Passover break could not be at a better time, the weather is warm and beautiful and it is the perfect time to explore. Since the holiday began the country seems to be more alive with people, from Israeli children on break to tourists from all over the world. So far in the week of break I have visited family, saw live music in a town square of Yafo, and I have spent a few days soaking up the sun and arctic (Israeli ice pops) at the beach in Tel Aviv. While there I was able to see friends living in Israel, friends visiting from home, and I ran into other MSIH students enjoying their time off as well. With such great public transportation in this country it is easy to go from Beer Sheva to Tel Aviv or anywhere else whether it be for a few hours our a few days. I hope to take advantage of this fact and travel more of the country during the rest of this break.
chag sameach = Happy holiday
Passover is a week long holiday that starts with a seder, a festive meal that follows an order of activities and readings (seder=hebrew word for order) and is filled with songs, food, and wine. Every year my family makes a big seder where family and friends come to enjoy the evening and traditions until the wee hours of the morning. This year, like every other, my family held a large seder but for the first time I was not there. Instead this year I was in Israel where there is only 1 seder instead of 2 and I had a seder with part of the MSIH family rather than my family at home. A gracious second year opened his house to the extended MSIH family and invited every student to the seder. Every day it seemed more and more people were saying they would be going to this seder and by the night of there were 21 of us. The seder was a great opportunity to hang out with fellow classmates, learn other people’s traditions, and was a lot of fun!
As someone who observes Passover and does not eat bread or other food items that are prohibited for the duration of the holiday I have fallen more in love with Israel through this holiday. From what I have seen, most restaurants here have a Passover menu which even includes kosher for Passover bread! The food is always terrific in Israel, and that remains true during Passover.
At this point in the year we have taken two finals and have three more before completing our second semester of M1. We are half way through our Passover break and last night we had a big BBQ for our class where we shared stories of our breaks so far. We had classmates all over the world this break, in Denmark, Austria, Romania, Jordan and there are some still traveling in Turkey, England, Ukraine, and Mozambique. Israel is a beautiful historical country with countless numbers of things to see, it is also an easy place from which one can travel to other parts of the world. -Baila Litwak, blogger of the month
