Now I have to admit I had found myself in a bit of a rut lately. As much as I love waking up each morning out here, I was beginning to feel the absence of reliable and close friends, family or any half-decent love interest. Work shifts lessened as my bosses tested out new staff to prepare for my departure (roughly 2 months away). I was feeling inactive and old and friends were starting to drag me out by the ear to our once-weekly hangout. Then a bout of illness confined me to my bed for a fortnight and plunged me further into inexistence.
So it couldn’t have come at a better time, when a friend of mine invited me along to a three day Eilat trip, organised by the university she graduated from last year. Having always intended to visit this top premier resort, where many Israelis and tourists alike find themselves on holiday, and pretty certain I may start decomposing any time soon, I eagerly accepted. A couple of bikini-buying and bikini-waxing sessions later, we were boarding the coach, which was to take us 5 hours away to a four star hotel that had been booked out exclusively to the 1000 students that were soon to beer-bottle their way in.
The start was shaky. No longer creatures of the campus, my friend and I joined the bus only after it had left the university, so on stepping aboard were stuck with the last seats left: two in the middle back row. The aisle gangway lay ahead, its perimeter perfect for two hurtling pairs of arms and legs. On discovering an absence of seatbelts, we crossed our fingers and both wondered whether we weren’t a little too old for this nonsense. Although everyone was roughly the same age as me, my student life had ended three years prior and these days I preferred a good movie to a wild night on the tiles.
But of course I was in Israel and here it is the army and not university that follows high school for 18 year olds. While I had been clubbing by the Brighton Sea and stressing over my essay word-count, the guys and girls sitting around me had been shooting rifles, encoding military intelligence systems or patrolling the 40 degree desert in full-bodied army uniforms. If anyone ever needed to let loose, it was these army graduates. I decided to turn back the clock and make the best of it. After all, you’re only as young as you feel.
My friend however couldn’t fight nature and slept the entire journey as a result of watching TV until 2am the night before. As the coach resounded with banter and song, I soon found myself following her lead. It was the last sleep we would get for 48 hours.
A whirl of bags, reception desk-arguments and room keys later, we found ourselves heading out to the pool, where a full blown teen-movie-style party was in process. Hundreds of semi-naked guys and girls surrounded the water, their plastic vodka-filled plastic cups glinting in the sunlight. Inside, beach balls were being flung around, as were the people flinging them and music blared out from the DJ booth. As surreal as it all seemed, the mood was infectious and I was soon tossing my hair around with the best of them, feeling light-headed from the vodka and semi-indulging the semi-naked sleazebag trying to chat me up. I was 18 again! My friend also got into the swing of things and was enjoying a back massage from some other unknown. A complimentary bottle of wine and chocolates welcomed us on returning to the room and as we sat out on the balcony, any doubts we’d had soon fizzed away inside our glasses.
The next two days flew past in an array of sunbathing, swimming, pool-gaming, drinking and dancing; while the nights flashed by in largely the same manner. Although it’s been a year, I never did absorb the Mediterranean mentality to prance around in next to nothing. Probably something to do with the fact I looked a lot less ‘American Pie’ and a lot more ‘Apple Pie’ bopping amongst them. In my specifically purchased black tummy-disguise-tankini however, I felt confident enough to day-dance amongst the scantily-clad size zero Israeli beauties. Meeting people was as easy as um, pie and the more I socialised, the more I felt my mood rocketing and youth flooding back into my former self-pitying Bridget Jones-veins.
Since returning, I have found it pretty much impossible to stay indoors and am currently planning my fifth night out in a row. Damn this writing obsession of mine. If only I had one of those careers that required a second degree - going to University out here would be an experience.
