Thursday in Israel

We started off our day davening right at the edge of the Makhtesh. Despite the beautiful view, it was incredibly cold and windy, and we had to move before the Torah reading. The night before, we packed up all our things to get ready to sleep in a Bedouin tent. We locked our suitcases in the bottom of our bus and drove off to an alpaca farm. At the farm, we got to see alpacas, llamas, goats, dogs, and horses, and also learned the difference between a llama and an alpaca. We even got spat at by some. 

We drove to a Moroccan woman’s home in Yerucham, and heard first hand the story of her husband’s father’s Aliyah to Israel while eating tasty authentic Moroccan food. He sang many songs with us, but most importantly, we learned that you should tell your own story, and not let others tell it for you. We then drove to the Bedouin camp where we rode camels. After getting settled in our tent, we listened to a rebellious Bedouin woman’s story and aspirations while drinking tea and coffee. The woman fought to give Bedouin women better rights, and her goals in life are to write a book and have a movie made about her life. To fund the publishing of her book, she hand makes and sells beautiful jewelry. We ended the night with a campfire and went to sleep.

-Anat