Curled up on a cramped blue airport chair – bound to 10 others just like it – I'm atypically quiet. A habitual extrovert who's no stranger to strangers, I find myself strikingly intimidated in the midst of so many to whom I am circumstantially connected; in what way will the next 10 days electrify the silence between all of us, as I have so repeatedly been promised by birthright veterans? I'm a Jew in my mid-twenties living in New York, bound to 40 others just like me.
Day 1, 6:53am, Ben Gurion International Airport – To say we hit the ground running would be a gross understatement; no sooner had I stepped off the plane than I found myself pitched against an airport bathroom stall, struggling to pull on a pair of pants suitable for a full day of walking as my Israel Outdoors name tag played hangman with my sore neck.
Walking out into the warm Tel Aviv sunshine, we were met with news of a snag: our dual medic/security guard – mandatory on all birthright trips – had slept through his shift. A replacement was summoned, and we killed time in his absence by holding an impromptu yoga class in the parking lot – because if there’s one way to make a good impression, it’s to show someone your downward dog, amirite? As we waited to board the bus that would become our home over the next 10 days, our Israeli tour guide, Libbi, started with the ground rules: no drinking until after the daily program is over; don’t pet the feral cats; don’t pee on the bus, as there is no bathroom.
Jaffa, an ancient port city in Tel Aviv, is beautiful, made up of cobbled pathways and ancient doorways to the past. On a hill overlooking the Mediterranean Sea, we joined in a prayer. The Shehecheyanu blessing – which gives thanks for enabling us to experience a new or special occasion – filled me with a warm glow of gratitude, and I smiled as I tipped my head back to taste the sweet wine that accompanied our toast. After a tour of the layered ruins of ancient societies newly rediscovered, we set off to make layers of our own – of extra weight, that is. Stuffing myself first with a massive shawarma wrap, then a rose-scented milk pudding dessert called malabi, I waddled my way through stalls of hidden treasures at Jaffa’s famed flea market.
As the day dwindled along with the newly minted shekels in my wallet, we headed back toward the bus, and were promptly whisked south to the Negev Desert. Ice and bread were broken as we sat down to our first proper meal, passing around family style platters of chicken, couscous, and an Israeli staple that would come to be ubiquitous over the next ten days: hummus. Retiring to my room after dinner with the two relative strangers who would be my roommates for the night, I begged one of them to braid my hair before the two days of hiking ahead. As the short, golden strands were woven together, so were our stories, and I was stubbornly reluctant to let my head hit the pillow despite my 3:30am alarm; how often do you get to retell a favorite story to new ears?
Day 2, 5:36am, base of Masada – I was on the wrong side of sunrise, I had eaten a piece of cake for breakfast, and I was wired for sound. Bouncing up and down at the trailhead of the Roman Ramp, I was eager to reach the top of Masada by the time the sun crested the opposite ridge. Libbi, denying my request to run to the mountain’s peak, led the way, following the sloping path carved by – you guessed it – the Romans.
As we roamed the summit, we marveled at both the panoramic views and the controversial history; had almost 1,000 Jews really enacted a suicide pact to evade death at the hands of the Romans? When the sun’s glaring rays had permeated every inch of the fabled plateau, we started our serpentine descent down the aptly named Snake Path, a winding route studded with rocks that left my legs trembling and my back sore from recurring impact. Dazed and sunburnt, we wandered into a “dairy breakfast” – kosher, no meat with our milk – gorging ourselves on runny eggs and, yes, hummus at 9:00am. After another bout of group yoga in the sun to stretch our weary limbs, we embarked on the second hike of the day, to an oasis.
As one of Ein Gedi’s waterfalls came into view, I whipped off my shirt and sneakers, bounding into the cool water and letting it quell the fierce blaze of my sunburnt shoulders. I welcomed the icy cascade, arms outstretched around new friends as we grinned guilelessly for iPhone cameras.
“You looked like you were having the time of your life,” said one of our trip leaders later as we ambled back to the bus.
“I was,” I said simply as I sipped the frothy, milkshake-esque iced coffee to which I would soon become helplessly addicted. “I am.”
Just when I thought my calves couldn’t take another millimeter of elevation, we were blessed with welcome news: next stop, the Dead Sea, the lowest point on Earth. How soon I forgot my sunburnt shoulders, casting off my long sleeve shirt once again to join hands with my trip mates as we floated around in a rudimentary ring, bedecked in water shoes and slathered in ostensibly therapeutic mud. Returning to dry land clean of mud and inhibitions, I engaged in my first of many meaningful conversations of the trip; what is the root of our Judaism?
It came about naturally, and our words flowed like the water at our toes, only ebbing when we paused to giggle nervously as a squadron of jets passed close overhead. I was struck by how intently these people simply listened, and by my own giddy enthusiasm for their stories. One girl, whose father had passed away not long ago, was taking the trip in his memory. Another had never been bat mitzvahed. And I – Hebrew-reading, but blonde, light-eyed, and born of a Catholic mother – had never felt quite Jewish enough. We were all there for different reasons, with different questions.
Next was a quick stop in a shopping mall for shawarma, iced coffee, bathrooms, and WiFi, and then we headed further south to spend a night in a Bedouin tent. As we filed into the gargantuan black goat wool structure, those of us who didn’t immediately claim a flimsy mattress set about tearing down the makeshift wall between the “male” and “female” sides of the tent, uniting us all on the cold, hard desert ground.
The night proceeded in stellar fashion; first, a traditional Bedouin coffee ceremony, then a communal hafla dinner feast, the most sober rave I’ve ever attended (from which we were unceremoniously kicked out by the organizers, a group of Israeli high schoolers and their angry chaperones), stargazing (wherein, after a ten minute silent reflection period, I promptly burst into tears), and a campfire replete with strawberry marshmallow s’mores and a stunning “Hallelujah” encore sung with arms wrapped around each other. Crawling onto my makeshift pallet bed in the corner of our lightless abyss, my personal reflection continued as I drifted into a fitful sleep; what am I looking for?
Day 3, 8:14am, Chan Hashayarot Bedouin camp, straddling a camel’s second hump – There’s a camel somewhere in the Negev with whom I’ve gone to second base. Thanks to the chain gang-style caravan chosen by our hosts, the nosy creature behind me got a snarl-toothed grin full of my tush every time he lifted his cumbersome head, which I’m sure was as great for him as it was for me. We trekked through the desert pedantically, watching our trip mate run across the barren dust in our wake, operating my iPhone camera with verve.
We disembarked twenty minutes later with an ungainly flourish, filing into breakfast to assemble something edible from yet another “dairy breakfast” buffet; in my case, it was some runny eggs and hummus stuffed into a pita, which I had the gall to dub a breakfast sandwich.
Loading ourselves back onto the bus, we made our way down the road to the day’s hike, which would take us up through the canyon of Ein Avdat. Weaving along the path between cavern-studded bluffs, we observed a moment of collective silence that was punctuated only by the sounds of the native birds. We ambled adjacent to another cascading waterfall, and were met with a startling surprise: a couple of rungs hammered into the rock face constituted the ladder that would bring us to the end of our hike. Libbi had additionally failed to mention that she may be half mountain goat, and I struggled to stay on her heels as we clambered along in her wake.
Shortly after we reached the summit, there was a new revelation, sent from Boynton Beach, Florida by way of a straggling WiFi connection: my grandparents and those of one of my trip mates had had dinner together the evening prior, previously oblivious to the fact that Dylan and I had been doing the same over the past several days. By the time I had answered their pressing questions (“Yes, I know him. No, not biblically.”), I’m certain they had finished planning our nuptials.
Our next stop was the grave of David Ben-Gurion, the first Prime Minister of Israel. His image throughout Israel is ubiquitous; ads, statues, the airport…you name it, his name is on it. Guarded around the clock by a member of the Israeli Defense Force, Ben-Gurion’s grave and that of his wife are adjacent to Midreshet Ben-Gurion, an educational center and boarding school that was inspired by his vision to bring scientists and educators to work in the Negev desert.
After an icebreaker activity that featured me slipping and falling directly onto my already aching backside like a beached starfish, we scarfed sandwiches and iced coffees at a local rest stop, then ventured on towards The Salad Trail, an agricultural farm tour six miles from the Gaza Strip.
“Do you like blondes?” asked our farm guide, scanning our group for willing participants. Tossing a blonde cherry tomato towards an open mouth in the crowd, he led us around the expansive grounds, pausing to point out different varieties of tomatoes, cucumbers, carrots, strawberries, and kumquats, all of which could be picked straight from the source. Gnawing at the narrow end of a phallic purple carrot I had yanked from the ground just moments before, I meandered back towards the bus, eager to get to Jerusalem and, more importantly, a hot shower.
One bout of carsickness, one French braid unraveling, and one perfectly scalding shower later, I joined my trip mates for a discussion on Judaism and being Jewish in America. Guided by our trip leaders, we shared personal stories of alienation, fear, and treasured community in an increasingly intolerant (or at least more apparently so) world; I was nonplussed to find out that there had been an increase in bomb threats to our very own Jewish Community Center in Manhattan since the election. At the end of the dialogue, most of us were tensely silent, anxious to shift the mood back from unsettled and distressed to light and convivial.
So, naturally, we streamed out of the hotel’s conference room and into the lobby bar. Itching to get our hands on the first sanctioned drinks of the trip, we clinked pint glasses of watery beer and disproportionate vodka sodas – “L’Chaim!” Over more rounds than planned, I bounced around the lounge with the widest smile, screaming expletives during rounds of “Never Have I Ever” and rejoicing in the candid novelty of our environment. Several new friends came back to our hotel room that night for an impromptu after-party, cuddling and joking and theorizing and laughing until all of our eyes were millimeters from closing.
Day 4, 8:47am, our hotel room in Jerusalem Gardens, late for breakfast because we’re taking mirror selfies of our matching outfits – This is the only day on which I took no real photos – selfies notwithstanding – in observance of the hallowed sites we visited. After meeting our eight Israeli peers who would travel with us over the next five days (our Mifgash), we headed to Yad Vashem, The World Holocaust Remembrance Center.
I had been there before, just over six years prior when my brother got bar mitzvahed at the Western Wall. Call it growing up or growing ever more fearful of the current political climate, but filing through the dark with the names of 1.5 million persecuted Jewish children in my ears struck me deeper this time, leaving me with a grief I couldn’t shake.
Our next stop was Mount Herzl, Israel’s national cemetery. It holds memorials to individuals who shaped the history of the Jewish state, and Libbi spoke knowledgably of those who had died in its name; she brought them to life, so to speak, with her stories and portrayals. Halfway through our tour, she turned to me.
“Morgan, can you do a reading for us?” she asked, eyes big and smile wide. I hesitated, declining due to a lost voice that sounded like Emma Stone gargling rocks underwater, at best. But she insisted (someone later quipped that she had “voluntold” me).
Relenting, I stood in front of one of the graves, voice shaking as I read an expletive-laden, darkly comic excerpt from Ron Leshem’s novel, Beaufort, about what Yonatan, a deceased solider, can’t do anymore. With my subsequent free time, I meandered through the rows of plots, faced with plaques emblazoned with the ages of the deceased: 22, 21, 19.
Our group dialogue later that afternoon was one of the most intimate of the trip; the two sites had encouraged an honest conversation about perspective, privilege, and gratitude. We turned to our mifgash – all Israeli Defense Force or Navy veterans – and thanked them reverently for their service.
The bus soon took us back to the hotel to rest, and I was serenaded to sleep by the sounds of my roommate’s baritone ukulele. With a quick shower and a careful application of red lipstick, I was ready for our first official night out as a group. But first: a cooking class.
Split up into three different teams, we set about making an Israeli feast featuring hummus, salad, and native wines, which fortified us for the night ahead. Struggling with a testy food processor, I succeeded in helping prepare a fiery Yemenite schug, an herby green sauce featuring cilantro, parsley, and a jalapeño kick. Once we ate our fill, it was time for the real games to begin.
Settling on an empty club that all 49 of us could take over, we set about tearing up the dance floor, snatching free shot tickets from the bouncer’s outstretched palm and making general fools of ourselves to our hearts’ content. Stuffing my face with chocolate-covered shortbread cookies on the bus ride home, I drunkenly waxed poetic about my theories on male-female relations as my angel of a trip mate nodded in agreement. Soon after – to my own relief and that of others, I’m sure – I drifted into a queasy sleep.
Day 5, 7:31am, on the balcony of our hotel room in Jerusalem Gardens, arguably still intoxicated – Looking out over Jerusalem with eyes blurry and stomach rumbling, I prepared myself for another intense day of touring, this one highly religious in nature. We wandered Jerusalem by foot, marveling at the Old City’s separate religious quarters, and the fraught history of the Temple Mount and its surroundings.
When we finally came to the Western Wall, I was nervous. During my first time there, I had felt virtually nothing when my hand had reached its cool stone, which had been the impetus for a startling bout of fiercely angry, guilty tears…why doesn’t this have an effect on me? This time, the tears flowed again, but with gratitude and veneration; I smiled as I slipped my hopeful note into one of its many cracks, and backed away to rejoin my peers.
Next we wandered through “The Shuk,” a marketplace selling everything from fresh fruit and pastries to Purim costumes and jewelry. Searching for a “white elephant” gift for a group swap happening that night, we strolled through the crowded bazaar, holding up fake mustaches, baby dolls, and the occasional funky pair of pants that had been trendy in America just a few seasons ago.
We were soon shuttled home to the hotel to change for Shabbat, and encouraged to “unplug” in observance at sundown, shutting our phones off and leaving them in our rooms. As someone who struggles with keeping my device more than six inches from my face, I took the challenge, putting my phone on “airplane mode” for the next 24 hours.
Returning to the Wall, we engaged in traditional Shabbos revelry, men and women retreating to opposite sides of a perpendicular partition to dance, sing, and welcome the day of rest. We were told on our way in that women from other groups would possibly join our circle, but I was nonetheless shocked when an older woman threw her arm around me and joined us in singing “Oseh Shalom.” I felt invigorated and proud as I swayed in rhythm with these women; we’re more alike than I thought.
Our hour-long walk home (no driving on Shabbat!) was peaceful and warm, full of the vibrations of fierce kinship ignited by our shared experience. After dinner, the gift swap, and a couple of beers, I turned in for the night, full in many ways.
Day 6, 11:15am, Sacher Park – In observance of Shabbat, Saturday morning was lazy. Our day started at 10:00am – the latest of the trip by far – when we walked to a park for group games led by our mifgash.
Later on, we headed to The Israel Museum, wandering between everything from impressionism to pop art to sculpture as our trip mate – an architect whose parents are art collectors – became our de facto guide, pointing out paintings by name from across the room and regaling us with obscure facts about their even more obscure artists.
Wandering back out into the late afternoon sun, we filed into one of our hotel’s conference rooms for a political seminar taught by Neil Lazarus. As he led us through a condensed history of Middle Eastern politics, we scrutinized maps diagramming the different factions enmeshed in Israel’s troubled history, and discussed the arduous process that has been the attempt at a two-state solution. Feeling inundated with a barrage of heavy, politically charged knowledge, we retreated to our room for a much-needed nap before heading off to Tel Aviv for a night out on the town.
Bidding a sweet goodbye to our ever-flooded, potentially possessed hotel bathroom, we dragged our suitcases into the lobby and prepared to leave Jerusalem. The bus’ speakers blared as it careened down the highway, pitching me back and forth while I stood hunched over my trip mate with tubes of glow-in-the-dark face paint in my shaky hand. I struggled to finish drawing the last scraggly line as we pulled into Tel Aviv, flooding the streets in our best Purim attire.
Bedecked in my favorite skeleton suit, I boogied my way into our chosen bar and set about shaking my bones, laughing over the coursing rhythm of a slew of indeterminate rap songs. After promising American citizenship to a 6’6” Israeli in a Kobe Bryant jersey with whom I was hopelessly smitten, I skipped back out into the cool night with my favorite trip mate, on the hunt for some late night grub.
Instead, we found a celebration. Barreling down a random street in a state of drunken revelry, we happened upon a raging dance party in the middle of the sidewalk, and joined a menagerie of young Israelis in motion. After what seemed like at least ten replays of “We Like to Party,” we bowed out and returned to the bus, exhausted.
Day 7, 9:08am, our hotel room in Tel Aviv, where my roommate just found a wasabi pea in her pants from the night before – Our seventh day started not with rest but with education; we visited Tel Aviv’s Independence Hall, where the Israeli state was declared in 1948 with the signing of the Declaration of Independence.
Our ramshackle group – physically and morally depleted after our night out – departed that tour early in preparation for another, meandering the streets on a guided graffiti tour in the hip neighborhood of Florentin. Sauntering past wall after wall of spray paintings, stencils, and decals, we stopped to take photos in front of one especially bold mural, posing and pouting in hopes of an especially brilliant photo for our Instagram pages.
That exploration – as all good explorations should – ended with ice cream, and I gleefully licked a cone of crema catalana with cherry and dark chocolate as we wandered back towards The Carmel Market. We spent the next couple of hours enjoying the area: taking an extended ladies’ lunch, haggling for jewelry in the marketplace proper, and popping into boutiques to try on unique sunglasses and shoes. Before I knew it, it was time to grab a much-needed iced coffee and return to the bus to venture to our next destination: Thai Village.
“But, Morgan, weren’t you in-“…Yes, we stayed on a Thai-themed kibbutz in Israel. My roommates and I shuffled into our cabin with conflicted emotions; our shoes were caked in dripping mud due to construction, but our suite was resplendent in ornate statues and a bathtub that – after six days of frigid rinse-offs and broken shower handles – could have been considered nothing short of luxurious.
Next we filed into the dining hall for the night’s dinner and subsequent group activity. We split into randomly assigned clusters of five, and were encouraged to discuss the three qualifiers we most identified with, and whether or not one of those was “Jew.” I was sitting with four men – one being our medic – and we spoke at such length that we didn’t rejoin the full group discussion when prompted; we were in too deep.
I hesitated when it was my turn to speak, speeding through “Optimist,” “Empath,” and “Family man? Family woman? I don’t know, you know what I mean,” before addressing my personal elephant in the room: the nature of my Judaism.
Through an abrupt bout of racking sobs, I detailed the seemingly unwarranted guilt I felt when calling myself Jewish. Every time it’s mentioned, I’m met with the same response: “No way! You don’t look Jewish.” And even my rabbi – years after my bat mitzvah – once told me that I wasn’t really Jewish, because religion is matrilineal and my mother never formally converted. “But I was raised Jewish!” I protested, my eyes filled with equally distraught tears that night in my home synagogue. “You bat mitzvahed me!”
The four men sat in reverent silence while I cried out every word I’d never uttered on the topic. As I wiped my running nose on the sleeve of my hoodie, we engaged in a respectful discussion about the cultural, historical, and religious implications of Judaism, and hey, who were we to be turning followers away, anyhow?
Later that night – after a few vodka lemonades and many rehashed discourses – I allowed my eyelids to grow heavy and my worries to grow light, taking solace in the comforting arms of peers who had become confidantes.
Day 8, 10:31am, shrouded in a rain jacket at a former Syrian outpost – Our Monday morning began somewhere above the clouds. After a pristinely sunny ascent through the mountains over the rich green pastures of the Golan Heights region, we found ourselves marooned over a sea of fog, unable to see much of anything through the haze. The wind picked up as Libbi explained the ongoing occupation of the area by the United Nations, forcing us to huddle close as we teetered on a precipice overlooking Syria.
Forgoing our planned hike due to poor visibility and incoming rain, we headed to De Karina Chocolate Boutique instead, salivating over the factory’s inner workings from behind a glass partition before being let loose in the sample room and gift shop. We filled our mouths and bags with handmade truffles and dessert liqueurs before retiring to the building's covered patio, where we prepared to say goodbye to our departing mifgash. Kind words and warm hugs were exchanged, and we headed down the road to enjoy a final meal with our Israeli friends.
En route, we were given a few options: eat at the restaurant with the most renowned hummus in the country, or give our ravaged digestive tracts a break with a more gut-friendly option. Flying in the face of everything my body so desperately craved (e.g. protein, leafy greens, anything in a solid, non-puréed form), I gorged myself on my own personal bowl of hummus, to which I added every available topping (chickpeas, marinated mushrooms, tahini, fava beans, and hard-boiled eggs) before stuffing it all into fresh, warm pita bread.
As we stumbled back to the bus in a chickpea drunk haze, the Israelis led us in one last kindred moment together; we threw our arms around each other’s shoulders, jumping up and down and chanting about brothers and happiness – Achim! Achim! Achim achim achim! Simcha! Simcha! Simcha simcha simcha! Hugging goodbye once more, we boarded our bus as they diverged in the direction of their respective trains home.
The grief we felt over our friends’ departure quickly dissipated when we pulled up to our next stop: Golan Heights Winery. Following our bearded, bespectacled guide – whom we dubbed “The Wine Rabbi” – through rooms of barrels and bottling mechanisms, we finally burst into the tasting room with glee, gripping our glasses with wild-eyed enthusiasm. Sampling one white wine, one red, and one dessert, we barely lifted them to our noses before tipping them down our throats, ignoring the spit buckets in our midst.
Wandering out none the drunker, we bought some bottles for the night’s festivities and headed towards another lookout. The rain had passed, and we laughed wanly at the irony of a double rainbow presiding over a sign bearing the words “DANGER” and “MINES!” in a neighboring clearing. Jogging back towards the bus, we returned to our Thai-themed home for the night.
Debarking the bus, I decided to go for a run around the village compound, unable to leave its gates due to birthright’s rules against leaving the group at any time. I took lap after lap, shedding a more leisurely trip mate and my technical jacket as I loped through the drying mud and fragmented concrete. Slowing to a stop after half an hour, I spent a few silent minutes regarding the beauty of the mountains ahead as the sun took its descent below the dark line of their ridge. I feel good, I thought to myself. Really good.
After dinner and an active group game that ended with an accidental cascade of broken plates, we clinked glasses under the stars, igniting an outdoor party full of vodka lemonade flip cup, haphazard dancing, and uninhibited heart-to-hearts. After my third of such poignant conversations, I was emotionally and physically drained, and retreated to my room with a contented smile tugging at the corners of my mouth.
Day 9, 11:30am, witnessing a bat mitzvah in the Old City of Tzfat – Doing the Hora before noon was never on any bucket list of mine but, on the occasion of my trip mates’ shared bat mitzvah, I succumbed to the revelry, dancing and cheering as they were hoisted into the air.
We had just come from The Ashkenazi HaAri Synagogue, a historic temple adorned in sundry shades of blue, a color said to symbolize the heavens. It’s the predominant color of the mystical city of Tzfat, and we passed many vivid azure doorways as we wound down Gallery Street, peering into jewelry shops, Judaica boutiques, and – of course – art galleries. Armed with a new ornate gold ear cuff and dainty white floral mezuzah, I joined my trip mates on our walk back to the bus.
We were bound for The Center for Shared Society at Givat Haviva, a nonprofit education institute committed to creating a shared future for Israeli Arabs and Jews. As we discussed the constituents of their fraught history, we traveled down the road to a lookout over the West Bank, where our guide pointed out the landmarks of the jointly occupied territory. I pressed my face against the bus window on our way home as we drove adjacent to the tempestuous area, ogling at the markets and mosques along the streets.
Checking into our last hotel of the trip, we watched the sunset over the beach before getting ready for our final dinner together in Tel Aviv. Heaping bowls of bread, stew, and shakshuka swarmed the long communal tables, and we passed the goods amongst each other until we were too stuffed to breathe.
Our last official activity as a group was the debriefing. Sitting together in a bare plaza, we took turns summarizing the meaning of our own individual trips, highlighting moments both frivolous and profound. We strolled to a vista overlooking the Mediterranean Sea for one last group photo, fondly realizing that it was the same one on which we had taken our very first.
We were finally coerced back onto the bus, and sauntered en masse to a nearby hookah bar once we had been deposited back at the hotel. Passing around hoses of saccharine orange and watermelon smoke, we toasted the bittersweet reality of our homecoming with colossal chalices of American beer, laughing and snuggling on the faded loveseats.
As I stood to leave during my first attempt at retiring to my room for the night, I hugged a trip mate who was staying in Israel beyond the end of our journey. “You’re like human glitter,” she declared, embracing me tightly. “And you go around ‘glitter bae’-ing everyone.” My first instinct was to clutch my heart, so touched by the comment that I truly thought it might explode. I hugged more people that night than any other, relishing in the chance to give all of the love that I felt so fiercely.
I finally managed to peel myself away from the group sometime around 2:00am, and moseyed back to my room to set my alarm for less than three hours later, ready – at least physically – to return home.
Day 10, 5:06am, Q Hotel – Biting into a chocolate-filled cookie, I poured steaming water over mint leaves and cursed myself for not drinking more water before I went to sleep. Our group shuffled bleary-eyed towards our last bus ride, throwing our bags under the bus with as much strength as we could muster at such an egregious hour. I fell asleep immediately, waking only when we came to a stop in front of Ben Gurion Airport 45 minutes later.
After hugging Libbi goodbye and trudging through security, we spent the next couple of hours lazily savoring our precious iced coffees and Israeli snacks while waiting for our flight to board. Once I was nestled snugly in the window seat next to a friendly Orthodox couple returning home to New York, I promptly fell back to sleep before we even took off, completely spent after 10 days of nonstop motion.
So I didn’t meet my Jewish husband. And – strangely enough – I didn’t eat a single bite of falafel. But, otherwise, this trip gave me everything I needed and more; who doesn’t want to come home from vacation with 40 new friends who all live minutes away? Cheers to next year in Israel, and next week in New York.