Shalom! Hello! My name is Rachel. I’m 24 years old and I’m originally from Boston, Massachusetts. I’m almost finished with my degree in biology at the University of Massachusetts at Amherst, and before I graduated I wanted to complete an internship experience. I absolutely love traveling, so interning internationally seemed like a natural fit for me. That search brought me to Tel Aviv, Israel, where there is a booming high-tech and biology research scene.
I have visited Israel a handful of times before this trip and every time I love it more. I speak Hebrew, which makes it feel very close even though it's all the way in the Middle East. Tel Aviv, the city where I’m living, is very vibrant and modern. It sits on the coast of the Mediterranean Sea, so people spend a lot of time outside enjoying the beach or surfing. My apartment is in a neighborhood called Florentin, which is a hip area of the city that people compare to Brooklyn in New York.
This opportunity to share Israel with all of you is truly exciting for me because I find that the impressions people have from watching the news or imagining a Middle Eastern country aren’t always accurate. Camels and deserts come to mind, but instead, it is a country full of skyscrapers, national parks, yoga studios and most of the other things we enjoy at home in the United States.
