Sunday, January 9, 2011

Creating Jewish Memories

Our morning began with an inspirational lecture by Avraham Infeld, president emeritus of Hillel: The Foundation for Jewish Campus Life.  He spoke of Jewish memory and how, through various means of connecting to our Jewish identities, we can remain unified without being uniform.

We then left for Mount Herzl and its military cemetery.  In addition to visiting the grave of Theodor Herzl, father of Modern Zionism, we paid tribute to fallen heroes Yitzhak Rabin, Michael Levin, Hannah Senesh and Yonatan Netanyahu.  Our group's 8 soldiers led a moving ceremony to commemorate Israel's losses in battle.

We drove from Mount Herzl to the town of Rishon LeZion for our tzedakah project with elementary school students, many of whom were born in Ethiopia.  This was a lot of fun and very rewarding.  The kids made art projects with our participants and had a great time.  The highlight was their obsession with one of our students who seems to look like Justin Bieber.  It was like a rock star had shown up at their school.



We had a meaningful conversation with the soldiers about how much they had become a part of our group so quickly.  Many participants reflected that encountering Israeli peers was like reuniting with family rather than just making new friends.  When the soldiers took their leave it was very sad but, if this group is like others before it, the relationships will continue and we will someday soon welcome these soldiers to Austin.
Later in the afternoon we returned to our Jerusalem hotel for a preparatory discussion about tomorrow's visit to Yad Vashem.  We discussed the importance of memories and names, and four of our group had a small ceremony (with everyone present) to receive their Hebrew names.  We talked about the meanings of many of our Hebrew names, and learned about their linguistic origins.


After another big dinner we enjoyed some short Israeli films with filmmakers from the Maale School.  Then off to bed, because tomorrow we have a long day that will begin with the Holocaust memorial at Yad Vashem and conclude in a Bedouin Tent in the desert.  (If the Bedouin experience does not include internet access, the next update will be the following day).


We seem to have arrived in Israel at the height of the sniffles season.  Our tour educator, Yael Menashe, with whom we have been since the first day, must be replaced tomorrow because she is without a voice.  And our guard/medic, Inbar Garji, will also be replaced tomorrow.  So we'll get to meet even more Israelis than we anticipated, though we'll miss these new members of our Texas family.


Finally, let us say that it has been a pleasure to share this journey with the 38 participants.  Though we are both well-traveled through this land, it is like seeing it all for the first time through the eyes of our students.  We are encouraging them to come back and to bring their families with them!


  • Ayala Peer, Texas Hillel Jewish Agency Israel Fellow
  • Rabbi David Komerofsky (AKA DKom), Texas Hillel Executive Director 

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