Last Tuesday I was supposed to go out with some friends to a bar near my current apartment for a few drinks. Ladies night out. One friend was feeling a little down and didn’t come out and then another hadn’t returned my call from earlier in the day. It was almost the time for action when she called me. I wasn’t expecting to hear what she told me…I know it is not surprising necessarily considering what has been going on here lately. Still. I was bowled over. She explained that she was in Ein Kerem hospital because a friend of hers who is in the army and had been in Lebanon during the last several weeks had been wounded. Shrapnel wounds in his legs and a broken leg. He had been in a house that was bombed an hour before the cease fire came into effect – a dozen bombs and somehow he survived. Not your normal “sorry, I won’t be coming out tonight” kind of story. In the states I know only a few people who serve in the military. Here in a way I know everyone. No matter how you slice it I know many. Hayiti b’shok. I was in shock.
On Thursday I went out to the first Pardes get together of the year. It was at the Dean’s house and there were about 20 people. A friend gave a few words of Torah. We introduced ourselves, ate food, told some stories. Chatted it up. It was short, sweet, and totally wet my appetite for meeting more people. I met one of the other people who is in the mechina year with me (we will both be at pardes for three full years). Afterwards I went out…and my night just got stranger from there on in. But it ended with me hanging out with a group of Israeli men just out of the army (that means about 22ish for the most part). In true me form I saw some cute guys and went and sat down at their table when I couldn’t find my group of friends…they didn’t mind☺. I got into good conversation with one of them and we are going out on a date in a few minutes…which is, by the way, the very FIRST date (not half date, accidental date, etc, of which I have had). That is what being in relationships the better part of a decade will do to you. I am a little skeptical. I have this theory that American girls and Israeli men aren’t so compatible. I’ll let you know. In any case he is cute, Italian and at least it will help my Hebrew! I just keep thinking about one of my girls from this year saying to me as her parting words, “Ms. G. you have to promise me that you’ll date at least ONE cute Israeli soldier.” Oy, here I go sweety.
On Friday I took a bus into….drum roll please….the West Bank. I went to a settlement called T’koa. It is about 30 years old and there are about 400 families there…a few thousand people. On the bus ride there I thought it was a bit bizarre that the windows on the sides of the bus were so thick…I couldn’t see through them. Well, actually it looked like I WOULD see through them, if I weren’t using my glasses. But I was sitting in the front so the bus driver could tell me when to get off. I had a good view. We drove through some checkpoints, we weren’t stopped though cause we were leaving Jerusalem, not entering. The drive took about 45 minutes and I descended from rocky windy craziness into a desert oasis. Granted, a politically difficult one for me to find myself in. Why, one might ask, did she go on a weekend trip to the West Bank. First I have to tell you two other things:
1) I had to get out of my apartment for the weekend cause my bed was needed.
2) I told my parents that I was going to a suburb of Jerusalem. This isn’t really a lie – it is a 20 minutes drive by car from Jerusalem. It is just not say, a drive to Manlius (for all you Syracusans out there – but there was actually considerably less traffic;).
I was going to spend shabbat with a friend that I made in ulpan. She is an olah chadasha, a new immigrant, and is engaged to a guy who was born and raised in T’koa and is building their home there. They are both great fun to be around and I am happy that I went out. I couldn’t take many pictures because I was there mostly just over Shabbat. But I did get a few for ya’ll. The house where I stayed overlooked a site called Herodian.
http://www.jewishmag.com/93mag/herodian/herodian.htm
(I don’t have the time right now to read the whole website to see how accurate it is, not that I am any great judge, but there are good pictures in any case).
So I found out from my friend that the bus windows looked the way they did because they are bulletproof. Mainly just the busses that go to the settlements are bulletproofed.
I arrived in the early afternoon and we spent the afternoon by the communal pool. Chatting, sunning, reading, eating. The community is on a series of hills that overlook the dead sea, Jordan, the Judean Desert. Whatever political qualms and questions I had while I was there, it was Fill My Soul beautiful and so so good to be back in the wilderness of Israel.
We spent Friday night in shul, and then eating a lovely dinner. It was a full house – and two very cute dogs to boot! On Saturday morning I woke up at about 930 (which was almost the end of shul, if you can believe it…why oh why does shul have to start so early!!) I read in a hammock...occasionally gazing out over the desert, past Herodian and into the distance towards Jordan. We laid around, read (I actually was able to understand the gist of an entire article in Hebrew!!!!!), they humored my many questions, we took a walk to a part of T’koa that overlooks the wadi that winds for miles and miles until it reaches the dead sea. Apparently people do a night hike where they reach the dead sea at daybreak…I hope I get to do that before I croak…well…that an a whole lot of other things☺
It was a really special place. Far removed from traffic and city-life. It is in the desert, as I said, and it seems like God put out all the stars at night so you would smile at them and say thanks. The air is crisp and dry. There are huge cacti, complete with sabra fruits galore. I even picked fresh figs off a tree and ate them (for the first time!:). The people were friendly and they all know each other. They don’t seem like radical settlers trying to claim the land for themselves. They seemed to me like nice people who are raising their families in a beautiful place…surrounded by Arab villages and Jewish ones too. Did they take land from the Arabs? They say, in their case at the very least, no. It was a vacant hill when they settled it. Were there Arabs around them, yes. For the most part they live in peace with their neighbors. They work together at times. They even protect each other at times.
Why did I decide to go to the shtachim, the settlements? Why did I take a bulletproof bus to spend shabbas in the desert? For one I love the desert in Israel. It is the most beautiful place that I have been. It reminded me of being 16 and finding God. It reminded me that I have lost my way a bit. It reminds me that I am small and that the world is beautiful. I went because I don’t think it is fair to judge the settlers without understanding their position, without physically visiting, without talking to them. I went because I need to constantly be reminded to see the infinite shades of grey that exist in the world. I still feel confused and unsure about my feelings and position on the settlements. I hope I am less so, or at least on a path to greater clarity on the issue.
Politics aside it was a lovely weekend and I am happy I went. I am sorry, Mom and Pops for not telling you the details of where I was going. I felt like I was making a safe-ish choice while I know that many of you might disagree. It was good to feel the desert wind again. I hope to go back sometime in the future, but who knows when now that school is starting.
Now, if you’ll excuse me, it is time to go on my first first date.
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