As I have settled into living in Israel, I have noticed that there were many differences from being back in America. Among the many differences I have noticed, the ones that stick out the most to me are the language, the food, the driving, and the weekends.

The language barrier here in Israel is a struggle for most of the students here on campus. Although most cashiers speak broken English, the people on the street or in the malls do not speak English, and it definitely hard for us to communicate with Israelis. I stayed at my Orthodox Aunts house this weekend, and 5 of her grandchildren were at the house. All under the age of 12, the children were hard to play and talk with. Thankfully there are people who are bilingual, like my Aunt Chaya, who can translate for us to help communicate. The longer we stay here, the easier it is getting to understand, but it is still hard.

The first week of being on campus, I struggled with finding food that I enjoyed and that I wanted to eat. After I got into town and the grocery store, I bought and put food in the refrigerator and in my room that I can snack on. When going to a restaurant, my friends and I were expecting to get a nice American salad and a burger. Little did we know, the burgers are falafel and the American salads do not really exist. The Israeli salad consists of cucumbers, tomatoes, onion, parsley, and very little lettuce. Yes, the food is delicious here, but it is hard to become adjusted to it and find places to eat other than falafel. Having Ofers, an on campus food kiosk, is super convenient to have accessible. We buy cereal and eat oatmeal in the dining hall, and snack throughout the day.

As strange as it sounds, the difference between driving here in Israel and America is a drastic difference. Israelis drive much more aggressively and careless than Americans do, but I do notice that they don’t use their phones while they drive. Here in Israel, there are always horns honking and cars cutting off other cars. Being American and not used to this, we all are taken back by seeing this style of driving.

The weekends here in Israel are shorter than those in America. Here we get off on Friday around noon, and we have Friday night and Saturday off. We go to school early Sunday morning. The students in America have Sunday off also. This additional school day has definitely been a change that took time to adjust to.

The differences here in Israel have not made it harder to adjust, only more interesting. It is cool to see the change in culture, food, personalities, etc. These differences are important to point out and appreciate, to understand that countries are different from each other and to value their differences. I am excited to find more differences between Israel and America in my last month of studying here.