Birthright-Mayanot, Bus 83

 As we walked down the cobble stone roads on our way to the western wall many emotions started to rush through my mind. I couldn’t stop wondering about what we were about to experience. Coming into the trip I thought to myself about the western wall not knowing anything about the history and the importance of that special site that I’ve heard mentioned before,  and had no clue what to expect. As we approached the wall I could see hundreds of different people sitting by the wall each engaging in prayer in their own manor. As we found our spot together by the wall I started thinking to myself that we just walked so far to sit by a wall and pray, but what came soon I had never expected to see. As Rabi Levi led our group in prayer we followed along with our individual prayer books. We recited prayer after prayer with the rabbi till the moment came when another group of praying men began to grab one another and formed a large circle as they began to sing and shout the prayers out loud. Within moments hundreds of men joined in and began to sing and recite prayers together. It was truly an amazing site as the Rabbis began to sing and dance on tables, fellow Jewish men hoisting each other onto one another’s shoulders, dancing and celebrating like I had never seen before. I was very confused as to what was going on as my pre conceived notions of the event were that we had gone there to pray and remember our long and sad history as a Jewish state, but what I had thought was a night of prayer and remembrance for those we had lost and the hardships that our people had gone through for years ended up being a celebration of life and happiness, the happiness we celebrated came from the idea that after so many years of fighting for our rights and freedoms as a Jewish population our holy land was finally reclaimed, and as we had gathered at the holiest site for the Jewish population in the world to sing, dance and appreciate the fact that after so many years of struggle and hardship that our people finally had received the outcome we had been seeking for years, an internationally recognized Jewish state. After a while of dancing and singing I thought to myself “wow this is what it means to be a Jewish man.” people who I had just met moments before had felt closer to me then friends at home that I have had for years, for the first time in my life I felt like I had a real connection to my faith and to my religion and I could not have been any prouder to be a Jewish man. I had never been a religious person at home  I followed along with the important holidays because I knew I had to ,but never did because I wanted to, but after my experience at the wall I can honestly say that I now understand the reason for how, and why we celebrate the holidays that we do ,and can’t wait to come home with the knowledge and tradition that I had gathered here in Israel to share it with my family and friends, I now know what it means to be proud of who you are and I would never want to change anything that I had experienced and learned that night. It was truly a life changing event.