Masada at Sunrise

I've got a pretty random travel throwback going on today.

Last weekend, there was nothing much on TV and I randomly decided to watch a History Channel show about Masada. And it sort of hit me that Masada was the site of what is possibly my favorite travel moment ever, yet I've never really talked about it particularly in-depth. So that's changing immediately.

Quick background: Masada is an ancient fortification atop a plateau in Israel's Judean Desert, overlooking the Dead Sea. It's known for the Siege of Masada, when Roman troops were attacking. Rather than surrender and be slaughtered, the 960 people living there decided to commit suicide en masse. They left their food stores untouched, so the conquering Romans could be sure that these deaths were no accident. So basically, even in death, these people flipped the Romans the bird, and the triumphant conquering of Masada turned into a giant "wompppp."

I'm probably not explaining it very well. But in any case, Masada is a really big deal and an incredibly important place to visit. It's also a bit of a thing to hike up there at sunrise, so that's what my group did. Or, well, that was the goal. We got a bit of a late start (an exhausted group of college students got a late start on a sunrise hike? Shocker), so the trek up the mountain was quite the speed-walk. On a personal note, I ran up a plateau in Israel at sunrise with a broken toe. So that's a fun story.

Masada itself was incredible, but the best part was that we were up there long enough to watch the swearing-in ceremony for new Israeli Defense Force (IDF) soldiers. Masada is the end of their 60 km run/hike through the desert to the ceremony, and we were there to cheer them on as they finished and got to see them get sworn in and mingle with them afterwards.

(Now, I always feel slightly strange blogging about Israel because the Middle East is such a sensitive topic. And a lot of people are anti-Israel, or at least against Israeli policies or how they conduct their international affairs. And that's fine, I'm not here to have a political debate. But if nothing else, my trip to Israel taught me that, no matter where we're all from, people are just people. We're the same everywhere. So if you do have an issue with Israel, I ask you to please know that I'm not advocating war or politicians or any of that, and to please appreciate the following from a purely human-to-human standpoint. They were a bunch of young boys who just accomplished something major.)

Watching these guys reach Masada was such a special thing. Israel employs a mandatory draft, but all the Israelis I got to know were so passionate about their homeland that being sworn into the IDF was an honor either way. Even more interesting were the handful of Americans among the soldiers, so passionate about a country they didn't even live in that they willingly moved halfway around the world to put their lives on the line. If you know me, you know that I love when people are passionate about something, so this level of dedication absolutely blew me away. They all looked so happy as they climbed the last few yards, just bursting with pride, and it was hard not to get emotional about it.

Look how happy that boy is!

 This is still one of my favorite things in the world. An American IDF soldier throwing up the U. Too amazing.

I find it really hard to explain Israel to people who've never been there. It's just... Jewish people are few and far between in America, and I didn't realize how strongly I've always felt like the odd man out until I went to Israel, where suddenly I was normal. I imagine it's the same for other people -- I mean, there are Americans voluntarily signing up for the IDF, so clearly there's a pretty strong attachment there! And I'm having trouble explaining why witnessing this swearing-in ceremony meant so much to me. I hate that people are killing each other, I don't come from a military family, and at this point I'd only been in Israel for like six days. But we were at this place that's so steeped in history, watching something so significant unfold in front of us...

I don't know what it is. But four years later I'm still at a loss for words.

My Favorite Travel Memories (Part 2)

When it comes to travel, I'M STILL LIVING IN THE PAST, GUYS. Next week (and probably for the foreseeable future) I'll have all sorts of tales about my Lake Placid adventures (have I mentioned I'm excited about this trip? Because I'm pretty excited about this trip), but for now I'll relive my past trips. For the umpteenth time. I know. But hey, I feel pretty lucky that I can keep reminiscing about old trips and continuously come up with more things to talk about. I've had some amazing travels! (For part 1, click here.)

+ When I went to Israel, I went as part of a birthright group and we traveled with a handful of Israeli soldiers. Not for protection or anything; Israel has a mandatory draft so they were our age, and they essentially use the trip to see their own country through the eyes of foreigners. Pretty cool. But anyway, we spent one night in a Bedouin tent in the Negev Desert, and the next morning we got to ride camels. I shared my camel with one of our soldiers, Dafna, and at some point during the ride she casually mentioned that she's ridden camels before but never ridden a horse. What?! Cultural differences are so fascinating.

+ Probably one of the most gratifying moments I've ever had was visiting Copenhagen and seeing Nyhavn (that famous canal lined with colored buildings) for the first time. I'd wanted to go to Denmark since doing a school project on the country in fourth grade. For so much of my life it had been a sort of pipe dream, and finally being able to realize it over a decade later was simply indescribable.

+ I studied abroad in London in the spring of 2012, and on my last day in the city I spent the afternoon wandering my favorite routes by myself. I started at Westminster to see Big Ben, made my way to Trafalgar Square, swung by Chinatown for a bubble tea, and then spent some time just sitting in Leicester Square. Leicester Square was the site of my very first outing to central London at the beginning of my study abroad experience, so that was a particularly cool moment of coming full circle. I still can't really articulate how much I love this city, and saying my final goodbyes was impossibly hard. I'm so glad I decided to head out on my own and take some time to be reflective and get closure.

+ I don't even know if this technically counts as a travel memory, but while I was studying abroad, my friends and I camped out overnight for the first Hunger Games world premiere. It was March. In London. It was cold. The ground is really hard. None of us slept much, if at all. But there's no bonding experience quite like sleeping on the street with people in the name of fandom. (The red carpet and getting to watch the movie immediately afterwards didn't suck either!)

So what about everyone else? Can you relate to any of these? What are your own favorite travel memories? :)

My Favorite Travel Memories (Part 1)

It recently occurred to me that I can't remember the last time I went on a trip that wasn't for work or to visit home. I guess my weekend in Breckenridge counts, but prior to that, I don't think there was anything since good ol' Eurotrip in the spring of 2012. WHAT THE HECK?! Everyone says to travel while you're young, but listen, my student loan deferment just ended (so I'm now short several hundred bucks a month) and any time off work shrinks my paycheck. So for the foreseeable future... I'm stuck where I am.

Life as a millennial: ain't it glamorous?!

All that being said, I'm really missing the days when I could hop on a train and be in another country. So today I'm taking a walk down memory lane and revisiting a handful of my favorite moments from my travels. :)

+ On our last night in Paris, Amanda and I swung by the Eiffel Tower to see it all lit up. What we didn't know, however, is that it sparkles. Exiting the metro and turning a corner to see the Eiffel Tower lit up and sparkling is a moment of breathlessness I will never forget.

+ I went to Israel on a birthright trip, which meant I traveled with two dozen other Americans and a handful of Israeli soldiers. Israel has a mandatory draft, so everyone joins the army before going to college. These soldiers were the same age as all of us, but while we were in college, they were thinking wistfully of the day they could finally go back to school. That alone was quite a realization. But one day, we were on our bus between cities and I was sitting next to one of our soldiers. We were chatting about basically nothing. Pop culture nonsense, TV shows, what-have-you. And it was somewhere between our discussions of That '70s Show and Friends that it hit me like a truck: this girl is me if I'd been born in Israel instead of America. I'd be watching That '70s Show and training in the military instead of watching That '70s Show while complaining about schoolwork. That one inane conversation changed so much about the way I see the world. We're all exactly the same but for where we're born and the life circumstances that presents us with. It's incredible.

Two students, three soldiers, and it's impossible to pick who's who.

+ An equally life-changing moment was visiting Dachau, the concentration camp. I'm a Jewish girl that walked into the gas chamber, and was alive to walk out the other side. Had I been a Jewish girl in that exact spot a mere 65 years previously, I wouldn't have had that luxury. I still get goosebumps thinking about it.

+ It would be totally remiss of me to NOT mention some of my Olympic travels, right? ;) One that has a special place in my heart is seeing my first Olympic stadium: London 2012. I made sure to get my butt over there about a week after I'd arrived in the city to study abroad. While I could see it from the windows of my flat, I was so jittery and excited on the way over... and I may or may not have cried a little bit when I finally got there.

Give it some time and I'm sure I'll be all nostalgic and putting together a part two. ;)

Shabbat, Shekels and Sherutim

I have some exciting news, guys! Well, maybe it's just exciting to me. I'm fairly well-traveled (though seeing some of the travel bloggers out there makes me embarrassed to even think that thought, but whatever), but most of my travel posts were more of a play-by-play diary than anything. Seriously, why did I not include more pictures? I have thousands of photos, and they're all collecting dust on my hard drive.

So I've decided that I'll be joining the Travel Tuesday link-up every week! Each Tuesday will be a different destination I've been to, and will essentially be a giant photo dump (see also: this one). Basically, this is an excuse for me to go through all my photos and relive some truly amazing memories. I'm pretty pumped. :)

For my first installment, I'm going back to a trip that kicked off the most epic year of travel in my life (so far?): Israel!

I went to Israel in May of 2011 with a birthright group from University of Miami Hillel. If you're unfamiliar with birthright, it essentially means that all Jewish people have a (duh) birthright to visit Israel, so there's a group that funds these trips for young Jewish adults. I'm probably not explaining this well at all. Basically, it means a free trip to Israel. Yes please!

Everyone I knew that had already been on birthright gushed and raved about how that trip changed their life. I was kind of skeptical, as I'm not a particularly spiritual or religious person. But more than three years later, I can honestly say that that trip did change my life.

I actually do feel much more connected to Judaism. Do I believe in god? I still don't think so, but that didn't stop me from being totally overwhelmed and crying when we visited the Western Wall on Shabbat. We spent most of the 10 days traveling with a group of Israeli soldiers who were our age, who wanted nothing more than to be in our shoes and go to school, who had ridden camels but never ridden horses, who love watching Friends and That '70s Show, and that alone was astronomical in changing my perspective on the world. As a Jew in America, I've never been a part of the majority... but in Israel, on Fridays, everyone greets absolutely everybody else with "shabbat shalom." We visited the Old City of Jerusalem and the new city in Tel Aviv, hiked valleys and deserts (where I broke my toe, oops) and Masada, swam in the Dead Sea and kayaked on the Jordan River, stayed at a kibbutz and in a Bedouin tent, rode camels, visited David Ben Gurion's grave and a military cemetery and Yad Vashem, ate shawarma and hummus (all. of. the. hummus)... and everything was amazing. Except, of course, the broken toe. And the ear infection. And the fact that the mere sight of hummus made me nauseous for several months afterwards.

I highly recommend traveling there if you ever get the opportunity to, even if you're not Jewish. It's an absolutely beautiful place, and so unbelievably full of history. And, for the record, not once did I ever feel like I was in danger.

(Also, if you're wondering about the title... the shekel is Israel's currency, and "sherutim" means "bathroom." It's just one of the few Hebrew words I learned and still remember, and I liked the alliteration. Hah.)

For my original posts on this trip, see here and here!