Going to Israel

Going to Israel does not feel real. Sure, I’ve gotten emails about the trip and the flight is booked and I have an internship ready to go, but it does not seem concrete. If I got a phone call saying I will be in Cincinnati for the rest of the summer that would seem reasonable. What am I even doing in the Middle East anyway? That’s a question I have gotten a lot and still have trouble answering.

When I tell people I’m going over to Israel for the summer, I’ll usually get an incredulous look followed by an “Are you sure you’ll be safe?” The quick answer is yes. The long answer is yyyyyyeeeeeessssss. I’m staying in an apartment in Tel Aviv with a guided trip. Even when wars kick up Tel Aviv has stayed safe. Plenty of people have done the same thing I have. It’s safe. I’ll be fine. I promise. Plus, my dude John Kerry is making sure that Iran can’t throw a nuke at my face or anything while I’m there.

Three summers ago I was over in the Holy Land for a youth group trip, but this time it will be a lot different. Last time I was just traveling around with no real responsibility. This time I’ll have to put on fancy clothes and go to work and pretend I am an adult. It’ll be at a newswire called NewsHound (think a smaller version of Reuters) and I am incredibly excited. I have experience as a journalist on a local scale, but I feel ready to cover the big boy events.

Besides not wanting to work as a camp counselor again, I think the main reason I am going is to see if the dream I had when I was 14 is still worth pursuing.

About five years ago I watched a report on NBC Nightly News where Brian Williams threw it to a correspondent in the Middle East (I forget where exactly).  He was reporting from behind this large  metal sheet. It could have been a downed airplane. He shouted about the situation with pounding rocket fire in the background and soldiers poking their rifles on the sides of the cover.

That’s when I figured out that if I became a journalist I would not want to just be a suit behind a desk. I wanted to tell the real story.

This trip over, I’m not doing anything dangerous; I’m not going into the West Bank or Gaza or Syria. That’s part of the agreement of going over there. Plus, I promised my mom that I would not.  I am excited though to get a taste of one of my dreams.

I became disillusioned with journalism for awhile. In fact, I still might be. I became afraid of the average salary. I became afraid that I would truly, truly commit myself to it and not love it anymore and be stuck. I became afraid that I would end up just reporting on things like traffic in St. Louis, high school football in Cincinnati, or local theater in Topeka. I am terrified of becoming boring.

Hopefully, this trip will help me decide if journalism is a path I want to commit myself to again.  We will see.