Ashdod

This weekend was pretty fun as I was able to catch up with a good friend of mine from back home in Mexico. She invited me to spend Shabbat with her and her family in Ashdod, a port city south of Tel Aviv. It is a large industrial city and the port receives about 60% of Israel's imports. Even so, it is also a very well planned city with beautiful beaches, a great port and a huge French community. I met my friend and together we took the train down to Ashdod. After we arrived we spent most of the day at the beach where I was finally able to relax after two busy weeks I have had.

That night, we were invited to Shabbat dinner at her family's home. The funny thing is that I had a Shabbat dinner with the exact same part of the family in the same place the first time I visited Israel almost 10 years ago! It is weird to think how quickly time has gone by, but how many things have changed during this period.  

It was nice to spend the weekend with people I have known for a while. I really enjoyed catching up with them and just disconnecting from what my life has been for the past months.

The next morning was amazing, my friend's cousins invited us to join them on their boat for lunch. We spent the morning sailing up the coast of Israel. Due to the season, the sea was filled with jellyfish. I have never seen anything like it. As we moved we could see a line a jellyfish swimming one after the other. They were all different sizes and colors. Here is a short video I took.

Once we were docked back at the port, we had a really nice lunch with the family on the boat. After a while we returned home to get our things ready to take the train back to Tel Aviv. This weekend was exactly what I needed. This past year abroad has been filled with many exciting and new experiences, but sometimes getting to reconnect to home is important and that is exactly how I felt. As I start the new week, I am ready to keep on meeting new people and experiencing new things.

Working at the ICT

After being here for a month, I feel like I have finally gotten the hang of things. Work at the International Institute for Counter Terrorism is really interesting and I am enjoying every day some much.
My work consists of a few things. First, I am working on my own research which focuses on public resilience in dealing with terrorism and fear. I am still at the early stages but I have already found some really interesting ideas to build upon. Secondly, we work on simulations that allow us to asses potential risks within certain systems. Finally, the third part of it is other projects. Among them I am helping organize the executive Program: a three week course with some of the top scholars in the field of counter terrorism that will be taking place in July.

A typical day in the office starts at 10:30 a.m. which is pretty nice compared to other places. The problem is that you really need to time the bus to the Interdisciplinary Center (the college where the ICT is based) correctly. If not, a 40 min journey can take up to double the time! In any case, at the office we mostly focus on our own research and projects but we have frequent meetings with researchers and among us to make sure we are on track and doing what we need to do. I have to say it is a privilege to be meeting and learning from so many amazing experts in their own fields within counter terrorism. Only in this month, I have already learned so much.

The interns usually grab lunch together at the school cafeteria at around 12:30 and then we go back to the office and keep on working until about 4:30 p.m. We also have certain lectures we can sit in which has been one of my favorite parts. At the end of the day I usually either hang around the IDC or Herzliya before going salsa dancing or I come back to Tel Aviv to do other things.

Although this experience is different to Rome, I am very happy and have been really really busy both within the ICT and in the afternoons. I have kept on going to salsa and now I have my friends there which I really enjoy. Moving forward I want to do some more traveling in the country, but I am also looking forward to continue building on the relationships I have begun to create here. I think meeting people from all over has been one of my favorite parts about being abroad and in different places. Although it will be difficult to say goodbye...again, the people I have met and continue to meet have made of these experiences unforgettable.

Tel Aviv, the Pride Parade and the worst tan of my life

This past week I finally moved to Tel Aviv and I spent my first weekend there. This was great as the Pride Parade took place on Friday.
I ended up going to the parade with a few friends I met during the tour of Jerusalem a couple of weeks ago. It was really hot and crowded but we had a really fun time. What I found really interesting about the whole day is how different Tel Aviv is to the rest of Israel and the Parade really showed that. Tel Aviv is the most secular part of Israel, and although this does not mean that the rest of the country is just full of religious people, it does present a big contrast to a more predominantly conservative society.

Unlike other parades this was a sort of walk. Instead of watching the parade go by, everybody was just walking alongside it. The parade ended on the beach where there was a huge party with vendors, food and people dancing. It was pretty fun and it was great getting to meet people from around the world who came to Tel Aviv especially  for the parade.

After such a crazy day, I spent Saturday on the beach. It was a beautiful day and it was nice to just relax by the sea. The problem was the sun was way too intense and between the parade the day before and the beach I am not only sunburnt but I have the most uneven tan I´ve ever gotten. So as I write this with a bright red back and aloe on it trying so sooth the burn, I just hope that I return to a normal color soon.

Here are some pictures from the parade.

Salsa, salsa and more salsa!

This week was really fun! I found out that there are free slasa lessons pretty much every night all around Israel and naturally I had to check them out. So last Sunday, I went to the Herzliya park to see what it was all about.
Although I have danced ballroom since I first arrived at Northeastern, I haven´t really danced a lot of Cuban salsa. Even so, it was fairly easy for me to pick up on it and soon I was dancing with a bunch of people.
I had a really nice time, and what is even better is that I made a bunch of friends there. This led me to go salsa dancing four nights last week! One of my favorite nights was at a place called Studio B. It is a dance studio, but at night it turns into some sort of dancing venue. In each classroom, an instructor teaches a different style like salsa, bachata, lambada and even Argentine tango and after the lesson they play music pertaining to that style. So for the rest of the night you can basically just go from room to room dancing different things.
Finally at one of the places, I ran into my old teacher from high school. It was really unexpected but I really enjoyed reconnecting with her an hopefully we´ll get the chance to catch up soon.

What I love about dance and in this case salsa is that it is pretty universal. You can go pretty much any place in the world and even though you might not be able to speak the same language you can connect with people and share something everybody likes doing together. It can often be intimidating especially when you get started, but if you go with it, you will slowly improve and build relationships with the people you meet.
In the coming weeks I am excited to continue salsa dancing although maybe not every night :P

Getting into the swing of things...

Although it hasn´t been long since I got to Israel and started my internship, there is so much to do. At the office I am involved in a few different projects. First off, we are all doing our own research on a particular topic related to terrorism. I have been doing some reading, but I am having a bit of a problem narrowing down my research topic, but hopefully I´ll figure that out soon.
Outside of the office I have spent a lot of my time looking for a place to live. I am currently staying with family, but I do need to find a place of my own. I have also been able to do some fun things with the people from the office and have met new people as well.

On Monday all of the interns and staff played basketball together. I don´t think I have ever played a full game in my life, but I still decided to participate. We were 10 in total, 8 guys and two girls. It was a bit intimidating since everybody else was actually good and most of them are really tall even so, I was able to score six or seven baskets so I was happy.

We also had a barbecue of Wednesday at the house of the US representative at the ICT. We had a great time and really interesting conversations around immigration, safe spaces and political correctness on campus, and just a lot of funny stories.

Some of us at the barbecue :)

On Thursday all the interns got together, since one of the guys was leaving. We all went for dinner at an amazing burger place in Tel Aviv and then played Risk. I had never played Risk before, and I have to say I never want to again :P I was so stressed out during the entire thing that once I got home I couldn´t fall asleep! Even so it was tons of fun and I have a feeling there will be a repeat of that night.

Finally, on Friday  I took a day trip to Jerusalem with the university. It was an organized geopolitical tour of the city. As you may know until 1967, the city was divided into the Eastern Jordanian controlled part of the city and the Western Israeli controlled part. In May of the same year Gamel Abdel Nasser, the president of Egypt at the time announced the the Straight of Tiran would be blocked to Israeli commerce, a direct act of war towards Israel. Egypt then mobilized its forces along its border with Israel, which it claimed to be a defensive measure, and on 5 June Israel launched a series of preemptive airstrikes against Egyptian airfields.
The attack nearly wiped out Egypt's air capability. However, Nasser convinced Syria and Jordan to attack Israel by taking advantage of the initial confusion to claim that Egypt had defeated the Israeli air strike. Israeli counterattacks resulted in the capture of East Jerusalem and the West Bank from the Jordanian, and Israel´s defense against Syria in the north allowed it to push Syrian forces out of the Golan Heights. Since then Jerusalem has remained under Israeli control although people from all different religions still live there side by side.
It was an interesting tour and I was happy I was able to meet many other students from around the world.

The Old City in the background

Coop Part Two: Israel

I hit the second part of my Coop running. I started my internship at the International Institute for Counter Terrorism (ICT), the same day I landed in Israel. So as I wrap up my first week, I am excited to write my first post from Israel.

So I know this is a bit confusing, but let me explain. During my Coop Application process, I interviewed for both the NATO Defense College and the ICT. Although I heard back from the NDC first and I took the job, I was also interested in the ICT. This is why when they got back to me, I asked them if it would be a possibility to start my internship in May instead of January. They agreed, and since the Coop at NATO was only three months long, I was able to fit these two experiences into one Coop period.

I am currently staying with my grandmother´s cousin. I had never met her before coming here, but she is lovely and I have really enjoyed hearing all of her stories. Even so, I will only be staying here temporarily while a find a place to stay.

The internship has been great. The funny thing is that out of the seven interns here, I am the only girl…again. Even so, they are all great. There are 2 other students from Northeastern who will be wrapping up their Coops in the next month, two Italians, a Dutch guy and an Australian. They are all really great, and they have really helped me get into the hang of things.

Although I´m new, I am already involved in a few projects and it has been really amazing. The crazy thing is that in a month, all of the interns will have left, and new ones will replace them This means that I will be the experienced one in the team. This is why I am making sure I learn as much as possible from them, so that I am able to do everything that is needed later on.
Outside of the internship I have just been trying to settle in. I have yet to get a phone as there are only a few companies that are available for international students. I am looking forward to this weekend to finally catch my breath and get everything done.

Even so, I am happy. It is nice to be back in Israel and to stay with family. Furthermore, I know that I will gain a lot from this internship. For now, I´m looking forward to arranging everything to get myself into the hang of things and start getting to know the city and people better.

"Roma non basta una vita"

There is a saying in Rome that says "Roma non basta una vita" meaning that for Rome a lifetime is not enough. Yet just like that, my time in Rome has come to an end. As I embark on the second part of my Co-op I leave with a lot of mixed feelings. Living in Rome, was a challenge in many ways. I came here not knowing anybody or what to expect. It was the first time I lived completely on my own, without being part of an academic program, and having to really leave my confort zone in order to settle into my new life. It was also a challenging work environment that constantly had me second guessing myself. Finally, as a city, Rome is a hard place to live in. There is a lot of traffic, people can be quite unwelcoming to strangers and living far from the center made me spend a lot of time on the metro.
However, this experience has also been wonderful. Although the cancellation of the NRCC (NATO Regional Cooperation Course) had a big effect on what my work at the NATO Defense College looked like, I feel as though I was able to contribute to my team and I leave having learned so much about the current international security environment.
My Co-op in Rome also allowed me to meet amazing people that have taught me so much. I have had amazing conversations and adventures with individuals from all over the world and I have been inspired to continue working towards my goals.

I have already talked about what working in a predominantly male military environment was like, but in short, being a young civilian women in this environment had certain individuals questioning the reason for me being there. If I learned something from this situation it is that your work ethic and the products you deliver speak for themselves. Instead of focusing on proving yourself, you just need to continue working hard and doing your job. By the end, I believe that the people that had doubts about me were proven wrong. Not only was I able to show that I was capable of the things I was doing, but I also got to interact with them more, getting to know them and sharing more about myself. I even became pretty close with some of them by the end.

In terms of the job itself, I think that the NDC is a great institution and the work being done to promote understanding and cooperation between Course Members from many different countries is important in creating a more effective international organization that can make the important decisions. Although I enjoyed my work, more than one day coming back as staff or faculty, I would love to come back as a Course Member. I thoroughly enjoyed every opportunity I had to attend the lectures, the discussions and to interact with the Course Members, which gave me a great insight into what being a Course Member is like.

The people I have met within the NDC as well as through dance, my roommate and other experiences really made my time in Rome very special. I got to meet people really from all over and I have created friendships that I hopefully take with me for the rest of my life. I have been inspired by many of them and I look forward to staying in touch.

As a city, I have conflicting opinions about Rome. It is a beautiful city to visit and it is true that for Rome, a lifetime is not long enough to see everything there is to see. However, living here was definitely a challenge. All in all I enjoyed my time a lot, however, I am also looking forward to this new chapter.

On my last day at the NDC, we had a Pakistani delegation come visit, which was a great to wrap up my time there (on one of my first days we had a Saudi Arabian delegation visit the college). However, the nicest thing was after. The whole Middle East Faculty, as well as many other people from the college took me to lunch. It was really amazing to see all the people that wanted to join me for my last day and I am touched they all came. I also received a diploma for my time at the college.

All in all, I am very glad this whole experience happened. I have learned so much about the world and about myself and I leave more motivated than ever to continue to work hard. I am also very sad to leave the amazing people I have met. Even so, a new experience awaits me in about 12 hrs to be exact (I´m writing this from the airport as I am on my way to Israel). At 11:00 a.m. tomorrow (yes it´s a Sunday, but that is how the work week in Israel is organized) I begin my first day at the International Institute for Counter Terrorism. Everything is going by so quickly, but I am excited to meet new people and to continue learning more in order to better understand the world we live in.

So goodbye Rome, it has been great and I hope to see you soon, and next week I will hopefully be writing with great new stories for this new chapter :)