It’s 3:36am and I can’t sleep. That’s to be expected- my body is confused about the time change. I’m in Israel, and this is only the second time in my life that I’m here. I’ve come because I’m attending the Matan Bellows Eshkolot cohort meet-up. I finished this fellowship (learning over Zoom) and joined an incredible network of women along the way. Every Sunday (with a few exceptions) from either 9am-1pm or 9am-3pm (with some breaks included) I learned from people like Rabbanit Shani Taragin, Dr. Yael Ziegler, Mrs. Simi Peters and the like - not to mention the other members of my cohort.
I was actually supposed to go to Israel for this meet-up during COVID. However, Israel declared itself a red country and refused to let any flights in, so we had to reschedule for this year. This rescheduling worked in my favor because there is now a nonstop United flight from Chicago to Tel Aviv, my children are older (so it’s easier to leave them) and best of all, a friend I’ve known for sixteen years is getting married and I (God willing) get to attend the wedding.
So these entries will be my thoughts, musings and commentary on my experiences here during this time. The experience actually starts before I ever got on a plane. Luckily for me, I have a friend, Tal, who works for OU JLIC. She spends a lot of time in Israel and was able to advise me on all sorts of things I wouldn’t have intuitively known. These included:
How to purchase adaptors so that I would be able to charge my phone and iPad (and her specific recommendation of which brand and type to purchase)
The different options for making sure my phone worked in Israel (I went with the international ten day plan that charges me an extra $10/ day for my phone to work normally)
How to check whether or not my credit card would work in Israel, and whether there would be a surcharge
The need to look into purchasing travel insurance (just in case I would experience any sickness) and her recommendation of where to look
Best of all, my flight and Tal’s flights landed at approximately the same time, so she was able to take me under her wing and make sure I figured out how to get to where I was going.
But let’s back up and talk about Chicago. United had me scan my passport into my phone, then told me which terminal I needed to go to. At the terminal, there was an easy place to check my bag (which is free, or included in the cost of the trip, unlike my domestic flights). I had to show my passport again in order to go through security. I reached my gate, C20, pretty early, but then was turned away. They told me to come back in 45 minutes to line up. I didn’t know what that meant but went to the nearby food court and hung out. (It was my Hebrew birthday and Eli’s Cheesecake, which is CRC certified, had been open, so that was awesome.)
I went back to C20 a while later. They had set up an entirely new screening system before letting us into our gate, something I had never experienced before. They told us to make sure to go to the bathroom now because they weren’t going to let us go out to use the bathroom later. We waited in a long line for them to reconfirm our passport, check our name off a list and write down which seat number we had. Then our carry-ons were swiped with some kind of small paper (maybe checking for gunpowder residue?) and scanned again. We were wanded and patted down. After all that, we got to sit at the gate for a bit.
We boarded the plane, which had in-flight entertainment. I had planned on purchasing streaming WiFi and was disappointed to learn that option wasn’t offered. Luckily for me, their in-flight entertainment did offer ‘House of the Dragon’ from HBO which is what I had wanted to see anyway. I was seated next to two adults from Kentucky who were with their church group, so there wasn’t an issue of a child watching the content over my shoulder. (Alas for me, I cannot sleep on planes- believe me, I’ve tried- so I either listen to audiobooks, read books or watch TV in a zombie like state.)
The plane took off and shortly afterwards they served us dinner (at past 10pm.) The lucky thing about having kosher meals is that you are always served first. Regal Corp provided a chicken, couscous and rice dinner along with bread and margarine, water and a small tart-like item for dessert.
I watched the House of the Dragon. Below are some spoilers based on things I noticed/ learned:
There’s a scene where Daimen pretends to parley/ offer a white flag of truce to the Crabfeeder. He even offers up his sword. Then, he gets up and goes on a murder spree. This scene would be breathtaking to use in order to teach about Yoav and his treachery, but alas, there’s too much gore so I can’t show it in high school.
King Viserys deliberately chooses not to know information he doesn’t want to know. He doesn’t punish his own daughter, which leads to a mess later on. Additionally, when Aegon (his biological son) becomes a rapist, it’s his mother who chastises him, not the king- and all that really happens to him is a slap on the wrist. Watching the show, you can really understand how royal members of the household can be adversely shaped when their parents never wish to “sadden them with rebuke.”
Watching King Viserys become old, infirm, feeble and addled on milk of the poppy gave me new insight into King David’s illness and his descent into fragility. Obviously, Viserys is much worse off than David, who at least maintains his strength of mind. But these scenes gave me new insight into why Yoav and Avner would defect from David and appoint Adonijah in his stead. This is very similar to the Small Council basically ruling in Viserys’ stead and trying to keep him out of the picture.
Aside from watching House of the Dragon, I wandered around the plane and talked to some fellow Chicagoans. Shortly before we landed, they served us breakfast. (Regal Corp again- this time it was eggs with some potatoes/ hash browns, a croissant, a fruit cup and orange juice.)
When we landed, I WhatsApped with Tal and we planned to meet at baggage claim. I got off the plane and copied everyone else in terms of what we were asked to do. We walked down a ramp, then paused and had to scan our passports and look at a camera at a section filled with machines. After a successful scan, the machine printed a document entitled STATE OF ISRAEL- BORDER CONTROL STAY PERMIT.
After we had gotten our permits, we made our way downstairs. We had to turn to go to the section that said ‘Foreign Passports’ rather than ‘Israeli Passports.’
There were black and orange signs atop booths that read ‘All Passports.’
We had to show the man at the booth our passport and our permit and he gave us a blue gate pass. We then had to hand the gate pass to another worker, who collected them from us, and scan our permit into another machine (and smile up at it for it to take yet another picture of us) in order to pass into the baggage claim area. It was set up like a fancy gate to a train (think of the gates to trains when you’re taking the tube in London and have to scan your Oyster card.) There was clearly no re-entry allowed.
At that point, there was a large screen that indicated- in Hebrew- where your baggage carousel was. I got my luggage and found Tal. Tal decided we could take the train to Jerusalem and then cab to our destinations from there. However, in order to take the train, I needed a RavKav card. (I could have also gotten a single-use ticket, but we figured it would be more useful to get a RavKav card so I could use it to get around.) I hadn’t exchanged my money for shekalim because my cousin, by whom I would be staying, knew someone who would do it for a better rate than at the airport. So Tal bought me the card and I paid her back with my American dollars. At that point, a man wandering by asked me if I could give him Shliach Mitzvah money because he was making his daughter’s wedding so I gave him some.
Armed with a RavKav card, I then was directed by Tal to download the Gett app. Gett is like Uber in Israel but it’s specifically for cabs- regular civilians are not allowed to just drive Uber and take you places. Since I didn’t have shekalim yet, it made more sense to use the Gett app than to just find a cab off the street. Tal directed me up various elevators and escalators to the train to Jerusalem. The train had incorrect signage and claimed it was going to Herzliyah but Tal knew better. She pressed a glowing green knob to open the doors to the train and we got on. My phone was about to die so she lent me her adaptor so I could charge my phone a bit on the train.
When we got off at the station, we had to get into elevators to exit. The elevators were INCREDIBLY crowded. The last time I saw elevators that crowded I was living in Brookdale in Stern. It seems not ideal, but we all shoved in, and people around me were speaking in French and Hebrew.
Tal showed me where I could wait to get my Gett to cab to my cousin’s house. We had a view of David’s Harp and the light rail, which was really pretty.
I got into my cab and arrived at my cousin’s home, and she fed me dinner and took care of me.
This entire experience was not intuitive at all and I don’t see how someone would have been able to navigate it on zero sleep (as I mentioned, I can’t sleep on planes) without help. (I guess I could have cabbed directly from the airport to my cousin’s house, but that would also have been more expensive.) I’m grateful to Tal for basically being my Camp Mom/ Dorm Mom since this would have been a lot more stressful without her.
Moral of the story: Find kind people like Tal and stick to them; they will help you figure life out.
Quite a story! Thanks for sharing.