Third Week of War: Between Sirens and Sunshine in Tel Aviv

There comes a point when war becomes boring, if not mundane; and there comes another point when it becomes annoying.

Two weeks of being in the same city, running up and down and up and down into the same miklat, going for walks in the same neighborhood square...Whereas it was good to have downtime and familiarity in those spaces between missile attacks the first week or so, it began to feel very same-y, especially in Rishon LeZion, a comfortable, quiet, and residential city. During normal times, it's nice to live there because you can always hop on a bus and ride 40 minutes or so into busy and vibrant Tel Aviv next door. But during war, all I got to know was a series of boxes: my room, my apartment, my neighbor's apartments, my miklat, my neighborhood. Someone get me out of this box!

It was with that desperation (and a sufficient amount of sleep deprivation) that I decided to take a little war "stay-cation" to Tel Aviv. I craved the sea, the familiarity, the vibrancy, the color.

If you're just popping in, you can read about the First Week of War here and the Second Week of War here.

Day 1 in Tel Aviv (TLV)

Last night, there were no alerts overnight. Unfortunately, I had been expecting them, so I still couldn't sleep.

When the air raid sirens finally came, indicating missile fire toward Tel Aviv, I grabbed my go-bag and hustled outside. In my home, the miklat is downstairs in the same building, but in TLV, many of the buildings (like the guesthouse where I was staying) are old and therefore contain no bomb shelter. I knew that the hotel next door had a miklat, and if I left immediately when the air raid sirens started and hurried to the end of the block, I could get to the miklat within the required 90 seconds.

My first time to the Tal Hotel miklat was a warm experience. People are naturally in a better mood when missile fire comes in the daytime than the nighttime. Although none of us were well-rested, perhaps some had managed to get some sleep last night.

Not everyone in the miklat were hotel guests. (I imagine most of the guests were in the other bomb shelters on each floor of the hotel, if not out and about somewhere in the city.) In fact, most of the people (and dogs) around me were locals who scurried over at the sound of the alarms, just as I had. Ayelet, owner of the golden retriever puppy named Hilda, informed me that this was one of the only miklats (miklatim) in the area that allowed animals. Perhaps that's another reason why I loved this miklat so much -- and why the people here were some of the best I've met!

Miklat regulars establish a spot for themselves in the shelter.

Here in the hotel, the staff break room doubles as a miklat. We all crammed into it each time there was an alarm. The resilience of people never ceases to amaze, in addition to children's ability to find fun and play in any situation.

Day 2 in TLV

The next day, a sandstorm blew through the region, coating everything in sand. You could feel it on your tongue. It would blow into your eyes. I went to a cafe, and even the menu felt grainy. The sky turned yellow, and after a few hours, the air pollution mixed in with the air, too.

Even sandstorms can't stop missiles! (Though, thankfully, the Iron Dome can.)

Besides lack of quality, uninterrupted sleep, the next biggest challenge is the lack of routine. I miss my daily walking commute to school, going to work and seeing my students and coworkers, and having a regular social life outside. Being in TLV has been so wonderful for my mental health, but the idea of going back to my "boxes" and being stuck in them again is discouraging.

There's no way to have routine right now. You never know when the missile fire will come, but when it does, one alarm will suck away at least 10 to 15 minutes of your time, and sometimes up to 30 minutes. Whether you're teaching online, attending a meeting, going for a run, trying to fit in a shower -- the constant interruptions are disorienting. Thankfully, the attacks are infrequent enough that we can find some normalcy in life between alarms, but the fact that they are still present and targeting civilian populations, it means that living a routine life (such as getting on public transportation or sending your kids to school) comes with risks that we are unable to take at this time. Therefore, there is no capability for routine, and everything feels wiggity-whack and tiring.

Plus, being on alert all the time is tiring. The stress and lack of sleep are in my body.

Somehow, it's all normal. You go for a drive. You get an alert. You pull over to the side of the road to run into the nearest miklat.

Day 3 in TLV

And the sandstorm blew away as if nothing ever happened.

I've been getting back into running -- finally! My dream of running with the gorgeous Tel Avivians on the Tayelet has come true, and the stress melts from my body as I run. I'm getting comfortable with running 5Ks again. My mind remembers what it's like to run half-marathons, even though my body doesn't. I'll get there.

In the daytime, I've also been able to take some long walks along the city and the coast. This is the reason why I came to TLV -- for the vibrancy, the life, the moments in which you can forget that there's a war going on. It's kind of nice to see the beach so quiet. I don't know if that'll ever happen again!

Over the past couple weeks, Israeli apps have been created or updated to feature the nearest bomb shelters. Google Maps does feature some (but not all); however, it has come to my attention that people leave Google Reviews for bomb shelters. Now, that is something that will entertain me the next time I have some downtime in the miklat.

One of my friends asked me which bomb shelter is my favorite, but I'm here to tell you about my least favorite.

During one of the alarms, I was in the guesthouse. One of the ladies who lives in the home above guided me to a miklat in another hotel across the street.

It was 2 PM, but it felt like 2 AM in the shelter. There were mostly locals there, and 100% of the people there didn't want to talk, even when I tried making conversation in Hebrew (which people usually appreciate). We all sat in silence. Uncomfortable silence, for me, at least.

Later, during another alarm around 9 PM, I followed an employee at my guesthouse to that same miklat. As usual, I snapped a few photos upon entering the space. There was a particularly fluffy Pomeranian sitting on a woman's lap. She passed it to another woman, to the lady who had originally shown me this miklat. I approached her and asked to take a photo of the dog. "No," she said. "Just the dog, not you," I tried. "No." Then, she began speaking to me quickly in Hebrew. I didn't understand anything she said, but I got the point.

Immediately, a man in a MAGA hat told me not to take photos of him, either. "You have to ask permission to take pictures. Don't take my picture."

I know my rights as a photographer, but I also know when it's wise to diffuse a situation. I released my camera, raised my hands, said, "Alright, alright, sorry. No problem. No problem," and backed away to the corner a meter away in the small miklat, deciding immediately to not go there again.

I fumbled with the buttons on my camera as I heard them complaining about me in Hebrew. It was one of those moments when I was glad I don't understand Hebrew. It was probably better not to know what they were saying.

It was also a fortifying moment for me.

War is stressful. We all experience it and express it in different ways. In that miklat, the mood was cold. I don't blame anyone for their behaviors there. I understand how my camera could have triggered their discomfort.

My Hebrew teacher joked with me about it afterward (since that missile had interrupted our online class). "Maybe the MAGA hat guy is cheating on his wife with someone in the miklat and doesn't want to get caught," he suggested. "Or maybe he killed someone and doesn't want a Netflix documentary about him. Maybe there's a Holocaust survivor in there who thinks you look like Eichmann."

We concluded that Hebrew class by learning war vocabulary and swear words. Not what you usually learn in A1 level but important nonetheless.

When the next alert came shortly after that 9 PM one, I went to my favorite miklat, the staff break room at the Tal Hotel.

How did this experience fortify me? I have a choice to make: to do photography or not. Every single time there's an alarm, I grab my camera and take at least one picture. Every day, I try to journal about what I experienced and/or what I felt.

I'm not a person who likes to make waves with others. I like social comfort and complacency. I like to please people and smooth things over. I'm great at diffusing situations and empathizing.

But I feel a great sense of purpose: to document all of this. To tell the stories. We are living history now. These are moments we will recount to our children and grand-children. We are living in times that are being reported by news sources that know nothing of what it's like for the people living in Israel, who know nothing of the bits of humanity and hope and beauty that prevail during this war.

So, if I must choose between living a comfortable life in which I cater to everyone else's comforts or a life in which I share the truth through my art during a historic time, then...I choose my camera. Every time.

Plus, in the Tal Hotel miklat, I find that people are usually more curious about my camera than wary of it.

Day 3 in TLV

Dan was feeling a need to get out of TLV and to take the girls (his dogs) to an open field. He invited me along, and on the way to pick me up, he happened across a sick pigeon. Thus, a new mission was born.

There's an incredible animal hospital that takes pride in helping any injured animal, even your common pigeon. It was founded on the idea that everyone deserves help and life. The facility is called For the Wildlife, and I will be certainly writing about it more in depth in a later post. That is where we went with our poor, sick pigeon. Immediately upon entering, a staff member took the bird out of the box, gave it a physical inspection, covered its body with a white powder, and checked it in for a proper visit to the vet. (Later that day, the vet sent us an update on the pigeon's diagnosis and condition, and the following day, we received a text that the pigeon was well and being released back to the wild.)

While we were there, a young girl, the daughter of one of the staff members, offered us a tour. All around the premises were dogs, birds of all sorts, turtles, and countless hedgehogs.

Hedgehogs are native to Israel and had been brought to the vet from all around the country. Most of them in the hospital were suffering of scurvy. They were kept in large, plastic containers, with a little hideaway inside and a helping of fresh fruit and veggies. Before we left, the staff offered for us to release a couple hedgehogs that had finished their rehabilitation and were ready to return to nature. We received a few instructions on where and where not to release them, and off we went. We found a field near a stream in the middle of nowhere. Dan led his dogs away from the field while I coaxed the hedgehogs out of the box. (That's me in the picture, holding a hedgehog box.) It was an incredibly rewarding experience. Now, the hedgehogs are happy and healthy back in the wild.

Iran was kind enough to hold off sending missiles until the hedgehogs were released. The next alarm came while we were driving back to TLV. We opened Waze's new function for finding the nearest miklat, pulled over, and joined a bunch of other dogs and humans downstairs in the shelter.

I haven't been a pet owner for a long time. There's a wonderful amount of communication that happened between Dan and the other dog owners in the miklat to keep everyone comfortable and chill, with lots of continuous encouragement of the dogs to relax amidst the sounds of air sirens. I will say...the children were better behaved.

The next bomb shelter I would run into later would be a bedroom tucked into the kitchen of a cafe.

Do you remember the difference -- is this a mamad or a miklat? If you guessed mamad, you got it right! Kol HaKavod (good job)! You win one night of uninterrupted sleep!

I'm not sure why someone is living in the cafe kitchen, but during wartime, you get jealous of literally any bedroom/bomb shelter combo. (You can rent/sublet apartments with a mamad, but the prices have gone up outrageously!)

In this mamad, there was a political news program playing on the TV. I almost would've preferred running into the missile fire haha. Every so often, the news alternated to the map showing the parts of Israel under threat of missiles.

It was around this time that I was dreaming of a European vacation I'd booked months ago, wondering what would happen with my flights. Until just a few days before the flight, I hadn't received any word, and I thought, Maybe no news is good news?

But bad news came, and my flight did indeed get canceled.

It is well known that non-Israeli airlines are skittish. (They canceled my late August flight to Israel last year immediately after the first war with Iran broke out -- in June.) If you want to guarantee a seat on a plane to Israel during wartime, you use an Israeli airline.

With my non-Israeli flight canceled, life posed me a question: How badly do you really want this vacation?

Well, I wanted it pretty badly. And I also tend to take things as a personal challenge when something seems difficult to impossible.

So, I booked another non-Israeli flight that was still selling seats that day. Within 12 hours, that one got canceled, too.

Well, working at Disney for five years, I've learned a thing or two about getting passes onto coveted rides. All those years of learning how to work the FastPass system for Avatar: Flight of Passage had prepared me well. Rule #1: You do not accept defeat. And so, I found and booked an outbound Israeli flight that would be leaving in just a few days.

With the flight booked, I sat in a mix of feelings. Some of them will be hard to understand. I felt FOMO and guilt about leaving Israel at this time. I wanted to stay, to be in solidarity with my people and to continue documenting the war.

I also felt sleep-deprived and vacation-ready. Travel is embedded into my DNA, and besides, getting a couple weeks' break with decent sleep each night was really tempting.

So, I crossed my fingers that I would indeed get on a flight to Europe. And in the meantime, I continued my stay-cation in lovely Tel Aviv.

Day 4 in TLV

Someone tell Duolingo that they chose the wrong icon reminding me to practice Spanish during wartime. Or...maybe it is actually the perfect icon?

There were two alerts last night: an air siren at 2:30 AM and a pre-alert at 5:30 AM.

All night, I dreamt of alarms, running to the shelter, and taking photos of people.

First dream:

I wake up to an alarm, grab my go-bag and camera, and leave my room. As I'm leaving, a couple of older ladies take me under their wing into an underground shelter in the metro. At first, I'm resistant to going with them, but I think of the photo potential; I haven't been in a metro miklat, yet.

As we descend the stairs, suddenly, my mom is there, panicking about the number of missiles that had been launched to Israel. "You lied to me!" she yelled. "You lied about how quiet it was! There have been 200 missiles launched!"

Frustrated, I argue back, "I didn't lie! You're counting the numbers from the north [the rockets Hezbollah has been launching over the northern border]. Those don't reach us in the center!"

The argument continues a bit longer, and I beg for us to please just table this for later and let me go shoot, as there are several incredible scenes ripe for photography already unraveling in front of me, and our argument is attracting too much attention from the subjects I'm trying to shoot. I wanted to yell, "Let me do my job!" But I pause, realizing this is not actually my job, even though I'm taking it upon myself to be.

---

My window in the guesthouse is at street level. The sound of traffic, cars and trucks passing, while I'm sleeping, sounds like fighter planes taking off or missiles whizzing by.

My window is at street level and the sound of traffic, cars passing, while I'm sleeping, sounds like fighter planes taking off or missiles whizzing by.

---

Today is Dad's birthday. After the restless night, I make my way to Dizengoff to treat myself to a good lunch, and then, I video call my parents. We stay on the phone for a couple of hours. Right before the war started, they'd told me, "Michelle, I don't think we're going to make it to visit you in April." So, today, I told them, "If you can't come to Israel, then I'll bring Israel to you." They stayed on a video call with me as I walked them from Dizengoff and along the coast, all the way up to my guesthouse in the Old North.

Somewhere along the northern stretch of the beach, "we" passed a couple white vans decked out in Israeli flags. A man in a motorized scooter was descending on a platform from the van. As I walked by, I noticed a colorful parrot in the van. Not believing my eyes, I circled back to check. Indeed, there was Ya'akov and his parrot, Nono. I asked Ya'akov if I could take a photo, and he declined a photo of himself but held out Nono for me to photograph. Then, he placed Nono on my hand. "Get my picture!" I urged my parents. Then, I returned Nono and made light conversation with Ya'akov. A few moments later, the man lit up a joint, and the man and bird duo scooted off along the Tayelet, an Israeli flag waving from the back of the scooter.

Day 5 in TLV

We had an overnight alarm at 2 AM. Instead of running to the hotel miklat, I went to the stairwell across the street. A young couple came in and left after only a few minutes' wait. I waited 10 minutes and returned to the guesthouse. I barely remember this. It feels like it never happened.

I returned to bed and slept until my alarm around 8 AM, but then, I snoozed it for 9 AM. I hopped out of bed and went for a run. The GPS conked out on part of the route, and Strava got really excited, thinking I was breaking world-record PRs. Nope, just GPS scrambles.

In the middle of the run, I got a pre-alert. Thankfully, it's not too loud through the headphones, but an Amber Alert sound is always jarring. I was in the middle of nowhere, sandwiched between a beach and a field of construction. I could feel the cortisol and adrenaline in my body as I continued running straight, noticing some structures ahead of me that would, hopefully, have a miklat. Remember: a pre-alert means you have four to seven minutes to find shelter before the air raid sirens begin (which give you 90 seconds).

You know that feeling when you need to run in a nightmare, and you have to push harder, like run-wading through molasses? The chemical release in my body felt like it was slowing my run. Or maybe I was just running uphill.

I watched a guy with a dog branch to the right at a fork in the path. An elder man just settled onto a rock to watch the beach. I continued straight, toward the established beach space with the shack. As soon as I arrived, the air raid sirens started. I plucked my earbud out of my ear and accidentally dropped it into a hole in the ground. Struggling to pick it out of the hole took about 10 seconds. Wiping the sand off it, I noticed several other people around me, and I followed the small crowd into a small room with no windows and an open door. We waited it out in there. Around me were runners, bikers, and surfers. There were a few Russian men talking amongst themselves and an Ethiopian woman on her phone.

Finally, the all-clear came, and we re-emerged and continued with our lives.

Day 6 in TLV

The alarms overnight are beyond annoying now; they are mundane. I wake up to the pre-alert sound the same way that you might wake up to your alarm clock and sleepily hit snooze. But you don't hit snooze to a missile attack alert. You hit the "OK" button thrice. I don't remember waking up, but I come to in a sitting position, with my shoes already on my feet, my feet planted on the floor, and my bag beside me. Was there even a pre-alert? I wonder to myself groggily. Then, my phone flashes with light as the air raid sirens duet between my phone and the public loudspeakers outside. I jump to my feet and run.

I had another nightmare last night.

My brother and I are in our childhood home in Florida. My go-bag was over my shoulders, and our house was on fire.

My go-bag is exactly the one I use in Israel. It has everything I need. But I decided to run upstairs, to my childhood bedroom, to see if I wanted to grab any extra things. Robert had already left the house with nothing on him, not his computer or anything. He hadn't wanted to take anything extra with him; he just wanted to get outside to safety.

I hesitate in my room and then, turn heel and follow my brother outside. "You don't want to take anything with you?" I call to him. It's in that moment that I realize that it's not just my brother who's outside, but also one of our childhood dogs. She had followed him outside. Once again, I turn around, and I run back into the burning house because I figure I'll grab our dog's leash. The lighting inside the house is turning yellow. The fire is spreading downstairs in our entertainment room. Plastics are starting to melt. I quickly pull open the drawer in that room to grab the dog collar and leash and hurry out.

Outside, I realize I haven't called the fire department. Had anyone called? I dial 9-1-1 and ask for the fire department. The operator takes her time to transfer me, but a few moments later, the fire department is on phone.

Then, I wake up (in the dream) and realize that our house is not on fire; I wasn't even there. I had been sleeping. It had all just been an awful nightmare, but here I am, with my phone in my hand, and the fire department on the call with me. It was midnight, and I'd sleep-dialed 9-1-1. "I'm sorry," I tell them. "I had a stress dream about a fire and sleep-dialed you."

---

Back to real life. A mid-day missile attack. I descend into a two-room miklat beneath a playground.

Day 7

Dan and I hung out the day before, and I decided to sleep in his mamad again overnight. It is such a luxury to be able to entirely turn off your phone, ignoring any and all obnoxious sounds, and sleeping in the peace that the missiles can't hurt you and can't even force you out of bed.

In the morning, I prepare for another online class with our 4th graders. Today, they're making chocolate cakes in their kitchens. The mother of one of my soldiers is an officer for Home Front Command, the department that is responsible for keeping civilians safe during emergencies. They are also responsible for the official phone app that warns us of incoming missile and rocket attacks. Our students will be donating the chocolate cakes to those soldiers.

After class, I'm ready to return to my guesthouse on the seaside. The buses are running, but they run less frequently. I decide a Bird scooter will be faster. As soon as I rent it and scoot down a block, a pre-alert screams from my phone.

I sigh, dismount the scooter, and follow a crowd to whatever miklat they're heading to.

We walk for the full time length of time before the air sirens start, descending deeper and deeper underground, following signs -- a mix of painted, spray-painted, and professionally-made signs -- to the miklat/shelter. I'm not even sure if the air raid sirens do indeed come on. I'm more intrigued by wherever we're going.

I've never felt more like I've been immersed into a post-apocalyptic world, following those signs down to nowhere.

Finally, we reach the miklat, way below the Central Bus Station, in a parking garage. Warm, welcoming signs that must have been printed by the municipality (I presume) lead into a world of tents.

The first thing I notice in this tent labyrinth is a table filled with food. A woman is seated in a chair next to it. "Can I take a picture of your store?" I ask her.

She doesn't answer. I ask again. I pause. Still no answer. I ask in Hebrew.

"I speak English," the woman tells me.

"She speaks English," says the man across from us. "I'm speaking English," I say with a laugh. "Can I take a picture of your store?"

"It's not a store," she says, finally.

It hits me. "Oh! It's your kitchen?" I ask.

"Yes."

"Then...can I take a picture of your kitchen? Not you, just the food."

The woman shrugged. She shrugs again when I show her the picture.

I take in my surroundings. Besides the woman's "kitchen," there are collections of books arranged here and there. A boy reads a book in an aisle between tents. Women of all ages sit together in congregations of various types of chairs.

I make conversation with the man across from the "kitchen." He's from Uzbekistan and moved here 45 years ago. He's a musician, and we bond over music talk. Then, I excuse myself to go explore more of this fascinating miklat.

It's a well-documented miklat, Dan later explains to me. I notice all the Asian and African immigrants down there, and I wonder what their life has been like down here during this war. How long do they live in the tents? How do they decide when to sleep in their homes above ground and when to come down here?

You may be wondering why they need to come down here at all. It's the same reason why any of us would need to go to a miklat. These neighborhoods around the Central Station are old and low-income areas. Since most of the buildings had been built long before the threat of rocket fire in Israel, they lack a bomb shelter. Of course, there are plenty of others around, though this one is the closest for many of the neighbors. And considering how long it takes to reach, being so far underground, and considering how many missile attacks we've received overnight during the war, it's only sensible to create a tent community in a bomb shelter.

As I wander to the opposite side of the shelter, a couple girls approach me and ask, "Ze-u?" ("It's done?") I automatically answer in English. Oops. They say it's ok; they speak English. Noticing the Masa long on my backpack, they tell me that they're also on a Masa program, volunteering with Magen David Adom (Israel's emergency/ambulance service) in Jerusalem. Jerusalem is a much quieter place, missile-wise, than Tel Aviv. They're on their way back there after a quick day trip to TLV. I show them the way out, and we ascend through all the flights of stairs and escalators to the exit to the buses.

A little while later, I find another Bird scooter and make my way back to the guesthouse.

---

Another alarm. Another miklat. This time, near another hotel by the beach. Three women dressed for a wintry beach day come down to the miklat in all smiles, wearing sunglasses and holding glasses of wine. "You brought the party!" I told them. They insist that I drink some of their wine.

Time is blurry. What time is it? What day? All the memories and days blur together without a sense of routine.

The following are memories that I can't remember where to put on the timeline of this week.

Sometime in the middle of the night, another alarm. I am in the Tal Hotel break room again.

One evening, my program director gave me a call regarding my upcoming trip abroad to discuss a waiver I'd need to sign -- for formality, he said. However, I needed to be aware of the risks that come with going abroad during war -- namely, the difficulties there could be in returning, and the consequences that would have on me receiving my stipend. The uncertainty in flights coming and going cannot be overstated, and though there are land crosses at the borders of Jordan and Egypt, those come with inherent risks, as well. Regardless of everything, he assured me he would do everything he could to support me. I was one of the few taking the opportunity to get out during Passover vacation, and he wished me luck.

---

I think it was Day 2 when my friend, Maor, came to visit me in TLV. He had scrounged up an old camera, so we embarked on a photo walk through one of TLV's most picturesque neighborhoods, Neve Tzedek, and then, of course, toward the beach. 

On the way to the beach, an ambulance passed by. Maor pointed out that the emergency vehicle sirens are different during wartime because the usual vehicle sirens sound like air raid sirens. Now, they sound more similar to European emergency vehicles.

Friday in TLV (The last day of my stay-cation)

All I know is that I finally got eight hours of sleep overnight. Was there an alert in the middle? And if there was, did I go outside for it? If there was a pre-alert, no, I definitely stayed in bed. But if there was an air raid siren, I definitely would have exited the building. I don't remember. The focus is just on checking out by 10 AM.

Around 8 AM, there they were -- the air raid sirens. I went to the Tal Hotel staff break room and said goodbye to the few people and dogs I'd met there. I spoke with Ayelet (golden Hilda's mom) and told her that it seemed I'd be flying to Lithuania soon. She told me that that's where her family is from. She'd just gotten citizenship but hasn't been.

All clear. We exit. I check out and head to Shuk HaCarmel for a photo stroll and lunch.

I've never seen the shuk so empty during the daytime. I almost didn't recognize it! The only time it is ever this empty is during weekdays (the weekend in Israel is Friday to Saturday) and at night. Perhaps it's becuse of the alerts we'd gotten throughout the morning that it's so empty? The stalls are all open. Around noon, it begins to fill up with more people.

In my time wandering, there comes one alert. It's unsettling to not know where the nearest miklat is, but there are sure to be many around. All you have to do is follow the crowd.

Even when the pre-alert message came in, there were large groups of people sitting at the cafes and bars. One particular group had been singing and enjoying life while drinking out on a terrace. When the pre-alert screeched from our phones, they just began singing a little more rowdily and dancing in their seats.

My usual at the market is Thai food. It was the only time I've ever been the only person eating there at that restaurant. Usually, you're nearly rubbing elbows with the people around you, and sometimes, you even have to wait for a seat to be available.

With the unusual silence, I was able to make more conversation with my friends there.

"All anyone talks about is the war and when it will end," my Thai friend told me.

We got to talking about her family. She joked, "I can't sleep at night, between the missile alerts and my mom calling me."

"I don't know which one is worse," I joked back.

When I went to pay, one of my other friends there made me a few paper cranes out of receipt paper. I loved this gift so much. I laughed and said they look like a little family. "Ima [אמא] and baby," he said with a laugh. Then, he made a turtle that he himself kept. I carefully placed the cranes in my go-bag.

My last alarm in TLV was between the shuk and beach. The biggest crowd I've seen yet was waiting outside the miklat, an underground parking garage. Once the air raid sirens began, we all flooded underground. I was surprised to see how established life in this miklat was. This must be the public miklat for the neighboring apartments.

A few hours later, my friend picked me up from TLV and drove me back to Rishon LeZion. How strange to be back after a week. Had it only been a week?

We hadn't seen each other since two weeks before the war. I remember what he had said the last time we saw each other. "I don't think there will be a war," he'd predicted. "And if there is, it'll be really short." He'd guessed no politician would want war and spoke of how it would be bad for both Israel and Iran. He'd expected a quick skirmish, and then, done. Now, his business has been closed for three weeks.

Before he left, around 9 PM, finally, an alarm. We headed down into the nearest miklat in one of my neighboring apartments. A group of people played some sort of word game until the all clear binged on our phones.

Day 8 -- Ben Gurion Airport

Perhaps there were one or two alarms between the one last night and my flight. One of the missile bomblets had landed close to my neighborhood, creating a large crater in the concrete. Thankfully, no one had gotten hurt.

The airport was incredibly quiet. I don't imagine I'll ever see an airport void of people like that ever again. It's strange. I looked at it and realized it's just a building. A building built on systems. And without those systems, it's nothing.

The systems were crossed now. Check-in was done at arrivals. There were corrals for us at every point. The "shelter" signs glared at us. On the way to the gates, I saw US Air Force planes parked at gates where there should've been commercial airplanes.

We were corralled at the food court. Shortly before boarding began, we were released from the food court to the gate. As we boarded, the rain stared. Our plane circled around the runway for a while. My blood felt tense. When would we take off? What if we couldn't take off? What would happen if there were a missile now? Breathe.

A girl from the UK sat next to me. She had bought her ticket yesterday. Her sister was living in Dubai and would be giving birth soon. She was on her way to see family and then to see her sister. She shared that she had done a Masa internship a while back. So had the Dutch girl in front of us. We talked about making aliyah. And as my friend at the Thai restaurant had pointed out, all conversations lead to the war. We talked about our lack of sleep and how much we looked forward to sleeping without interruption. We predicted that it would take time for our nervous systems to come to normalcy.

"It's amazing how we adapt," said the British girl.

It reminded me of the conversation I'd had with my Gett (taxi) driver that morning, about how we adapt to anything, even missile fire. "At this point, it's like having a mosquito in your room at night. Annoying," he'd said.

It reminded me of how I've joked about the Iron Dome system. "Get it!" I'd yelled at the sky amidst the booms of missile interceptions overhead. "Get it! Kill it!"

The Dutch girl daydreamed about returning to a cafe she likes in her neighborhood in Amsterdam.

The jets finally began to rumble. Our tiny plane vibrated with the jets, the rain beginning to accelerate off the windows, and the wheels lifting from Eretz Israel, which began to look smaller and smaller below us.