there is so much history in Israel or that Israelis are so good looking or the hospitality of my Israeli cousins influenced my feeling so at home. A smart friend of mine advises me to go with my gut feeling if I feel conflicted, and I will take his advice on this subject. I can't wait to see my friends and family in Chicago, but I have two homes now. My gut feeling tells me that I wish to continue traveling throughout my life, seeing and hearing and experiencing new things every day. I look forward especially to returning to Israel, maybe even to live for awhile. I thank everyone who supported me in this journey!

feelings

with only about a week left in tel aviv, i find it very difficult to sit and write papers when a) it is beautiful outside, b) they aren't due until a few weeks after i'm home, c) i'm having trouble admitting that these essays mark the end of the semester, d) everyone that walks by this cafe is good-looking, and e) i don't want to come home yet.

:(

why are israelis so attractive?

שביל ישראל

We had two days off of class this week for Shavuot. Like many Israelis did on this holiday, I went with three friends on a hike and camped out. We packed some food, clothes, a mini grill, one tent, and took the 30 minute train to Cesarea. After checking out the ancient ruins and having a delish lunch overlooking the water, we set out on a hike south on the beach. We were mostly on the beach until we encountered a humongous powerplant on the beach with intense fences which we had to find a way around. ("can't go under it, can't go over it..." Name that song!) It was a tough hike uphill and through sharp plants around the powerplant, but we eventually found our way to the Israel trail leading us through a path in a forest eventually back to the sea. The Israel trail runs all the way through Israel, from the north in the Golan to Eilat in the south, and takes about 40 - 60 days to complete. Most Israelis know about the trail, and we were asked multiple times by Israelis chillin' on the beach if we were doing it. Of course, I said yes, but little did they know that we were only doing two days of it! They kept saying kol hakavod, "well done/way to go". Before sundown, we found a spot to set up camp far enough away from the powerplant that we weren't going to be electrocuted in our sleep. Lauren and Mark made excellent hot dogs on the mini grill (and did a nice job opening the bean and corn cans) and Dan made an awesome campfire.






The next day we did a lot of hiking. Mostly on the beach, we walked and passed a lot of Israelis who had the same idea as us. They had very intense setups...some brought huge tarps, speakers, and even some mini-fridges. We were asked a lot of times if we were doing שביל ישראל, the national Israel trail. We were offered water and beer so many times! We must have gotten off the trail at one point, because we found ourselves unable to go around a cliff because the sand ended and the rocks were submerged underwater, so we climbed to the top of the cliff where there was a fence. There was a spot under one part of the fence where we could climb under, so we threw our backpacks over the fence and made it to the other side. So adventurous! We stopped under some shady rocks for lunch (tuna sandwiches and peanut butter on crackers, or if you're Mark, tuna peanut butter sandwiches). We got a little tired toward the end, but eventually made it all 15 miles to Netanya. After a celebratory watermelon on the beach there, we had a dip in the water and headed back to Tel Aviv on a sheirut.

Yom Hastudent

Thursday was Yom Hastudent, Student Day at Tel Aviv University. Every university in Israel has one of these, and it was great! My classes were canceled and I went to campus around one in the afternoon to check it out. The entire campus was covered with a huge fair and grinning students. I walked around with some friends to find: stands of cheap cute clothes, hot dogs, chinese food, ice cream, yogurt, multiple stages with different bands, hookah to rent, and a mini pool. It was a balagan! After a sivuv, we decided to rent a hookah and chill out near a band performing nice music. There were even pillows set up on the grass for us to sprawl out. The weather was beautiful, as usual, and it was a lovely afternoon. I left around five for my violin lesson, and I returned to campus just in time to catch Shalom Hanoch performing. Go TAU for sponsoring a day dedicated to its students!


bbq smoke


mini pool

highlights

Here are some highlights of everyday life in Tel Aviv:

• riding my bike-it's purple and has a basket
  
• lazy tuesdays and wednesdays (no class till 4:30!)
  
• shabbat lunch at bela and eser's with all the cousins
• playing doodle jump
• frozen yogurt at tamara with unlimited toppings
  
• running in shorts and a tshirt january through may (and getting high fives from randos on the way!)
  
• visiting the dried fruit man in the shuk
• hearing Joshua Bell play two concerts
• making friends in the sheirut (shared taxi)
  
• drinking excessive amounts of ice cafe from aroma
• making shabbat dinner at my apartment with friends
• hearing tiny (roommate's dog) snore at night
• lunch with Joshua Bell at benedict's
• learning how to cook
• realizing israelis know more about english literature than i do
  
• going to see alice in wonderland
• eating avocados at lauren's
• listening to my environment teacher talk about the pancake house for most of class
• wearing flip flops out to the bars at night without getting any dirty looks
• attending the tel aviv film festival on the namal (port)
• walking down nahalat benyamin (art fair) on tuesdays and fridays
• wine tour and tasting at Golan Winery

yes, i realize this is mostly about food.

some visits

Last weekend, I went on a jeep trek with my environment class. It was mostly off-roading, which was cool at the beginning. It reminded me of off-roading in Morocco, but this time we continued for hours and hours! My neck didn't feel great at the end. Atar, the driver, said we shouldn't wear seatbelts during offroading. We saw some cool things. Most of the day we were in the west bank...we saw the wall and learned how to distinguish Israeli settlements from Palestinian settlements (red roofs from flatter, white roofs). We saw some tanks on the roads and did a small hike along a stream (unlikely to find in the desert!) Later, we saw a beautiful view of the dead sea from the west bank side with the Jordanian mountains in the background, which looks very different from the views I've seen before. Our guide pointed out the places the dead sea scrolls were found. That night, we had a picnic/hot dog bbq between the jeeps in a pretty area between tall gorges. As we drove back to Tel Aviv, we used strong flashlights (or panas in Hebrew) to look for animals. We were unsuccessful.

On Wednesday I went to Sderot. Long story short, Lauren knows someone from the Jewish Agency who is on the board of TAU and was going down there to visit a friend and offered to take us. So Lauren, Sara, Dan and I piled into John's car and we drove the short drive (less than an hour) down to Sderot. Sderot is mentioned in the media all the time...this is the town that gets hits with rockets from Gaza. Ofer, John's friend who lives in Sderot, showed us around and told us that some days they get up to 65 rockets shot into the streets of their small town. (There has only been one fatal rocket in the past year, though.) A siren goes off and they have 15 seconds to get to a shelter. Ofer took us to a small hill from which we could see Gaza--it's so close. There is a balloon-like machine in the air in between this hill and Gaza which detects rockets. By the height of the rocket it predicts where it will land, and the sirens go off accordingly. Afterwards, we went to the police station where Ofer showed us the pile of 200 rockets they kept. Each one is labeled with the date and place it fell in hope that there will eventually be an investigation and they will have evidence. The first thing I noticed driving around Sderot is the lack of people in the streets. It was the middle of the day, and people were probably going about their activities, but the residents are so used to hiding inside that they are not accustomed to being able to walk around outside. We went to a playground in the town where there are these huge concrete tube-like things painted with fun colors like snakes. In Hebrew, it is written: "In case of siren, enter the snake for safety." These toys serve as rocket shelters. Ofer told us about the people of Sderot who sleep in one room, shower together, and go to the bathroom with the door open in fear that a rocket will come and they will be separated from their family. Most have Post Traumatic Stress Disorder, and one can only imagine the effects the rockets have upon the kids, parents, and everyone living there. People are living in hell both in Gaza and in Sderot, and it is painful to experience even second hand.

North Trip

April 23 - 25 was OSP's North trip. On the first day, we did some silly ropes course activities. We split into groups and had to climb things and pick up balls and run the fastest in order to gather the most keys to open a treasure chest, which turned out to have a bottle of champagne in it. In the end, they pulled out 6 more bottles of champagne and everyone had some. This would never fly on Ramah seminar. We then went to the Kibbutz where we were staying for the weekend near Nahariya...it was nice, but is mostly a moshav (less of a socialist community, more just an Israeli village) today. I roomed with Sara and Elli, and we had a beautiful sea view from our window! I went on a nice run with Elli along the sea and read on the beach before we had dinner at the hotel/kibbutz and had free time at the local pub, woohoo.

The next morning we explored the natural caves at Rosh Hanikra. We had to take a cable car (the steepest in the world!) down to the caves. The best part of the visit was the video where a British dude narrated the erotic relationship the sea has with the caves and then we were spritzed with water. After the caves, we went on a hike along one of the upper Galilee streams. Later that night, we boarded the buses headed to a small town called Rosh Pina. After driving for an hour, they realized there wouldn't be anything open there on Saturday night after Shabbat, so we turned around.




On Sunday, we did a pretty hike along the Amud stream that I remembered doing on Seminar. It was really nice out, and not too hot. Along the hike, we played a game where each of us had to tell an embarrassing story if someone put a clothes pin on us. I know you all want to know mine: one time at a party, my friend was tickling me. As soon as it was silent when the music was changing songs I farted really loudly. So....after the hike, we went rafting on the Jordan river! My dad reminded me it was like rafting in a bathtub, but the water was actually much higher than I remembered it being on Seminar. Israel got a lot more rain than usual this year, and there is always more water in the spring than in summer. We had a double date in my raft: Elli and Ben, and me and Moshe. Moshe and I were the rowers while Elli and Ben enjoyed a pleasant ride along the river.

an israeli weekend

The weekend of April 15 - 20th (extra long for two Israeli holidays) was my favorite weekend of the semester, so far. My violin lessons on Thursday evenings always put me in a good mood; although it's only once a week, I love playing my violin for an hour. Svetlana, my teacher, is an excellent violinist and offers good advice along with the musical company that I missed my first month or so here. After the lesson, I met up with some friends and took the bus into Tel Aviv. Caleb knew of a restaurant hidden in an alley on Allenby, and it ended up being delicious. Afterwards we walked to Florentine and hung out at a bar there. On Friday, I went to a crafts fair on Nahalat Benyamin and sat at the beach with Lauren and Becca. For Shabbat, I went to a Ramah Poconos dinner in Ramat Aviv.

On Saturday, Lauren, Sara, Dan and I went to the Tel Aviv Museum of Art. There was a special Degas sculpture exhibition, and in addition to that I enjoyed the paintings in the permanent collection by Miró, Picasso, and Monet. The four of us went on a long walk afterwards without forgetting to stop at Iceberg for the best ice cream in Tel Aviv. As we were walking down Rothschild, we spotted a poster for a roof party. It had just started, and was taking place in Florentine. It was a bit of a hike from where we were, but we decided to be spontaneous (can you decide to be spontaneous?) and make the trek. We soon found ourselves in the middle of Florentine on a roof with cool indie/techno music and a bunch of hipsters. Everyone there was smiling, as if they had no worries in the world. We let ourselves go and soaked up the beautiful view of the entire city (including the ocean in the distance) and danced the afternoon away. We made it to the beach for sunset, and went to Neve Tzedek for a delish sushi dinner.





The next morning, the four of us took a bus to Jerusalem in time for Yom Hazikaron. Dan and I first went to the Hava, the campus where we stayed on Ramah Seminar a few summers ago. Walking around there brought back so many memories and it felt like we were living there only a few months before (it's already been almost four years!) Matt Gordon was waiting for us at Hebrew U, so we put down our things and went to the Kotel with him and his friends for a Yom HaZikaron ceremony. We heard Shimon Peres speak, and the Hatikva was very powerful that night. Back at the dorms, it was fun to hang out with Matt's friends and enjoy a good old game of beer pong.





The next morning, the four of us went to Mount Hertzl for another ceremony. There, we heard Bebe Netanyahu speak. I found his Hebrew much easier to understand than the other speakers we heard previously, although listening to speeches in Hebrew always makes me want to study more and speak Hebrew better than I do now. It was crowded and very warm, and heart-wrenching to see the young ages on most of the graves. We took the bus back to Jerusalem, rode my bike back to my apartment, and took a nap in preparation for that evening's festivities.




A few hours later, I met my friends at Kikar Rabin for the inauguration of Yom Haatzmaut. Already the mood was drastically different, and we enjoyed watching Israeli dancing and singing accompanied by fireworks in the square. We then walked to Florentine where a huge street party was taking place. It felt like there were millions of people there--sweaty, hitting each other on the head with blow up hammers, spraying with fake snow, and dancing to drums and music blasting from windows. We joined in for many hours, and then went to refuel at Benedicts, the famous Israeli breakfast restaurant open 24/7, at 4am. After breakfast (or a mid-night snack?) half of our friends went home, but our foursome stuck it out and went to the beach to see the sunrise. We couldn't believe how many people were still around at 6 and 7 in the morning! The sea was as beautiful as ever, and it was a satisfying end to an amazing weekend.

back to europe-hungary and switzerland

During the second week of Pesach I went to Hungary and Switzerland with my friends Sara and Lauren. We bought a multi-city roundtrip ticket from Tel Aviv to Budapest on Sunday and from Zurich to Tel Aviv the following Saturday night. It was an unforgettable trip...I will include as many details as possible!

The only experience I've had in eastern Europe is in Poland for a week, Austria as a little girl on tour with my violin group, and Prague for 9 hours last semester. I've never spent a significant amount of time touring eastern Europe, and Budapest was a great place to start. We left Tel Aviv at 4am and arrived in Budapest with a full day of touring ahead of us. Wondering why the city seemed so quiet as we drove through the city at 9am to our hostel, we asked the taxi driver what was up. He looked at us oddly, and said, "Easter." Oops, I guess living in Israel we don't hear much about Christian holidays. Our hostel, the Budapest Bubble, turned out to be a very cute place! They only have about 12 beds spread out between a few rooms which made for a very comfortable, welcoming atmosphere. Sara Lauren and I actually got our six bed room to ourselves all three nights! The lady who works there was so helpful. She sat down and talked us through the entire city; where to go, what to do, when to do it, etc. Even on Easter Sunday, she had great suggestions of things to do. We started out the day at the Easter market where we had delicious cinnamon bread-like cake that was hot out of the oven. We heard two different bands and there were kids dressed up in funny old-school dresses parading around the market. Sara (the vegetarian of the group) had some trouble finding non-meat dishes in the market..a preview to our few days in Budapest. After a few more rounds of the market, we headed towards the Buda side. The Buda side is much older than Pest, and had beautiful old palaces that we loved exploring. It was a hike up to the top of the palaces, but we enjoyed getting some exercise. We saw a statue of a lady who is considered to be guarding the citadel where there was a cool view of Pest. On our walk back, we passed Budapest's biggest synagogue, which is the third largest synagogue in the world. It is beautifully lit at night and has an impressive silver tree Holocaust memorial behind it. Being the last night of Pesach, we were not surprised that it was closed to the public. We asked the guard outside if it would be open tomorrow, and I quote, "No, the Jews have an 8 day Easter celebration."








On Monday, we woke up early and walked to St Stephen's Basilica. It was pretty on the inside, and I thought very similar to many of the churches I've seen in Europe. I wasn't feeling 100% that day, and I let Sara and Lauren walk up the hundreds of stairs to the top of the tower while I hung out in the museum downstairs. Then, we took the metro to the famous Szechyni bath house. This was my favorite part of Budapest. There were three pools outside with three different temperatures that felt awesome in the slightly drizzle-y cool weather outside. Then, we went around the baths inside. There were different minerals in each bath, and again were different temperatures. There were saunas and steam rooms throughout. To complete our spa experience, we got Thai massages! We didn't know what we were getting ourselves into...my lady stepped on my back and legs and twisted my body every which way. But it felt awesome. We got back to the hostel only in time to drop our stuff and run with wet hair all the way to the opera! We bought 2 dollar tickets to earlier that day to see Tosca's Puccini in the old famous opera house. They were standing room tickets, but whoever knows the Debbie (or Israeli) way would guess correctly that we were sitting in pretty good seats by the time the lights went down. There were excellent acoustics, and although there was no English involved--Italian play translated into Hungarian on a screen above the stage--we really enjoyed the play. After we were culturally stimulated, we walked across the street to a bar a friend recommended to us. For 3 US dollars, we paid the cover charge, coat check, and got three beers each! Hungary is so cheap. It was student night, and we met a lot of cool young travelers in addition to some Hungarians (like a dude named Ishmar, who told us to call him Steven). It was a half karaoke bar, half dance club, and we had a great time.





On Tuesday, we met Sara's friend at the Terror Museum. The building was the former Nazi headquarters, and afterwards was Soviet headquarters. It is a very powerful modern museum, and a highlight of the trip. I would recommend it to anyone who visits Budapest. We walked around the city for awhile and ended up at the market. It was nothing like the shuks in Israel, but we had some delicious fried dough with nutella on top. We got the giggles (maybe had something to do with the overwhelming amount of sugar we consumed in only a few minutes) and had the best time running around and playing with the chochkees and taking pictures. The time then came to say goodbye to Budapest and its cheap prices--we took Malev Hungarian airlines that evening to Zurich.



Lauren's parents were nice enough to put us up in a nice apartment-like hotel room for our two nights in Zurich. We woke up on Wednesday to a huge breakfast laid out in our room! We filled up and headed out to a trolley tour of the city. The trolley drove around the entire city (it's not very big) and we heard through our headphones a lot of cool info about the city. The weather was perfect--I was surprised that it was so warm and sunny at the beginning of April in Switzerland, but I didn't complain! Although we saw a lot, we didn't feel that we had a grasp for the city yet, so we took a long walk through Zurich after the tour. The first stop was obviously at a famous chocolate shop (named Sprugli, or something) and we walked up and down the river. Sara bought two Swatches, and Lauren and I spent most of our francs on chocolate. The exchange rate is about 1 franc to 1 dollar, much easier than the 190 Hungarian forents to 1 dollar. We met my friends Stephanie (from Zurich) and Daniel for a drink, and went to an excellent vegetarian restaurant called Hiltl for dinner.




Chagall windows


We woke up early the next morning to catch a train to Interlaken. We were very close to the train station and with only backpacks, it was an easy commute. Throughout my year abroad, I've really learned to appreciate trains. They're so much easier and more convenient than planes, and in many ways, have a much prettier view! I wish they were as useful and efficient in the states. It was not a long ride, and we arrived at the hostel by 10AM. We stayed at Balmer's, the hostel that my mom and uncle stayed at in Interlaken 30 years ago! It used to be THE hostel, says my mom, and everyone used to go there from across Europe. It's cool for me to think about how backpackers traveled in those days without hostelworld.com and all the networking we use today to make travel plans. We chose to stay there because it was voted number one hostel in Switzerland on hostelworld even before I knew that my mom stayed there...it definitely lived up to its reputation. We dropped our stuff off, met Lauren's friend Tom who is studying in Geneva, and headed up to the slopes! It took longer than I expected to get up there...after renting gear and taking the bus and two trains required to get to the top of the mountain, it was already noon. It was Sara's first time skiing, and she ended up with a cute personal instructor named Christian. Lauren, Tom, and I had a great time skiing. Although the beautiful weather (Tom skied in a t-shirt!) and late date in the season made the snow a little slushy, the scenery was unreal and it felt great to be back on skis. Totally pooped after our long day, we carbo-loaded at the Thai restaurant nextdoor to Balmers and went to bed early, looking forward to the next day...

that's me


Friday, April 2 became an epic day. Sara, Lauren and I went skydiving!! Papa Bill asked me if I fell out of the plane by accident or on purpose. He suggested getting a window seat next time if I wanted to see some scenery. The skydiving company picked us up in a van from Balmer's, and we joined a group with three brothers from Buffalo and a few Swiss people. We all bonded quickly over our nerves as we signed the waivers and suited up. An intense skydiving man told us to position our body like a banana as we jumped, and that was about all the instruction we got. We were then introduced to our tandem dudes. Mine was named Roland. Rolley, as they called him, put my harness on and directed me towards the tiny airplane. Four jumpers plus tandem dudes plus two photographers plus the pilot barely fit in the airplane. Sara was sitting on the floor, and the rest of us were squashed like sardines. Before I knew it, the plane took off and we were flying between the Swiss Alps. The pilot thought it would be a funny joke to tilt the plane 180 degrees towards the ground and open the door that Sara was basically leaning on. Her mouth dropped open, she started screaming, and clutched onto the guy's foot that was sitting next to her. No worries, the videographer got Sara's freak-out on tape. Roland started harnessing himself to me (or maybe me to him), put goggles on me, and all of a sudden the door opened again. By the time I looked left and right, Sara and her dude were gone. The other three couples jumped, and then it was my turn. Roland and I scooched to the edge of the plane, he tilted my head back, and I was flying through the air at 120 mph! The feeling is impossible to describe, but I will say that it felt like the ultimate freedom. I put my arms out, waved at the camera, and smiled. It was so windy and my cheeks were so floppy, but I didn't even notice how fast I was falling. That is, it didn't feel like it does on a rollercoaster where your stomach feels like it's 10 feet above the rest of your body. I just felt free. Roland tapped my shoulder, signaling that he was about to pull the parachute and I should tilt my head back. I realized that it had been extremely windy and loud before, because all of a sudden it was silent and we started descending ever so slowly. Gliding down in the parachute was peaceful, and I was able to notice the beautiful Swiss Alps around me. Roland handed me the straps to the parachute, and I could control where we were going. I held one side for too long and we did a flip. Soon, we had a smooth landing on the grass onto our feet. I was so exhilarated, and could feel the adrenaline still pumping through my body as I ran to my friends and jumped and hugged both of them. Lauren was chill (as usual) afterwards, and Sara felt like she was going to throw up. But they both loved it as much as I did. As soon as I landed I knew that I wanted to do it again.







After the extreme sport of the morning, we needed some nourishment. We went to have lunch with the three brothers we met skydiving. We walked around Interlaken afterwards...it's a cute little ski town that I would love to see with some snow on the ground! That evening, we went to a chocolate show recommended by the hostel. We ran into some girls from OSP who are also chocolate lovers. The show turned into our big group of girls eating chocolate for two hours in the basement of a chocolate shop. Not bad. We met some people from the hostel later and tried out the hostel bar before passing out no later than midnight.




On our last day, Sara and I took three trains up to Jungfrau, the "top of Europe". It's the highest point in Europe at some 12,000 feet and we took some beautiful pictures before being too frozen to be outside. We also checked out an ice castle up there. We met Lauren and a million other Swiss people on the way down at the Snowpen Air Music Festival. Grabbed a bite to eat there and took the two long trains and a bus back down to Interlaken. Grabbed our stuff, and took the bus to the train station, two trains to Zurich, cab to the airport, and boarded our 10pm flight back to Tel Aviv. (That's 8 trains, 2 buses, 1 cab, and 1 plane all in one day!) We were pooped when we arrived at 3:30am in Tel Aviv, and so happy with our vacation together. I'll always remember it, girls!