First Post

Hey Everyone! This Blog is so I can keep in touch with all my friends and family everywhere.

I leave in 4 days for Newark where I'll meet up with the rest of the 119 high schoolers for Tel Aviv. I stay in a Kibbutz outside of Jerusalem called Kibbutz Tzuba. I don't work on the kibbutz, just go to school and live there. I've been to the Kibbutx before. My brother went on EIE (the name of the program I'm going on) in Spring 2006 and my family and I stayed there. It's very beautiful and overlooks the village of Abu Gosh.

One of the focuses of the program is the Jewish History class. When we learn about something that happened in Israel, we then go to place where it happened. Since I love history and I love Judaism, what could be better? When we learn about the Holocaust, go to Poland the Czech Republic to see the concentration camps and learn about what happened there. I also take an hour and a half of Hebrew every day, plus my regular classes that I would take back in Dallas.

With 4 days left I am very excited and very nervous. I understand this is an amazing experience to meet new people and to learn about my heritage and can't wait to start. But I'm also nervous about meeting new people and how I don't know anyone and am not going with any of my friends from Dallas or camp. The conflict that has been going on does not worry me too much. The people I've talked to who ahve come back from Israel recently tell me that if they didn't watch the news, they wouldn't know there was a war going on. And no part of the trip goes in the area around Gaza within rocket range. But Israel is a small country and we're all going to be careful to where we travel and are going to accomodate any dangers that may occur.

This is all I have to say for now! I'll be posting pictures of Israel the kibbutz when I have a chance. And my address in Israel is:
NFTY-EIE High School in Israel
Kibbutz Tzuba
D.N. Harei Yehuda
90870
ISRAEL

Joey B.