(I am) becoming a stronger, more independent person.

I’ve been in Israel for over 2 weeks now, and quarantined for 18 days. When I first got to the dorms, homesickness hit me like a brick wall and so the first few days here was rough for me. I essentially went to a program, AMHSI, that is halfway across the world from home alone, without having any previous experience of being away from home by myself. After settling in for a week and exploring this completely new environment, I started to get used to it and relax. Though I still miss home I think I am overcoming it and becoming a stronger, more independent person. 

Quarantine has been strange since we could only be with our capsule while seeing the other capsules in our building through the plastic sheets or being 6 feet apart from other capsules outside. Plastic sheets and all, we still managed to play games with the other capsules using gloves and somewhat connect and communicate with the kids in the other capsules. I can’t wait to actually see and meet everyone in person, especially those who I didn’t get to meet during quarantine. 

I come from an Israeli household and my entire family lives in Israel aside from me and my immediate family. That being said, I really want to be able to read and write in Hebrew. I can already speak Hebrew, my Madricha always says I speak it “fluently” but I do make some mistakes here and there. I want to learn these things so I can connect to my family and communicate with them more in a language they know so we can both understand each other better. In addition to this, I really want to get to know more about my Jewish heritage. While yes I know the surface-level things about being Jewish and the holidays but I don’t really know the deeper meaning to it. I want to know and learn why we celebrate the holidays we do and what is the history behind it and I’m so excited to get to do that at AMHSI.