A Tale of Two Seas

Greetings from Israel! Bus 830 has been rolling along for the past two days, down to Massada and the Dead Sea, into the desert, and back up North to the beautiful Galilee.

Pictures will hopefully be posted tonight on our blog at http://goucherhillel.blogspot.com/.

We’d like to reiterate as there has been some confusion: our flight lands on Tuesday January 27, El Al flight LY001 landing at JFK at 6 AM.

Members of our bus agree: the trip just keeps getting better. At the front of the bus, we have placed a chatterbox where students can place anonymous comments. One recently read: “I have fallen in love with Israel.” The experience of this trip has been different for every student, but each and every one has been able to share in the feeling of discovering a land that seeps history, home, and ancestry from each and every nook and cranny.

Tuesday started off with our group leaving Jerusalem. We were called back in to the hotel to make a special Birthday video for Lynn Schusterman, one of Hillel and Birthright’s biggest supporters. Then we headed down to Masada, the desert fortress of the 1st-Century King Herod, on which a group of brave Jewish zealots made their last stand against Roman legions, eventually taking their own lives. We ascended the mountain via cable car, and met a family that included two Birthright alumni on the way up. At the top, we learned about the history of Masada, and pondered what choices we would have made in the place of the Jewish zealots on Masada. Group members also learned about the methods of water collection and distribution for the fortress, and spent time looking at beautiful desert birds.

The afternoon was spent lounging at the lowest place on earth, the Dead Sea. There is nothing quite like coating yourself in Dead Sea mud or floating on the warm briny water. Those who had made the mistake of shaving that morning screamed for a moment or two, but generally got along fine. We had a relaxing lunch and marveled at how smooth our skin was as a result of the mud.

That evening Bus 830 had a real treat – authentic Bedouin hospitality at Kfar HaNokdim in the Negev desert between Masada and Arad. The Bedouin host taught us how to use the mortar and pestle for coffee to rhythmically sound out a beckoning call. As always, the Goucher students were ready and willing to jump into the fray, trying their own hand at sounding out the rhythm. We were served strong coffee and sugary sweet tea, and then later had a full delicious (kosher!) Bedouin dinner. We sat on the carpeted desert floor and ate with our hands from trays – pita, the best hummus ever, and barbecued chicken and beef. We took advantage of the beautiful desert night to go off, each on our own, to contemplate and reflect. What followed was a powerful group conversation about spirituality. Many students were moved to share their own personal experiences, a testament to the trust and friendship that had been built over the first five days of the trip.

On Wednesday morning, many students woke up for sunrise. We started the day off right with a ride on the ‘ship of the desert’ – the camel! Everybody took the opportunity to name their camel – this would be the first of a few times when our students connected with animals on this day. We got on our ship, Bus 830, and rode north to the oasis at Ein Gedi, west of the Dead Sea. We saw a transition to a beautiful green in the middle of the desert, a result of the natural springs at Ein Gedi. On a hike and a great picture of our Goucher group (to be posted soon), we saw the goatlike ibexes, and the gopher-like hyraxes walking nimbly on the cliffs. Our students again connected with their animal natures, demonstrating hyrax mating rituals while singing “The Lion Sleeps Tonight.”

The next ride was about two hours as we travelled all the way to the Galilee area in the north. It was striking how the whole countryside could turn from sand to lush green in the space of an area the size of Delaware. We stopped to tour Bet She’an, which was a Roman and Byzantine regional capital. At sunset we transitioned to modern Zionist history as we took in the Kinneret Cemetery, one of Israel’s most beautiful resting places among the trees at the shore of the Kinneret (Sea of Galilee). There we saw the graves of many of the first founders of the yishuv (pre-State settlement of Israel), who often left home and family behind in Europe to live in kibbutzim in a strange and wild land. We saw more recent graves like that of Naomi Shemer, Israel’s most famous singer-songwriter, who wrote “Yerushalayim Shel Zahav (Jerusalem of Gold)” and “Al Kol Eleh (on all these)”. Finally, our tour educator Chen shared his own family’s story, and showed us where his father, uncle, and grandparents are buried. It was a powerful moment to see how this place, these people still mean so much, as the sun showed its full color on the waters of the Galilee.

We made our way to the Ramot resort on the other side of the Galilee, where our group will be staying for the remainder of the trip. Our students wrote letters of support and encouragement to Israeli soldiers which our Mifgash group of 7 Israeli soldiers was bringing back as they left today. The time has flown by, but our bus has forged strong bonds with Hila, Shani, Sagiv, Nir, Alex, Yana, and Tammi. In the wake of the Gaza conflict, our group was able to understand a bit more about what it really means to be an Israeli, and how much these young people, the same age as our Goucher students, are like them.

As the week draws to a close, many of our students are getting ready to celebrate a Bar or Bat Mitzvah this Shabbat with our group. Taglit offers a special opportunity for students who would like to choose a Hebrew name or celebrate Jewish adulthood to do so within the context of the trip. As many as six Goucher students will be celebrating bar/bat mitzvah by learning a little of the week’s Torah portion and the Torah blessing, and contemplating the next steps in their Jewish journey. The entire bus is supportive and can’t wait to celebrate their friends’ special moment in this special place.

Signing off for now – we’ll have a short update tomorrow afternoon.