Purim, Parents, and PFL (plus a backwards c next to the P to make a B because that's what it really was and I just wanted more alliteration)

I apologize for not having posted a blog in a while, but you should be happy because this means I've been good and busy :)

Purim- If you don't know what Purim is, it's a Jewish holiday and out of present laziness I suggest you look it up to have an idea of why we did crazy things like wear costumes.  All of Nativ came to a hotel outside of Jerusalem to spend 4 days together.  I didn't want to leave the petting zoo for so long, but this was worth it.  The hotel at which we stayed had incredible food, we fulfilled all of the mitzvot for the chag (holiday), staff taught short shiurim (classes), and I think we all had a lot of fun.

Wednesday night was the beginning of the holiday, but during the day before this we had 2 shiurim (there were 3 different shiurim for each time slot, and we signed up for all of them before).  My first shiur was with Jules (not Nativ staff, but head of USY) about Amalek and the requirement to remember his people.  My second shiur was looking at a criticism of the Book of Esther, which was fascinating.

Then we got into our costumes and joined together for maariv and megilla reading (Nativers did it all).  Before the service, though, I took a lot of pictures of a lot of great costumes. 

Candy Land

Arielle and Eric, as Prince Eric and Ariel

Danny and Sandy

After this, we had a dance party, which I and several of my friends used as an alternative to our usual workout.  The next morning, we had services and read Megillat Esther again.  Then we went to a town, the name of which I do not currently remember, for a parade where we were able to see real Israelis dressed in their finest costumes.  We went to an unnecessarily (my opinion) fancy restaurant in Tel Aviv for our seudat mitzvah.  When we returned to our hotel, Jules led a session on the status of Conservative Judaism. 

On Friday we went to Jerusalem because it was Shushan Purim there (walled cities have an extra day of the holiday).  First we went to Ir HaKerach (Ice City) to see ice sculptures (a lot of people loved it- I was impressed by the technical skill but didn’t think it was that amazing).  Then we were on our own for a few hours.  Walking down the streets there, you see people in costumes, street performers, beer stands, candy stands, last minute costumes stands, and people reading megilla.  I saw a Magen David Adom blood drive truck, and decided to donate blood with Zach, Jon, and Lainey.  I visited the Conservative Yeshiva (I just missed their play!) and ate lunch at my favorite restaurant (The Village Green).  That afternoon we returned to our hotel with plenty of time to prepare for Shabbat.

Shabbat began with an incredible Kabbalat Shabbat service (honestly, I’m impressed with my fellow Nativers).  After dinner, we had another shiur.  I went to one about independent minyanim with Rachel where we had a good discussion, but of course left more confused on the issue of whether they are good or bad.  After this we had a tisch, and after that I had a 2-hour long conversation with Yossi (plus a few more Nativers) about Jewish communities.

Shabbat morning included services and another great shiur (Adi led one on fate and destiny).  As I hadn’t talked about it enough over the past couple days, I spent much of my free time discussing Judaism with Nativers and madrichim.  Between mincha and maariv, I had my last Purim weekend shiur with Simeon about Maimonides’ and Spinoza’s rational Jewish philosophies.  In all honesty, in less than 4 days, I had some of my most mentally stimulating, mind-blowing, and meaningful discussions about Jewish theology, philosophy, community, and individuality.

Parents- Saturday night in Israel, we returned to the kfar.  Saturday night in Chicago, my parents boarded a plane. 

On Sunday, back at the petting zoo, things were a little crazy.  Food dishes were moved in and out of cages, animals were hungry and thirsty, and a rabbit had died.  On the other hand, all 20 of the eggs one hen was sitting on hatched!  Then that night, I met my parents in Chaifa.

Monday morning, my parents came to the kfar.  I showed my parents around the kfar, and this happened to include watching the birth of goats.  They met a lot of Nativers, and they were surprised at how my peers were even more excited to meet them than they were to meet my friends.  Then I spent the afternoon with them in Chaifa.  On Tuesday, we went to Tzfat, where they got to meet more Nativers as the Karmiel group was in Tzfat for their Yom Nativ.

Thursday would have been the best day for my mom to see the petting zoo, but she was in Jerusalem with my Dad, learning about Israel.  Why would she have loved this day?  A woman came to us with a turtle in a basket, so we then had a turtle (who has since been released into the wild by Harari); a rat gave birth to a litter of cute pink squirmy babies; and we had two new black and white goats.

Friday morning I went to Jerusalem to go to the shuk with my parents and be with them for Shabbat.  I took my parents to Roz’s minyan (my mom loved it, my dad didn’t, as I expected), and we had dinner with Leah, Suzanne, Steph, and Julian.  In the morning, we went to Shira Chadasha.

Building Future Leadership (BFL)- Sunday morning, while my parents continued with their touring and learning program, I went to this Masa conference.  I wrote little notes about the conference for the purpose of this blog for Sunday through Tuesday, but by Wednesday into Thursday I was so tired that I completely forgot about it.  BFL was not very special for me- I would have much preferred to remain at Kfar Chasidim, much of what we did was not very leadership-related, and if a leadership seminar was necessary one of just Nativers would have been preferable- and I do not feel a need to write too many details to remember it.  Suffice it to say the following:

Small groups- We were split into small groups based on the colleges we are planning to attend.  My group was MIT, GW, Penn, Wash U, Vanderbilt, Emory, Northwestern, Tulane, and Tufts (unlike most groups, we had only 4 non-Nativers and no more than 2 people per school).  We discussed the programs of the week in these groups.  It was fun, but nothing amazing.

Tracks- I was in the intrapreneurship track, which was really “how to introduce yourself, how to make a point, visit the Knesset (Israeli parliament) for unknown reason, and public speaking.”  I had a great facilitator for this, and had fun in these sessions.

They spent money- During the week, Masa brought in Shimon Perez and Natan Sharansky to speak to us (Why am I not talking about these seemingly interesting speakers?  They weren’t of substance).  We had fancy dinners.  We received not 1, but 2 pens. We also received nice folders, T-shirts, and framed graduation certificates.

One worthwhile program- Avraham Infeld spoke to us on Thursday morning about how Judaism is a people, not a religion.  He said we need not be uniform, but can be unified with the stability of 3 legs of a 5-legged table where the 5 legs are family, memory, covenant, Israel (land and/or state), and Hebrew.  A 3-legged table is strong and stable, and if all Jews pick 3 of these 5, at least 1 will be shared.  He was not only a fantastic speaker, but he spoke of substance.

Parents (again)- After the seminar, I met my parents and Rachel (the one who stayed at my house 14 years ago) and her family in Ashdod.  It was so nice to see them again.  Friday, my parents and I went back to Jerusalem for their second Shabbat in Israel.  We went to Yakar (along with many Nativers) Friday night, and brought Sarah, Deena, Sandi, and Dana back for Shabbat dinner.  In the morning, my dad went to the Italian synagogue (which he found interesting, as I expected), and my mom and I stayed at the hotel talking.  That afternoon, we took a 2 ½ hour walk around Jerusalem, spending most of this time in my favorite park.  It was great to spend time with my parents, to show them my favorite places in Israel.   I came back to the kfar Saturday night, and Sunday night they went to the airport to finish their trip.

This is the majority of the past 3 weeks.  I hope to have more good things to tell you soon.

Trivia: There is such a thing as a hammock tent. http://nerdapproved.com/misc-gadgets/hammock-with-integrated-tent-tenammock/

What if...?

Since being on the Kfar, many of us have compared our jobs to others’ jobs and our lives to other tracks’ lives.  Recently, I’ve had the chance to experience some of these others.

It has been raining a lot in the North recently, which is fantastic for Israel, fantastic for the land, and really annoying and inconvenient for most of our jobs on the kfar (petting zoo, gardening, maintenance, fields).  Because we need to volunteer on the kfar (I think more to establish that Nativ is serious about this than anything else), the outside workers are moved around to other jobs for the rainy days. 

With the rain last Wednesday, we fed the animals and thoroughly cleaned all of the rat cages.  We also had quiet reading time for a while.  After lunch, unable to do the weeding that I wanted to do, I joined Lucy to paint a wall in the school.  It was nice to hang out with Lucy and a little fun to paint.  Thursday with more rain, again we fed the animals, and then I did maintenance with Harari, which was mostly me standing and watching him try to fix a boiler.  I wasn’t much help besides finding tools and holding things so he could pull something in the opposite direction.  He is only here until 12 on Thursdays, so after lunch I joined the kitchen crew and spent about 2 hours with the very loud dishwasher, loading and unloading trays on a conveyer belt.  It was fun to work with some different people for a couple days, and it was nice to do different things, but I missed the petting zoo.  I am now surer than ever that I was put into the perfect job for me.

Friday morning, I went to Karmiel.  Brief recap of the day: feed the animals (Matilda begged for a lot of attention and managed to slip into the parakeet cage when I went in to change their water), wait for bus 72A, see 2 dogs fight and then trot along together as if it didn't happen, let bus pass by (we couldn’t see the number!), get ride in bus 11 to later 72A stop to still make the desired bus, take another bus to Karmiel, see Karmiel friends (Julia and Hannah [in whose room I stayed], Zach, Neil, Rozzie, Maddy, Teri, and Gila [visiting from Yerucham]), eat deep dish pizza, watch "The Prince of Egypt."

Karmiel Shabbat was great.  We had Nativ Friday night services.  Then dinner, which was amazing!  In Karmiel, where Nativers stay in apartments and have to buy and cook their own food, often during the week two rooms will plan to have dinner together, and it can be even more on Shabbat.  We ate the following food with the following people: fresh challah, barley soup, tofu and veggie stir fry, salad, schnitzel (which I obviously didn’t eat), fries, and chocolate chip cookies; Julia, Hannah, Teri, Mia (also visiting from kfar, along with Arielle, Suzanne, Leah, Steph, and Jesse), Gila, Zach, Neil, Maddy, Hadas (madricha), and me.  It was so great to have home-cooked food!  Pretty much right after dinner, I went to sleep.

Saturday morning, I woke up very early.  I walked around the building for a while and read until it was time to go to shul.  Only Hadas, Maddy, and I went- everyone else asleep- some until lunchtime.  The same 10 of us ate together, but now a dairy meal of challah, lentil soup, a different salad, lasagna, potatoes, and banana bread.  Yum!  Julia and Hannah went back to sleep right after lunch, so I hung out with Gila, Mia, and Teri for a while, and when the last of them finally decided to go to sleep too, I hung out with Rozzie and Arielle.  We didn’t have a minyan (10 people) for mincha, but I managed to chant the few lines of Torah for the service out of the siddur fairly well (not that we had a Torah to do it officially anyway).  Then the 5 of us at mincha played yaniv (an Israeli card game) and ate challah, chumus, veggies, and cakes in Hadas’ room, followed by maariv and havdallah.  Then I packed up and left to return to the kfar.  It was really nice to be in Karmiel for Shabbat. 

Karmiel is a city of about 40,000, a large percent of whom are recent Russian immigrants.  Most of the volunteer jobs here are ganim (preschools), teaching English to children, teaching English to adults, and a Salvation Army-type place.  But there are also jobs at a farm and a special needs kibbutz, where Nativers work with goats, horses, and dogs, and if this was my track, that’s what I’d want to do.  The volunteer schedules are very different for each person.  Nativers occupy the majority of a floor, but could easily not see their next-door neighbors for days at a time.  Their laundry costs 4 shekels a load, instead of ours which has to be sent out for 4 shekels a kilo.

After this weekend, I got a glimpse of what it would be like to be on the Karmiel track, and I think I would have been happy.  I really wish I could buy and cook my own food, and the atmosphere here was much less camp-like than the kfar.  Still, I’m extremely happy with being on the kfar track.  I’ll have my whole life for the independence of purchasing and preparing my own food, practicing keeping a kosher kitchen, and sticking to a budget, but I could see myself loving that life now, too.

Today, Monday, we had a break from our normal schedule to see a play and dance performances.  Many of us wanted to stay at the kfar to do our jobs (finally, it’s sunny and the land is drying!), but the show was definitely worth it.  The play was done by the students (I think 11^th graders) and was about auditioning for a show, so it was full of impressive singing, dancing, and gymnastics.  The whole show was in Hebrew, so I only understood some of the dialogue, but it was still great.  The message was “Every child needs an adult to believe in him.”  After this performance, there was a short video of kfar staff being silly in honor of Purim- it’s so weird to see the serious staff playing in a playground, the kitchen, and the petting zoo!  After this, some professional break dancers performed, and they were incredible! 

Trivia: I now need to scare the peacock away from me when I work because he’ll follow me around; he’s very intimidating.  Seriously.