Reflections

January 11, 2015

Sonia M.

Anton, Almog, David S., Ron, Katie, and James on the Salad Trail.

Wow I can’t believe how quickly this trip has progressed and how much we have done…After a very relaxing Shabbat spent at Sde Boker enjoying the much awaited sunshine and gorgeous views, we set off for today’s adventures. The road blockage due to flooding prevented us for going to Masada.  We even got off the bus at one point to watch some heavy flooding. Then we went to the Salad Trail and got to pick and taste some delicious cucumbers, tomatoes, kumquats& lemonquats, and my favorite (drumroll please) strawberries. These strawberries were special because they were hanging rather than planted into the ground—this is a brilliant solution to many issues that come up with harvesting strawberries. We also learned that because strawberries are a very delicate they were originally grown on straw, which is how they got their name! We got lunch in Sderot and then headed to a memorial where we were able to see Gaza in the distance.   There, we talked about the events of the past several years including this past summer’s Operation Protective Edge. Now we are in Jerusalem where we will spend our last days of the trip. I am so impressed with the way Tzach, Becca, and David were able to change our plans when necessary and swiftly find great alternatives. I am looking forward to the days to come and feeling a lot of love for the people in this group and this country.

Becca S.

The border with Gaza as seen from Sderot

After one rainy night in a Bedouin tent, a reflective Shabbat on the edge of a cliff, and about eight too many power outages in our rooms in Sde Boker, we've arrived at the final spot of our journey: Jerusalem. It's hard to imagine what the next few days will be like, because I'm still trying to digest everything we've experienced in the past few days. (That includes all the hummus I've eaten.)
I haven't had enough time to condense this weekend into real thoughts, but some contradicting words come to mind: openness and boundaries, celebration and mourning, hope and impossibility. We spent Shabbat morning looking out at a huge canyon in the Negev, sharing our dreams with each other in a place where everything seemed possible. We spent part of this afternoon looking across a field at the Gaza border, talking about everything that's happened there. Some of the Israelis shared their experiences as soldiers in a time of war. It was hard to stand in such a serene place and imagine so much violence. It was even harder, after spending Shabbat in such a magical and open space, to stand so close to this border and think about how much is closed off--how much stands in the way of peace.
I'm sure my confusion will only grow when we visit Yad Vashem tomorrow. I'll have even more to think about in terms of my Jewish identity, our history in Israel and the world, and how all of us will continue to connect with Israel once we leave. But above that confusion, I'm really excited to spend the next few days in Jerusalem. Maybe we'll even get some well-deserved sunshine.

January 12, 2015

Jenya L.

My name is Jenya and I’m an Israeli soldier that's served in the Israeli Border Patrol for the past two years. I joined this Taglit group 4 days ago. It was a cold day and I didn’t knew what I should expect. I had mixed feelings that messed with my head for the hour ride on the train, I didn’t know if I would like it, if I would get accepted to the group and what should I expect from the Americans on Taglit.

The initial meeting was hard for all of us: we were really nervous to meet each other (the other Israeli soldiers), and on top of that we had to meet the Americans for the first time. It felt like going to a new place, even though I had already been there and Israel is the country I grew up in, but it felt so special, like it was my first time there. So we met, and it was awkward to say the least, but it our first time seeing each other. It’s not that the Americans haven’t met Israelis already – and it wasn’t that we didn’t meet Americans in Israel, it was the bond and commitment to the group that made it special.

Everyone was so different, you have a really big variation between people – it’s not that common with Israelis. They presented our life with a show and threw a great show to everyone's life story, they lied that I like Kangaroos just because I said I wanna go and live in Australia – it was funny to see them try as hard as they can to put up a good show for everyone else.

We traveled in Tel-Aviv for few hours, the tension was really big between the Americans and Israelis. Even though we were should have hanged with Americans we were sticking in groups with the other Israelis, I guess it was because we felt uncomfortable.
When we got to the southern part of Israel a few days later, we couldn’t ride camels because it was raining (I guess camels don’t like rain or they are just too spoiled…) so we were brought to the Bedouin tent and it was really awkward. Me and another Israeli named Ron placed our beds next to each other because we felt out of the group – I guess it was really weird to go and place your sleeping bag next to someone you don’t know. At dinner we met other Americans, so I guess you can say the ice was broken (do you know what’s the weight of a polar bear? Enough to break the ice… haha…) and we started talking to them, slowly but surely we made few friends and met new people.

We went back to the tent during free time and I spent that time to meet new people, I talked to as much people as I can and I saw other Israelis done it too – it was good we were finally starting to feel like we belong.

Everyone was nice to us, treating us like we were one of them, asking lots of questions about our personal life and our service. And how can a conversation be complete without the Israeli-Palestinian conflict talk – it was feeling really good that suddenly new people joined to the circle and people were asking questions and listening from the other side of the room – we felt like it was a serious subject to talk about and the Americans are really interested hearing our opinions and hear our stories.

The night was HORRIBLE – it was cold and I woke up 6 times during the night, tired at the morning we went to Mitzpe Ramon (which is the Ramon crater) and learned about the amazing geographical thing that happened there, most of the tour was dedicated to Ilan Ramon (the first Israeli astronaut) and to be honest there were things that I didn’t knew about Ilan Ramon or the crater.

We finished our trip early due to bad weather and we went to kibutz ‘Sde Boker’ we got our rooms – I was roomed with Todd and Max and they are really great guys.

Friday night was awesome, everyone went to hangout together and to meet each other more personally – I had lots of fun with the Americans and I bet the other Israelis did too – that’s when I felt we really stepped out of the awkward zone and into the friendship zone, everyone was having so much fun!

Saturday wasn’t too special, again bad weather influenced our trip – thankfully our tour guide Tzach found a quick solution and took us to the ‘Salad Road’ which is a farm where you pick fruit on your way and eat them fresh out of the crops, David the counselor from America ate the second hottest paper in the world – it was funny.

On our way driving everyone was really feeling comfortable with everyone – we were talking about so many things even things that had nothing to with Israel or Judaism – just things we found in common with each other.

I’m gonna finish with a note – I met two good friends from the US, we became really close and I actually feel like I met some real friends, I learned so many things about the American culture and American people, hearing other opinions really spread some light on how I see things, I will defiantly go and visit my new friends in the US once I finish my service.