Goodbye Israel!

Today was the final day at the University. We still had a full day of lectures and they were all fantastic. I have to write again about the calibre of the Professors that are lecturing us. They are all world class in their fields and it is so amazing that Gandel Philanthropy and Yad Vashem has given us this opportunity to come to Israel and learn from these people and experience the country for 3 weeks. We had lectures today on Muslim Antisemitism and the Global Jihad, Current Issues in Holocaust Education in an Age of Genocide, Prosecuting Nazi War Criminals and The World after Auschwitz. It was such interesting content. We then had a final debrief before piling back on to the bus and returning to the hotel.

My day started well. When I first arrived my first breakfast was waffles with maple syrup. I had never eaten waffles before but they never made a reappearance after that. I had the same thing every morning from then on, plain yoghurt, grated apple and granola and a cup of tea. Every now and then I asked the chef who made the omelettes if there would be waffles again and he always said 'no'. This morning I got to breakfast at 6.30am with the early crew and made my yoghurt and cup of tea and then, low and behold, the chef brought me a big plate of waffles with maple syrup. I was so happy that my friend had to take a photo because she had never seen such a happy face in the morning. Then to top it off my Mum and Dad rang me :)

At school today I went for a work along the Avenue of the Righteous and took a photo of the tree that Oskar Schindler and his wife Emily planted in 1962.

The next photo is one of the tree planted to commemorate another Righteous Gentile, Raoul Wallenberg. Wallenberg was a Swedish architect, businessman , diplomat and humanitarian who saved tens of thousands of Jews in Nazi-occupied Hungary during the Holocaust from the Nazis. I included this photo because my scholarship was awarded in the name of Raoul Wallenberg.

Following are just a few photos of the University that has practically been my home for the last 3 weeks. It is an amazing place.

We all met in the dining room tonight to have a quick dinner together and then out to the mezzanine to have a farewell drink before we all head in different directions tomorrow. Some of us heading home and others continuing travels before school goes back. Below is a photo of Tess, Barb and myself, three members of the 10 strong Melbourne crew. As you can see a stubby of Israeli beer is about as big as my head.

Tomorrow several of us leave the hotel at 8am to head to the airport. We are all on the same Cathay flight out so I will have plenty of company at the airport.