Israel Revisited
On October 10, 2009 Oren and I flew over the big pond to Israel to join in on a family trip. The primary reason we went was because the first of Oren’s cousins was getting married and it was an important milestone in which the Feinsteins wanted to take part. It had also been about two years since Oren and his dad had gone and four years for Oren’s mom. And as most of you know, Donna is currently living in Tel Aviv so we wanted to see her of course!
You ask if this was my first time? Nope! This was my second opportunity to visit the Holy Land. I went when I was 16 with a group of 60 kids from the Houston area. It was called Houston Pilgrimage and it was organized through Hadassah — one of the largest women’s Jewish organizations in the world which I am now a member of (thanks mom and Orna!). I was obviously young and a bit immature at the time. Although it was an experience of a lifetime, I definitely saw the country through different eyes this second time around. To be honest, I never thought I would get back there. It is so far and expensive and it’s one of those things that unless you are Israeli or wanting to study abroad, you are so completely satisfied going one time in your life. Little did I know I was going to fall in love with a native Israeli who would take me with him to Israel several times to come.
I feel so incredibly lucky to be marrying into this family for many, many reasons. But one of them is because I get to be part of such a wonderful heritage and I get to explore my faith to an extent that I never would have imagined just by visiting their country of origin. Although they have already been thanked, I have to once again send all my love and gratitude to Dubi and Orna for inviting me along on this journey. I loved meeting the extended family. They were truly lovely and it made me feel so much closer to Oren, his sister and his parents.
So, Oren and I were only able to be away from our jobs for 10 days. The trip was short but it was totally action-packed. As Orna likes to say, we did about a month’s worth of things in one week!
We spent the first few days in Tel Aviv, a beautiful city on the Mediterranean Sea that many people compare to New York — as it is known for the country’s “best of” everything; food, fashion, art, etc. Each morning we spent lounging on the beach, which was just a short walk from our hotel. It was unusually warm there for that time of year. I believe the temperature reached about 85 each day and the water was probably about the same — so refreshing! After our relaxing mornings, we would go go go and eat eat eat!
Some of the highlights in Tel Aviv included visiting the Opera House where Donna is carrying out one of her internships. She works for the props department so she was able to take us on a behind-the-scenes tour. We went backstage. We went to the costume room where we all began to play dress-up! Then to the props room, where employees were hard at work sawing wood and making fake bodies. Talk about amazing subject matter for a photographer! I must have taken at least 100 photos in that one building. We also had our first falafel of the trip in Tel Aviv. We found out later it was the first organic, healthy falafel shop in the city and it was quite popular, not to mention delicious. We did lots of walking, where I continued to take lots of pictures of the interesting dichotomy of old and new architecture and the tropically lush greenery and flowers all over the city. We walked into a really neat art gallery where each piece was made entirely out of iron words in several different languages.
One evening, we drove to a town called Herzliya where we visited with Orna’s sister, Ayala, and her family. We all ate in a Yemenite restaurant that is known for one of the Yemenite specialties called Melawach. We were there for several hours talking and eating, and yes even singing. Well, only Oren’s uncle sang. He used to be a cantor for a local synagogue and he is very talented. Later, we walked around a brand new park area. It tends to get a bit chilly at night and being the idiot I am, I forgot a sweater. Dubi sacrificed the shirt off his back so I could layer up and be warmer. It was quite a funny sight because he was shirtless and the shirt was so big it covered up my shorts! We all had a good laugh.
One afternoon we went to this awesome outdoor arts and crafts market that parallels a famous Tel Aviv food market called The Shuk. Orna, Donna and I went crazy buying jewelry and other goodies left and right. The street went on and on with artists and craftsmen selling any kind of paraphernalia you can think of. I loved taking pictures of all the different objects and people hanging around.
On our last evening in Tel Aviv, we got a chance to have dinner with Oren’s cousin a.k.a. the bride! Her name is Yael and she is a doctor in Tel Aviv (her new husband is too). She specializes in cardiology in the pediatrics department. She is so incredibly down-to-earth and fun to be with. We had a great sushi meal together and later frozen yogurt.
Finally, it was time to make our way to Jerusalem. We like to call it “Jerals,” coined by goofy Oren. This is where Dubi’s side of the family lives so we did a lot of visiting between his sister, Bella, and her family as well as his mother, Chaya, and her husband Yom Tov. We took a day trip to Mt. Massada and the Dead Sea. Mt. Massada is a holy, historic site where several Jews living on top of the mountain committed a mass suicide so as not to be killed by the dominating Romans. It is a huge tourist attraction and important for Jews and others to visit to see how a civilization lived on top of a mountain in the desert for several years. Donna actually had her bat-mitzvah here, as do many Jews. We spent a long time walking around. I had been there the first time I went to Israel but hardly remembered it because I was so delirious (we woke up at 3 a.m. after sleeping in the open desert and hiked the mountain in order to watch the sun rise).
After we descended the mountain, we made our way to the Dead Sea, or Yam Ha-Melah in Hebrew. For those of you who don’t know, the Dead Sea is the lowest point on earth — 1,385 ft below Sea Level to be exact. Nothing can live there, hence the term “dead.” The sea is more of a lake and it has sadly been receding over the years… so much so that Orna and Dubi nod their heads in disappointment every time they visit the area. It is one of the world’s saltiest bodies of water with about 33.7 percent salinity. Because of this, the body’s buoyancy effect is astounding. If you lift up one toe, your entire body floats up to the surface and you float with hardly any of your own effort. One suggestion if you ever visit… bring water shoes because the hard, salt-crystalized sea ground hurts bare feet like crazy! Before we went in we rubbed Dead Sea mud all over our bodies, which is very moisturizing for the skin. It is also said to have healing powers for minor aches and pains. We didn’t get to spend as much time as we wanted floating around before the sun began to set and we had to leave, but we still had a great time.
The main highlight, of course, was Yael and Yochai’s wedding. The ceremony took place on a kibbutz (co-operative living grounds) right outside of Jerusalem. It was very casual, which was different. According to Israelis, they really “do it up” there for their weddings…even bigger than in America normally. Yael hardly even wanted a wedding so they settled on something simple and fun. The chuppah was a small talit (a man’s holy shawl) held up with plastic posts by members of her family. The backdrop was beautiful countryside with the city of Jerusalem in the far background. The ceremony lasted about 10 minutes. Yael looked beautiful. She wore a more casual lace-detailed dress and her groom wore black pants and a silk, white shirt. Everything was in Hebrew so I didn’t understand much, but it was still lovely. Yael held her mother’s hand the whole time and no one cried until it was all over. Immediately following the ceremony, a meal was served and the DJ began to play up-beat dancing music. Most of the attendants danced for the majority of the time. We also got Savta (Grandma) out there and she did great! Everyone seemed to have a good time. They even had an after-party at a bar on the kibbutz! We all went to that for a short amount of time before going back to our rooms to rest.
The other more significant highlight was visiting the Western Wall in the Old City of Jerusalem. For those of you who don’t know, this wall is the only remaining structure from the holy Jewish temple that was destructed multiple times throughout history. The fact that the wall still stands brings hope to the Jews and is a symbol of the people’s resilience and commitment of carrying on their traditions. I had been here before, and I remembered getting very emotional as do many people who visit for their first time. Hence, the nickname “Wailing Wall.” It’s something you hear about and see in religious school books growing up and you don’t really understand its significance, nor do you feel its holiness until you stand dead center inside it all. This time was a little bit less emotional for me but perhaps even more special because I got to visit it with the man I love and I had completely different prayers to write down and to stuff into the cracks of the ancient wall. We also witnessed a bar-mitzvah taking place, which happens on a regular basis. Oren had his bar-mitzvah there too. It’s always a bit disturbing to me that the wall is segregated between males and females in observation of the Orthodox laws. Because of this, the women have to stand on chairs on their side and peak over to the men’s side to watch it all happen. Oh well, it’s part of tradition I suppose.
While we were in the Old City, we shopped for hours at the Arab bazaar. This is such a cool experience. You are basically walking through a tunnel of this ancient walled-in sector down these ancient, shallow steps that have been treaded upon so much that the stone is completely smoothed over and almost slippery. Everywhere you look there are things! Things to buy and eat and look at. Arab men enticing you to come into their “store” and practically begging you to buy their item rather than another man’s item three stores down for a few shekels less. They are so desperate for your business it’s hard not to feel sorry for them. Yet at the same time, you know they are ripping you off to some extent so you go ahead and negotiate until they cave in. If they don’t cave in, you walk out and then they come running after you giving you the deal you wanted. This my friends is where Emily Berman became a master! Most people think of me as a nice, giving person. But oh no…when it comes to bartering I am ruthless! The Feinsteins got to watch me first-hand and all commended me on my excellent work. It was so much fun.
The last highlight is one that spurred a lot of curiosity when many of you were scanning through the photos from this trip. Oren’s parents took us to the Central Jerusalem Prison museum where everything is preserved from when prisoners actually served out their sentences for crimes committed before Israel became a Jewish state. Oren’s great uncle (Dubi’s father’s younger brother) — Meir Feinstein — was an “underground” freedom fighter who adamantly fought to make Israel a Jewish state. At the time, the country was under British control and everyone wanted the British out. Meir was in a specific organization and after a successful railroad attack, he was arrested and sentenced to death at this prison. At the time, people sentenced to death were hung in the gallows of a prison. Just before Meir’s time was up, he and a fellow freedom fighter who was also sentenced to death, decided to commit suicide by detonating a home-made hand grenade that was disguised as an orange. They tricked the British guards asking for one last orange before being put to death. Little did they know they had been plotting with other prisoners in the kitchen to make an explosive device. The way these men saw it was that if they killed themselves, it was of their own free will. But if they let the British kill them, it would be as if all of their work was for nothing and they would be defeated.
Meir kept a bible with him in the jail cell and wrote in the front page a statement in both English and Hebrew basically stating that it is more honorable to die by one’s own gun than surrender to the enemy. He asked a decent guard to take it and give it to his family members. Meir was only 19 at the time he died and he was engaged to be married. Obviously, his love for his country was his number one priority and he would not rest until he did everything he could to help win its freedom. His honor was so recognized throughout Israel that the Israeli Prime Minister at the time asked to be buried next to Meir’s grave site when he passed away, and his request was faithfully executed. In the pictures I sent, you will see that the bible Meir left behind lives in the museum today. The replica is on display outside the prison cell that Meir and his friend stayed in, but the authentic original is kept safely by the museum director in his office. When we visited, the director just happened to be there so he showed us the original bible, which was donated by the Feinstein family. We also got our own private tour of the museum where there is a huge room honoring all of the prisoners who were killed under British dominance, including Meir. The eerie part is Oren looks a lot like this guy. They have the same eyes and lips! It’s neat to know that the Feinstein family is famous in Israel due to this man’s courageous acts.
Well, now that I have written what seems like a novel, I will stop here. There is so much more I could write about and so many funny or special moments that I will never forget. But this at least gives you a good taste for some of the awesome experiences I had while revisiting the beautiful country of Israel.
