Celebrating shabbat in Jerusalem requires being there to fully understand the awesome power of the cultural and religious energy in the city, but our experiences today fully cemented our relationships with each other and established the family that is our group. We started off the morning with some delicious cake and coffee, and leftovers from the oneg Shabbat last night added in for good measure. We shared our feelings and reactions to our visit to the Wailing Wall yesterday, which was a tremendous experience and allowed everyone to reach deep within themselves to express momentous emotional, cultural, and psychological experiences. We also continued the previous conversation of our reactions to Shabbat, which was a further bonding experience amongst newly formed friends. After a lunch break, we sojourned to the pool for some swimming, games, and meet-and-greet with some other Birthright groups staying in the hotel. We then took a walk through the government district of Jerusalem to a lovely park where we celebrated the bar and bat mitzvahs of four of our friends, including Julia, Christina, Jane, and Daniel. This was a moving ceremony where each shared a story of their chosen Hebrew names, shared a bit about their families and their experiences in Judaism, and then received the blessings of the bar and bat mitzvah. It was a really exciting time for our whole group, as all four participants took part in an ancient ritual. We then had a very intimate discussion preparing for our visit to Yad Vashem after which we celebrated with a Havdallah followed by dinner on Ben Yehuda Street in Jerusalem.
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