When I Get Tired, I Play With Animals

On Sunday, once we finished feeding the animals, Arielle and Jake left to work with Yitz and I was alone.  I continued with the work we had been doing, but took a nice break to take pictures of play with animals.  I have realized that our job at pinat chai is like the gardening job (because they’re cleaning before they can actually garden), except we care for animals when we first get to work and can play with them when we get tired.  With my iPod this day, I learned that songs by Bob Dylan are the best for yard work.  On Monday, the 3 of us plus Sarah (who works in the refet/greenhouse/fields but without fieldwork yet this season has a lot of free time to go to other jobs) took another play with animals break.  I held a pigeon this day!  This one dark gray pigeon who still had a few yellow baby feathers let me pet him and then pick him up.  It’s so weird to hold birds, especially being used to just having them on my finger/arm as it was in my high school Zoobot class.

Matilda won't let me take a picture with her face...

Our first Yom Nativ was Yom iCommunicate.  Tuesday is the only day when we daven together, and we had individual prayer to communicate with G-d in our own ways.  We had some fun activities, like playing telephone and making fruit salad in small groups in which some people were blind (blindfolded), deaf (listening to music so could not hear others), blind and deaf, Israeli (only spoke and understood Hebrew), mute, and stutterers (3second silence after every 3 words).  This was truly great programming, giving me some hope for my group’s Yom Nativ.

Wednesday was a busy day back at the pinat chai.  We fed animals, cleaned, raked, weeded, moved rocks, attached a wooden thing with a bunch of different openings near the top of the dove cage (for nests), and, sadly, buried another bird.  Harari also took us away from our work for much of the day: he showed us a chicken sitting on her eggs and another laying eggs and told us they incubate for 21 days; he put a roaming rooster in the cage with chickens (male and female) just to watch them (they’re crazy!); he picked up two younger non-aggressive chickens from this cage, gave them both to me, and had me put them in the cage with the doves.  Like I said before, Harari is crazy.

That night, most of us went to a bowling alley in Chaifa.  It was great to (1) see how the buses work before going away for Shabbat and (2) do something.  Don’t get me wrong, I love the kfar.  I love working, getting back from my job, resting, working out, showering, resting, eating dinner, and then reading or watching a movie until I go to sleep.  I am content just hanging out with friends, not going anywhere or doing anything.  But it was a nice change of pace to do something for a night.  It also helped diffuse some of the tension of people in our group getting annoyed with each other, preventing (or delaying) any real issues.  And most importantly, it was a lot of fun!

Thursday (today) was Rosh Chodesh Adar (first day of the month of Adar).  And, as “When Adar begins, happiness increases,” music was played during breakfast, to which a few Nativers and a lot of yeshiva students sang and danced.  Everywhere, people were jumping, singing, and dancing in silly hats.  They had a carnival or something at the school.  A couple banot sherut walking past the pinat chai invited us to the show, but we knew we had to stay and work.  We could hear the music and cheering, though.  We saw many people with face paint throughout the day, too.  After today, I can’t wait for Purim!  With all of the Adar excitement, finishing the left side of our pinat chai path, finished cleaning out two more sections of the pinat chai grounds, and delicious fresh bread with zaatar (a spice) at dinner, this was a great day.

Trivia: How do I want to spend Shabbatot on the kfar?  After the second week, I learned they aren’t so amazing, so I don't.  This weekend Mia and I are going to visit our host family from when we went to Modiin, next week I’m visiting Nativers in Karmiel, then I’m spending 3 Shabbatot in Jlem (1 with Nativ, 2 with my parents), and after these I hope to travel more.

One Whole Week

We started jobs on Sunday, February 12.  I got the petting zoo job with Arielle and Jake!!  The thing about the petting zoo, though, is the job was meant to be only Mondays, Wednesdays, and Thursdays (I’ll tell you about Tuesdays below), so for Sunday we went to Yitz’s autoshop.  (This whole Sunday thing was later changed to starting at petting zoo and coming to Yitz at 10, then to someone (me!) staying at the petting zoo all day and others going to Yitz after feeding the animals.)  Why do they have an autoshop?  They know many of the students will not attend college, so they teach them trades to prepare them for work when adults.  Yitz was great, very funny, extremely nice, and always impressed at how quickly we finished assignments.  He taught us Hebrew and we taught him English.  After lunch, he brought us clementines.  Most of the day, Arielle and I painted tools to be separated into sets.  We also brushed rust and chipping paint off of mysterious objects.  We had a lot of fun with this work, but I really just couldn’t wait to get to the petting zoo.

Monday, we started at the petting zoo!  Our boss, Akiva, took us around to see all of the animals.  He showed us what to feed them, and I held as many as I could.  This started with the rats, who are in the room also used for food, tool, and random crap storage.  Then we went to the line of cages of parakeets, pigeons and rabbits, a ferret and a cat (Matilda, who we let out), and a chatamon (chatuman?  South American coati).  Past these cages is one of chickens, more rabbits, and guinea pigs; past that cage is one of doves and pigeons.  (We learned the Hebrew for pigeon is ‘doar,’ the word for mail.)  After the cages, we fed the ducks, which are in a fenced in section with a pond.  There were also chickens, peacocks, and a turkey running around free. We then saw the goats, which actually belong to the yeshiva, but they’re close so we can play with them.

The whole area is run down and dirty.  We spent this day completely cleaning and organizing the rat room and cleaning out the rabbit cage- it had been far too long since it was last cleaned.  But the real need here is the land- raking and weeding.

While first semester, Tuesday nights we had “Erev Nativ” programming, second semester Tuesday is Yom Nativ (Nativ Day).  For our first one, we had a programming workshop, brainstormed goals and ideas for our programs, and were broken up into groups of 3 or 4 to organize and lead a Yom Nativ.  My group is with Leah, Aryeh, and Aaron.  Originally, it was supposed to be “Religions/Minorities,” but we couldn’t agree on anything different from the “Culture” group; thus, we decided to make a new topic for ourselves.  We’ll see how this goes.

On Wednesday, Arielle, Jake, and I started our raking.  In one day, we made a huge difference.  We’re also working on making a path to all of the cages.  Also on Wednesday, we met Harari, who is also sort of our boss.  Let’s compare Akiva and Harari so you have an idea of what our job is like.

Time: Neither are with us every day, and if one is, not for long.

Feeding: Harari arguably overfeeds the animals and Akiva arguably underfeeds.

Personality: Akiva is quiet and sweet.  Harari is crazy: he lets the chatuman out to run around, he squirted goat milk into Jake’s mouth, and he will hand a chicken to you (me) by the feet.

?

Expectations: Neither push us to work hard or timely.  If an animal dies, Akiva wants us to bury it; Harari wants us to feed it to the chatuman.  Harari wants us to feed the cageless chickens and peacocks; Akiva says they find enough food around the land.  With regard to the cages with double doors (so a back door can be closed before the front door is open and birds don’t fly out [which we do not have for the parakeets, and on the day I write this, we lost a parakeet to the door being open too long]), Akiva says to put the padlock on the outer door, and, of course, Harari wants it on the inner door.

Thursday was another day of heavy raking.  Akiva was back today, and asked if we could come by Friday morning to feed the animals and just check on the place.  I was more than happy too.  Though we have no requirement to work on Fridays for Nativ, I really want to be there for the animals.  So on Friday, Jake and I went (Arielle was leaving that morning to go away for the weekend, but otherwise she would have come), accompanied by Lucy and Maya because they wanted to see the animals.  As soon as we passed the gate, we saw that the turkey had been attacked and killed.  Minutes later we saw that two pigeons had also died in their cage, probably due to the wind from the storm the previous night.  This was a hard day, a horrible day.  In such a short time we had come to feel that these animals were ours.  The turkey was especially difficult to handle.  He was our only turkey, and in just three days we had learned his personality.  It was a bad day.  Still, despite this day knowing we will have to deal with more dead animals in the future, I cannot imagine being nearly as happy with any other job on the kfar.

Later this day, Alysa and Dana came to visit from Karmiel.  Soon, Shabbat arrived.  Most of our Nativ group davened with the Nativ group, but I went to the kfar synagogue to see what services there were like.  They were nice services, but nothing special by my perspective.  They sang less than my favorite services, but I really liked the tunes they did sing.  There were few people there for the amount of space, and only one other woman- Tamar, Benny’s wife, with whom I talked during the dvar Torah.

I spent most of Saturday at Beth Mitah (For the non-Hebrew speakers, this is a common way of making my bed sound like a synagogue.  Nativers are also big fans of “The Horizontal Minyan,” “Rodfei Chalomim” [Dream Chasers] “Beth Lishon” [House of Sleeping], and “B’nai Pajamas.”), pretty much just getting up for food and bathroom.  My room usually had many people coming in and out to talk, so it’s not like I was being antisocial.  It was a good day.

Trivia: What is my normal bedtime at the kfar? Around 10 o’clock.  Last night most of us went to Chaifa for bowling in honor of Barry’s birthday, and not wanting to pay for a cab, I took the more time-consuming buses and did not get back to my room until around 11.  All of my roommates were asleep and I could barely believe I was awake so late.

In a Kfar kfar, kfar away...

We arrived at Kfar Chasidim approximately 2 hours before we expected to.  Driving from the entrance of Kfar Chasidim through to the entrance of Kfar Hanoar Hadati (translation: Religious Youth Village, this is the part of Kfar Chasidim where we live and work) to outside of our dorm buildings, we saw 5 refetim (cowsheds), the makolet (little shop for basic needs), and the petting zoo.  We knew this was going to be a great afternoon and a fantastic 3 months.

It is beautiful here.

almond blossoms on Tu B'Shvat- a good sign :)

Waiting outside, we heard the school “bell,” which is actually a medley of ice cream truck songs.  Still, several times a day I expect to see an ice cream truck driving by.  We got our rooms (we already figured out roommates- I’m with Lucy, Maya, and Deena; we share our bathroom with Sarah, Leah S. (not my past roommate), Arielle, and Netanya) and began unpacking.  It doesn’t look like a lot of space, and the rooms are clearly made for 3 inhabitants, but with drawers under our beds we have no problems.

At dinner, we discovered the food is good!  We were expecting much worse food.  We did not want to assume all meals would be good, but they have proven to be pretty consistent (just some dairy meals are very unsubstantial).  It was also healthy, and we didn’t have desserts like at Beit Nativ (but we soon learned that nearly all of the vegetable dishes are full of oil, so…eh).

After dinner we met with the kfar director, Benny, and decided to no longer call ourselves kfarmers or kfarniks but The Jets.  We have not stuck with this at all.

Some things about the kfar:

·         Dati- The kfar is religious, and though many of the students here do not come from religious backgrounds, in public we are required to show a specific amount of modesty.  Though girls do not need to wear skirts at all times, as we once thought, only those volunteering in the gan (preschool) do.  We really just cannot wear very short shorts or tight pants.  We also cannot be publically affectionate- this goes for the 4 couples in our track and everyone’s general hugging and jumping on each other- in order to be role models and prevent students from thinking they can act this way towards us.

·         Duration- We are here for 3 months.  While many groups have come to volunteer here before, none have stayed longer than 3 weeks.  We are the guinea pigs with this, but I think this is good because it is even more worth our bosses’ times to teach us how to do our jobs.  The students here are used to groups coming and going quickly, so it will be interesting for them for us to be here so long.

·        Inter-Interest- The students who live here are ultra-Orthodox yeshiva boys and boys of Ethiopian/Indian/Russian descent.  There are a lot of cultural differences between us and these groups, which can make us all uncomfortable at times.  It is definitely a learning experience, and soon we will have programs with the students (not the yeshiva- they really just rent space here) to break down these boundaries.

Day 2: Elana, our kfar coordinator, gave us more information about the kfar and a tour.  We learned about all of the different jobs on the kfar and ranked our choices for Rachel and Ira to decide who goes where.  My top choice: the petting zoo (not really a petting zoo…the animals are in cages…it’s technically the Pinat Chai, Animal Corner).  [Other potential jobs: gardening, refet + fields + greenhouse (the most desired job among us, and only space for 5), kitchen, gan, maintenance + laundry, shadowing students in English, Marom (school for special needs), yeshiva (maintenance in the area with potential opportunity to study), and beautification] 

Later in the afternoon, most of us went to the makolet, which is a bigger store than we expected and very inexpensive.  Internet had yet to be established for us, so we spent a lot of time hanging out together.  I kept on thinking the whole day how much I love just being with our group.  Still, we found we could get internet on the stairs outside of the girls’ building, so we took advantage of that and everyone walking by pointed out how funny we looked doing this.

Day 3: We did awesome stuff that people in Karmiel and Yerucham were definitely not doing. (I later learned they spent much of this day learning about kashrut because they need to take care of their own kitchens.)  First, we went to “Yankel’s Shtetl,” just outside the Kfar Hanoar gate.  Here, a man named Gadi showed us paintings and things that made their ways out of Europe.  The way he presented everything was a lot of fun, plus we took a break to eat delicious challah.  Then we went to the goju.  A goju is the hut that Ethiopians lived in, and one was built just past our cheder ochel (dining hall) to teach people about Jewish Ethiopian culture.  The Ethiopian rabbi’s wife, Tami, cooked for us a lot of traditional Ethiopian food and told us about life in Ethiopia and coming to Israel.  We learned that when she came to Israel (20-something years ago), there was no question about Ethiopian immigrants’ Judaism, but those coming now are coming from intermarried and assimilated families and there is question.

So far, the day was breakfast, Yankel’s Shtetl with challah, and the goju with Ethiopian foods, so clearly we hadn’t eaten enough food and went to lunch.  Then we prepared for our first Shabbat on the kfar.  We showered, cleaned our bathroom for the first time (we’re switching off weeks with our bathroom-sharing room), and got dressed for Shabbat (but I resented this a little because I was ready to not need to be clean, like how it will be for our work).

Shabbat: We had services together as Nativ, and I really don’t think that if other tracks were to do this they would be as spirited.  Then we went to dinner, where we had a lot of good food, but everything was brought out slowly (I don’t know why they found this necessary, but students working in the kitchen brought the dishes to our tables instead of our typical buffet).  Most of us stayed together for a tisch, too.  On Saturday, we had services together, lunch, menucha (rest), a dvar Torah (sermon) by Benny, and our final services to conclude Shabbat.

Motzei Shabbat (Saturday night after the Sabbath), nearly everyone worked out.  All of the guys plus 3 girls started “Insanity,” a 60 day strength and agility workout program of which Jake has a video.  A lot of girls did a few of Lucy’s 10-minute workout videos, too.  I’m really proud of our track for this.  Most of us are trying to eat more healthily, and nearly everyone has stuck to working out every day, even after our physical labor at our jobs, which I will tell you about in the next post (feel the suspense!).

Trivia: The cat at the petting zoo has been named Matilda. 

Tiyul DaROAM

On the first day of Tiyul, we drove south to the Ein Gedi where we were supposed to do either an easy or a hard hike (every day there was either an easy- or non-hike option, but I always chose to do the hard- or plain hike).  However, the night before there was a flash flood, and the hard hike route was full of water and not safe, so we all did the easy one.   There was still a lot of water, and most of us ended the hike with shoes soaking wet.  Rain and flash floods are not too uncommon for January, but not this much water.  There was more water and vegetation this day than Yossi had ever seen there before.

We then went to a Bedouin camp where we first had camel rides (5 years ago I did this late at night for maybe 5 minutes.  This day it was in daylight for a long walk around the desert, so muc more worth it.).  I shared my camel with Mia and we named him Major Major Major Major in honor of the Catch 22 character.  A few people named their camels after Nativers, including Suzanne and Rivka naming theirs Jill Susan Katz; Ira and Yossi named theirs Lucy, but not after the girl in my track, short for Lucifer.

We spent the night with the Bedouins, where we had a really yummy dinner (we vegetarians ate our soy balls together, which were far more nutritious and delicious than we expected our food to be).  That night everyone hung out outside our sleeping tents.  It felt like camp with our campfire, guitars, and singing Jewish and secular songs.

On Friday we had a real hike!  It wasn’t too difficult, but there were some places where we needed ropes or handles.  Again, we saw more water and plant-life than one would expect to see in the desert.  From this hike, I have a small group planning on doing Yam l’Yam (Sea to Sea- a very popular hike in Israel) during our Passover break.

We met the non-hiking group at Kibbutz Keturah, where we were to spend the next 3 nights.  We split into rooms (I roomed with Sarah, but we were in a building that had 4 rooms and a shared kitchen and common room, which was really nice.  It was fun to- in a way- also room with Ellie, Hayley, Courtney, Becca, Sarah, Sivan, Lucy, Julia, and Alisa.) and prepared for Shabbat.  We had a tour to see just how cool this place is; it is not like any other kibbutz.  They have an algae farm, an experimental orchard (growing fruits from other parts of the world), date orchards, the oldest tree in the world (only a few years in the ground, it was started from a date seed found in an archeological dig…hate to say that I cannot remember to when the seed was dated), cows, water desalination machines, the Arava Institute for environmental studies, and solar panels.  Completely surrounded by mountains, it is also an absolutely beautiful place.

We had services all together with a few kibbutzniks.  Everything was led by Nativers, and I must say there was a high Kfar representation.  We had a good dinner (finally somewhere that knows how to feed vegetarians!), and then I hung out in my super-room for a while (the 11 of us were constantly coming and going), staying up just a little past midnight to wish Lucy a happy birthday.

Saturday morning, we had breakfast together in our super-room and services, lunch, and mincha like we normally would.  We had a nice chofesh (free time), during which a large group hung out and read on the grass outside my building.  We also played with these cats that were hanging around, tried to get them to leave, and upon failure, fed them yogurt and hardboiled eggs.  Seeing the cat pounce on the egg was by far the most exciting event of the day. 

On Sunday, I went on the hike while others either did de cupage, choreographed a dance (to a song from Lion King!), or made a movie (It was called “The Negover”, paralleling “The Hangover.”  The kibbutz director, Leah, said, “Over the years I’ve seen a lot of movies made for this activity, and this is one of them,” but I thought it was hilarious.)  The hike included a long, tedious walk to get to the mountain and a shorter but still tedious walk from the mountain to the kibbutz.  The beginning was intense (to me, this means fun), which made it nice.  On the top we looked out to see Keturah and how it was organized (e.g. the refet [dairy] is downwind) and all of the other kibbutzim in the area.

After lunch we had some much needed chofesh.  There was an option to learn about the Arava Institute (environmental studies by a diverse group who live on Keturah), but I am glad I took this time to read in my bed.  Then we went to sand dunes to frolic! This was extremely fine sand, very soft, so we ran and rolled down the hills, did flips we would be afraid to do on hard ground, tackled our friends, and played lap tag (aka sumo, this is a game that involves running, rolling, and tackling, but probably not flips.  I’m not going to explain it here, but I dominated the game this day!).  Later, we returned to the kibbutz and I took a much needed shower to later discover that my ears were still full of sand.

On Monday we had a very good hike, and if I remember correctly, there was water that we had to maneuver around and sections necessitating climbing.  Then we went to Eilat and settled into the hotel (I roomed with Hannah and Sivan).  We had a boat trip that reminded me of my 8^th grade yacht trip: we got on the boat, on one level they played really loud music and people danced and on another level people looked out on the water and talked.  The only difference was no one had cards in Eilat.  Neither time did I find the experience worthwhile, but this time was much better and probably not just because I’m a less bitter person now than I was 5 years ago.  After the boat, we had time to walk around and get dinner.  Eilat reminded me of Navy Pier with the boats, rides, and food.

black mountains!

Tuesday was the final day of Tiyul Darom.  The hard hike group ascended and descended Har Shlomo, but this was not nearly as difficult as Yossi made it sound.  It was steep and challenging, but I think this is better than a slight incline which just makes me sore.  That afternoon we had the opportunity to do water sports, but it was cold and looked like it would rain, so I indulged in my sleepiness and went back to the hotel.  That night, I went with a group to a Beatles restaurant in honor of my Beatles-obsessed friend’s birthday, and they did not play a single Beatles song.  So disappointing.  Still, we had fun hanging out.

Sarah and me on Har Shlomo

Wednesday morning we said our goodbyes.  Some people were sad, but I was mostly excited to finally get to Kfar Chasidim and be with my track only.  Anyway, we’re all going to be together every few weeks.  We got into our respective buses and parted ways.

Trivia: What do most (I assume most, at least) religious Israeli girls and others who have some reason to not go into combat do for the mandatory “army service”?  They participate in Sherut Leumi for which they do national service by volunteering in different places all over Israel.  There are 6 banot (girls) sherut volunteering with kids on the kfar who live down the hall from Rachel, the floor above the Nativ girls’ dorms.

Israel a-few-weeks-ago Seminar

A day after the Poland group returned home, the Israel Experience Week groups also returned from their archeology digs in Acko, volunteering in Chaifa, or Gadna (an Israeli army experience).  We had some time for recuperation, catching up on the past weeks, and our last open Shabbat in Jlem.  Then, from Sunday to Tuesday, we were busy with our Israel Today Seminar (ITS):

Day 1:
We had a lecture with an Israeli correspondent for NY Times.  He was rational and didn't talk about Zionism, so I found this interesting.

Then we had a choice of a session on film at some place that would give a tour and a session on film in our auditorium in -3.  We are supposed to have choices because people have different interests, so I don't really understand this, but I enjoyed not needing to leave Beit Nativ.  We watched two short films- one about a group of observant Jews on a camping trip and one of them brings his non-observant girlfriend and the conflict that ensues in this, and one about a group of snipers in the army.  We talked about the films' purposes and messages, and if I had any interest in film I probably would have enjoyed this.

That night, though, had the worst piece of ITS. The CEO of the Masorti Movement (kind of like the Israeli Conservative movement, but with a heavy emphasis on bringing non observant Jews to some observance and making non-Orthodox Judaism more acceptable in Israel) gave a presentation about his work and how the Israeli government resists it.  He gave a lot of numbers and statistics without enough context or information to fully understand the situations, and I personally could not find much meaning in the presentation.  The one benefit I had from this experience is that I realized I can no longer lie to myself about how I observe Judaism.  I understand being "culturally Jewish," and believe this is a great thing for many people; however, to get what I want out of Judaism, I know I need to be "halachicly (lawfully) Jewish.  If you want to know how this is changing anything for me (I do come from a fairly traditional, typical Conservative background) I do not want to risk offending anyone, so please ask me personaly about specific customs/observances/etc.

Day 2:

Half of the group toured around Lod, an ancient but currently developing town near Tel Aviv.  This town is kind of a microcosm of all of Israel in its ethnic/religious diversity.  It is a very poor town full of the problems common to most poor towns, and it seems like people are really just starting to do serious work to make things better.

Then we went to Tel Aviv to meet with a social activist who did a lot of work for social justice, including organizing the rally I attended in my first week in Jerusalem.

Finally, we came back to Jerusalem to the Chasidic neighborhood of Meah Shearim, where we had a very bad conversation with a man from this community.  We talked about issues in the Chasidic community and conflicts such as the attempt to separate sexes on public buses (Chasidic and other groups of Orthodox Jews are shomer negiyah, which means that they avoid physical contact with people of the other sex who are not their spouse or young children, and on very crowded buses this is difficult to observe and makes them feel uncomfortable.  To some people in Israel and out, having women sit in the back is pure discrimination.  To me, it is not discrimination but it is not fair for this minority to impose its restrictions on others.), and overall had a discussion in which it seemed no one understood the other’s beliefs.

Day 3 (aka, the only really good day):
We had 3 choices for today: heroes (going to Tel Aviv), environment (going to a farm and seeing solar energy stuff, etc.), and technology (seeing some "cars of the future" and other things I don't remember).  While I feel I would have had an even better day with environment, I am happy I chose heroes.  We spent the whole day in and around Tel Aviv doing this...

First we went to the Deaf and Blind Museum, but we could only go to one or the other.  I went to the deaf one, where we had a deaf guide who we could only communicate through acting and signing.  It was a lot of fun, and I hope to go to the Blind Museum sometime.

Then we went to the Olympic Museum, which was pure propaganda and made actions like running despite a sprained ankle seem like the most noble thing one can do.  Clearly, the whole point of the museum is to encourage Israelis to forget about school and train to be in the Olympics.  We had funny videos and fun strength test-type activities.

Then we had a scavenger hunt, for which we had to answer questions, ask strangers for a lot of information, perform tasks, and take pictures with strangers.  We also had to get a creative souvenir, so my team (Red) took a roll of toilet paper from a bathroom and wrote, in English and Hebrew, "Holy Sh*t from the Holy Land."  We got extra points for this, and ended in second place.

To end the day, we went to Yaffo to meet the other two groups to eat at the deaf restaurant and see Na Lagaat (Translation: Please Touch), a play performed by the deaf and blind.  It is amazing how well some of them moved without seeing where they were!  The message of the show is "Not by bread alone," so the show starts with them kneading bread and ends with delicious fresh bread for everyone in the audience. This day was long and tiring, but incredible.

We returned to Jlem that night.  The next day we packed for our Tiyul Darom (Southern Hike/Tour/I don't like any English translations for "tiyul") and had short orientations for each track.  The next day (Thursday) we commenced the tiyul.

Trivia:
What's going on in my life now?  I'm on the kfar and love it and can't wait to get around to blogging about Tiyul Darom so I can tell you about my life here!