Alix Brown

July 2006 Israel Seminar

My Trip to Israel with the Florence Melton Adult Mini-School

by Alix Brown

I have been home now five days and I am still walking a few feet above the ground.  Any trip to Israel will do that to you.  But I also left a piece of my heart behind; being in Israel during a matsav will do that to you. I never expected that this trip would have such a profound effect on me…it is an experience that will live with me always, a journey at once as much about the physical as it was about the spiritual. I return home, a different person than when I left.

I had the privilege of traveling to Israel as part of the Florence Melton Adult Mini-School Israel Seminar, after completing the two-year program offered through United Jewish Federation and the JCC here in Stamford. I loved the Melton class so much, and learned such a tremendous amount that it only seemed logical to continue and go to Israel.  After all, I had never been there before and here was my golden opportunity, staring me right in the face. My mother decided to join me – also her first trip – and we looked forward to our trip with great anticipation. And Melton promised a different view of Israel, active and involved, not for the armchair tourist: experience and understand contemporary Israel by walking in the path of history. I remember my first sight of the coast and Tel Aviv coming into view just over the wing of the plane. Like an excited child, I took out my camera and unabashedly took photos, not unaware of the laughing around me, noting that this truly marked the beginning of our journey: we were really here! 

We joined up with the rest of our group the next evening. Everyone, including our fellow Meltonites seemed very nice. We had already been divided into two groups that would be traveling on similar paths, sometimes going separate ways, sometimes coming together. Although the groups were put together quite randomly, the synergy between us was evident. Twenty of us, from all over the United States and Canada, became fast friends, looking forward to ten days of learning and exploring Israel in an exciting and unique way. Little did we know how strongly we would bond and through what circumstances, for while we laughed a great deal together, we also cried and worried, not just for ourselves, but for the whole of Israel.

It was on the cable car coming down from the top of Masada that we first heard people talking about two soldiers who had been kidnapped on the Lebanese border. It was eerie, as we rode gracefully down to the tourist center; speculations buzzed about in five different languages.  It would take a phone call back home from our bus as we made our way to the Dead Sea to find out what had happened.  Our ride back to Jerusalem was quieter than usual. We stayed on schedule but our journey began to take a whole new path, not on any map and not part of any itinerary. Discourse on the last 3000 years of Jewish history took on different meanings while crisis unfolded around us. Thinking about the dilemmas, challenges and hardships that the Jewish people faced while sitting on the remains of streets where they walked was simultaneously enlightening and silly as we also listened to the daily reports of events in the north, far from where we sat. How could we sit and continue our tour? How could we act “normal?”

But the greater question to ask is: how could we not? Living in an atmosphere of tension is part of day to day life in Israel. Every action taken by Israel is under international scrutiny, but international news does not cover the regular firing of Katyusha rockets into the northern region, nor the number of suicide bombers that are stopped leaving the West Bank and never make it to their targets. Tourists travel through, skimming the surface: we visit a monument, a ruin, maybe talk to a vendor, spend a few shekelim and move on to the next photographic moment. We read about events in the newspaper or listen to international news in our hotel rooms, bombarded with powerful images of events unfolding in Lebanon. Walking the streets and listening to conversations around you as people talk of war forces you to leave the security of your own personal space and engage in the dialogue. We never thought of coming home early, but only of what could we do. A connection - amongst us and to the land - was formed that even now pulls at the very core, back to Israel.

Some people from other trips did go home early; we heard about them and put our arms around each other in understanding. Many of us received endless phone calls from home, frantic and incomprehensible over our decision to stay. Some trips cancelled entirely before ever leaving; we heard about them, too, and felt badly. But we also cheered as the first solidarity group arrived from the United States. We never worried about our safety, but only for the safety of those in the north, soldiers and civilians. And as we unwittingly bore witness to history repeating itself before our eyes, we look to the calendar.  As we approach Tisha B’Av this year we are not only mourning the destructions in our history, but remembering that we are still here.  In our grief, we remind the rest of the world that we are not going anywhere!

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