Early morning. From the open door of the bamboo hut where I am writing, the majestic Sinai mountains are in full rose blush, blending with the milky blue sky. A corner of the deep blue sea twinkles in the sunlight… silhouettes of Bedouins going about their day move like dancing shadows… the camp is waking up… Welcome to Sinai, Egypt.
I came for a 4 day vacation, to time out from the bustling Tel Aviv life. I arrived on the full moon, the day of the eclipse by the earth… I watched the moon rise from the Akaba mountains, expanding like an orange balloon, becoming silver as it inched its way towards its cosmic meeting with the earth. The magic show lasted for hours. That night, I got enchanted… It was my own cosmic meeting with my destiny… the journey to Shanti, an inner place of peace so deep that even a Tsunami cannot make a ripple, had started.
By the time the sun had washed away all traces of this cosmic event, I knew that I had been called here, at the heart of the desert, to bloom like a flower… I had arrived home. I could rest. A month has passed since that first night.
Most Israelis are scared to come to Sinai, because of media hysterics, and local politics… yet I have a feeling of safety, of being guarded by the Bedouins who notice the slightest move in the desert. It is in their best interest to keep each one of us safe and happy. I sleep with the door and windows of my 'hoosha' (Hebrew word for 'hut') open, rocked by the melodies of the wind, the rhythm of the waves which are coming in, a million stars twinkling 'sweet golden dreams.'
After a few days of exploring the surroundings, resting by the fire at night, or along the many private yet open welcoming space bordering the shore, I realized that I could fall asleep anywhere, with the benevolent energy of the camp like a mother's embrace. The expansion I am feeling inside is experienced on the outside… my home has extended to the whole camp…
Born, raised and living in big cities all my life, I am not yet in tune with the implacable, perfect rhythm of the surrounding nature… I have seen only one sunrise. "One is enough," said a Bedouin, smiling. Yes, a taste is enough to know… On the other hand, every evening I am in awe of the sunsets, kaleidoscopic splashes of colors emblazing the sky as the sun sinks behind the mountains, dissolving in thesea with a final soft pink kiss.
Bedouin huts are sprinkled over the camp… Typical Bedouin carpets adorn the straw walls and ground... mattresses are lazily thrown on the earth. Signs of past residents are sometimes left: a seashell mandala, bits of candles, blessings written in the languages of the world, mainly Hebrew, colorful drawings of deities on the doors, a stone circle with a spiral in the middle…
I am settled on a tiny hill, with mountains at the back, the sea spreading un-interrupted on all sides, and once again joining the Akaba Mountains. I have come to know where the first ray of moonlight starts, and as I greet it from my hammock, I melt into a prayer of gratitude. It feels like a cosmic conspiracy, to welcome me into Being, by the sheer mirroring of the nature which Is.
The mountain that doesn't ask whose feet treads its belly, imposing respect by its immobility, is my teacher; the sky which offers its blank screen to the multitudes of cloud formations, like fluffy thoughts passing through the cotton of my mind, is my teacher; the seashell which calls my attention to its minuscule beauty, is my teacher… I receive the silent messages of nature as omens on the journey. I have yet to discover the desert… there is no hurry… I am slowing feeling my comfort zone in this new life.
A month ago, the possibility of living in Sinai was not one of the infinite possibilities in my horizon. Yet, over the past year of drastic and evolutionary changes in my life - leaving my husband of 22 years and being on my own for the first time in my life, at the age of 53.
I have learned to trust the inner voice when it resonates with the will of the Divine, when Life offers me the gift of the possibility behind all possibilities… the one which appears as the most natural in the world… right now to live in Sinai, the perfect place to dive at the core of the Self, to surrender to the infinite, to drop all that is not needed… and here I need very little… only to sink my barefoot feet in the sand, merging with the softness of the sea, with the movement of the wind, dissolving into love, my very nature, manifested by joy, smiles and hugs to all… welcoming myself home in a generous embrace of acceptance and surrender.
My presence here is a touch of vivid color, with my red, orange, yellow Indian clothes and scarves. The Bedouin team of young energetic camp workers know how many sugar I take in my coffee and joyfully deliver 'rusha service'.. the Bedouin sheiks from neighboring camps who visit in the evenings, singing or telling stories around the camp fire greet me with a knowing grin… they recognize me as one who has been enchanted by the desert, like others before me….
A month has passed…. I give myself the luxury of living the simplest life I have ever lived… one month, few months… until it is time to move on…