My Moment

I saw a pre-school today where I got to join 30 four year olds who sang Hatikvah - nothing has quite hit me about being in a Jewish homeland with "old" israelis as well as new israeli olim from ethiopia, russia, eastern europe, and even a kid from chicago than getting to experience and participate in such a moment. It was quite beautiful.

So was the school - again, influenced and augmented by PACT. It's an amazing overlay to the existing excellent infrastructure with Ashkelon, Israel seems to have. the girl in purple above is also a new immigrant to israel - by way of chicago. she got to wave the flag for hatikvah. she was a part of a class of all jews - ethiopian, russian, morrocan, native israeli, and more - who were all one jewish people.

Ashkelon in itself proved to be an incredible experience for the group. if yesterday was the ah ha moment for all in understanding world jewry, today proved to be the power of how the people in program are affected by the work PACT does, JDC does and in turn we all do.

We truly experienced their experiences today. After gan and pre-gan this AM, we had an open discussion with social service leaders from Ashkelon to ask them how they do what they do - it led us to determine we need to begin to ask our own questions of what we want to accomplish. Then we went on home visits - we actually were invited in the homes of olim and in their words told us their experiences. my visit consisted of a father and his family of 5. the wife was out working and she told him to make us feel at home. he was a true olim success. he emigrated in 1984 at the age of 18 and now has a nice home and a job. he proudly showed us his certificate of excellence from the hospital where he works, and his scrapnel souvineer from when he served in the israeli army. he made us all feel quite at home.

some aren't so lucky, yet. one group saw a 24 year old single mother in an apartment without heat and a 6 month old baby. that group was stunned - but even moreso by JDC's response of that they will make sure the woman receives the services she needs. just like that. she potentially goes from despair to salvation thru JDC and PACT. just imagine what such a response can do at home?

we ended the evening with a chanukah show by the neighborhood kids - pact and locals alike. it was full of enthusiasm, parental involvement and of course cute songs. i saw how our reactions, our support, and our involvement makes a true difference. our group was quite moved - so much so, that blogging truly doesn't do it justice, but professional lives were changed today.

sure, sounds a bit dramatic, but i saw it with my eyes and its witnessed by a delegation of 16 professionals from baltimore looking to make a difference, but learning a whole lot in the process that they didn't bargain for.

keep reading - as i process this and share pictures and stories, maybe a part of it will begin to translate and make sense to you the reader.