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Greetings from Israel, otherwise known the hottest place on Earth. (Well, maybe. If you don't count Death Valley. Or a Manhattan subway station three levels below ground at 2:00 on an August afternoon.)
I am in an internet cafe in Tel-Aviv, trying to beat the heat after thinking I could wander around town all day without the benefit of an air-conditioning unit strapped to my chest.
It is very beautiful here and I've enjoyed my travels immensely, especially seeing the dozens of fun relatives I have here, most of whom I have not seen since before I hit puberty. Luckily, I look so much like my mother that just about everyone recognized me straight away, most of them exclaiming "Bat shel Sonia!" (meaning "Sonia's daughter!") the minute they saw me.
Over the past 9 days, I have criss-crossed the country, stopping in Jerusalem, Tel-Aviv, Tiberias, Caesarea and Eilat. I have swam in both the Mediterranean and the Red Sea, contemplated life at the Wailing Wall, toured the narrow streets of the Old City of Jerusalem, soaked in the overwhelming Holocaust Museum (Yad Vashem), enjoyed the Tel-Aviv Museum of Art and the Museum of the Jewish Diaspora at Tel-Aviv University. From dusty tour-bus windows, I gazed up at Masada, watched people float in the Dead Sea and saw parts of the West Bank I would not otherwise have explored.
The best part has been seeing and beoming reacquainted with dozens of family members, both old and new (spouses, kids, babies). And, of course, the food--Israel has some of the most unbelievable produce, including dreamy cucumbers, tomatoes and peppers, plus grapes and melon that melt in your mouth.
And let me rave a minute about the delicious hummus, tehina, felafel and hatzlakhim (eggplant salsa-like stuff) I've had. We're talking yummy overload. Delicious as it's been, I do miss sushi--haven't tried any here, as I'm told it's not great (though I've had some delicious fish).
My cousins and I have compiled all of our photos onto one cousin's laptop, so there will be many photos to share once I return. As with the best of vacations, I have enjoyed the trip very much and am looking forward to returning home to my life, my loving boyfriend and my kitties (whom, as Jason reports, spent the entire first week of my absence sulking). In my next report, I will share some observations of life here, as compared to that in the States.
Being a Jew, I cannot help but feel changed by having visited Israel, seeing the small northern town my grandfather founded, riding along streets where my father rode his bicycle as a child, feeling the power of Jerusalem, hearing and speaking Hebrew (better than I did 10 days ago, I might add).
Israel is a mystical place for Jews, particularly for those, like me, whose family are Holocaust survivors with deep roots here but who are now part of the diaspora. I am very glad to have finally made the trip and I expect to feel its effects for a long time to come.
Posted by ayelet at August 7, 2007 05:16 AM