Boarding a Plane to Israel

The first leg of the trip was Israel, a country I was excited to visit, as it was the one place in the world where when I said my name people didn’t immediately think I was having a stroke.

Being allowed to board a plane to Israel involves several obstacles, the main one being that the El-Al Agent will quiz you as if you’re a contestant on Jewish Jeopardy.

“What was Moses’s Brother’s Middle Name?” the hot, Israeli woman at the counter asked when I showed her my passport.

“Which daughter did Noah have sex with?”

Israel is the only country where they quiz you on a book to get in. When you go to New Zealand they don’t force you to answer Lord of the Rings trivia.

“What was the color of Gandalf’s staff?”

About 20 minutes into this merciless Hebrew School Reenactment, I wanted to point out that my level of ‘Jewiness’ was such that if this was a performance, then I should not only be let on board for the effort, but receive an Academy Award.

“Why are you traveling to Israel?” she asked.

“I’m performing stand up comedy.”

“How long have you been performing comedy.”

“About 15 years.”

“I don’t know your name. Have you been on Netflix?”

“No.”

“And people come to see you in Israel?”

“No, they come to see the other comic I’m going with. No one knows me.”

She eyed me with suspicion.

It’s a real blow to your Ego to find out your lack of achievements will raise red flags at the airport. Apparently my career has moved at such a slow pace it’s more believable as a terrorist’s ruse than an actuality.

I looked away and sighed grumpily.

“You don’t seem very funny,” she said.

I did my best to explain that, though hard to imagine, being interrogated at midnight before traveling internationally is not the ‘ideal set’ up for stand up comedy.

“Look,” I finally exploded (spoke in a what only I thought to be a curt tone), “I’m Jewish, I just don’t observe any of the customs, or practice, and I go to synagogue only once a year…and even that’s just a lie I tell my Mom.”

With Shawshank-Redemption-Parole-Scene-Abruptness, my passport was stamped and I was allowed to board.

It turned out that by admitting I barely followed any Jewish customs, I had inadvertently proven I was Israeli.