By Maya Shimony

To start our day, Etgar 36 took the BART (San Francisco Public Transportation) to Berkeley where we met with the Jewish Partisans Education Project. Daniel Riff, an alum of the 2004 summer trip, set up this program for us. We learned about leadership by hearing the stories …

By Liz Rosenberg

After an early morning wake up, we were all ready for a day of beautiful weather, lots of walking, and of course, public transportation. Our first stop of the day was with Global Exchange, where we learned about the organization’s attempts and successes at eliminating social injustice.…

By Jared Hinds

Today was yet another great day. We were on the road at 10 AM and we drove into South Central Los Angeles. This area is one of the poorer sections in Los Angeles. As we drove through the area, I noticed that South Central has not really …

By Aaron McCausland

In the morning, we spoke as a group about the different sides of the immigration issue. When we arrived in Los Angeles, I felt more at home than I have in any other city on the trip. All the people, areas and beaches reminded me of my …

By Adam Singer

We pull into Las Vegas where it is 114 degrees. This is the place that Bugsy Siegel, Meyer Lansky and other Jewish gangsters had an idea of turning this piece of desert into an oasis for hedonism.

Our first item of business when we get to Las …

By Dylan Sykes

We woke up at 9 AM and went to the Grand Canyon which was about 2 hours away. After having lunch we finally got to see the awesomeness of the Grand Canyon. We were on the North Rim and the views were spectacular.

We went on a …

By Leah Berryhill

Today, we woke up in Salt Lake City and drove to our destination, Zion National Park. On the way, we stopped for lunch and then made it to the beautiful park. When we arrived we filled up our water bottles and set out for a small hike.…

By Dave Goodman

We arrived at the Salt Lake City JCC around 8:30 AM after our overnight ride from Denver. For the next 3 hours we were able to relax, eat, shower and use the gym. It felt great to work out and exercise.

We then went downtown and had …

By Haley Leibovitz

We started our celebration of our nation’s birthday by being able to sleep in late. We then went to Littleton, Colorado where we stopped at Columbine High School. This is the location of the major school shooting in 1999. It was a very powerful experience for us …

By Shira Underberger

Our first stop was supposed to be a meeting with Blue Cross/Blue Shield to discuss their response to the new Michael Moore movie “Sicko” and the issue of universal healthcare vs. private healthcare. However, when we got there Billy was told we would not be able to …