My Unexpected Day at The Red-Zone

Going to Sderot today, I already came with preconceptions of what it will be and consist of. I have heard that it is one of the most targeted cities in Israel since it is closest to the Gaza Strip. I imagined that the city will be spotted with rocket craters and rubble everywhere, but the exact opposite was true. The Israeli government is so caring for their citizens that they don’t want tragedies to affect their lives. After a rocket falls within their borders, they immediately send out a team to clean up the mess and fix any damages that occurs. This really spoke to me because it shows that the Israeli are so optimistic and set their minds in the future that they want the best for their children. They don’t want to have their kids being harmed or traumatized beyond what they need to so they make the situation as pleasant as possible. Not that I am saying that this is anything to be happy about, people are in constant threat of death and no one should go through that. But it’s beautiful to see that they handle the situation with the most maturity compared with anyone or government that I could think of.

                One thing that really hit it hard on me was hearing how routine the rockets fell on them and how it impacted the children. When I heard that an Israeli boy turned down the opportunity to live any other place in the world instead of Sderot solely on the reason that he knows that nowhere else in the world offers the quantity bomb shelters like his home town really shows how the situation affects their lives. Essentially he believes that this rocket fire is so normal that it happens all around the world and that there is nothing abnormal of this situation. It’s scary to think that these kids are growing up with the tragedy that is happened to them and how it will affect them in the long-run. But as I said before the government tries extremely hard to make everyone’s life as normal as possible, and we can clearly see that with the parks they make for the children. Half of the park was bomb shelters, but they disguised them as gigantic caterpillars and other fun objects so they can play in and let their imagination flourish even with the unfortunate situation. Life in Sderot is something that I never have seen before, combining the worst of situations plus the best mentality and handling of the situation.