Hi Habonim Dror people of the world, I’m Brooke from HDOZ!

I made aliyah in March this year and have since been living in the best city in the world - Hadera. I live in garin Tof Miriam with 7 of my friends and movement partners, and I’m lucky enough to be a part of ma’agal Alumot which are such a sweet group of tzabarim and other olim. Right now the main thing I do day-to-day is Ulpan (Hebrew classes). It’s really cool to gradually be understanding more, being able to better communicate with people and feel more at home. At the same time I still have so so much more to learn, which is often really overwhelming and frustrating. My class is such a cute group of people who have been really interesting to get to know almost every day, especially seeing as their backgrounds are so different from mine. We have one Australian (me), one Kiwi (Noah from HDANZ), an Argentinian and the rest of the class is from Russia and Ukraine. 

Other than Ulpan I’ve been spending plenty of time at the beach, travelling almost every Friday to Pardes Hanna and doing day trips around the country when possible. Living in a garin has been so important for me in this whole experience, it makes life so much more fun when you’re living with friends and even more meaningful when you experience garin together. Living in a house with 8 people who all make mess and have opinions definitely isn’t always a walk in the park, and sleeping in a bunk bed at age 23 is a bit odd, but overall it’s been so worth it for me.

We have some people leaving and some people joining over the next few months, a big time of change for our garin that we’ve been preparing for. I’m definitely so sad to say goodbye to some of my closest friends, but I’m also excited to welcome new people into my life and see what energy they bring to the garin! 

Looking forward to watching my garin develop, and to learn more about myself, about Israel and hopefully being really good at Hebrew one day :)