Kibbutz Yiftach

So I guess I owe an apology because I promised an update that was due about two weeks ago. The past two weeks have been possibly the longest two weeks of my life. In no way do I mean to say that I did not enjoy nearly every second of the past two weeks I just mean to say that I find it hard to believe that I have only been with my Garin for two weeks. As I might, or might not have, explained in the previous post the Garin goes through five seminars that explain the process of moving to Israel, living on a kibbutz for three months, and joining the army. Additionally, one of the goals of the seminar is to get to know your fellow Garin members. Many Garin members arrived before the 14th of August, when we moved to the Kibbutz, so we spent a lot of time together. It very quickly got to the point where I felt as if I had known all of my fellow Garin members for years.

Two weeks ago, as of yesterday, was the opening ceremony for Garin Tzabar 2008. I could not believe that I was finally at the ceremony. Ever since I did my fall semester of Junior Year, in 2005, in Israel I realized that I would be coming back to Israel and one day serving in the army. I spent half a year in Israel after high school and then I sat through all of the seminars of Garin Tzabar and I remember, especially at the final seminar, how much I just wanted to start the process already. Sitting in the ceremony I realized I had finally started. In the days leading up to the ceremony my friends and I started to receive phone calls from Garin Tzabar requesting that we come to their offices in order for different Israeli newspapers to interview us and take our picture. This year, with 160 kids split up into 6 different kibbutzim, is the largest group to ever do Garin Tzabar. Only a few years ago there were groups with 20-25 kids. A day or two before the ceremony I went to the Garin Tzabar offices in Tel Aviv, had my picture taken, and was interviewed by Maariv, an Israeli newspaper. The interview, and of course the entire article, was conducted in Hebrew. I could not find a copy of the article online but I will try to scan it and put it on my blog for all who would like to see.

At the ceremony there were a wide variety of speakers ranging from Army spokespeople to the head of the Tzofim (Israeli Scouts) organization, which is responsible for the Garin Tzabar program. However, each speaker essentially had a very similar message; wishing us success on our courageous step of serving in the army and moving to Israel by ourselves.

Before I knew it the ceremony was over and the huge auditorium that was already overflowing with the 160 members of Garin Tzabar, their family and friends, government spokespeople, and members of Garins of previous years, started to flow out onto the streets of Tel Aviv. To try to give an idea of the chaos I will explain that the scene that ensued was 160 kids, plus friends and family, trying to load at least 480 suitcases (at three pieces of luggage per person) onto a bus on a Thursday afternoon in Tel Aviv. Kibbutz Yiftach (my kibbutz) also adopted a Garin last year so about 10 kids from last year's Garin, who were able to get out of the army, came to our ceremony. We then started on the at least three hour drive to our new home at Kibbutz Yiftach.
We arrived to Kibbutz Yiftach at around 9:00pm and we were warmly greeted by some Kibbutz members. We made our way to our new rooms and started to unpack. Without making too much headway with unpacking we were overcome with the excitement of finally being in Israel and on our kibbutz and we soon found ourselves hanging out outside of our rooms with some volunteers and the 2007 Garin. Before we knew it, it was 8:00am and we had to meet the director of the program. We spent the day figuring out where everything on the kibbutz was, meeting people in charge of the kibbutz, and talking to one another. Although I had only met everyone a few times from the seminars by the time we got to the kibbutz it felt as if everyone was old friends and we just haven't seen each other in a very long time.

For the three months before we are drafted we have various different trips to learn about Israel, we have ulpan (intensive Hebrew classes), and work. Because the amount of time on the kibbutz before we get drafted is so short our schedule is somewhat busy. Some weekends we are allowed to leave the kibbutz and others we aren't. We spent our first weekend at the kibbutz. The on Sunday, the first day of the week in Israel, we started to organize bank accounts, cell phones, health insurance etc. On Monday we took a trip to Tiberius in order for people to sort out their Israeli I.D. cards and then we went to a nearby spring. It was very hot out but the water was refreshingly cold. I saw someone put a watermelon in the spring to keep it cold. Then I helped make a fire to cook potatoes and fresh pita. Other people made all sorts of salads and when we were finished we sat around talking and eating for a few hours. Even though everyone was exhausted from the long day we somehow had the energy to hang out in front of our rooms until way too late.

I meant to write sooner, especially since we aren't that busy, but every second I am away from my group of friends I feel as if I am missing out on something even though I know they are just sitting in front of the rooms. Later in the week we were tested and broken up into two levels of ulpan. Many of the kids in my Garin are Israeli but left at a young age so their reading and writing isn't quite up to par. I am in the higher class, with mainly Israeli kids, and then there is a lower class for people ranging from people who hardly speak any Hebrew to kids who speak fairly well but need to improve grammar.

It is a Friday afternoon and I am at my friend's house in Haifa. We are planning on going to Tel Aviv and the buses are going to stop fairly soon, because there is no public transportation on Shabbat, so I have to get going. I'll try to write another update soon.

Thank you to everyone who has been asking about me. It always helps to think about my family and friends who I care about. I'd love to hear from everyone. Have a great weekend!
Aaron

I am sitting in my room in Kfar Saba and in eight days I will be moving up North, to Kibbutz Yiftach. I so guess I have a lot of explaining because I have been in Israel for a little over a month.

For starters, I live in, as I said, Kfar Saba. Kfar Saba is a city north of Tel Aviv right next to Ra'anana and one city over from Hertziliyah. I'll go one more step back to make sure we're all on the same page. However, before I do so, I would like to apologize for the various mistakes I am inevitably going to make in terms of spelling and maybe some grammar. Keep in mind I am having hearing less and less English these days and although I have been reading in an attempt to keep the quality of my English level somehow the 19th Century narration of Mark Twain, in Innocents Abroad, has not been as helpful as I had expected. So bear with me!

One Tuesday June 24th I arrived at JFK airport with a one-way ticket to Israel. I was still a little bit tired from the night before. I had some last minute packing I expected to do after a nice family dinner, however, little did I know but my friends had planned a surprise going away party. Packing had to wait until after my surprise party. Getting back on topic, I was flying with two friends from my Garin, 50-60 other olim chadashim (new immigrants to Israel) and the regular El Al customers.

Just in case I failed to explain what my "Garin" means; it is a reference to Garin Tzabar. Garin Tzabar is a program formed nearly twenty years ago by children of Israeli parents who were part of the Tzofim (Israeli Scouts in America, all activities are conducted in Hebrew) who wanted to move to Israel and serve in the Israeli army. Over the years Israelis living in North America but not affiliated with the Tzofim began to join the program. In the past few years North American Jews who were not part of the Israeli community began to hear about the program's success and they too joined the program. The idea of the program is to make aliyah (move to Israel) with a group, which will then be absorbed onto a Kibbutz. The first three months on the kibbutz consist of volunteer work and an ulpan (intensive Hebrew study course) and becoming good friends with your group. The program encourages, or forces depending how you look at it, group bonding by making every other Shabbat a "Closed Shabbat" (Closed Shabbat is an army term which means you must guard the base over Shabbat and cannot leave for the weekend). So we have a group to come back to on our free weekends and a group of friends we can depend on to help us out during hard periods of the army.


Throughout my flight it didn't quite sink in that I was moving to Israel. I thought that it was going to be much more exciting of an experience, however, in actuality it felt very normal. I had spent time in Israel from August 2007 until February 2008 working on a kibbutz doing ulpan and improving my Hebrew. When I landed and spent the first few days in Israel it felt as if I had never left! Nothing had changed hardly and when I saw friends I hadn't seen in months after no time we talking as if we had seen each other the day before.

I certainly did not remember the flight being so long! I fell asleep three times and each I awoke I could not believe how much time on the flight remained, the first time I woke up we had yet to take off.

Finally we landed and I got my first taste of Israeli bureaucracy, even though it was only a small dosage. My flight was arranged by Nefesh B'Nefesh, not to be confused with the Jewish Agency which actually arranges aliyah with the Israeli Consulate. Nefesh B'Nefesh is a private organization that encourages Jews to make aliyah by providing assistance such as clarifying new immigrant rights handling a fair load of the required paperwork, etc. It was a good thing Nefesh B'Nefesh helped out with the paperwork because it only took an hour. I have no idea, nor any inclination to ask, how long it would take otherwise.

Although I did not quite finish typing up all that I have written in my notebook and I didn't quite get as far as I expected to I think I will have to call this a first entry in order to just post it up already. Hopefully I will be able to finish writing another post or two relatively soon, however, be sure to expect a brand new post with in the next 10 days or so once I go up to Kibbutz Yiftach. There is going to be a big ceremony in Tel Aviv at Bet HaChayal. Ehud Barak, the Defense Minister, former Prime Minister, and the most decorated Soldier, is scheduled to speak.

Until then I hope everyone is having a wonderful summer. I would love to hear feedback, comments, and to hear from you in general. Hill.AaronJoseph@gmail.com is my e-mail address. Additionally, it is very nice to think of all of the support (or concern!) I have from friends and family.

Aaron