Changes in Plans

An unfortunate turn of events means I'm not going to Israel in a few days. Nope, I'll be stateside, which has some other exciting news attached to it. But this video was posted on Twitter today and makes me really bummed I'm not going to Israel, and even more bummed that I'm not going to ROI (well, I was never going this year -- why didn't I push to apply!?). Oh Benji, how I miss you! (Esther, you, too!)




Bad screen cap there if you ask me. 
Anyway, sometimes teams don't mesh, and sometimes people get voted off the island, so I'm not going to be staffing a trip to Israel. It's upsetting for me personally and professionally, because I saw a huge change to really impact the lives of some amazing Colorado teens. With my connections, my master's degree in Judaic studies and deep knowledge of the political and religious history of the Israel-Palestine conflict, and love of all things Jewish and Israel, I saw myself as really making an impact. Alas, I'm not going. Hopefully I can find a way to Israel later this year or my chazakah of going every year since 2008 will crash and burn. 
The upside? I'm taking a trip to Los Angeles in a few weeks to meet someone I've been talking with online on and off since moving to Colorado. He and I haven't talked about how public I can/should be about the details, so for now, I'll leave it at that. 
Stay tuned!

Big News!

I'm ...

Going ....

To ............

ISRAEL!!!

Not forever, but for part of the summer. I'm going to be one of the Hebrew-speaking staff members on the CAJE Israel Study Tour trip to Poland (four days) and Israel (four weeks). If there were better words to describe how stoked I am, I would use them, but there's not, so, just believe that I am beyond excited to visit Israel for the FIFTH time in the past FIVE years!

HaShem knows my heart is in Jerusalem.