Day 11

May 8

We woke up at 7:30, that’s when we all discovered the tragic fact that this was our last day in Israel. And to top it all off, many also realized that they had gone bankrupt from the crazy, and even sometimes illogical, auction the night before.

            We headed down to Tel Aviv after packing our luggage into the bus yet again. After arriving, we entered a Reform synagogue in which we prayed tefillah led by Avi, Rachel, and Josh.

            The class walked back onto the bus and we drove off to the Palmach Museum where we learned all about the group and their push for Israel’s independence. We were able to follow some of the members of the Palmach and learn their struggles and thoughts. Directly from the museum the class went to a mall for lunch and had some time to walk around as well.

            From the mall we went to the house in Tel Aviv in which David Ben Gurion declared Israel an independent state. We learned how it was originally a house for the mayor of Tel Aviv, became an art gallery, than finally was the place where Israel officially became an independent state.

            After the short museum tour, we saw that it wasn’t raining anymore so, as any teenagers would react, we went straight for the beach. There we enjoyed swimming, trying to jump over waves, and of course covering Yaakov in sand and making him look like a mermaid. Yoni then took a picture of him sunbathing with Srulik, a puppet Amit and Nir gave the class to take pictures with in certain areas of Israel.

We then headed off to dinner behind a guy playing the violin in his convertible. After our last dinner in Israel, our Last Supper if you will, we located our bus and headed off to the aifrport. We then said goodbye to our good friends Dudu, Yonit, and Avi. After we entered the airport we shifted some luggage to lighter suitcases, not going to name anyone, Morah Amalya. It didn’t take much longer for the class to discover that our flight had been delayed, what was originally a 12:45 flight turned into a 7:00am one. So we have about an extra six hours to kill, just meandering around the airport.