When I first signed up for birthright, I wasn’t sure exactly what I was expecting out of the experience. I knew I wanted to feel the same bond to this ‘foreign’ land that my brother and my mother had felt, but I was also afraid that it wouldn’t happen for me. The particular birthright trip I chose was the Anguish to Hope one. During this trip you go to Poland and tour the concentration camps and ghettos to experience a piece of the holocaust. That section of the trip was the most emotional four days of my life. Not only was I standing in a different country where no-one knew my name, or my language for that matter, but I was also surrounded by all my new friends who were also young Jews from Canada experiencing the same emotions as me.

Before I left for Poland, I was afraid I would be the only one who would experience Poland to the extreme I knew I would. Many of the Jews in my city had no desire to travel to Poland to learn more, and being surrounded by your peers, you need that comraderie. I was amazed to find every person on my trip in tears in Majdenek, and in that moment we joined hands and sang Hatikvah and connected in a deeper way. Being in a different country alone is an amazing thing, but learning your past while you’re there -your past, not someone else’s…unforgettable.

The next 10 days of birthright were spent in Israel. I wish I could describe the joy of landing in this land, the thrill of seeing a good looking soldier with a gun…and then another, and another, They’re everywhere! Our first night in Israel was spent in a Bedouin tent. That was truly the best night of my life! The hospitality of the Bedouin people, and the way they invited us into their home was so heartwarming. It wasn’t just the Bedouins though, it was the Israeli people. Every day was another amazing adventure, every night a complete party. Climbing up Masada and walking the same line King Solomon walked. Dancing beside the wall with hundreds of others. It’s an experience that not only brings you closer to this amazing country, but it gives you an opportunity to feel like you’re truly home. And you are. You make lifelong friendships and feel unforgettable emotions. You come alive in the city of Jerusalem, you glow in the sun at the Dead Sea. You bathe in the water at Ein Gev. These names are no longer a mystery, they are now part of my home, places I know, places I’ve been. I felt a closeness to a land and a people and a past that I didn’t know I could feel, and it didn’t end with birthright.

After I said goodbye to my friends, my new Israeli friends put me on the bus to Yotvata to begin an Ulpan. Once again I was in a situation where I knew no one. It didn’t last but one minute when the kibbutzniks, volunteers, and other ulpanists starting showing up to invite me into their lives. I found a part of myself on the kibbutz. I learned a different language, a different culture, a different mentality. I fell in love with the desert and the sun rising over the Jordanian hills. The people on the kibbutz became my best friends. I was invited into various homes during my stay, and was fortunate enough to become very close friends with many of the kibbutzniks, one in particular.

During my Ulpan I felt the fear of not knowing whether or not the man I had come to love would come home from his army duties, and in that I learned to embrace each moment of life, and live it to the fullest. The kibbutz taught me so much and it gave me so much. Not only did it give me a new appreciation for life, and a deeper knowledge of who I am, it gave me a new family.

The man I fell in love with followed me back to Canada, and we will be returning together, home in the spring. If it wasn’t for the birthright and Ulpan programs.who knows!