Delta Flight 468

I thought it was rather clever of me to procure seat 44D – in the bulkhead row, adjacent to the emergency exit door, as the vast expanse of leg room would allow me to stretch out and get a good sleep on the overnight flight.  However, it was no more than ½ hour into the flight when the open space became filled with men davening Maariv.  As I attempted to doze, my size 12 feet became unintentional targets.  Shortly after, flight attendants pushing food carts made their way past the daveners and negotiated their trays among excited, chatting Birthrighters and mothers walking sleepy toddlers up and down the aisles. For many, it wasn’t a matter of kosher food or not, but whose kashruth supervision or whether any kosher selections offered by Delta met sufficiently high standards of kashruth.

Nine hours into the flight, as the sun began to rise over the sky to the east, men began perusing the aisles whispering “Shacharit, Shacharit.  It didn’t take long before a minyan was formed in the tight space behind the bathroom that links the two sides of the plane.  The Tallises donned and tefillin were wrapped, the muttering of the morning prayers began just as the breakfast service began.  Exasperated flight attendants pleaded with the worshipers to find their seats to allow room for the cumbersome food carts.  But one does not stop the Shemoneh Esrai once it has begun and the minyan continued undeterred in the face of increasingly exasperated and strident flight attendants.  It was at 40,000 feet or so, a wonderful mini documentary on faith and devotion in the context of modern society. 

Twinkling lights appeared in the distance. The flight descended in the dark sky over Tel Aviv. The wheels touched the ground.  The passengers applauded.  Slowly, with babies, hat boxes, knapsacks and rolling luggage in hand, we all deplaned to traverse the seeming endless series of corridors and ramps at Ben Gurion Airport that is so metaphorical of our collective journey. Duly interviewed, passport stamped and luggage collected we stepped, at long last, into the cool night air of Israel.

No one would ever confuse a flight to Israel with any other airline itinerary.  The daveners, the hatboxes, the array of Shadels; handsome young men in knitted kipot headed to study in yeshivot, young children toddling down the aisles; Birthrighters taking selfies.  But of course the flight to Tel Aviv is not like any other journey. Because no matter where they came from, and no matter where their return flight will take them, the majority of passengers on Delta flight 468 to Tel Aviv were going home.