My Hospitality Obsession

Hello. My name is IsraeliMom and I’m a hospitaliholic.

Nothing to do with hospitals, mind, just with my tendency to invite people to come and stay with us. I am weird that way – I meet people online, via emails, forums, twitter, you name it, and if they show any interest whatsoever, I immediately ask them over for coffee, a meal, a tour of the country and just getting to know each other. I do it in person too btw. And we’re also members of the hospitality club and have had quite a few visitors from there as well.

It is very rewarding for me, getting to know new people, from different places of the world, and different walks of life. Each one of our guests has been a delight to host and has left us with a positive experience, be it good conversation, a shared meal, nice memories from an interesting hike or an everlasting friendship (or all of the above!). Looking back, it’s nice to see just how varied our guests have been: the 80 year young man from the US who I have talked into visiting Israel for the first time and has turned into a lifetime family friend; a lovely family from S. Korea we met at MacDonald’s in the upper Galilee and hooked up with for 2 weeks of great comradeship; the Egyptian journalist with whom we’ve shared wine, friendship and evenings of challenging political debates; the Canadian and New Zealand yachting couples who spent an evening by the bonfire and a morning of breakfast under our oak trees; the Argentinian cycler who spent the night here while crossing across Israel on his bicycle; the American priest whom I’ve met on a peace workshop and had the pleasure of taking on a tour of the Galilee and Golan; the fascinating young Mormon who passed through Israel on his way from Egypt back home; and more recently, the young IDF soldier from Washington DC and the seasoned traveler working in the West Bank (both of whom I met on Twitter).

It’s not the full list either. Writing it now, I regret not having some kind of a guestbook. I think I may just start one – as I am sure the list will just grow longer in the future (already looking forward to meeting two new friends from Twitter – a young artist from Berlin and a heap young man from LA!)

And if you’re wondering about the timing of this post, the trigger is a new contest hosted by a Jewish organization called “We Do Care”. The contest itself is Twitter-based and consists of spreading the love of hospitality via tweets. You can read the rules here. All you need is a Twitter account and a willingness to open your heart to others and you too can be the winner of a fab vacation in Italy!

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