Summary, Part 2

With the soldiers in tow, we went to an "Israeli-Arab relations" seminar. I don't feel like getting into it in this summary, but for now, all I will say is that it did not change or open anybody's mind, including my own. It was, however, a great effort by Birthright to show one of the many darker sides of Israel. No matter how much I joke about the trip being "propaganda" when people ask me why I get to go to Israel for free, Israel Experts (the organizer of this particular Birthright trip) did a great job of not being propaganda. I didn't get the sense that they were saying, "move here, we need you," as much as "yeah, we want you to move here, but we're going to show you how the country is and let you make up your mind."

While the speakers were speaking in Jaffa, two wedding photo shoots were simultaneously going on in the background. It only added to the cinematic commotion of it all.

From Tel Aviv we went to Tiberias. On the road there, we passed by the separation wall, and shortly after passing it, I realized that I had to pee so bad, I was almost ready to go in a bottle. Rosa tried to get me talking to get my mind off of it, but I had to pee so bad that nothing short of peeing would relieve me. A gas station miraculously appeared and I was saved. I ran into the empty women's room and relieved myself for about 5 minutes straight. There were other, more interesting and profound things that happened that day. I had a conversation with one of the two soldiers named Michal about identities and Reform Judaism and why you shouldn't stay somewhere if you're too comfortable there. At the end of the day, we went to Tiberias.

In Tiberias, we met an entertaining Israeli historian. He was from originally from America and he had a voice that can only be described as too Jewish to function. He specializes in the history of Israel's first settlers, who were a bunch of young Jews from Eastern Europe who bought and cultivated land in the Galilee while it was owned (but completely uninhabited) by the Ottomans. The stories contain two aspects of Israeli history that are often overlooked:

1)The original settlers settled land that was completely uninhabited. No Arabs, no Turks, no Jews, no white people. Just mosquitos.

2)The original settlers were young and their settlement didn't have much to do with religion. They had a choice between a futile life in Eastern Europe and a mostly futile but more exciting life in a Middle Eastern country full of neglected swamps and deserts. Some of them chose the more exciting route. Religion did play a small part, of course- it was their religion that insured they had no good future in Europe. But they were ultimately a bunch of young people (younger than me, many of them) who wanted to do something more interesting with themselves. It could have been me.

And actually, it literally could have been my ancestors. But my ancestors managed to go to America instead.

The storyteller kept reminding us of the lurid details of the settlers' diaries. "Sex, relationships, do I need to tell you why I can't stop reading this stuff?" And, as if that wasn't enough, he would add, "It's not just because it's history!" What a Jew. My dad is a more mellow, less squeaky, less portly version of this man. And me, I'm pretty sure I'm just a less Jewish version of my dad.

Tiberias also includes the Hamat Gader hotsprings. I've never seen so many 22+ girls within such easy access of so many boys under the age of 17. And I've never been in such awesome water. And I've never smelled so much like hard-boiled eggs as I did that night.

While staying in Tiberias, we also saw the Golan. It resembles inland Northern California, but on a smaller scale. If it weren't for the remains of Syrian weapons, you wouldn't have any idea that it was the subject of so much violence. It's a nice, quiet place, really, and I suppose that's why Syria wants it, although the fact that owning that little piece of land would make it 100 times easier to attack Israel is probably a major factor, too.