Home Sweet Home

This past week was filled with a lot of "goodbyes" and a lot of excitement. A family gathering on Sunday, saying goodbye to school friends on Thursday, and a beautiful Shabbat send-off Friday night at NSCI are just among some of the things that filled my week.

A few friends and me at the Cubby Bear on Thursday.

Friday evening Ally and I received a special and heartfelt blessing from Rabbi Greene and Rabbi Geffen. It felt so right to be at Shabbat services at NSCI the night before beginning my year in Israel since so much of my decision to attend HUC all started at NSCI.

Ally, Allison, and Me after Shabbat services.

Blessing From Rabbi Geffen and Rabbi Greene:
Yhi Ratzon Milfanecha Adonai Elohainu v'Elohai Avoteinu v'lmoteinu:
May it be Your will, our God and God of our ancestors, that you lead Ally and AManda in peace to their destination in Eretz Yisrael.
May You bless the work of their minds and hands that they continue to grow to their fullest potential.
May their eyes and hearts be open to the beauty of the land and its people, to new friends and new experiences.
We pray that their deeds merit honor for themselves, our people, and You, our God.
Baruch Atah Adonai, Shomeir Yisrael, L'ad.
Blessed are you Adonai, Protector of Israel.

So, on July 4th, Ally and I arrived at the airport within 30 seconds of each other (talk about good timing). We said our goodbye's to our families and headed inside with 10 months work of luggage.

At O'hare with all of our luggage

I've never had such a pleasant traveling experience, especially one that is roughly 24 hours door to door. But Ally and I had a blast! On our flight to Philly, we saw that both exit rows behind us were empty and asked if we could take those seats. After being asked twice if you were 15 and confirming, that yes, we were old enough to sit in the exit row (and in fact on our way to start grad school), we layed back and enjoyed the ride.Ally in her exit row

Once we got to Philly we had a four hour lay over, so we grabbed some dinner and a glass of wine. Before we knew it, it was time to board the plane. I had a window seat (which I love), and Ally got the aisle (for our long legs) and our ride was very pleasant. Despite the fact that Ally and I learned on our flight to Philly from the drink napkins that US Airways only began flying to TLV on July 1st and that we were the second flight to TLV, all was smooth. We even got to see some fireworks from the runway and as we took off!

TLV on time!

When we arrived in TLV we got our bags and found a sherut (a shared taxi) that would take us to our new home in Rehavia. Walking out of the aiport I instantly got that amazing warm, homey feeling I get when I arrive back at the TLV airport. On the ride to our apartment, Ally and I were a bit nervous as to which one of us should wait downstairs of our apartment with the luggage and who should go upstairs to find out landlord, since neither one of us speaks fluent Hebrew. Luckily for us, Felix, our 87 year old landlord, was sitting on our balcony waiting for us. He showed us around our new apartment and even brought flowers for all of us. Our apartment is in a great location (way better than my last apartment in Israel) and is already starting to feel like home! By this time Ally and I were pretty hungry so we walked down the street to Ben Yehuda and headed to Moshiko (the BEST Falafel in Jerusalem!) Afterwards, we headed to the SuperSol to get some necessities (toilet paper, soap, etc) and then back home to our apartment.
We are just starting to settle in, but are also quite exhausted, so hopefully tomorrow we will be able to unpack and start turning this apartment into our own home (and Allie comes then too!) So I'll post some pictures of our apartment when all of our luggage isn't all over the place.
For now, I'm off to bed! Boy, does it feel good to be back! Lilah Tov!