Today is a special day for me in the trip.  First of all, it's our last full day of the trip and I know I will miss the group and the atmosphere.  Second of all, today is our only full Tel Aviv day - my real chance to make my new found friends get a glimpse of my favorite city in the world. 

We split up the team; half goes with our guide to the flea market and a tour of Jaffa.  The other half come with me to get a tour of Galei Zahal - the Israeli Defense Forces radio station.  Since my brother served there - he is able to give us a tour of the place.  It is really cool experiences as most of the group has never been to a radio station or a military base, and none of them have ever been to a combined place.

After the station tour I take the team to my favorite hummus place - Abu Hassan.  We have the world famous Masabacha (no real English way to spell this) and head to Rothschild Blvd. to see the hall of independence, where Israel was decl

Today started with a hangover.  MBAs are known for many things and drinking is one of them - last night we proved it.  It was our first jet-lag free night and we bought a ridiculous amount of alcohol.  Our group had to understand that Arak, a Middle Eastern drink, does not play well with others...

Another thing MBAs are well known for is being able to switch to work mode even when hung over.  So the entire group was ready to go on the bus and head out with only a 15 minutes delay (45 minutes early in Israel time...).  We started climbing up the Golan height as our guide, Yael, told us different stories about Israeli history and aspects.  We interrupted her stories about the Kibbutz as we bought the group their first taste of Yatvata chocolate milk.

As we neared our first stop, Bental Mountain, Yael started the story of the Israeli - Arabic conflict.  There is no right way to tell this story and there is no simple way either.  However, Yael manages to tell a very interesting version.  A very colorful version with no black and white and no right or wrong.  We talk about the different Israeli wars and I also give them my own perspective.

After arriving to Israel yesterday and staying near the beach in Herzliya, it was time to start the trip. We met our lovely guide, Yael, and headed up north. We started with Capernaum.

As a Jew, I never got the chance to visit these Christian related sites. It was very interesting to see them and also see the perspective and reaction they receive from people who are visiting Israel for the first time. For them it seems that the stories they grew up on literally come to life. We continued to a place called Tabcha, where Jesus allegedly reappeared to his apostles. I love how Yael builds a story that unravels itself as we go to more and more places and still has a scent of mystery.

Our group surprised me today. We had a choice between Nazareth and Safed. While Safed is a beautiful and very spiritual place, I was sure the almost entirely Christian group will choose to visit Nazareth. I was wrong. We went to Safed, the birthplace of Kabbalah and toured it’s lovely streets. My dad always says Safed is a city for daydreamers and it is very easily understood why. Wandering the streets without a purpose is an almost must there. We, however, had very little time as the day’s highlight is approaching and we have a 4:30 PM deadline to get there. At 4:31PM we arrive at Kfar Blum for our relaxed river Kayak

Hi, As a leader for this year’s M-Trek, I am very excited I get the chance to write about the experiences we’ve been through.

We just finished the Jerusalem part of the trip. Jerusalem was a very special experience. Our group is very diverse – Jews, Christians and even Hindus. Therefore, every person had a different perspective to Jerusalem. We visited both Jewish and Christian holy sites. An amazing quote I heard from one of our travelers is “I feel like I get to see where god had his weakest moment”. We all put notes in the Wailing Wall and went on a night walking tour of the beautiful city. We also had cool dinners at the new Shababeek in East Jerusalem and Imma restaurants in West Jerusalem and roamed through the old city streets.

As a born and raised Tel Avivian, Jerusalem has always felt somewhat abroad for me. At these times it is very important to have a good guide. Our guide, Yael, was great and really knew how to tie up the whole day as a big story.

Today we went to Yad Vashem. I was very impressed how even people who have no correlation what soever to the Jewish people were even more thorough than me in there. We ended the day with  a picnic for which we bought all the stuff at the Machne Yehuda market. I’m really excited for tomorrow -  we will climb up Masada in the morning.