The thousands of tourists wandering around every evening on the famous Chaweng Boulevard on the Thai Island of Koh Samui were evidently puzzled at the goings-on in a large three-story office building located at the center of the crowded boulevard. In between the stalls of jeans and T-shirts, the restaurants, the bars, the massage dens and the thousands of street peddlers, there stands the center of the Chabad movement, the likes of which are scattered by the hundreds throughout the world. Since the early evening hours, hundreds of people of all ages, most of them clad in white shirts and wearing a curious piece of cloth on their head, were flocking into the building.

That piece of cloth is a skullcap, called a Kippa, traditionally adorning the heads of Orthodox Jews, and the event they were about to attend was the Passover Seder, the Passover being the most formative of Jewish holidays — the symbol of the Israelites deliverance from slavery to freedom and of the exodus from Egypt and return to the Promised Land. The Passover Seder was celebrated that night in Koh Samui with great pomp and ceremony amid the sweaty, noisy, colorful and enchanting Thai medley that attracts millions of tourists each year to this magnificent land of many islands. The majority of the Israelis who attended the Passover Seder in Koh Samui are not observant Jews; nevertheless, they did not want to miss the event that night, which for every Israeli represents the values of family, unity and freedom.

There is virtually no spot on the globe where a local Chabad representative cannot be found. They are always there, ready to lend a supportive hand and extend instant help on any matter at all, and, if need be, offer accommodation as well, not to mention the open-to-all ritual Passover Seder feasts and the Sabbath celebration according to the Jewish law. Thousands of emissaries of the Chabad movement are deployed around the world, standing by, ready to respond to any contingency or call for help. And they are not waiting in vain. Israel is a nation of 8 million people, but the activity it generates globally would befit a nation with a population dozens of times more numerous. Indeed, there are people in India who are willing to swear that Israel’s population numbers several hundred millions. After all, the Israelis are seen everywhere — in Delhi, Mumbai, Rishikesh, Agra, Goa and countless other sites, whether out-of-the-way or nearby, well-known or godforsaken.

I once participated in a challenge jeep tour of the Indian Himalayas. While traveling around Ladakh, a remote, isolated, rugged and uninhabited region on the outskirts of the Himalayas, we noticed all of a sudden, after long days of roaming the rough country without seeing a soul, a cloud of dust approaching us from the east. In a few minutes, three motorcyclists became visible through the dust. They stopped in front of our caravan of decorated jeeps and it turned out that they were Israelis, on their way back from Kashmir, the area of dispute between India and Pakistan torn by bitter battles. What were you looking for out there? We wondered. Isn’t it a highly dangerous place? As if it isn't dangerous enough in Israel, they snapped in response, adding, "Anyway, we are from Jerusalem." They had apparently gone all the way to Kashmir to flee Israeli reality.