Until we meet again

Well I’ve gathered all my things and have packed them up, but am having a much harder time gathering all my thoughts. I leave for the airport in just a mere couple of hours, and while I’m quite excited to see all my friends and family, have potential jobs that I’m excited about ahead of me, and eat some Mexican food and sushi (the 2 food categories I’ve missed out on the most, despite all the delicious middle eastern food), I can’t help but be sad to leave what I’ve come to know over the past several months behind. While I still can’t see myself actually settling down permanently in Israel for a variety of reasons, I still have learned what a special place it really is. I mean, where else in the world do you watch the Olympics and (on a Saturday) the announcers continually say, “Shabbat Shalom.”

My last week on the farm was wonderful. I did quite a lot of dishes, helping with the hospitality portion of the farm, as well as got to know some really nice Israelis who were staying there for a conference nearby that weekend. I also did a little more painting, and continued helping around the farm. I finally felt confident in making the most basic cheese all by myself, which was fun. And also the farm grandpa, Avi, took me on an awesome tour of the Golan Heights. It’s a beautiful area, but also a place that has seen many recent wars- there are quite a lot of abandoned bunkers around and minefields with fences surrounding them warning you to not go in to them because of the mines. Apparently the mines were put there by the Syrians, so it’s not really worth Israel’s time and effort at the moment to try to dismantle them right now without having a map of where they are (which would have to be given to Israel from Syria). Another day when the 2 new volunteers showed up, he took us all to Nazareth for the afternoon. It was quite interesting with lots of Christian history. We also ate knafe in many different forms at an amazing Arab bakery. Nazareth is apparently one of a handful of cities in Israel known for Arabs and Jews living side by side in relative peace.

Sitting on a Syrian tank from the Yom Kippur war for 1973

Mount Tabor behind me- our stop right before Nazareth

One type of the knafe

The last bit of excitement on the farm for the week was that the family found a viper in the yard. Quite poisonous- glad it didn’t find me first. They said in the 30 years they’ve lived there that they’ve only seen 3. I have a photo of it with its head chopped off, but I’ll save that for viewing off the blog for those interested. Volunteering on an organic farm through WWOOF has been something I’ve had in the back of my mind for a while. I couldn’t be happier with my experience. I feel like it was a wonderful way to see a side of Israel that wasn’t a large populated city as well as to meet the locals. It may have only been 2 weeks out of the 6.5 months that I was here, but it was definitely a major highlight to this trip.

Having fun cleaning out the kids' pen 

After the farm I have been spending my time hanging out with friends and embracing being a tourist. I went to the graduating Bezalel student’s final show and was totally blown away. The ceramic work was phenomenal and a huge inspiration to keep pushing myself. I also went and checked out all of the other departments, and while I enjoyed a lot of it, I was still the most impressed by the ceramic department (I may be biased). The industrial design department was quite impressive, and really fun to wander around and see the products they invented or reinvented the design of. I also toured the City of David (including the tunnel where you wade through water), the tunnels under the Western Wall, and walked around the Mount of Olives.

View of The Old City Jerusalem from Mount of Olives

I can’t say it enough how much of a wonderful experience this has been. I may do one more post once I get home, but if not, thanks everyone for reading my posts! And I’ll see most of you in the very near future J.