A smile is all it took – along with sincerely kind words.
It was on a Motzaei Shabbos flight on an El Al airplane headed to Eretz Yisrael for Yom Kippur and Sukkos. I sat down and noticed a not-yet frum Israeli woman in the seat to my right. Her demeanor and expression spoke volumes; she was not in the least bit excited for me, a visibly proud frum girl, to be sitting next to her. She also seemed very unpleased to be on a flight that was almost 100 percent haredi Jews. On a long flight seatmates impact the appeal of the journey. In addition, we had to interact at least somewhat because we shared an armrest. No time to think, I had to act in preventing an even longer 10 hour flight.
I gathered my courage and timidly began a friendly conversation about the armrest. Thankfully, she saw I was friendly and readily accepted my invitation to shmooze. During that conversation, I gained insight into her religious outlook, mindset and way of life. A couple of years prior, she lived in the States and loved it there; she was unhappy to return to Israel. She said that she has been traveling a whole day. (My heart sank because she didn’t understand the sanctity of Shabbos; still I knew to listen and kept quiet.) She also shared with me her negativity toward El Al; overall my seatmate was not too happy, to say the least.
My new friend was returning in time for Yom Kippur because of her parents’ wishes. She also said, “You will not like to hear what I do on Yom Kippur: I go biking.” I understood that although she grew up in Eretz Yisrael, she was misguided and knew almost nothing of true hashkafic importance about Yiddishkeit. Granted she spoke a fluent Hebrew language as a native Israeli, but she did not even know or understand lashon kodesh.
After listening and not saying a word, I responded with a piece of my life. I articulated my excitement about going to Israel; grateful awareness every single time I go and so humbled at the opportunity. I told her about my appreciation for El Al; my feeling that it is the start to my trip in Israel and how beautiful it is that we come off and will be wished a shanah tovah, g’mar chasimah tovah. I shared with her where I will be staying and what I will be doing, as well as bits of information about my family in Israel and how I will be joining them for the chagim. I voiced my love for the Kosel: Davening there and how I couldn’t wait to say Nishmas with a special tzaddik at midnight. I told her about Mrs. Tzili Schneider of Nefesh Yehudi; she made Shabbatons per their request: from Kibbutzim that have contracts against kashrus, mechitzas and sifrei Torah (lo aleinu). She was fascinated about that.
At the end of the flight I asked her if she’d like to stay in touch and she acquiesced; we exchanged phone numbers and e-mails. Suddenly, she turns to me and says, “B’emet, I need to thank you, you made me excited to come back to Israel.” We walked out into Ben Gurion Airport together and she repeated “Thank you” over and over again. I responded by saying that she made my day and made me even more excited to be in Eretz Yisrael.
True to my word, I called and left her a message with an invitation to join with me for the huge Birchas Kohanim at the Kosel. No response was a bit of a disappointment, but the key to successful change is subtle and most effective if not accompanied by pressure. Subsequently, I let it go and moved along with my day.