Shavuot

These past two days are ones I will never forget.
Shavuot in Yerushalyaim is amazing!
We started learning around 10:45PM Tuesday night and kept learning until around 3:30AM. We heard amazing shiurim on the Gemora we are learning and such topics as why did HaShem actually feel it was necessary to hold Mt. Sinai over our heads when he asked us to accept the Torah even though we already said, "Na'asei v'nishma."
When there was a beit hamikdash in Yerushalayim every male Jew came to the Temple each Pesach, Sukkot, and Shavuot. Even though we unfortuantely do not have the third beit hamikdash yet, many people still go to the Kotel on Shavuot night. On Tuesday night, well really Wednesday morning, me and some friends from Yeshiva decided to walk to the Kotel for morning prayers at 4:40AM. We left the Yeshiva at 3:30AM and started the usually 45 minute or so walk to the Kotel. When we started getting close we met up with thousands of people all coming towards the Kotel. We walked with a huge crowd of people through the Arab shuk at around 4:30AM singing Jewish songs about Torah and the rebuilding of the Temple. I guess the Arabs of Yerushalayim also have a custom to stay up all night on Shavuot... It was absolutely amazing. When we got to the Kotel we realized how many people were actually there. It could have been close to 100,000! You could not walk from the Kotel all the way back to not only the ramp that leads to the Kotel, but all the way back to the buildings behind. It was a breathtaking sight to see so many Jews in the same place, doing the same thing, at the same time, together.
After we got back we had a quick kiddush and then a long nap. On Wednesday we had great meals, conversation, and learning and went to sleep ready for another day. Thursday was very long which I welcomed because I had a lot of thinking to do. I had a very good day spending the majority of my time thinking about life and where I am headed in it. I also got to spend some quality time with friends who when they leave I will not get to see again for a long time. Then something amazing happened. As the holiday was leaving us on Thursday night we were all together listening to words of Torah from our Rabbeim and singing zemiros. Those people who know me know that I am not such an "artsy" person. I never have had the ability to really feel to my core something from music. Tonight was the first time. We were all singing one of my favorite songs and I closed my eyes and all the music coming from every person in the room just joined together into one entity. I have experienced this before with niggunim but never with words. After I truly felt like we were all praising Hashem with one voice I started getting chills that ran through my entire body. There were no more individuals in that room, it was one voice coming from one source.