When I was in elementary school, I remember always looking out the window whenever I could. I just wanted to know what was going on outside and I didn’t care about fractions because that didn’t matter outside. When I heard about this program and being in something called a “living classroom”, I couldn’t contain my excitement. I had seen the pictures of people sitting outside in the desert but that was pretty much it. 

Hiking up Masada was one of the most memorable and meaningful experiences in my life. Maybe even the best. Going up was so hard, I took off so many layers of clothes and I also saw the amazing love and support from others as we helped each other up. When we reached the top, the first thing I saw was the huge Israel flag with the beautiful pink tint behind it. I couldn’t help myself but cry. Also the fact that I knew that I was going to be learning about the reason why the hell I just hiked up that mountain at 4 am built my excitement for the day. I loved the entire day. We started off watching the sunrise and there was a magical moment where my teacher, Akiva, said something about the sun rising and during that exact moment, the sun came up from behind the mountain. We all sat there and watched the sunrise. Now go back and read sunrise again but emphasize the word rise. This was so insane to me because obviously our teachers know what they are doing here. We spent the entire day walking around the top of the mountain and hearing all about the rise and fall of Masada. The story beginning to end.

If I were to hike Masada with my family, we would most likely just walk up, check it out at the top then go back down. But with AMHSI, we toured the entire thing and I learned what each and everything was and why it was there. When we were about to go down, we went to the end of the mountain where we saw other mountains and even some people hiking far away. We then were told to scream  “Masada shall not fall again” but in Hebrew. We yelled it word my word and it echoed throughout the desert. Nothing has ever been so special to me before this experience and I truly thank AMHSI’s living classroom concept because it is teaching me things not only about history but about myself too.