Not in Kansas Anymore

So what happened?

The plan was always to leave Israel, check out Jordan, and then head to Egypt for some touring. I would then silently switch to my new israeli-stamp-lacking passport, and catch a flight into Damascus. See Syria, and then go into Turkey via train.

One small glitch is that I was misinformed regarding visa's for Syria and I didn't do my homework and double check.

Oh, but there is a loophole - you can go into Lebanon, and then cross the border into Turkey getting a visa at the border. It works most of the time. No more.

Oh, but there was a loophole.

On June 9th, the U.S. Embassy issued a statement warning U.S. citizens that they could no longer enter Syria without a prior issued visa - multiple individuals were stuck in Beirut.

As romantic as that sounds, I decided maybe it's not the right time, perhaps the universe is trying to tell me that the middle east will wait a little bit longer.

I went to Rachel's boyfriend (Adam's) birthday and army send off night, which was at an all you can drink wine night. Combine that with a few other factors, and I woke up after a night out with Yael with no voice, and a very sore throat.

A few hours in bed was all I needed to realize that I had mentally already left Israel. I knew there were a few more goodbyes, but I decided better to let the guilt settle in and get me to come back sooner.

I booked my flight to Berlin in the evening over the phone as I headed into Tel Aviv with a few last minute things for Dashiell for dinner. Goodbye to Katie and Xan, and I headed back to Ramla.

Less than 6 hours after, I headed to the airport, only my orange backpack and a small daypack for carrying a camera with me. By the time my friends were awake, I was back in Berlin.

It's amazing how fast the German came back. I still throw in hebrew words and phrases because they have become so ingrained (I use Rega and Beseder all the time!) but when an issue arose with paying for the hotel using a credit card, my german came forth like nothing before. When I tried to convince them (unsuccessfully) at the train station that I was living in the european union (hey, israel was a british colony not so long ago) the woman thought I was german and it was all going ok until she saw my german passport. She told me in German, that my german was excellent, she was fluent in english, but we continued the purchase auf Deutsch.

Yesterday I did a free walking tour of Berlin. I found it all rather elementary, and the people rather dull. The guide was a little over the top in theatrics, and I soon tired of his pompous nature, and left the group at the end. The only interesting story was the fall of the Berlin wall, which I had heard before, but I never really understood the extent to which the press secretary set the stage for the fall - it's one of my earliest memories, that and the gulf war in '91 (I remember my father watching the news on television in the middle room in our Dennistoun Drive house on the second floor and not being allowed to come in the room to watch as well).

Then I met up with Ruthie, a friend of both Louis and Brandon. Ruthie has been living in Berlin doing work for the Jewish Community. We had tea / coffee, and then dinner and walked. Stopped to watch some dancers doing salsa, tango, and a few other traditional dances by the pier near the museum. It was quite beautiful to watch them gracefully float in circles, nearly all the dancers were quite knowledgeable in their form.

I turned in early, and slept most of the evening - waking up once in the middle of the night. I am still getting up at very early hours, 5 or 6 in the morning, which is odd since the time difference is only one hour from Israel.