When Traveling Is Taboo

By: Sarah Saltzman

In 1998 alone, there were 24,537,600 crimes committed in the United States according to Heritage, a public policy research institute. If you were a parent from outside of the United States and you read that statistic, would you let your child visit the U.S.?

Over winter break, I am going to Israel for ten days, free of charge through the organization Taglit-Birthright Israel. The organization awards this free gift to young adults who practice Judaism, primarily between the ages of 18-26 “in order to diminish the growing division between Israel and Jewish communities around the world, to strengthen the sense of solidarity among world Jewry and to strengthen participants' personal Jewish identity and connection to the Jewish people,” according to birthrightisrael.com. The only money I will spend traveling to the Middle East is on the plane ticket that takes me to New York that will fly me out to Israel and on souvenirs. Everything else, including food and hotels and the round trip to Israel is covered completely.

I applied to go on this program two times before actually getting accepted. When I told my dad that I finally got accepted, he was thrilled for me. When I told my mom, all she said was “Oh, no.” Instead of pushing me to study abroad in college, my parents have pushed me to remain in the United States, saying it is unnecessary to travel outside of the country for long periods of time because of all the dangers of drugs, crime, etc. When I first asked them both about studying abroad, they had just seen the movie “Taken” about a girl who travels outside of the U.S. and is forced into the realm of drugs, sex and slave trade. Perfect, I thought. That movie touches on everything they have warned me about. On top of that, a close friend of mine died studying in Singapore earlier in the year. So of course, the response I received from my parents about studying “abroad” for a semester was to go to California. Great.

When I got accepted to the Israel program, I was happy to know at least my dad was on board. I figured he could calm my mom down eventually. It’s funny because you would think that because my parents are so against studying abroad that they would obviously have a much bigger problem with me going to the Middle East over Europe. Wrong. I just informed my parents I have applied to study abroad in Europe for the summer and they are very upset with me. Much more than my mom was about me traveling to Israel. Because of the amount of people my parents know that have gone on this Israeli birthright trip, it makes traveling to Israel a little more legit in their minds.

Most of my friends have gone to Israel for this free ten day trip and no one even questions the dangers of venturing into the Middle East, especially as a Jew. I had friends on this trip when there was bombing in Jerusalem that still had an amazing time. But when I tell my friends that aren’t Jewish about going to Israel, they ask me, “Why?” and “Is it safe?” It seems taboo to venture into a region where the Jewish faith is persecuted in some countries. But today, it’s really not as taboo as it maybe was in the past. Today, cultures are being fused. People are modifying religions to fit their personal needs. It’s almost like the evolving definition of vegetarianism. Some people say they are vegetarian but still eat fish. Others say they still eat chicken. The point is, people are modifying their faiths and eventually, there could be so much diversity, that there will be no religious difference in the Middle East. Until then, conflict will always exist.

Nowhere in the world is entirely safe from crime. However, I am pretty confident when I say that the dangers of visiting Israel are no more if not less prominent than the dangers of visiting the United States. After working at a camp with international staff from Israel, I learned a little about the Israeli culture through some of the friends I made while working there. They all said the same things; Israel is not unsafe. The conflicts that have been going on in the Middle East have been occurring for centuries.

As an anthropology and journalism major, I want to travel. I want to see places, visit my international friends and meet people different from me so I can understand the various cultures of the world. As for my parents, they will have to stop their worrying and heed to my words of wisdom this time. Sitting on the couch and watching crime on the news is not a way to live your life. Perhaps less crime would exist if more people actually got off their couches and did something about it.