Innocents Abroad

Sea of Galilee from Meron Mountains

Fifteen months ago my wife and I left behind a comfortable life in the north of England and moved lock, stock and barrel to Karmiel in Galilee, northern Israel. Why did we do it? I had just retired from being a publisher's agent, basically on the road selling books day in and day out for almost 20 years.

Inside however, was a nagging voice which wouldn't be silenced, telling me that my destiny lay not in viewing the Pennines but the mountains of the Upper and Lower Galilee that so inspired the Psalmist of old to utter the prayer 'I will lift up mine eyes unto the hills.' Who knows but he may have been an ancestor of mine and his spirit was urging me to return to this land after two thousand years of exile and wandering.

My wife, less than keen, but resigned to my 'meshugas' (irrational obsession) dutifully accompanied me, always believing that it wouldn't really happen and I'd see sense eventually.

We left Manchester in a minibus early one morning and arrived at Heathrow to be initially processed at the El Al special check-in desk for olim (immigrants to Israel). The preliminaries over, we were flown to Ben-Gurion Airport and the many new immigrants taken to the old terminal for further processing. Eventually we were bussed to the Ramada Hotel in Jerusalem where we flopped into bed at 3am.

After only four hours sleep we breakfasted,  heard a lecture, signed up with a bank, health fund and mobile phone and  issued with our ID cards. Finally we were bussed to our destinations to begin our new lives in our adopted country where the inhabitants may be our co-religionists but culturally often miles apart and speak in a language we did not understand.

Israel, no less than the USA, is a melting pot of many cultures and peoples but all believing that this little patch of land is now home. This includes the 1.5m Palestinian Arab people who share full Israeli citizenship and make their contribution to this country which has moved from the Third World to the First in only 60 years.

Further posts will follow which may be of interest to those considering following in our footsteps, those who disagree with our actions and the merely curious.