This may be my last post! Other than a possible reflection once I am back in the US.
Waking up to memorial day was hard, the stories on the tv, and the music playing all very much reflected the sorrow for those who have been lost.
Shenhav and I went into South Tel Aviv to gather supplies for a Bachelorette party she is throwing for a friend later this month. It was fun to see all the shops, and all of the preparations for the celebration that night. The silly string began to cover the streets as shop keepers wanted people to know their shop was the place to buy, we bought some patriotic toys for later that night and we after a few hours had found everything we needed at the shops.
Heading over to the Juice Stand I found, I had decided to go with Shenhav into the city pretty much in hopes of getting juice from a shop. I took Shenhav to the hostel I had stayed at in Tel Aviv to show her their new Mural, and I paid for a tour I will be taking later this month. It has begun to feel like business as usual.
As night fell we began to et ready to go out, and we drive over to a friend of Shenhav's house, which was a beautiful house, the pond in the backyard reminded me of the pond in my families back yard accept theirs seemed cleaner. I got to have this fresh friend bread, which again I have to stress how happy I want to have eaten that and it not upset my stomach. Shir, one of Shenhav's best friends is a beautiful soul. She is curious and happy and caring, I really admire people who are themselves with out worrying about the way others see them. Well, her sister just returned from Mexico. It is common for people when they finish the army to go on a vacation and that is why Shir's sister was in Mexico. Here its mandatory military, women have two years and men three.
I appreciate the mandatory service, because its not all combative, or even combat oriented, some of it is working in a hospital, at a school or for a city. I know that this is partially because I am a big advocate of community service, but it teaches you so much. From 18-20 or 21 you are in the army here, then when you finish you begin your studies, which means you have 2-3 years to figure out what you want to study, you have worked, you have experiences to a certain degree. I think going to college at 18 is a mistake, which is why I like this system, at least at face value.
We were all in Shir's room as she gets ready and I began to see how our lives can be similar and different. Housing is expensive, so people live with their parents, as Shir does which is nice but her room is pristine, and that is not reflected in her personality. She mentioned that her mom is adiment that everything in her room has a place and should be put away, I could not handle that, I have lived on my own since I was 20, I will be with my family this summer, which I am already bracing myself for that challenge. Even when I was 19 and I lived at home, I was always in the city staying over at friends or boyfriends houses, and that is not how it works here.
I can resonate with something that I see we have in common, the US has done some horrible things, and so has Israel, yet us girls, all sitting in that room have the privileges we do in part because of these actions. To add to those privileges, we have the opportunity to completely ignore the wrongs that currently are happening in the world. For me it is hard, how do you confront a privilege, to even be educated in the United States to the point where I read about and discuss the atrocities that my country has committed is because of the fact that I am a white upper class female. I know that people in Israel exist that feel what I am feeling, I know people in ever country exist that feel what I am feeling, I have just had a hard time finding them.
As we leave the house these thoughts are still on my mind, as we get to the streets of Tel Aviv, I see the excitement and love in the air just as I see in large groups of youth at events in the US. I dance, and I have a good time, they really know how to party in Israel and the police shut down the streets when people fill them, where as in the US the people would just be dispersed. People spray nasty white foam in the air, drumming groups come together and add to the excitement in the streets. Drunk kids that are probably in the army right now get transfixed by how many tattoos I have and as questions, realizing im from Chicago and I do not speak hebrew, they begin to ask me about Al Capone. I continue to think about places that are privileged enough to have this amount of Chaos in the streets with out the police trying to break it up with violence. The fact that places I have been, in the United States, in Edinburgh, Tel Aviv, these places have opportunities like this, but places like Guatemala or Palestine do not have these instances.
Around 3am we headed back to the car and after dropping everyone off we returned home by 4, Shenhav worked 6am-2pm so when I woke up I decided to go for a run, and clear my head. I drank 900mL of water and I figured I would be fine. As I got to my 25 minute mark while running away from Shenhav's I realized that I was very dehydrated from the night before and that 900mL was not enough. I had turned around a corner and was running through a primarily Ethiopian neighborhood.
The Ethiopian Jewish population came in two waves in 1984 and 1991. They came as Beta Israel, when the political climate in Ethiopia became to unstable. They were actually in large part airlifted in.
Many Ethiopians in Israel have less opportunity than other Jewish communities. It seems that the power hierarchy is Western European Jews, Eastern European Jews, Arab Jews and then African Jews. Well as I stopped in this neighborhood obviously hurting for water. A family that was barbecuing sent one of their kids over with water. When I said thank you in English, she got very excited. She brought me over to the other kids and told them I speak english. Then the rest of the family began asking me questions. This was so cool, I love being pulled off the street, they offered me chicken and usually I would say no thank you and finish my run but, I fell in love with the hospitality.
As I sat down to talk with then for 45 minutes or so, they engaged me in conversation. This felt amazing, these people speak quite a few languages yet they, during their independence day Barbecue they chose to spend time with a complete stranger speaking english. After thanking them profusely, I began my journey back to Shenhav's, walking because running after chicken and rice was not a good idea. On my walk I thought about how the creation of Israel gave these people a place to go in a time of uncertainty in their home country. They truly appreciate the Independent state of Israel in a conscious and thoughtful way. This experience will change the way that I think about and participate in the 4th of July this year.
Well, tonight I am packing up all my belongings to continue my journey! I will not be continuing my journey on this blog, but I hope that my posts were insightful to all. Writing all of this down has been extremely helpful as I process my experience here in Israel.
Thank you Eilat and Susie for organizing all of this for me! Rivi, Einav and Melanie for showing me around your beautiful cities, and Shenhav and her family for hosting me in their home for an entire week!
-Jliv
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