Passover Break Writing Exercise

High Point 

This Passover break has been one of the best that I have experienced up until this point. I had the opportunity to travel Europe both with my parents and my friends. I visited Paris, Rome, Florence, Tuscany, Pisa (briefly only in the airport) and London. It is really hard to choose one moment or day or place that was truly my the high point of this vacation. It was all spectacular. It made me realize how blessed I am to have these opportunities. It was really special traveling with my parents, but I also really enjoyed traveling and exploring with friends. It made me realize how capable and independent I am, organizing activities and making different plans on my own. I enjoyed getting to visit cities in which I had friends studying. It was special to have my close friends be my tour guide and show me around their “home” for the past few months. So overall I had an amazing trip. It is too hard to pick one high point so I am going to briefly give my high point from each place that I visited. My trip began in Paris, the city of lights and the city of love. My time spent in Paris was with both my parents and two other couples that they are good friends with. This was both my father and I’s first time in Paris, so I thought that was really special to experience it together. Overall, aside from museums, touring, shopping and eating spectacular food, my high point from my time in Paris was a dinner cruise we did our first evening. We got on a boat that was parked across from the Eiffel tower around 7:30 pm, we picked what we were having for dinner off the pre-set menu, and then we were on our way. The 8 course meal with wine pairings was spectacular, but the views of the city that we got from the water was extraordinary. My next stop was Rome and there it was just my om and me. We had the best time. We drank fabulous wine, saw countless beautiful and impressively preserved historic sights, we ate delicious food, shopped some and laughed until our bellies hurt. This was the first time my mom and I had been on a trip together just the two of us so it really was something special. So I think just exploring and spending one on one time with my mom was the highlight of that part. As for Florence, Florence was amazing. A beautiful city, small but with tons of great history. However, my high point from my time in Florence actually took place outside of Florence, when my friend and I spent an afternoon at Feragamos Il Borro estate touring the wine cellars and doing a wine tasting. We learned a lot, the views were spectacular and we had great fun. As for London, what a great city. It was nice to have a taste of reality and a big city with people speaking English before returning to Tel Aviv. We had a great time in London, however my high point for London was most definitely going to see Mama Mia live on our last night. It was so much fun, the entire audience was singing and dancing in their seats the entire show. However, the trip as a whole could be seen as my ‘high point’ it was a spectacular experience that I will never forget. 

Low Point

Majority of my trip was amazing, how could one complain while traveling around Europe and eating great food, drinking great wine, and spending time with great company? Well there was one mishap that is most definitely the ‘low point’ of my Passover Vacation. On Saturday April 20^th, my friend Alex and I were traveling from Florence to London. We had booked our flights months in advance. We were taking a 2:10 flight out of the Florence airport which was 20 minutes from our hotel, and we were scheduled to land in London at 3:30. If only it happened like that. We got to the airport with plenty of time to spare, we even figured out that there was a short line to go in if you had already checked in online, just to drop our baggage. We zipped through security, got some water and snacks and then we sat down. Finally we were called to the gate, we got in line to go through border control where our passports were stamped with a “Firenze” stamp. We then sat in the boarding area and it was 2:30 and nothing had happened. No announcements, no one was boarding the plane, nothing. Hours went by and the gate agents kept saying there’s weather, well update you soon. 3 hours later they make an announcement that due to strong winds there is a weight capacity for the plane to fly at. So 43 people will be kicked off. They read a list of names and said go to gate 8. Inevitably Alex and I were sent to gate 8. We got in another line, with no explanation, got a big X through our “Firenze” stamp in our passports, were put on a bus, taken to baggage claim, and then we were sent upstairs back to the check in desk to figure out next steps. There was one man, trying to assist and redirect 43 people, the line was not moving and we needed to get to London. So I decided to befriend those in line near me. As it turns out there was a nice couple from the UAE who was going to London and also impatient like Alex and I. We all impulsively decided to book another flight out of the Pisa airport which was an hour away. We got in a cab with our new friends, we chatted our whole way to Pisa. They gave us restaurant recommendations for London and we all laughed a lot about the miserable day we were having. After hours of travel and sitting in waiting in airports we finally made it to London around midnight that day. While it all worked out in the end, and looking back on it we can laugh now, it was the most miserable experience while it was happening.