December 2006 9th Day

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David here. Rabbi Hachen does not know that I am doing this but I ended up with such great pictures I had to post them.

Our last day had some of the worst rain of the week. Fortunately, our stops were inside. Our first stop was our Tzedakah project. It was at a Jaffa Institute food warehouse in Tel Aviv where we packed packages for distribution. We did it with Harvard, Princeton and Yale kids from the Birthright tour. It was nice to interact with them but I loved watching Rachel look up to them. She even asked Nina and I about her going on a Birthright trip. Nina mentioned that she was happy to see Rachel listen intently as one of the Institute's leaders (a former Bronx native) tell us what the Institute accomplishes on limited resources from the Israeli government. There are a lot of needy people in that section of Tel Aviv who simply cannot afford to feed their entire families.

After that we traveled to the Ayalon Institute in Rehovot. This was the undedrground ammunition factory that the Hagana put into place before the War for Indpendence. It was another story of what Israelis went throught to fight for a Jewish state. From hiding from the British to successfuly making the ammo for battle, Israel could not have gained independence without it. Its truly an amazing story of the bullets were made in secrecy. I was impressed by the tour guide who was in his twenties. He told us that he believes that this is a story in Israel's history that must always be remembered for future generations of Jews to appreciate what they have.

From there, our last stop was an archaeological dig at Bet Gevurin. This was a sight that was buried in 2000 years ago and we did in fact find pottery pieces from then. I could not believe how much we found in a short time. We were digging in a place that had been seven years in the making from the time digging was started above ground.

Well, that was our last stop and yes I am typing this after being home for a day and a half. It was a long trip but one I would recommend to anyone. The connections to the Jewish faith and heritage are too intense to be missed. I am grateful that I had the opportunity to do it with my family, new friends and Rabbi Hachen.

We had a long flight back. We left Israel at 11:40 that evening and arrived in Newark just before 5 AM on the 31st and we are all still recovering from a very active week, while trying to make sure we remember everything we learned. I hope more and more Beth El families take advantage of a tour of Israel.

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