Vacation In Israel, Come Home Cured

Patients consult with a doctor in the waiting room of Assuta Medical Center in Tel Aviv, which has become one of many Israeli hu

Sharon Udasin, Staff Writer

Wednesday, May 5, 2010

Rachel and her partner had been contemplating artificial insemination for years, but they didn’t actually go ahead with the process until Rachel came to Jerusalem from New York for a one-year teaching fellowship. After some encouragement from another couple that had gone through the process, the decision was clear: they would create their child in Israel, at Hadassah Medical Center in Mount Scopus.

“I wanted a Jewish donor who lives and serves in Israel, and has his family living there, so that if my child ever wishes to search for the donor someday, my child will be led to Israel, which is religiously and ideologically important to my wife and me,” Rachel told The Jewish Week, asking that her real name be withheld for privacy. “Israel is renowned for its fertility treatment, and they don’t play around. They want and plan to get you pregnant as soon as possible, without dragging it out to make more money off of you like they do in the U.S.”

After five trials of regular intrauterine and intracervical insemination, and the assistance of the Gonal-F fertility drug, Rachel, now 14 weeks pregnant, finally conceived at one-fourth to one-fifth of the cost of a similar process in America.

Israel has seen a surge in medical tourism for various procedures in the past few years, yet thus far, experts say that the clientele remains largely concentrated among former Soviet countries and some African nations, where treatment facilities are still inadequate. But in recent years, Israel has begun to broaden its reach to couples like Rachel and her partner, slowly attracting customers from Western European countries and North America. While the medical care in Israel equals or even sometimes exceeds that of the United States and Western Europe, the cost of procedures remains significantly cheaper.

“Medical tourism in Israel has been around for about 17 years, but only in the last year or two has it become part of the Ministry of Tourism’s agenda, the Ministry of Finance’s agenda,” said Ira Nissel, CEO of International Medical Services (med-international.com), which has been guiding medical tourists through Israel for five years — reviewing pathologies and consulting multiple specialists. “We’re trying today to put Israel on the map. But in comparison to India and Costa Rica, the prices are a far cry from what you’d expect there.”

The quality of medical care in Israel, combined with an ideal vacationing environment, is drawing more patients to visit Israel for their procedures — most commonly for oncology, cardiac and in vitro fertilization procedures, according to Nurit Agiv, medical tourism executive at Assuta Medical Center in Tel Aviv. Residents of former Soviet countries, she noted, can easily visit Israel for these procedures because they no longer need a visa to travel there.

“A lot of the doctors had their fellowships here in the United States,” Nathalie Steiner, vice president of marketing at a new medical tourism initiative called Global Health Israel (globalhealthisrael.com), a subsidiary of her father Moshe Steiner’s larger medical equipment distributor, Israel Scientific Instruments, told The Jewish Week during a recent visit to New York. “And compared to India and Costa Rica, you can go out and eat at a lot of good restaurants — it’s a Western culture here.”

Steiner, who is limiting the focus of her fledgling company to IVF procedures for now, aims to target American insurance companies, self-insured private companies and uninsured Americans, who might enjoy the added benefit of a vacation in Israel. Nissel, who says his company has been bringing in patients for IVF treatment for years, estimates that between 85 and 90 percent of these tourists are from former Soviet countries, where IVF is often unavailable, as opposed to Israel, where women can undergo the procedure through age 42.

“You are not sick when you have IVF, so you can enjoy the country,” Steiner said, noting that IVF treatment in most Israeli hospitals will cost tourists approximately $4,000, about a third the cost in the U.S. And while in Israel, tourists can rely on companies like hers to arrange airport transportation and accommodations.

The lighter financial burden can be a huge attraction.

“It’s not the bargain rate of India, but it certainly has a top-notch medical system,” said Laura Carabello…   Continue reading…

Funding In-Marriage Out Of His Own Pocket

“You have to try to find Jewish love,” Momo Lifshitz, inset, told his Oranim trip participants, pictured here near the Syrian border. LEFT CREDIT: Sharon Udasin

by Sharon Udasin
Staff Writer

Tel Aviv — Tucked into the rocky thickets of Mount Carmel in northern Israel, 43 American 20-somethings gathered in a hotel conference room to play a simple game — using their bodies as place markers, they lined up across the room according to how important they found dating Jews, and Jews alone.

At first, only four people stood on the “date Jews” side of the room. But when the question changed to marriage, four soon grew to 15. And when marriage changed to raising children Jewish, a good 15 more shuffled over.

“If I were going to raise my kids with a religion, I would want it to be Judaism,” said Matt Lakind, 29, from Hoboken, N.J., who had joined the trip with his girlfriend, Erica Roth. “Otherwise, I wouldn’t want them to have any religion, that’s all.”

A week later, after touring Israel from top to bottom, east to west and back again, his opinion changed. “Now coming here I can see there’s actually a whole ethnic culture to Judaism that has been harder to find in the past,” he said. “Now I understand why when people ask where I’m from, I will tell them: ‘I’m Jewish.’”

Lakind and Roth were participating in an inaugural free 10-day trip to Israel, sponsored by Oranim Educational Initiatives, and funded personally by the owner of the organization, Shlomo “Momo” Lifshitz. Though their trip followed an itinerary quite similar to that of the better-known Taglit-Birthright Israel, this 10-day journey was under the auspices of Oranim alone.  Continue reading…

Well, I still love Israel — no surprise there. Apologies for the lack of blog post the entire time I was in my favorite country, especially since I was so fastidious about writing while I was in France. But Israel is my home — well, for now my second home, but hopefully my primary home one day — so I just felt like relaxing and totally unwinding during my six days there. Six days which definitely were not long enough. I got to spend time with so many wonderful people as always and definitely was not even able to see every person whom I had intended to spend time with. But Israel is Israel and it waits for me, so I will surely be back very very soon. Ben Gurion Airport staff must really be tired of me by now!

This time, I saw some things that I hadn’t expected to see — thanks to David Abitbol (@jewlicious), I was able to spend essentially an entire day touring Eastern Jerusalem, where the air smells like the most amazing spices in the world. We saw the Church of the Sepulchre and the many spots where Jesus did x, y and z, and we also walked around a lot in the Muslim quarter shuk — taking in the spices, as I said, and the knaffe. My stomach even behaved and I didn’t get sick at all after the knaffe, which is this indescribable amalgamation of sugar, cheese, honey and flour, served best in a dingy hole-in-the-wall Arab cafe that has flies swarming around the sweat-drenched tables. I also walked as close to the Dome of the Rock as possible for a non-Muslim during that hour of the day, and we chatted with the Islamic federation guy who was guarding that territory. He was surprisingly friendly and didn’t seem to mind that we were Jews, but I definitely would not dare try to cross that line. No games with these guys.

As the sunset, we all (our group now had grown to include some new friends, the Weil sisters, their uncle and Talya) made our way up to the roof of the Austrian Hospice, where you have the opportunity to see one of the most beautiful — albeit hidden — views of Jerusaelm. Such a nice and welcoming group of people, and such a nice way to spend an evening. After checking out the Green Tea Style brand soap in the Mamila Hotel bathrooms, we parted with the rest of the group and joined my amazing friend Cori Chascione (@coric) for some sushi and unforgettable conversation. Cori is 100 percent sure that I’m going to end up making aliyah, so we’ll see if I prove her right or wrong. Cori is doing some awesome work in Israel now, working as a leader for the Nativ group of American 18-ish-year-olds who are here to spend the year in Israel. In fact, we ran into a group of them on Ben Yehuda Street, where they shouted to Cori and waved their Burger King crowns at her. Now that’s love. Well, actually, that Ferrero-Rocher gelato we had at Aldo — despite the need for multiple LactAid pills, that’s love.

And then of course, there’s Liat Levy, who with her boyfriend Dotan were such generous hosts to me in Jerusalem. I’m so glad that we became such close friends, and I regret that we didn’t hang out more when she was actually living in New York. But hey, she, like Cori, is another firm believer in Sharon’s future as an Israeli citizen, so we’ll see if that happens. Liat has an amazing new apartment in Beit HaKerem, near the  science campus of Hebrew University, where she just started this past Sunday. In addition to just chilling out and watching Gossip Girl — yes, I do believe that Gossip Girl is reputable, intelligent television, seriously! — we just spent lot’s of time catching up and hanging out with her friends. Oh yeah, and there was one trip to the Jerusalem Malcha Mall (my first time there), where I have to say we looked totally out of place without floor-length skirts. On the way out though, we saw a couple of guys that were perhaps even more out of place — two 7-foot African Americans who must be basketball players in Israel (I’m saying this because of their basketball attire and mannerisms, not because I’m saying that all 7-foot African Americans in Israel are basketball players).

Another proponent of a Sharon-move to Israel is Liron Mark, who has become one of my best friends ever since we met on Taglit now nearly two and a half years ago. I’m really happy I got to spend some time with her and with the entire Mark family in Haifa as usual, even if it was for far too short of a time. In retrospect, I should’ve stayed in Israel longer a couple days longer. Next time, I certainly will. I miss the entire Mark family already — they are my Israeli family after all. In addition to having an amazing dinner with them, Liron and her mom took me to a lecture and screening of the Woody Allen/Larry David movie “Whatever Works” on Friday morning. Though I was seeing it for the second time, it was still funny, and even funnier was that the three of us were probably the only ones under 80 in the room.

I also had the chance to see my friend David Saranga (@davidsaranga) in his homeland, and he brought me with him to IDC Herzliya’s Sammy Ofer School of Communications, where he delivered a lecture to first-year students about using Web 2.0 in Israeli public diplomacy. I might pretty much know his stuff by heart, but this time, it was in Hebrew — so I needed to make friends with some of the students sitting next to me to understand completely. But I have to say, the students were really, really receptive to his lecture, and I think he should continue on the professorial track, even if it’s not full-time. That same day, I also made my way to Kfar Saba to visit Momo Lifshitz and Todd Edelman at Oranim (@oranim), to hear some more details on their latest ventures — many of which I hope to write about soon. My favorite part of their office — the humongous fish tank and killer catfish inside, as well as the mural collage behind Momo’s desk.

And I leave Tel Aviv for last because despite what Mr. Jewlicious says (he calls in “Hell Aviv” for some reason, grrr!!), Tel Aviv is my absolute favorite city in all of Israel, perhaps in all of the world. When I do move there (wow I said “when” and not “if”), that’s where I will live. One of my best choices in Tel Aviv this time was invading the Haaretz offices, where I got to hang out with both my J-School buddy Raphael Ahren (@cologneboy) and Cnaan Liphshiz (@hebrish), who together essentially man the paper’s entire English edition, Anglo File. It was great getting to see them and then getting to explore lot’s of old Yafo and Florentine — an amazing South Tel Aviv neighborhood with a really friendly trio of dogs who tend to roam the streets at night. I also fit in my beach day, of course, because Tel Aviv wouldn’t be Tel Aviv without its beautiful beaches. : ) Beautiful beaches complete with nice warm water, dead eel caracsses on the pebbly sand and awkward Arab teenagers staring down at you from the tayelet. Haha, that’s Israel for you.

The trip to the airport was not without its own hilarities, as the driver proceeded to sing me American oldie love songs in broken English. What a perfectly Israeli way to end my trip there, even though I really wish it didn’t have to end. Well, as I typed in my Facebook photo album, that just means I’ll have to be back very soon. Don’t worry, you know I’ll find a way.

Tel Aviv Beach

In The Park

  

Surf and turf: Faux Tel Aviv beachfront will appear at Central Park bandshell.

by Sharon Udasin

In the throes of economic recession, New Yorkers might find it difficult to get to the beaches of Tel Aviv this summer — so Israel has decided to bring its sunny seaside to New York.

The Mediterranean beachfront will spring up in Central Park on June 19 in a celebration marking Tel Aviv-Jaffa’s centennial anniversary, one of 40 such events occurring in Israel and worldwide between April and December. Transplanted in the mid-park Naumburg Bandshell will be a 1,300-square-foot sandy beach, complete with a life-size panoramic Tel Aviv skyline, colorful parasols and complimentary lounge chairs — and unlike in Tel Aviv, sitting on these chairs will require no six-shekel ($1.50) fee. Beachgoers will be able to compete in shesh besh (backgammon), visit tattoo artists and play matkot — a popular sort of beach tennis — while enjoying live Israeli performances from reggae group Hatkvah Six, rock band FLOW and DJ Hadar Marks.

“Tel Aviv is very similar to New York, but one component that New York doesn’t have is the beach,” said David Saranga, the media consul for the Israel Consulate in New York. “We are bringing Tel Aviv to you.”

Still struggling to boost Israel’s image months after the Gaza war, the Consulate is striving to project Israel as a place of vivid culture, cosmopolitan people and travel opportunity. 

“The anniversary is a great opportunity for us to reflect this image,” Saranga said. “Tel Aviv is one of the strongest engines of Israel’s brand.”

The beach party will take place on Sunday, June 21, from 11 a.m. to 6 p.m. at the Naumburg Bandshell in Central Park. Enter at 69th Street and 5th Avenue or at 72nd Street and Central Park West. For more information, visit www.tlv100.co.il.

by Stewart Ain And Sharon Udasin
Staff Writers

Stung by the delays that plagued last year’s Salute to Israel Parade — many groups were more than two hours late in marching — organizers this year hired a professional production company that kept the parade in proper step.

“It made a difference — there were a lot more happy people and the weather was idyllic,” said Rabbi Susie Moskowitz, associate rabbi of Temple Beth Torah in Melville, L.I., as she marched under sunny skies up Fifth Avenue from 57th Street to 79th Street. 

“We were told we would start marching between 12:15 and 1 o’clock and we started promptly at 12:15,” she said. “There were some congregants who didn’t come this year because of what happened last year.”

She was among 320 marchers from 10 Long Island synagogues organized by SAJES, the area’s central agency for Jewish education. Sherry Gutas, a SAJES spokesperson, said there had been twice as many marchers last year, blaming the difference largely on the economy.

“Some synagogues could not budget for the cost of the bus and the parade fee,” she said. “But about one-third of the group never marched before and we had more families marching than ever.”

Mardi Gras Productions, which handles many of the large parades in the city, helped run this year’s Salute to Israel parade.

Michal Brickman, executive producer of the parade, said there were 31 floats instead of the 40 that participated last year, in part because of the economy. But she said there were a “similar number of groups and participants” as last year, which numbered 100,000.

But many marchers were caught up in the excitement of the day.

“It’s exploding — there are so many more people marching,” said Etana Staiman, 15, of Ma’ayanot Yeshiva High School for Girls in Teaneck, N.J. Continue reading…

Here’s what two weeks of reporting in the Holy Land can produce. I had such an amazing experience there, and I certainly produced a lot in

Tel Aviv at 100

a short time. Next step, really learn Hebrew. Please see my five articles below, as well as my friend Yoav Sivan’s editorial about the non-religious nature of the city.

Growing Up With Tel Aviv

  

“Tel Aviv developed a lot; it became the big city of the state,” Natan said, looking back through his seven decades as a Tel Avivian. But there is a sense of longing for his and Mirtza’s young days together. “Life was much better then,” Natan says.

by Sharon Udasin
Staff Writer

The moment he laid eyes on Mirtza Antin 74 years ago, Natan Abramovitch was determined to win a date with her. Little did he know that they’d end up fighting through a War of Independence together, witness the growth of a Jewish state and one day celebrate their 70th wedding anniversary as Tel Aviv — their city — turns 100 years old.

It’s still their city, sure, but the urban center that Tel Aviv has become is hard to recognize for them now, and they prefer to think back to the carefree days when they were newly married, and both they and their country were young.

“He had horses, he had a car,” Mirtza, told The Jewish Week over coffee and cake in the Tel Aviv apartment that she and Natan have owned for the past 68 years. Her youthful eyes glimmering under vibrantly dyed red hair, she poked fun at the handsome young man who she said “followed her around” for four years until they were married. “He was born specially for me,” Mirtza said. Continue reading…

How Green Is My Landfill

  

The Hiriya landfill, above, dominates the landscape from the highway below. Left, part of the state-of-the-recycling effort at the site. Photos by Sharon Udasin

by Sharon Udasin
Staff Writer

Just southeast of Tel Aviv, a huge mountain peak looms over the highway below, harboring swarms of flies and wafting scents of decaying garbage down its sprouting hills. The manmade mound — called Hiriya — may contain a colossal pile of trash, but the landfill is quickly becoming Israel’s icon of environmentalism: a space to recycle waste, produce energy and cultivate greenery.

Hiriya, named for the former Arab village of al-Hiriya, served as Israel’s largest landfill from 1948 through 1999. During that time, flocks of birds posed a danger to aircraft at nearby Ben Gurion Airport, according to Danny Sternberg, former Hiriya engineer and current CEO of Ariel Sharon Park, which is located directly below the landfill. Ten years ago, the government closed the dump and converted it into Israel’s largest waste transfer station, and since 2001 the site has been home to several environmental innovations, including what is being billed as a revolutionary water-based recycling project. By 2011, Steinberg said, developers hope to open Hiriya to the public — not as an odorous garbage dump, but instead as 2,000 acres of sprawling green landscape filled with bike paths and wildlife, two and a half times the size of New York’s Central Park. 

“It’s really the entrance to Israel — everybody who flies in sees this space,” Sternberg said. And revamping Hiriya is just one major example of the Tel Aviv area’s newfound efforts to become a greener, more sustainable place; the city is becoming increasingly filled with yellow recycling bins and new, tree-lined bike lanes.

Hiriya is part of no municipality and remains completely under national jurisdiction. Locally, the site is managed by the Dan Region Association of Towns Sanitation and Solid Waste Disposal board, half of whose members are from Tel Aviv, according to its chairman and deputy mayor of Tel Aviv, Doron Sapir.

Yet the space is crucial to southeast Tel Aviv and the surrounding area as “an environmental social project,” Sapir explained, because it will drastically improve the quality of life in the area, which is known to be among the poorest sections of Tel Aviv. Continue reading…

Pride OF PLACE

  

“The real breakthrough was not the fact that [the LGBT Pride Center, above] was even built, but the fact that it was financed by the government,” says the center’s chairman, Etai Pinkas, inset. Photos by Sharon Udasin

by Sharon Udasin
Staff Writer

In San Francisco, the Castro district teems with gay life — there are drag shows, gay-run boutiques and the signature of the gay rights movements — the rainbow flag — seems to be everywhere.

In the Chelsea neighborhood of New York, gay life has taken root, transforming that West Side area into a mecca for men with well-developed pectorals in tight T-shirts and jeans, and for the wider the lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender community.

But try to find a “gay neighborhood” in Tel Aviv, believed to be one of the most gay-friendly cities in the world, and you’ll come up short. Likewise, there are very few exclusively gay social establishments or bars in Tel Aviv — a sign of how well woven into the fabric of the city Tel Aviv’s LGBT community has become. This is due in large part to the city’s overwhelmingly accepting culture, observers say.

“I don’t think people ever felt particularly threatened, so that’s why there was no need to group up” in a gay neighborhood, Etai Pinkas told The Jewish Week. Pinkas, chairman of the new city-funded LGBT Pride Center, is having lunch at the center’s café and reflecting on the city’s gay community, the victories it has won and the unfinished work that stands before it. “Generally, LGBTs in Tel Aviv are very well integrated.” Continue reading…

‘The Great Neck Of Tel Aviv’

by Sharon Udasin
Staff Writer

You can play the national pastime — the American national pastime, that is — on a baseball diamond in Ra’anana, one of the few fields of dreams in all of the country.

In this affluent Tel Aviv suburb, you can get Gatorade there, too, and American candies can be had on the grocery store shelves. And you can join the Penn Club and reminisce about the old college days in Philadelphia.

“I would say Ra’anana is the Great Neck of Tel Aviv,” said American Joel Leyden, president of the Leyden Communications group, founder of Israel News Agency and a Ra’anana resident for the past 10 of his 22 years in Israel. “Ra’anana really stands out as the most cosmopolitan, most modern town in the country.”

And while the influence of American culture can be felt in much of Israel, it’s particularly strong in Ra’anana, the suburb to beat all other Israeli suburbs, to hear the locals tell it. Continue reading…

Bauhaus Is Our House

  

Photo Sharon Udasin

by Sharon Udasin

Cream-colored stone apartment buildings line nearly every street in central Tel Aviv, each varying slightly in shape and size but adhering to a loosely defined style of openness and movement that is particular to Israel’s “White City.” (In 2003, the area was designated by UNESCO as a World Heritage Site.)

Tel Aviv urban development began with the “eclectic style” of the 1920s, largely through the plans of Scottish architect Patrick Geddes said Jeremie Hoffmann, 42, the director of  Tel Aviv’s municipal Conservation Department. In the 1930s, Tel Aviv saw an influx of bourgeoisie, as well as famed architects from the German Bauhaus School eager to construct the stone buildings. Continue reading…

Temple OF THE NOW

by Yoav Sivan

Few cities define themselves by what they are not, but Tel Aviv prides itself on being the city that is “not” Jerusalem. Indeed, the distance between Tel Aviv and Jerusalem is precisely that between a living-in-the-moment present and a layers-of-history past that can sometimes be a burden to creativity.  

In contrast to Jerusalem where you inhale thousands of years of history in a single breath, Tel Aviv lives today intensely. And much of that life gets lived in cafés. First-time visitors are in awe at the number of cafés a city of 400,000 people can sustain. You won’t find a block without a café and free wireless Internet. Tel Aviv’s coffee shops have become Israel’s modern temples for secular thought, where students finish their homework, businessmen conduct their meetings, couples meet for dates, friends hang out and artists hash out new ideas. These are the places to seize the moment. Continue reading…

Exactly a week ago today, I landed back in New York after my two-week reporting odyssey in (predominantly) Tel Aviv.  Now that I’ve had time to get over the initial Israel euphoria phase/acute post-Israel withdrawal syndrome, I figured I’d write a bit about my experience there. During my two weeks there, I was assigned by The Jewish Week to conduct interviews and research for our upcoming Tel Aviv at 100 section (appearing May 22), but while there, I really was able to do much, much more. In those 14 days I think I learned as much as one entire year in college — no offense Penn, you know I love you.

Tel Aviv-Yafo celebrates its centennial

Of the four times I’ve been in Israel, this was the first time that my purpose was work, rather than vacation. But I enjoyed this experience as much or maybe even more than my prior visits — this time, though I might have been staying with Lior’s family, I was navigating the country completely on my own. After two weeks there, I think I have the map of Tel Aviv memorized, as well as the Herzilyya-Tel Aviv Merkaz/HaShalom train schedules and many of the local bus routes. Despite my (embarrassingly) minimal Hebrew abilities, I was able to get around with absolutely no problem, as if I had been to the country 100 times before. I felt completely at home. And another part of home had come with me in a way — my parents decided to take their first vacation to Israel while I was there reporting, and I was able to see them briefly a few times.

While on this trip, I interviewed and met with so many brilliant, interesting people — just to name a few: my new good friend and fellow journalist Yoav Sivan; deputy mayor and head of Hiriya environmental development Doron Sapir; director of the municipal LGBT center Etai Pinkas; head of conservation and architect Jeremie Hofman; one of the  mayor’s gay advisors, Adir Steiner; Technion environmental professor Emily Silverman, the only gay Knesset member, Nitzan Horowitz; Filipino caregiver Jonny; and the Abramovitches, a nearly 100-year-old Tel Aviv couple who have been married for the past 70 years and also appear in Centennial photographs by Dani Eshet.

Among the most interesting places I visited was Hiriya, the garbage dump turned recycling center, which is now being redeveloped into a huge park of greenery and wildlife — out of the way and near no public transportation, but definitely, definitely worth a visit. The innovation going on there is unparalleled, and engineers have devised such advanced recycling techniques that now only 20% of Israel’s waste ends up in landfills. I think that more and more, the world is recognizing just how advanced Israel’s science and environmental innovations have become.

In addition to Hiriya, another thing I was thoroughly impressed by was the municipality’s direct contributions to the city’s huge LGBT community. I feel like in the United States, gay organizations only exist through private funding, and this type of step is very honorable on Tel Aviv’s part — though, of course, they may have other motivations in keeping this population happy, with the sheer number of LGBT Tel Avivians involved in politics alone. Crazy/amazing that such a liberal city could exist just 45 minutes from Jerusalem.

Speaking of Jerusalem, I did spend one day there, where NY media consul David Saranga and press officer Noam Greenberg worked really hard to get me into the official Yom HaZikaron-Yom Ha’Atzmaut ceremony at Har Herzl. That evening provided a great window into the importance of Israel’s military culture and really emphasized the sacrifices that all Israelis make in order to keep the country a Jewish homeland. The ceremonies, which also paid tribute to Tel Aviv’s 100 years, quickly jumped from somber to celebratory, eventually bursting with fireworks. My only problem with that evening — I forgot to bring a sweater because I didn’t realize that Jerusalem evenings are about 20 degrees cooler than those in Tel Aviv. Luckily, the woman sitting next to me covered me in a blanket. Sure, Israelis are known for rudeness and brusque behaviors, but they should also be known for hospitality.

Yom Ha’Atzmaut I spent with my amazing friend Liron Mark and her family in Haifa, where we also visited the Air Force base at Ramat Avid — the one day of the year that the base is open to the public. Missiles and aircraft were on display, and war planes swooped in formation above in a sort of sky show. One thing that really, really surprised me while I was at this base, however, was the fact that nearly half of the many visitors there were Arab. Not Druze, but 100% (Israeli) Arab — and so many of the parents took photos of their kids in front of the missiles, as if this was a theme park. I really regret that I didn’t go speak with some of them, and ask them why they had decided to come for a visit that day — Do these Arab families side with Israel and dislike nearby Hezbollah as much as their Jewish neighbors do? Or are they Palestinian supporters who want to explore their enemy’s military culture? Or are they neutral civilians, who simply wanted to take the kids somewhere new and exciting to play that day? I guess I will never know that answer to these questions.

I learned so much in Israel, yet so much remains unanswered. Could I ever live there? Do I want to live there? Could I learn to speak fluent Hebrew? For the moment, I am happy in New York and have a great job, but I constantly think of the possibility of one day spending more than just a couple weeks in my favorite place — in Israel. Well, who knows what will happen. And with that uncertainty, I need to be satisfied because really, I guess anything is possible.