Meeting at SFO around 9:45, the
air was full of anticipation and excitement. After checking our bags we
said goodbye to our wonderful
protective Jewish parents, as they handed us extra bottles of
sunscreen. We went through security and awaited for our first flight to
JFK. The flight went smoothly and we were treated to a wonderful movie
starring Eddie Murphy, which nobody watched.
After arriving at JFK, we took the AirTran to terminal 4 to meet
Matt Blumenthal, and to find our gate. Unfortunately, because we had
received both boarding passes in San Francisco,
we did not check in with El Al in New York. As we were about to board,
Israeli security told us that we had the wrong boarding passes! At that
point we found out that we somehow managed to miss the Israeli security
checkpoint. About 10 agents were called in
to question us individually. Their questions ranged from the purpose of
the trip, to the age at which we learned Hebrew, and what we do on Yom
Kippur. Single handedly, we delayed the plane by 10 minutes.
We boarded the flight with energy and excitement as this was
the flight to Tel Aviv that we have been waiting for, however by about 8 hours into the flight, most
of the excitement had died down. During the
flight we were entertained with classics like The Lorax, The Notebook,
and Sex in the City 2. We were served dinner and breakfast, which were both great. After what seemed like years, the plane finally landed in Tel
Aviv. El Al always seems to have the best landings.
Most of us had not slept for over 22 hours, so that we could reduce jet
lag for the coming days, however the energy was back when we exited
the plane in Tel Aviv.
We went through customs, and thankfully everyone's luggage made it all the
way to Israel! We exchanged some currency, met our wonderful tour guide
Lior, and then boarded a tour bus for a
2:30 hour bus ride on our last leg of the journey halfway around the
world. We arrived at the kibbutz that we are staying at for 2 nights
and the first thing we noticed was the smell, a mix between cow poop and
flowers. The kibbutz had a camp like feel,
however the rooms we are staying in are lovely. We had an opening
ceremony, and a discussion in which about 90% of the group was spaced
out 90% the time. Finally, after our day of travel, and 30 hours of
being awake, we went to our rooms and crashed.
Sincerely your leaders of the day,
No comments:
Post a Comment