Goodbye to Otzma

In just a few days it will have been a month since Otzma ended. Since we stood together on the Tayelet overlooking a stunning view of Jerusalem and said goodbye to Israel and one another. For me the past month has been full of too many goodbyes and a new start to my life. Unlike most other Otzmanikim, my goodbye to Israel was only temporary. I was home in the US for less than two weeks and then I returned to the apartment in Jerusalem I was on the search for during the majority of Part III. I have another year in Israel, appropriately titled the Year in Israel Program, it is my first year of Rabbinical School at Hebrew Union College. I had two weeks in between one intense experience ending and quite literally the rest of my life beginning.

It's been difficult trying to process the end of Otzma and my amazing year and still getting acclimated to a new lifestyle in the same country. It's strange being in Israel not in the context of Otzma. I miss my friends terribly and the closeness of a group who has endured everything together for an entire 10 months. Otzma was by far the most significant amount of time I've spent in Israel and so my association with Israel is now centered around Otzma and all of my Otzma friends.

I've been struggling since I returned to give Israel to create new associations in my mind. As odd as it has been there is a comfort in the familiarity of the the city and the country. My daily activities are all new, as are the people I am surrounded by, but Jerusalem remains the same. As I'm transitioning I know the country still works the same, or doesn't really work, depending on how you look at it. This weekend I'm going to Yokne'am to visit my adoptive family and enjoy the comfort and familiarity of being there.

As I do become more comfortable being in Israel but in a different setting I expect to still have the constant reminders of Otzma, whether it is visiting a family or friend I connected to last year, or hearing a speaker (I already have!) we heard on an Otzma seminar. I know my Otzma year has set me up for a better life in Israel than I would have had here otherwise. I know this extra year only gives me more of a chance to put down roots here that I can always return to.

In some ways after this year Israel feels so comfortably like home and in other ways it couldn't be more foreign. But what I realized during my brief visit home is that I missed even those crazy foreign aspects while I was away. On Otzma I fell in love with Israel when I wasn't even trying and I built friendships that will last a lifetime. It's almost impossible to say goodbye but luckily for me those two things are still here whether or not right in front of me at the moment.

So rather than a goodbye to Israel, I'm saying goodbye only to Otzma and I'm looking forward to a year filled with Otzma reminders.

Thanks for reading!

Best,

Andi

Summing It Up?

How, exactly, do you sum up the past 3 months living in Jerusalem? For that matter, how do you sum up the past 10 months living in Israel? How do you condense everything into an “elevator speech”, something that you can fire off without thinking when someone asks about your year abroad? How do you keep from chuckling when you are asked for the 400th time, “Did you have a good time?”

Did I have a good time? Well, OF COURSE I had a good time. I just had a once-in-a-lifetime experience, the chance to live and work in a country about as different and familiar to my own as you can get. I lived in a small city with 40 people I had never met who would become some of my closest friends, as we all found ourselves facing a culture shock that many of us had never imagined before. I lived in a town smaller than my college, speaking a language so different that it isn’t even read in the same direction as mine, and somehow managing not only to survive, but even to thrive. I lived in what may be the single most unique city in the world, one that has sparked countless wars as well as inspired countless dreams. I’ve met countless people from incredible walks of life, been to places I had only imagined, and had daily experiences that I can’t even start to describe. So… yeah. I had a good time.

The past few months, I’ve been living at Hebrew University on Mt. Scopus, while working for the Partnership Division of the Jewish Agency. It has been a great experience, especially due to the people I was working with. I’m not going to lie and say I did any sort of groundbreaking work – it was pretty basic office work, with a large part of my time dedicated to working on registration for an international conference last month. Like I said, the people in the office was what made the experience so great for me – I learned a great deal about the Partnership 2000 program, the Jewish Agency, and really even Israel as a whole. Seeing the dynamic of the office and finding my place in it made heading in to the office each day (with a real world schedule!) well worth it.

But now? That’s all in the past. OTZMA 24 has now been over for about 2 weeks, as hard as that is to believe. After a few final hikes, campouts, and swims in the Kinneret, we all said our goodbyes and parted ways, back to our respective homes. Some of us will eventually return to Israel as olim hadashim (new immigrants), some of us will stick around for a while to begin their rabbinical studies (cough cough Andi cough), and many of us will find our places back in the United States. But all of us will, in some way, find our lives affected by our year together in Israel. And really, I’m not sure I can explain it any better than that.

And as for that other question – no, I don’t know yet where I’m going to go from here!

There are Reform Jews in Israel? Who knew!

Since Max and I have been living in Jerusalem for the past two months we've both been spending our weekdays busy doing office work. My internship (finishing next week!) has been working for the Israel Movement for Progressive Judaism, the head of the Reform Movement in Israel. I've really enjoyed my time as an intern there, feeling like I've both learned a lot and been able to contribute to the goings on of the movement. I've had the chance to work with various departments from newsletters to marketing projects and with the new Women of Reform Judaism-Israel. As the first intern at theIMPJ, they've taken it upon themselves to make sure I'm enjoying the work I do and that I get a full picture of the Movement in Israel.

A couple of weeks ago I went to visit a Reform Congregation just outside of Jerusalem in Tzur Hadassah. I met with the Rabbi, Ofer (who is also the only paid employee of the synagogue). He spent the afternoon entertaining both me and his son around Tzur Hadassah. This small community, just on the edge of the green line, is filled with people with all different Jewish ideologies. They struggle to get and retain members, to engage existing congregants, deal with other groups' hateful preaching, utilize a single room for services, educational seminars, bible study, etc. Some of these issues are felt by congregations in the US and others are faced by other Kehillot in Israel and still some are specific to Tzur Hadassah. Ofer explained to me how each community in Israel is different, facing it's own set ofchallenges.

Tzur Hadassah has around a 100 families as members, some years more and some years less. While there are much larger congregations in Israel there are also much smaller. Their members come from every social class and educational background. While some Israeli's have never heard of the Movement, many have but don't quite understand what it is truly about. They often think Reform Judaism is "American" and not"Israeli". While there are certainly congregations here made up of mostly Americans and other Anglos who have made aliyah, Tzur Hadassah is an almost entirely Israeli-born Kehilla.

The kindergarten of the Kehilla is in a small structure that used to also act as the sanctuary. They now have an actual building where they aren't forced to turn a classroom into a sanctuary each Shabbat. The building is essentially one room which serves all of their purposes. Seeing Ofer's pride in this one room shocked me. While it is quite the functional room when I heard new synagogue I thought of the multi-million dollar project that was the remodeling of my own synagogue in St. Louis. But in Tzur Hadassah, and in most places in Israel, this one room is enough for now. This room represents the government agreeing to build four structures to serve as Reform congregations, a huge accomplishment of the Israeli Relgious Action Center. This room represents a movement that is struggling to find and keep members but still persists.

Ofer next took me to a location in Tzur Hadassah where as he said you can see in one place the political situation in Israel. We were standing in Tzur Hadassah looking at a tree line which marks the green line. On the other side of the green line was a Palestinian village and right next to it was a Jewish settlement of Ultra-Orthodox Jews. The growth of the Jewish settlement had literally entered the Palestinian village so that if you didn't notice the difference in architecture it is impossible to see where one begins and the other ends. Regardless of political affiliation or opinions on the settlements, while standing on one side of the green line looking onto the undeniable issues on the other, one can't help but agree with Ofer, this is Israel.

Tzur Hadassah works with leaders in the Palestinian village to help them get their voices heard.

Ofer told me all about existing projects the Kehilla has, it's board of directors, the challenges of being a Reform leader in Israel as well as in Tzur Hadassah and his hope for the future. Our afternoon gave me a chance to observe Reform Judaism in Israel in practice. It's definitely a little rough around the edges but there is true heart and persistence at work.

I mentioned above that Ofer's son was with us for the afternoon. Later on his daughter returned home from school and joined us too. While his wife was still at work Ofer played and took care of his kids. I couldn't help feel I was intruding on his family time but Ofer told me that if he could he would have all his meetings at night (I was not the last on his list to see). He restricts himself to only a couple of late night meetings a week because he is only part-time and has this adorable family. As I'm getting older I always find it fascinating to observe how adults with families balance their family and professional lives. Are they always sacrificing one for the other? In Ofer I saw an unrelenting commitment to both.

I'm a sucker for the hopeful message at the end of the story so here it goes: I spent the afternoon with an impassioned Rabbi who has seen both progress and stagnation during his career. He remains hopeful and hardworking, not overly idealistic, but just the right amount. In the same Rabbi I found an attentive and loving father. Ofer's abilities are important but limited due to the current climate but based on his example as a father and religious leader, if children are the future, I'm not so worried.

So many holidays, so many days off...

My Israeli friend compared passover seder to the way (she thinks) we celebrate thanksgiving. This made me think about something fundamentally different in celebrating Jewish holidays in the US versus celebrating them in Israel. In the US when a Jewish holiday roles around, it's generally known but always something Jewish. I'm celebrating because I'm Jewish, I have to miss school or work. There's something to explain about the holiday to non-Jews. It's something different. But we all celebrate thanksgiving. No one needs to explain to a non-celebrator why we have thanksgiving, no one has to take off work or school. It's expected that everyone will celebrate the holiday with their entire family and for one day the country seems to pause. That's what Jewish holidays are like in Israel. There's nothing different about celebrating the Jewish holidays, it's the only kind. Just like thanksgiving at home, everyone is off work or school. Everyone knows this festive meal happens each year with the entire family gathered for the occasion.

So many of these holidays have gone by and I haven't taken the time to sit down and recount my experiences. So I thought I'll do a quick recap of the holidays that have passed.

Passover:

The first night of passover fell on the day my parents flew into Israel to visit. Luckily, everything went just right and we were able to make it to the seder we were invited to. We spent the night with my friend's entire extended family reading from the Hagaddah, just like we do every year...except this time it was in Hebrew! The country literally shuts down on holidays, as it does every Shabbat, and with my parents visiting it was slightly more annoying that exciting. The holiday got in the way of our travel plans! Only the first and last days were holy days so on Chol Hamoed (the days in between) were able to fit a lot in to a short trip. Some restaurants were entirely kosher for passover while others shut down for the week, of course there are those which fall into neither of those categories: some continue business as usual, others stop putting out bread but still have pasta, etc.

One day during the holiday we spent the day in Tsfat (I made a deal with my parents that as long as they were in Israel they were not allowed to call the city "Safed"). We spent most of the day shopping in the mystical city where we generously donated to the Israeli economy. I started looking at the kipot in a few different stores. My mom pointed out one kipah to me that I particularly liked and so I tried it on in the store. Seconds later a woman who worked there came rushing over to me saying, "Oh, honey, those aren't meant for women." I politely explained to her that she wasn't exactly correct and a few days later I was wearing a kipah for my first time in Shabbat services!

Yom HaShoah:

Holocaust Remembrance Day was the first time in Israel that I heard the siren. At 10:00 am on Yom HaShoah a siren goes off in the country and for one minute everything in the country stops. Cars stop moving, drivers get out of their car and stand on the side of the road, people walking freeze, and everyone is silent. During Yom HaShoah we were in the middle of a seminar in Jerusalem. It was strange because we did discuss the day and we experienced the siren but somehow after the siren, people started moving again and going back to their normal lives. I was told that I missed a significant part of the experience by not having access to a television. On TV, the entire day is dedicated to Holocaust related programs.

Yom HaZikaron,

Memorial day in Israel is quite different than Memorial day in the US. Instead of the diving for coins in the neighborhood pool, a memory I will always associate with the holiday, it's a very solemn and self-reflective day in Israel. There are two more sirens like those on Yom HaShoah. On the eve of the holiday I went to an interesting ceremony. The event was in English so there was a trade off experience. Because it was in English I was able to really understand the ceremony rather than just getting the "feeling" or "idea" of it. At the same time, the content of the ceremony was also different than it would have been in a Hebrew language ceremony. The focus was centered on families and soldiers who moved from the US and made aliyah. It was interesting and thought provoking but not the typical experience of an Israeli on the holiday. The next day was similar to Yom HaShoah for me. I lived my normal life, looked at apartments in Jerusalem for next year, froze while I was walking during the 2 minute siren and continued with my day. TV programs, I was told, were again dedicated to Memorial day themes, remembering fallen soldiers with a solemn tone to each program. While it was disappointing that I didn't have a television on either day the experience was still one unparalleled by any other country, and...there's always next year.

Yom Ha'atzmaut:

See below!

Lag B'Omer:

What is Lag B'Omer? I didn't know until I celebrated it a few weeks ago! Apparently there are several reasons for the celebration of this holiday. The first is that it is the day Rabbi Akiva's students stopped dying from the plague. We commemorate the day with a celebration. Another reason is to remember the Bar Kochba revolt around 135 A.D. Supposedly, the different groups communicated to each other with fire so the celebration of Lag B'Omer is marked with bon fires all across the country. The day, TERRIBLE for the environment, was a lot of fun. I spent it with an Israeli friend of mine and her friends where we sat in her backyard roasting vegetables on the fire (get a chance to roast something over a fire and Israelis choose vegetables instead of marshmallow...go figure). We spent most of the night trying to keep the fire from going out (well to be honest, I watched them try to make sure the fire didn't go out) and we played taki...the Israeli version of Uno (and so much better!).

Shavuot:

I spent Shavuot in a small city called Netivot that is in the middle of the Negev Desert. When I was living in Yokne'am my friend was living and volunteering in her partnership city, Netivot. We went down overnight and visited with all the families she become close with during her three months there. Eve of Shavuot we ate a festive dairy meal. The meal is traditionally dairy because Shavuot marks when Moses received the Torah on Mount Sinai. In the Torah the land of Israel is called the land of milk and honey. For this reason there is bountiful amounts of cheesecake being consumed throughout Israel. This was my first time celebrating Shavuot and was marked as most other holidays have been for me here: a big meal with a gracious and welcoming family. We didn't stay up for all hours of the night studying Torah as is traditionally practiced on Shavuot, instead we got a good relaxing night sleep. The next day some families have another dairy meal while others have their own Al Ha Ashe traditions (literally means "on the fire" or barbeque). Shavuot offered a nice relaxing break in the week where I was able to wander a new city and see little kids with water guns spraying each other and anyone in sight (but not me, fortunately!).

It's hard to believe but Shavuot was the last holiday I'll celebrate in my 10 months on Otzma. I've celebrated in new ways and familiar ones and always appreciated the days off the many many holidays provided. With only one remaining month on the program I've already started to ask myself "where did it go?!" and the only thing I find comforting is that I get to do the holidays all over again next year in Jerusalem.

Yom Ha'atzmaut

It seems like it's always a holiday in Israel (at least that's what my mom says). Last week was no exception, two in one week. I'll let Max tell you about his Yom HaZikaron experience (Memorial Day) and instead I'll focus on Yom Ha'atzmaut (Israeli Independence Day). It came at the beginning of last week, so pretty quickly after the move to Jerusalem. We were all in a rush to get settled so that we could make the most of the experience, for most of us the first time we've celebrated the holiday in Israel.

As all holidays start at sundown Yom Ha'atzmaut started Monday night. That night I went with friends to explore the celebration on Ben Yehuda street and the surrounding area. We found people of all ages from all different sects of Israeli society excited and thrilled to welcome the holiday. It seemed like there was another stage with another band playing every couple of blocks. The party went on until all hours of the night with kids running around, teenagers standing in packs, families trying to stay together in the chaos, and of course us. There were blow up toys with the Israeli flag and water guns and glow sticks.

The night was held in stark contrast to the way I spent my previous evening, at a very emotional ceremony marking Memorial Day in Israel and all of the fallen soldiers. You never would have known hours before this enormous street party people were mourning everyone they knew and didn't know. The contradiction was difficult to wrap my head around but at the same time the juxtaposition managed to make each experience more powerful in and of itself.

The next day all of Israel spends the day in the same way: barbecuing. So in true Israeli fashion, we had a barbeque. But because we were too lazy to leave our dorms and because a park in the center of Jerusalem would have been impossible to penetrate, we didn't travel too far. We had our barbeque in the open courtyard/quad we have next to our building (all within the same complex of our dorms). The rest is pretty predictable: good food, good company, and a lovely farmer's tan for me. It was a great way to spend the entire day (especially since I started work the next morning). It was relaxing and delicious and we still felt like we were taking part in the holiday's tradition.

Part III Check-in

This week marks the beginning of Part III of OTZMA, which is the more “professional development” part of the program. Rather than be scattered in small towns all throughout Israel, the group has now been split into a community in Tel Aviv, a small group down on a southern Kibbutz, and the remainder in Jerusalem, which is where I am. From now until the end of the trip, we will all be working in various internships at non-profit organizations. I will be working at the Jewish Agency in the Partnerships division, where I will be working on an upcoming international conference as well as doing some work with social media (which is, as you’ve noticed, something I’m quite familiar with).

Our apartments here are really fantastic – maybe even the nicest that OTZMA has ever had! We are living in the student dormitories in Hebrew University on Mt. Scopus, which is about a 30-minute bus ride from the center of town (and my new office). All of the new Jerusalem residents were taken aback by how nice the apartments were. We’ve been fully equipped with new couches and chairs, a large kitchen space with four gas burners (Sidebar: This is the first time I’ve had an apartment here where I haven’t needed a match to light the stove), a full size refrigerator and freezer, and plenty of cupboard space. In our single rooms, we have a full-sized mirror, a good amount of shelves and hanging space for our clothes, a very large desk, drawers, and another large amount of shelf space. Currently, I’m sitting at our kitchen table looking out of the full-wall windows on the beautiful Hebrew U quad.

The apartments are meant for five people, but there are four of us living in my apartment – Jeremy (from San Francisco), Ari (from Milwaukee), and Alex (from New Jersey). All four of us were already very close – Jeremy was my roommate during Part I in Ashkelon; Ari and I were very active in BBYO at the same time in high school, and he was also a member of AEPi while at Wisconsin; and Alex is a recent graduate from Wash U, so she and I have been able to bond over shared St. Louis experiences.

Andi is also living in Jerusalem, but I’ll let her fill you in on her side. Needless to say, we are all very excited to be living here in Jerusalem, for our upcoming internships, and for our great new living spaces!

In Praise of Arkady

So, as of today, our three months in Yokne’am have come to an end – and quite quickly, we might add! As you have read, there have been many twists, turns, challenges, and pleasant surprises, and you’ve only heard about some of them! But the truth of the matter is that we would have never been able to survive Part II of OTZMA were it not for our fantastic coordinator, Arkady Hasidovich.

As anyone who has met him can attest, Arkady might very well be one of the most capable people in the entire State of Israel. A recent recipient of the prestigious Nahum Goldmann Fellowship, Arkady is fluent in at least three languages, is an experienced world traveler, and in dealing with us, he may have run into his most difficult challenge ever. (I kid, I kid. Sort of.) Arkady was able to answer any question we had (no matter how stupid), defuse any situation we ran into (no matter how ridiculous), and help us with anything we needed (no matter how trivial). Furthermore, his ability to remain calm and gracious no matter what the situation was continues to amaze us. Somehow, no matter how flustered we might have been, a conversation with Arkady always seemed to relax us and solve the situation.

Furthermore, Arkady was always willing to go above and beyond his job without us even having to ask. If he overheard one of us grousing about an issue we were having outside of our volunteering, he would, without fail, ask us what was happening and how he could help – and then he found a way to fix whatever we were worried about. Folks, this man could and would move mountains for us.

You’ve all heard a lot of stories from us this year, and we’ve got a few more months to go. But believe us, many of these stories would not be possible without Arkady’s help. He is, in very large part, the reason why our time in Yokne’am was such a positive experience. The St. Louis Jewish community should feel blessed that there is such a gifted, caring, responsible, and capable friend on this side of the world, and we truly hope the Jewish Agency realizes what a remarkable person they have working for them. We know we do.

-Andi and Max