Arrived.

I safely arrived a week ago, and I can definitively now say that I have experienced jetlag, although I have since recovered. The time difference is 7 hours from East Coast time, however, we just had a very early daylight savings time so it is now only 6 hours difference until November.

This past week has been chock full of a whirlwind of meeting family and travel et al. I've done much sleeping, asking lots of questions, experiencing culture shock, and feeling confused. I've never really had to deal with being in a place where I don't know the language (all my previous travel having taken place in Latin America where most people speak Spanish and the United States where everyone speaks English), so this has been a fascinating (yet frustrating at times) experience for me. There is a lot of inner turmoil (in my head) about what it means to be here, and what Israel is, but I also am cognizant of allowing myself to experience whatever comes my way. It has been incredibly challenging but also incredibly incredibly beautiful thus far.

A brief rundown of the past few days:

last Thursday = lots of sweating, meeting a neat Spanish Red Cross worker on the plane, arrival in the evening, feeling tired, settling in to the room that Noam's family got for us across the kibbutz, delicious delicious hummus and pita.

Friday = meeting the grandparents, seeing some parts of the kibbutz, going to Caesaria (ruins) by the sea, getting treated to a delicious seafood meal.

Saturday = walking around, realizing I can see the West Bank from the kibbutz and talking about it, driving north with Noam's parents to his sister's house and meeting her family (husband, twin 3-year old sons and 5-year old daughter), eating fresh carob from a beautiful carob tree, talking about life and values, struggling with language with the Hebrew-only kids, and feeling shocked for a lack of a better word.

Sunday = Lots more talking, sleeping, first experience with the Mediterranean Sea and then a rushed drive back to get home before dark (and rock-throwing zealous Jews) because it was the start of Yom Kippur.

Monday = Yom Kippur, so everything (and I mean everything) was closed down. Went for a bike ride down the middle of the highway toward the beach and walked around near a cotton field then felt excited about watching television only to remember that pretty much all tv and radio stations were not running.

Tuesday = Driving north to the Kinneret (only fresh water lake in Israel, also on the border with the Israeli-occupied Syrian Golan Heights, also where Jesus walked on water etc), being treated to a ridiculous lunch at a tasty Arab restaurant along the way, seeing the out of place tropical agriculture (bananas...mangos...things that require tons of water that is a scarce commodity in the area), and setting up camp along the banks across from Tiberias.

Wednesday = My first experience with seeing the diversity of Israeli hitchikers, driving into the Golan, seeing remnants of Syrian villages right next to an Israeli base, seeing lots of areas still closed off because of landmines, going on a hike to two beautiful waterfalls, getting a little sick from so much sun, laughing at my first Bithright group sighting, coming back to the kibbutz and lots of conversations about the IDF.

I'll try my best to update later with more details and a few photographs (I've taken a gazillion thus far), but we're in a bit of a rush to catch the train south so we can then catch a ride (or the bus) with our farmer to Ezuz (the red letter A on that map). Ezuz is really tiny agricultural village near the border with Egypt where we'll be working with goats and terraced orchards at least for the next week, hopefully for much longer depending on how it goes.


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