Missing in Israel – Jack in the Box

October 24, 2009 - 10:24 PM by David · 1 Comment
Filed under: A New Reality, General, Holidays, Life, Sports

basketb Residents of Haifa have a new unlikely neighbor who is hardly anonymous – Jeremy Tyler, is an 18-year-old basketball-playing phenomenon from San Diego who signed with Maccabi Haifa this past summer and has been acclimating himself to his new enivrons.

The 6′-11″ 260-pound Tyler decided to skip his senior year in high school in order to gain experience in professional basketball playing in the European League with Mac. Haifa as a prelude to reaching the NBA in the 2011 draft.

Last year, he averaged 28.7 points during his junior year at San Diego High to lead the club to the CIF-San Diego Section Division I quarterfinals.

After a few weeks here, Tyler is convinced he made the right move, telling The Jerusalem Post’s Aryeh Dean Cohen that playing basketball in Israel will be “a good story to tell my kids about, and their kids’ kids.”

But he also admitted that he’s still getting used to some of the basic elements of life in Israel. As far as the food goes, he likes “absolutely nothing” that’s prepared locally, and has a constant craving for his his favorite meals at Jack in the Box.

He also misses his family and his Jewish girlfriend Erin, with whom he hopes to visit Jewish sites here when she arrives for a visit this year. So far, Tyler’s ‘I’m not in Kansas anymore’ moment came on Yom Kippur, which he called “that holiday where we had to stay in the house – Yom Kippur… I’ve never seen a city, a whole country like this shut down. It was like ‘Wow’ to me.”

That’s alright Jeremy, I’ve been here 25 years and am still in awe when that happens.
Welcome to Israel, and good luck with Maccabi Haifa.

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