Army

This is a significant post because it is the first time I am writing as a soldier and not as a civilian. I came here to serve in the army and I am finally doing it; so let's talk about it. I just finished my 3rd week and tomorrow I go back to my base in the north for my final 2 days there. I am in a 3 week program for Hebrew-speakers that were not raised here (and are therefore lacking basic, cultural knowledge pertaining to the army). The base is near the town Carmiel and the Sea of Galilee in the North and is known as Mikhveh Alon after General Yigal Alon. On Monday, we have our ceremony and will then find out where we will be heading off to next. The army is everything I thought it would be: hard, tiring, and interesting. The point of this program has been to acclimate us to the army and its rigors and it has done an excellent job. They managed to fit a large portion of all the fun drills and routines of basic training into this short program without overloading us but at the same time challenging us. I feel that I will be very ready for the next stage.

One thing that I have come to learn from my experiences in Israel and before is that there will always be bumps in the road. It's a simple enough lesson that we tend to forget until we hit the next bump. Throughout my time here I have encountered obstacle after obstacle in reaching my goals and the main message I am taking home is not to get too excited by anything. That doesn't mean 'be dull' but rather just be more in the middle with relation to new events. You didn't get into Matkal? That's okay, there are plenty of other good units. You didn't get into that other good unit? That's okay, even in the other units you still find good guys and are serving Israel. The bed is disgusting and you can feel the metallic springs poking into your back? That's okay, you won't die and at least you're inside for the time being. A lot of the guys in my unit get very hyped up about a lot of things throughout the day and while it is important to be passionate in the army and try your hardest, I am now a firm believer in "taking it all with a grain of salt." It's a good attitude and despite the fact that I still get hyped up as well, I'm getting better at it every passing day. I like what the army is doing to me and I hope that I will be continue to be pleased with the outcome.

A bit of Judaism

I've been doing a lot of soul searching over the past year and a half, specifically on the topic of Israel and Judaism. The most common question I'm asked here is, "Why did you make Aliyah and decide to join the army?" It's a complicated answer that I'm not even sure I know the complete answer to. One thing I can say for sure is I had a gut feeling about it and that feeling was supported by several indicators that made it seem like a good idea. The most simple, general answer to the question is Zionism. The next level of the answer is that Judaism is important to me and I believe that without Israel, the Jewish homeland, Judaism cannot survive and thrive in a healthy and non-oppressed fashion. The Neturei Karta would have you believe that Judaism had been fine for 2000 years and that the real anti-Semitism started only after the inception of the Jewish State in 1948. They should be called Neturei Charta (Charta = bullshit in Hebrew). My grandparents and their parents and so on could attest to the fact that Judaism in the Diaspora was not treated kindly. So the next question that is more rarely asked is, "If you're making Aliyah because Judaism is important to you, then why do you not keep more religious?" Well, what can I say? I'm a fundamental moderate who believes in not leaning to far to either side. Judaism is important to me for multiple reasons but one thing that has always left me impressed with regards to my religion is the truth and wisdom in the Tanakh (the Torah, Prophets, and Writings).
I was thinking about something the other day and I think I struck a chord with one story. The story about Abraham offering up his son Isaac as a sacrifice often seemed savage and dogmatically blind to me. I think that when you look upon the story as a metaphor then you realize the true significance and depth of the story. What was Isaac to Abraham? He was his flesh and blood, his offspring, his genetic hope and future. So why would God or Judaism ask him to, so cruelly, sever his only line in the gene pool and kill his son? I think the two factors here are symbols. The God character in the story can be looked at more as Jewish morality. Not the Jewish morality that tells you not to put fish and meat on the same plate you eat off of, but rather the deeper stuff. Abraham and Isaac are humanity, the animal kingdom, evolution if you will. Is there a single healthy organism in the entire world that would sanely forfeit its genetic offspring just because? No; but we learn from this story that some things are more important than ourselves. In some areas we must not fall prey to our tendency toward evolution and furthering our link in the genetic pool. Our morals that are sometimes incongruent with evolutionary interests must be upheld despite the sacrifices we have to make to uphold them. That is what makes mankind different than other animals, whether it be God-given or an acquired evolutionary trait. That is what makes Judaism important to me.

The End of the Beginning

9 days until I am no longer a civilian. A week or two after the Gibush I went home for a brief 2 week visit and did not inform my mother of my return until I was home. Needless to say it was a great trip home and we all very much enjoyed what will be our last family thanksgiving for a while. I came back on December 9 and went back to work. I had an interview for the Egoz unit and although I thought the interview went rather successfully, I was not accepted to the unit. The worst part is, through all these interviews and tryouts they never let us know why we were not accepted. The let-down of the Gibush and then subsequently of the interview were upsetting but through it all I haven't broken down or anything like that. I've held up a good attitude that I guess comes in part from my family's way of "looking toward plan B". Anyway, I worked up until January 14 and then officially was unemployed. Since then I have been taking care of little things that I could not attend to while I was working. Last week I went to London and met my Dad there since London is equidistant from both of us and I have never been to Europe (except for shit-ass Poland in winter).
It's weird...I've been waiting for the day that is about to be upon me in a little over a week for a year and a half now and I don't quite know what to make of it at this point. I'm sure my feelings will change in the 9 days to come and I will begin to become more excited and nervous but at the moment I just feel like, "well it's about time." I think a year and a half of waiting has left me a bit over ripe but at least by this point my Hebrew is very good and I have a pretty good idea of how Israel works in a general sense. I wouldn't say that I'm bitter about having to wait so long but rather just very ready to go next week. It will be challenging to become a Chapash, or Chayal Pashut (Simple Soldier) where you don't receive any kudos and no one lauds your triumphs and your extraordinary efforts. This week I am going to buy some gear I need for the army with Dudi, take care of some last minute things, visit my girlfriend Arielle in Tel Aviv, and take advantage of the last few days of peace and quiet to maybe travel a little or just rest. That's all for now but I hope I'll be able to blog later this week. Email me and let me know how things are (it will be great to hear from everyone before the army).

Gibush Matkal

(Ami's blessing at 6:00 am before the Gibush on Sunday)

Lots to cover in this entry. Two days ago I got back from the most challenging (mentally and physically) thing I've ever done in my life. Gibush Matkal started on Sunday and ended 2 days ago (Thursday). I, unfortunately, was not accepted into Matkal, Shaldag, or 669 but the competition was fierce so it's not as if I feel cheated. Prior to the Gibush I thought I would be horribly disappointed if I did not get accepted but surprisingly I was not. I did, after all, give more than 100% and if that's enough than it is only fitting that I should not be in Matkal. Also, I was grateful that I at least got the chance to compete in this Gibush. About 3 weeks ago I went to a cardiologist in Nahariyya to get an extra heart check for the army. He said he found irregularities in the echo test and that I should not engage in demanding physical activity. Had I brought his letter to the army, they would have disqualified me without a doubt from any combat unit and I would be stuck as a jobnik or in intelligence -- both things that don't particularly interest me. Luckily, the Rahamims (my adopted family in Holon) are experts on bureaucracy in the Israeli army and we (with the help of my dad and others in DC) were able to get an appointment with one of the best cardiologists in Israel at Hadassah Hospital in Jerusalem. He cleared everything up and said that there is no problem with my heart (i.e. the previous doctor is an idiot and almost ruined my chances of being in a combat unit for nothing). The lesson learned here: socialized medicine sometimes sucks.

On Sunday, Gila drove me to the train station Ad Halom in between Ashdod and Ashquelon. We got there at 7:00 and at 7:30 the bus came to pick all of the "Gibushees" up and took us to the Nizzanim Base. I have to say that all the details of the week are still quite fuzzy in my head since when one is in a high stress situation he or she tends to focus on the now and the past and future tend to fade and become less important. I am still somewhat in "Gibush" mode so the details of times and drills might not be as accurate as they should be. We waited that day until about 4 pm until we actually did anything physical. After getting our equipment, suiting up (in uniform), and getting clearance from the doctor, we had about a 4 hour waiting period of sitting in the sun and doing nothing. During this time we were introduced to "Manot Krav" or combat meals. This actually became more delectable as the week progressed since food turned into one of the few spoils we could enjoy and also because we all grew slightly insane. The combat meal consisted of dry bread that barely slid down your throat, tuna, grape leaves or tuna salad (depending which MRE you got), olives, ketchup, mustard, and fruit. Needless to say, all of this was NOT fresh and came with heavy preservatives (very healthy stuff). At 4 pm, we all gathered and the Gibush administrator explained to us the "rules and regulations" of the Gibush. We then were divided into groups. There were about 450 of us and we were divided into groups of about 21 kids in each group. I was in group number 9 and my personal number was 6. We then set out with our equipment after our officers (about 6-8 of them) toward the sand dunes. We immediately started with intense sprinting exercises with our rifles in hand. About 5 sprints in I started to have trouble catching my breath and shortly thereafter regurgitated the canned-preserved grape leaves and pineapples that we had eaten earlier. I then went to the Mirpaah (clinic) to get checked out. Understandably I started to freak out a little bit and asked myself questions like, "Am I going home so early into the Gibush? Is this going to hurt my standing in my group?" I returned about 15 minutes later to my group after drinking lots of water and joined back in with the sprinting and the overexertion. After sprinting a lot with no breaks in between sprints, we went down to some sand dunes where there were a lot of other groups as well. There were about 20 dunes in this area and although we did not know it at the time, this was the torture chamber that we would be returning to about twice a day for the next four days to carry out strenuous drills that made Yom Sayarot look like some sort of relaxing dead sea spa treatment. At the dunes we did a number of other sprinting exercises and then moved on to "Zchilot" or crawling. While I am typing this my elbows and knees resemble roast beef more than they do body parts. Crawling was especially hard because I had not practiced this prior to the Gibush and it demands that you use every muscle in your body. After all these exercises we eventually returned to the base camp area, soaked in sweat and caked in sand, where we had to set up our tents for the night. That night, and the rest, we did not shower and went to sleep in our uniforms.

I don't remember exactly what the schedule was for the rest of the days but I can give a general idea of what went down. It is important to mention that it was extremely hard to keep track of time during the Gibush because watches and cellphones were banned. Every morning we woke up at about 3:30 or 4:00 and had 20 minutes to eat, drink, and get everything ready. At the end of the 20 minutes we had to be in order and awaiting our officers. We would then get checked to make sure we had everything in line such as water, efod (vest), shirt tucked in, and more. We then would go out to the "torture chamber" area where we would proceed to have our asses kicked (no beating, just drills until we dropped). The order of the drills went something like this: sprints, 15 minute break, another drill, 15 minute break, another drill, 15 minute break. These were not just any "soccer practice" running drills. The point of them was to exhaust you until you reach your breaking point and then keep going a little bit to see who is strong enough to trek on beyond their maximum. With this in mind, it should be clear that a 15 minute break was NOT enough to recover...just enough to not pass out or die or something. I remember one of the drills that they did that was especially brutal. It was called the "triathalon." Everyone lined up and dropped down (with all our gear and rifles), crawled about 30 meters, hoisted up 15 kg (33 lbs.) sandbags and ran around a certain point all the while uphill. We then dropped the sand bags off at the point that we picked them up and ran another lap (about 80 meters). The second lap (without the sandbag) ended at the line where we started crawling. This was considered one repetition. We did this for about 20-25 minutes and the goal was to do as many repetitions as possible. This was mostly how the physical exercises went for the entire week. The aspect that made this all hard was the mental stress we were under.

The mentality of every person going into the gibush is essentially to "win" or be accepted into Sayeret Matkal or any of the other units that are scouting. This means that although you make some good friends during the week (and I made a few) you are all the while competing with them, thus making you somewhat isolated the entire time. Also, from the very get-go the officers are not very "nice" to put it lightly. There tone is constantly harsh and ridiculing and their answers to our questions terse and condescending. This is obviously in no way their personality, rather their persona they take on in order to cull the best of the competition. Nonetheless, the stress piles on and it becomes very exhausting and difficult to manage. They constantly demanded things that were physically impossible just to see how we would handle it and to try to break us. For example, we had to run around a certain bush in 30 seconds. The total distance was probably 150 meters or maybe a little more. The trick is, we had just finished a brutal exercise, we had a total of about 20 pounds on us, we were running uphill on sand, and 30 seconds was expected even from the slowest in the group. That means that even if only one person doesn't make it we all get punished. Whenever we did not make it in time we would then have to do the same drill with the heavy jerrycans and stretchers. The hardest part psychologically about this drill is that you feel as if you're being punished all the time, even though the officers are just testing you and know that you cannot complete the track in the allotted time. The other kinds of mental testing were actually exercises that demanded thinking. One such example is when we had to draw maps of Israel. The point of this exercise is to make sure that you are capable of critical thinking and not lacking basic mental skills (i.e. they want to make sure you're not a dumbass). Periodically the officers would hand out a two-page article (different for each person) and you would have to read it and master its content whenever you had a free moment. This was especially difficult for me since Hebrew is obviously not my mother tongue (although I was still able to cope with the assignment). Another quality they tested for was leadership. They would give us a mission to complete in a certain amount of time (usually something ridiculous like 2 minutes) and only one person could talk and direct the group during each attempt. One mission was when there was a narrow and low-to-the-ground iron fence that all of us had to pass under along with a massive heavy log about 10 meters long. The parameters of the drill were that the we as well as the log could not touch the fence and the log could not touch the ground.

For me, there were several things that made the gibush especially challenging. Despite the fact that I speak the language fluently now, I still have a lack of confidence speaking under high pressure and that hindered my ability to lead the group. Although I no longer struggle with the language, it was just one more thing that I still was not comfortable with but the rest of the group was. Another challenge was that a lot of people either knew some kids going in to the gibush, or had brothers or fathers who had been in these units, or just more orientation towards this sort of thing in general. I came in only with the knowledge I had acquired online and the advice that Dudi (Ami and Gila's son) gave me. Overall, however, I don't think I can complain too much. It would have been great to have been accepted into one of those units, but considering the odds I didn't do half bad. About 450 started the gibush (and these were 450 quality guys), about 50 left by their own volition during the first 2 days, and on the third day 150-200 kids were booted out. 28 were accepted into Matkal (2-3 Americans), 12 to Shaldag, and about 50 to 669. I forgot to mention that kids were booted also on the third day essentially splitting the gibush into two parts. As I see it, I made it to the finals and although I did not get accepted it was a hell of an experience and I definitely learned a lot from it. The guys (or a lot of them) are really great people there and they have a lot to offer so I look forward to serving with them in whichever unit I end up in. The kids who finished but were not accepted to any units are given 3 possibilities. One of them is to go to a gibush for Hovlim (although only the mental part and not the physical part), the second is an interview with Egoz, and the third is an interview for Duvdevan. I do not want Hovlim although it is also an excellent unit. In order to get to the second option (Egoz) one must pass an interview although not a gibush and then he is accepted into the unit and spends his service there unless he gets kicked out during training. Egoz is a unit connected with Golani and is essentially a guerilla-warfare tactical unit that uses techniques like camouflage heavily. In order to get to Duvdevan one must pass the interview and then start basic training with the paratroopers. About 1-2 weeks into basic training there is a gibush for Duvdevan and then in that Gibush, the soldier who completed the Matkal Gibush will be looked upon in a better light to begin with since he already passed the Matkal Gibush. I am leaning toward the Duvdevan option but nothing is definite yet. As for when I would go to the army...well, as usual this is up in the air. For the Duvdevan track, there is a paratrooper gius (draft) in about 2 weeks or in another 3-4 months in March. I would prefer to be drafted in 2 weeks but then again it's not exactly up to me. Either way, it has been an interesting couple of weeks yet well-worth every second of it.

Yom Sayarot

Erev Tov from the beautiful Kfar Tavor at Shoshana and Iftach Genez' house! Well I had hoped to blog immediately after Yom Sayarot but...that didn't happen. Since nobody said that we could not disclose any information I am gonna write it all down. First of all, the big news: I passed and now I have a tryout for the unit I wanted. The unit is called "the Unit" or more specifically Sayeret Matkal. The tryout, or gibush, is set to take place on November 8. Now, from the beginning. We got there at 3; actually, we all got there a little earlier. They called us over to the registration tin shack things and we handed in our invitation and got our numbers. We then wrote in permanent marker on our white shirts our numbers. My number was 59. Then we got in line at the medical tent and got our pulses checked and a general assessment (about 2 questions). I listed somewhere a while back on my medical report on the Kibbutz that I was allergic to dust. I'm not really, just a little bit. That was a stupid thing to do; all it did was make the army medical lackey suspicious of me. Fortunately the doctor he referred me to at the second set of tables was more understanding and wrote it off as Harta, bullshit. We then waited for a while in the tents that doubled at Shade tents and our dormitories for that night. We were all just milling around when a stout, unathletic 20-year-old came over and chose 10 of us. Eager to find out what we were to do we trotted after him. Our assignment was to open tuna...not even 20 minutes into Yom Sayarot and I was already the army's bitch. We took it in stride and even made fun out of it. One of the guys joked, "Pace yourself, chevre! It's all in your heads, keep opening!" After that there was some more waiting and then some more. There was a lot of waiting during Yom Sayarot and needless to say it was annoying. Eventually we went out to do the Bar-Or Test, or the newly modified version of it. It seems that in the last year or so they have only been doing to 2000-meter run and have left out the push-ups and sit-ups. I came in fifth in my heat out of about 90 other guys with a time of 7:28. I don't believe that it was only 2K because I typically do it a lot faster but then again it was hot and on a sandy surface. After this we assembled back on the main campgrounds and filled out our preferences of which units we wanted. Our choices were between "The Unit", Shayetet/Flotilla 13, and Hovlim (Navy Commanders). I put my first choice as Matkal/the Unit, second choice as Shayetet, and third was Hovlim. The rest of the evening was boring. We got stuff ready for the next day (stretchers, jerrycans, and other stuff), ate, and then went to bed. Bedtime was 7:50 pm, the earliest I've gone to bed in about 10 years. Nobody fell asleep for several reasons. The giant campgrounds light was left on all night, we were sleeping on the ground on the sand with rocks, and it was 7:50! Who goes to sleep at 7:50? After 2.5 hours of turning from side to side I finally fell asleep. We were woken up at 4:00 am but I actually got up, along with some other guys, at 3:30. It gave me some time to get dressed, pee, wash my face, and stretch out and warm up a bit. At 4:07 we were to be in formation and from there we went over to another area of the campgrounds to eat a quick breakfast of chocolate spread on bread and tea. The head doctor of Yom Sayarot then came out and informed us that if anyone did not feel good or wanted to leave, then this would be his last chance to leave and still be given another chance to try out in March or April. At the last second, one guy raised his hand and decided to leave and was then followed by a few other guys. After that we were split into 20-25 groups with about 13-15 guys in each. I was in group #9. We put our valuables (cell phone, wallet, etc.) in the group's "valuables bag" and then, with all our equipment, set out to the training grounds. The beginning of the end of our muscles took place at the sand dunes. We got there, unloaded equipment, and almost immediately started sprints. We started at the top of the dune, and ran in a circular path. The path was probably about 80 meters. After several sprints they said that only the first 8 would be listed. Then after about 10 minutes of that they went down to the first 7. Then 6. Then 5. The hardest part about the sprints was that we would get back completely breathless and they would say, "Tze" or "go!" No break, no nothing. The incline in the sand was also pretty difficult. I don't exactly remember the order of all the drills but after the sprints we got a 7 minute break. Then we had 8 minutes to fill up the sand bags with sand. They were probably something like 15 kilograms, or 33 lbs. We then started to run in the same track as before, but this time with the sandbags and without stopping. After about 20 minutes we stopped. I was one of the leaders in my group with about 35 laps. We also did an exercise with the stretcher. We loaded the stretcher with 4 bags of sand and the first four to arrive would pick up the stretcher and run the next lap with the weighted stretcher. The following three would carry bags of sand. Obviously it was preferred to be carrying the stretcher. I did fairly well on this exercise since I was carrying the stretcher a lot and often arrived first. One thing that I think really improved my standing with the commanders was that when my buddy next to me on the stretcher was having a lot of trouble getting up the incline I gave him some crucial, non-bullshit encouragement and he picked up the pace. After the running exercises each person dug a hole in the sand one meter width, one meter depth, and as long as possible. After this drill, which was not actually too difficult it just wears out your back, we sat in a circle in front of the commanders and gave a little background: where we are from, what we studied in high school, and where we hope to go in the army. There were about 30 Americans at Yom Sayarot from the program Garin Tzabar. There were 3-4 Americans in my group and they seemed to be pretty good guys. One of them also got an invitation to Gibush Matkal. After all the physical assessments we headed back to the campgrounds with the equipment and filled out what is called a Sociometric test (Sotziometri). This is where you rank everyone in your group according to their performance. The best guy would be number 1 and the worst would be highest number of all the people in your group (in mine it was 13). Only 1 guy dropped out in my group and there were groups where 2-3 dropped out which puts the ending number of guys at about 350 (we started with about 400). After the Sociometric, we ate and then waited about 2-3 hours for results. I should give time frames for the events of the day. We started the drills at about 5:00 am and finished at about 8:30 am. At about 9:30 we ate and at about 11:30-12:00 we got the results. Everyone was visibly tense and extremely nervous/excited as some high-ranking officer came out to give us the results. He gave a nice speech about how we are the future of Tzahal and that whether or not we get through to the next rounds, all of us are the elite of the combat units and we will be the next generation of officers and our roles are so important. Without specifying which group the numbers belonged to he told the first group to go to the tent behind him to and to his right. 4, 11, 24, 37, 44, 54...HOLY SHIT, is he gonna skip me?!?! 59. I was ecstatic but I still was not sure whether I had gotten into the gibush for matkal. As we assembled in the tent our suspicions were confirmed as we saw several of the stronger guys from the group. The officer that called our numbers entered the tent a few minutes later and proceeded to congratulate us and tell us that we received gibush matkal. He then reminded us that there is still a long way to go until our position in "the Unit" is secure. We have the incredibly grueling Gibush at Nitzanim in the south on November 8 that will last about 5 days during which they will obliterate us mentally and physically. If you are accepted after this, which in and of itself is an extraordinary feat, you then have an 18 month exhausting Maslul, or training track/path to get through. Even after this there are still those who drop out from injury or just from burn-out. The gibush is incredibly difficult. Of the 400 who start (all of whom are in good shape) only about 200 finish. Of the 200 remaining, 20 are taken to Matkal, 20 to Shaldag (airforce commandos), and 20 are put on the "waiting list" of Matkal. This of course is hearsay from the forums I've been reading online in Hebrew. For now, the best preparation I can do is stay focused, keep up on my rigorous workout schedule, and not stress too much. For now, it should be plenty.

2 days until...

Shana Tova/Gmar Chatima Tova! I'm currently sitting in the Rahamim's dining room. We finished fasting about 4.5 hours ago and broke the fast with delicious fruit and sweets followed by a meat meal. We didn't go to synagogue for 2 reasons. 1, I was afraid that I would get the swine flu in shull and that is the last thing I need two days before Yom Sayarot. The second reason is that they don't typically go to shull here on Yom Kippur. There seems to be an Israeli custom that you fast but you stay at home and watch movies. I took advantage of the Lax Day of Atonement and slept until 12:15 and then woke up and watched a movie (Ben-Hur to be specific). In short, it was a good and easy fast and I'm glad I spent it here. As for Yom Sayarot, Shiri will be driving me to it at the Wingate Institute near Netanya on Wednesday. It starts at 3 pm and lasts 1 day approximately. This means that we will be sleeping there (at least I hope we will be sleeping). I hope this is all information that is not "classified" and that the army will not come after me for disclosing this on the internet. I have to admit that I am a little bit nervous because I really want to get to a specific unit. From the 3-4 options that are possible I have 1 that I would really prefer and another one that I would accept and still be greatly honored. They are all excellent units and to be accepted to any of them is truly extremely difficult. We find out which unit accepts us at the end of the 2-day tryout. Well, not exactly accepts but rather gives you the opportunity to be accepted. Once you pass Yom Sayarot you continue on to the Gibush of the unit that invites you. The Gibush is 5 days and extremely grueling. From what I've heard, Yom Sayarot is more physical and Gibush is more mental. I can't say any of this with absolute certainty, however, since I have not experienced either of them. Whatever way the tryout turns out at least I can sleep soundly knowing that I did all I could to prepare myself. Over the past several weeks I have been training relentlessly and restricting my diet accordingly to what would yield optimal results. My workout schedule went something like this: 3-4 days a week running, 3 days weight lifting/strength training, and the occasional cross-training exercise such as swimming or weighted-cardio (lunges while holding weights).

On a separate note we started picking avocados this past week (Ettinger avocados to be precise). This is exciting because work is no longer so grueling. Picking is a lot easier for 2 reasons: we pick in the trees which provide shade and also I can listen to my music/audiotapes. Some of the other work demands that you listen or simply cannot deal with the iPod. Everything is going relatively well and I just go a package from my parents which really brightened things up. I had a lot of things that I wanted to blog about but it seems I'm too tired tonight. Maybe after Yom Sayarot. 'Night!

Reflections After 1 Year

(My cooking skills in my new Apartment!)


Long time no blog. Almost 5 months to be exact. Since my last entry I have returned home to the United States for a brief respite from Kibbutz and have already come back. I went home on May 9ish and came back to Israel on July 7. It was a great vacation and I really wish I had blogged but no use in crying over spilled milk, right? What did I do at home? Histalbateti = sat around on my ass (isn't it great that there's a Hebrew word for all that?). I went back to work around July 15 and it was good to get back to being useful and not just a waste of space. About 1.5 weeks ago was my one year "anniversary" of arriving in Israel and it got me thinking about what Hannah Hafshoosh (friend of my Dad's) said to me. She said that my parents observed while I was home that I had changed and matured. I told her that I really did not feel as if I had changed that much over the past year and that I feel more or less like the same person. She responded very wisely that we never realize how much we change but the people around us pick up on it much more keenly. I guess that's probably because from our point of view we go through all sorts of transitions that we have to rationalize and work out in our minds so the changes do not seem that stark and glaring but rather labored and insignificant since we invested so much energy in the changes. Your friends and family do not go through your changes for you so when they see you for the first time in months you may seem quite different than that same person they remember you as from 5 months prior. I went back and read all of my blog entries from the past year and wrote down all of the changes that I noticed that I went through. The following are those changes.

When I was working in the Kindergarten during my Ulpan, my Hebrew was passable but I wrote down that I did not feel comfortable speaking Hebrew all day. I distinctly remember that speaking in Hebrew all day actually wore me out physically! Now I more or less speak Hebrew for most of my day without thinking twice about it. It's really good that I've gotten used to the language at such a high level before I join the army. I believe that it will make my integration into it much easier and less painful socially. While I would not say that I am as fluent as an Israeli I would say that I am at such a level where I no longer need my English. If there is a word that I do not know in Hebrew I typically have enough of a vocabulary to describe the word I am searching for. For example, a couple weeks ago I was looking for a spatula in the supermarket on Kibbutz. I did not know how to say spatula so I described it as "the tool you use to turn eggs over in a frying pan". That worked well enough.

My first entry was entitled "The Land of Soy Milk (I'm Lactose-Intolerant) and Honey". You will not find soy milk in my apartment on Kibbutz or any other products for the weak-stomached Americans. One of the things I have learned from being in Israel and working in Agriculture is, "Don't freak out if not everything goes your way." A month before leaving Israel in May, I was anxious about what I was going to do on Kibbutz because picking season was coming to an end in the avocado plantation and I was worried that I would be out of a job with nothing to do. I don't even know where to start about how irrational that fear was. Everything worked out fine and looking back I was irrational and unnecessarily stressing myself out. The wisest person I have met in Israel and possibly in my whole life is my boss in the avocados, Elisha Shelem. He is about 75 years old and is still out in the fields toiling from 5:30 in the morning until 1 in the afternoon. This work is no easy task; if an athletic 19-year-old has trouble getting through the day and comes home completely exhausted how is a 75-year-old veteran of almost every war in Israel's history supposed to do it? But he does, and with perfect patience and compassion. He is the kind of person who you want to ask, "What is your secret? How did you get so wise?" I have a feeling that part of it is working with nature for 50 years and his diligent nature. Elisha has taught me 2 things about avocado trees that are profound in ways that I still cannot fully comprehend. We were putting planks in the ground to straighten and provide support to the newly-planted avocado trees when Elisha explained to me that the planks were superfluous -- it is just the paranoia of the plantation manager. As it turns out, even if an avocado tree is crooked and bent it will continue to grow and if it is too unbalanced it will sprout a branch in the unbalanced direction in order to achieve equilibrium. While you obviously cannot simply leave 100 avocado trees to survive and thrive on their own, you don't have to bind them to a support. They will find their own way to grow. The second thing Elisha taught me about avocado trees is that they have an amazing sense of self-balance with regard to the future and the present. Avocado trees sprout 1 of 2 things at the end of each branch: a leaf or a fruit. A leaf is the tree's way of protecting itself. I assume that by sprouting a leaf it takes in more sunlight thereby undergoing more photosynthesis and yielding more energy to power the tree's processes. When the tree sprouts a fruit, it is trying to protect its future by spreading its seed. If the tree were to only worry about spreading its seed all the time, it would not worry enough about its own health and would therefore die before it had a chance to reproduce. At the other extremity, if a tree only focuses on itself, to what is it giving? Its self-preservation is useless and vain and serves no purpose for the future. If the tree is only for itself, then who is it? If it is only for others, then who is for it? I think Hillel the Elder worked in the avocados.

When I used to get up for ulpan at 7 am, I would be distraught that I had to get up at such an ungodly hour. I was quite uninformed of the definition of early. We typically meet nowadays at 5:30 am in our usual place in the orchard to drink coffee. This means that I get up at 4:45 in the morning. Even the sun doesn't get up at 4:45. There is no such thing as getting used to 4:45. There is just such a thing as coping with it. I guess it's all for the best since I hopefully will be going to the army sometime soon. With regard to the army, there are several updates. Last year I planned on going to the army in March 2009. I then pushed my intended draft date back to July. Then I pushed it back even further to November. All of these postponements took place because they were necessary in order to participate in Yom Sayarot. As it turns out I have to push the draft back one more time until February/March. As it stands, my draft date is February 14, 2010 and on September 30, 2009 I have a try-out for Yom Sayarot at the Wingate Institute near Netanya. We'll see what happens. While I am somewhat annoyed that I have had to wait so long for my draft, at least I now have a very high level of Hebrew and am used to my surroundings (Israel).

I was talking with my sister Ilana about a month ago when she suggested the idea of perhaps writing a book about my experience once I get out of the army in several years from now. I think it's a great idea and that perhaps all of my blog entries could either stand as a book on their own or at least provide a structure to build the book around. Even though there are already several books that have been published by formers soldiers who made Aliyah from the United States, I think every story is valuable because every one describes in its own right the unique experience that is making Aliyah at a young age from the United States. Also, all of the books that I read on this topic helped me immensely and I think it would be nice to do the same for those brave enough to follow suit. In any case, I first have to worry about getting through the army healthily and willing to write a book. I wonder what changes I'll be able to document one year from now. Happy start of the school year!