Finally it was time to go. The bus twisted up a mountain road, the drinks from the night before sloshing around my stomach. Looking around, it was clear I was not alone with this feeling, and seemed like only a matter of time until someone ruined the ride. Amazingly, we all made it to the drop off point without incident and we scurried off the bus, eager for some fresh air.
The caves were interestingly designed, in the shape of a cross to remove the need for and support beams. The walls were covered in holes, designed to nest carrier pigeons. As badly as I wanted to use them as foot and hand holds to climb the walls I could only imagine the nastiness inside them.
We gathered around to recap our journey together. The soldiers handed out their gifts: pins from the intelligence division of the IDF. Once everybody had gotten theirs I greedily asked for a few more, a couple extra memories to take back home.
And that was it. There was just one more drive and one more lunch with the soldiers. We sat together and reminisced about our time together. It was amazing the memories we had formed as a group in five days: floating on the Dead Sea, walking through Mt. Herzl, and we did our best to piece together the events of Ben Yehuda street. And finally it was time. Shaul said goodbye first, followed by Tzukit. We walked back to the bus and said farewell to the other six and that was it.
The bus looked how it did the first four days but it now seemed strangely empty, unoccupied seats was out of the ordinary to us. We drove back to the hotel, picked up our group shirts (luckily mine fit perfectly), and prepared ourselves for Shabbat.
We drove to the Western Wall, the holiest place in Judaism. It was an amazing site to behold. I'm not a spiritual person, and the wall did nothing to change this but the impact it has on the thousands gathered around it was amazing. Grown men weeping at the site of it, some dancing and singing in the square in front of it. I was stunned by the power a structure, made by men, of brick and mortar, could have on so many. And as I placed my prayer into the cracks of the wall I felt more touristy than holy.
Sundown approached and our group rejoined for a Shabbat service. We walked back to the hotel and I was surprised to see so many people still doing their business. I had expected Jerusalem to shut down and become a quiet, almost eerie place after sundown. But there were vendors selling bread on the street, cars driving and lights going on and off in houses.
We had a quiet evening and a chance to sleep in the next morning. The Shabbat elevator slowed everyone down as we group in the lobby, ready to walk to the Knesset. Eleven of us had decided to reconfirm our Bar/Bat Mitzvah (although I was partially in it for the chair ride). We sang the Haftarah blessing together and read our Torah passage aloud in turn. After the holy reverence, the party began. We lifted the first of us in a chair, singing Siman Tov u'Mazel Tov. Each of us went up, until it was my turn. A few reinforcements came to take my now vacant place under the chair and up I went.
The celebrations were over, and we sat in a large circle, tossing around a ball of string. The possessor sharing their favourite experience of the last ten days before tossing it to the next person.
Dinner, frantic packing, and a bus ride and it was time to say goodbye to those of us that we're leaving Tel Aviv, either back to Canada or on their own adventures. Birthright was more than I expected. It started off as nothing more than a free flight and express tour of Israel but quickly turned into one of the best experiences of my life. If I'd gone home then, with most of the group, I would have had a worthwhile summer and a lifetime of memories to cherish. But I wasn't going home, I was off to Tel Aviv, with a dozen of my new friends. And as sorry as I was to see the others go, I wasn't sad. We'd all see each other soon enough (reunion plans were already in the works) and my adventure was just beginning!
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