Israelis love to travel. From post-army backpacking in India to summer trips to Asia, Africa, Europe and the Americas, some 1.6 million Israelis fly out of Ben-Gurion airport every summer. And what could be more essential to an Israeli vacation abroad than Friday night at a Chabad House?

Ynet, the popular Hebrew-language news website, recently asked its Facebook followers to post the “most Israeli thing you did during your vacation abroad.” The results, shared along with a recent survey conducted by the Israeli travel site Travelist, included such Israeli classics as haggling over prices and stashing away food from the hotel to eat later.

Shabbat meals at Chabad ranked third on the list, which was topped by the practice of “helping out other Israelis” and “applauding after landing.”

It seems that the Israeli experience abroad with Chabad extends beyond just Friday-night meals. In another story shared by Ynet, Shir Bar recounts how when in a village in India, a Chabadnik asked one of the Israeli guys to put on tefillin. He refused, and when asked why he was so determined, he replied that he never had a bar mitzvah.

After some back and forth, the backpacker agreed to don tefillin.

“We celebrated a bar mitzvah at the age of 30 in a remote village,” continues Bar. “It even included throwing candy! He put on tefillin for the first time in his life.”

Shabbat meals at Chabad ranked third on the list, which was topped by the practice of “helping out other Israelis” and “applauding after landing.”
Shabbat meals at Chabad ranked third on the list, which was topped by the practice of “helping out other Israelis” and “applauding after landing.”