Welcome to Beit Shean

Arriving to Beit Shean with Lindsay and Alex about a month ago, we came directly to our apartment for the next few months. It was amazing! Beautiful, new, big, and filled with umbrellas (it was raining that day), chocolate, and fruit. Chen (our amazing coordinator!) was there to welcome us, feed us, and show us around Beit Shean. After about a week of visiting lots of different volunteering opportunities Chen made us each a schedule of different places to go every day. My schedule includes 3 different elementary schools, a cooking/English extra-curricular activity, a high school, and an English class for adults.

 In the elementary schools, I help teach the English classes of the 4^th, 5^th, and 6^th grades. The most significant contribution I have made to the elementary schools is through teaching the kids fun songs from camp. It is really amazing how much the kids love singing the songs. I have become famous in Beit Shean as the girl who sings with the kids. I love doing the songs with them at the beginning of class and then hearing them sing the songs later down the halls or during hafsakas. Liat, one of the English teachers I work with, says I have made my mark, contributed my part to Beit Shean through the songs.

In the high school Lindsay and I work with the 12^th graders to prepare for their oral exams coming up. Their range in levels of English differs from person to person, but all of them like getting the opportunity to practice speaking English, since there are not many English speakers in Beit Shean. We also sometimes work with the 11^th graders, giving them presentations about life in America. They are very interested in an assortment of topics from fraternities/sororities to racism and anti-Semitism.

The English/cooking activity is one of our most fun activities- that Alex, Lindsay, and I do together along with Moriah (our awesome soldier friend). Together we teach the kids how to cook fun American foods, while playing games to teach them English. It’s a really great activity and lot of fun, but most importantly it targets a population in need. The kids we work with for this activity are all from broken homes with difficult families. They don’t have the opportunity to do a lot of after school activities at all, never mind one as cool as this. The positive feedback that we get each week from working with these kids is incredible. Each one of them gains so much in a session, not necessarily the words we teach them or the food they eat, but in being apart of something special, something fun, something they can look forward to.

Lastly Lindsay and I have just started an English class for adults who were formerly part of an English program called Engliyada that has been extremely successful in connecting Cleveland volunteers with the people of Beit Shean. The people in the region wanted more practice with their English because they believe it’s such an important language. We will work with them on their conversational English

In each place I volunteer, I do different tasks and work with different people, but there is one thing that all the places have in common- appreciation. Everyone I work with is so appreciative of the help we are giving, it’s amazing. From the little kids who love singing with me to the adults who want to improve their conversational English, It really makes a difference when people say thank you, and truly appreciate the work we are doing. Beit Shean is a wonderful city filled with wonderful people and it has been a true joy to volunteer here. 

Winter Break

Over the winter break, I went around Israel with my parents, hiking, and exploring all parts of the country. I met them at the airport, with Lauren, who coincidently I sat next to on the plane here in August. We waited together for our families, as we played Israeli/American game (trying to figure by the people’s appearance if they were American or Israeli) and then even further if they were from NY or on a connecting flight. Finally they came and it was very exciting, I was so happy to see them after not seeing them for quite a while. We went up north from the airport and went to the Carmel winery and ATVing in the mountains, where the fire had taken place. That night everyone was exhausted, so it was an early night.

         The next day we went to Akko and explored the old city and the crusader castles. Then we went up north to explore some sea caves, and ended our day in Haifa, shopping, having a nice dinner and relaxing at Aroma, using the Internet, so my mom could update her blog. The next day we went hiking in Mount Merion, which was beautiful and perfect weather, then we went to a pomegranate wine, and tasted wines and sampled jams. That night we went to Beit Shean to have dinner with my host family. It was a really nice night, everyone got along, and I was a good translator, with the help of Nissim back and forth between everyone. There was a lot of good food, and it was really nice that my parents got to meet some real Israelis and see me interact with all my Hebrew skills.

 The next morning we got up very early to go hot ballooning, we had a bit of difficulty getting there as our guide got lost and had a meltdown, where his Parkinson’s flared. It was a scary car ride, but we made it there safely and right on time (well actually we were late but they waited for us). When we finally got there it was very nice and the views were really great. Afterwards, we went a nice bike ride through the hulu valley where we saw the birds migrating for the winter. We ended the day saying goodbye to our guide, since he was pretty crazy and not meant to be guiding anymore and relaxed in our amazing hotel. We stayed at the Mitzpe Haymim, which was really beautiful and the food was delicious. This was my favorite hotel of the trip; I loved the atmosphere, and everything about it.

         The next day we went to Jerusalem with our new guide Sarah, who was great! We saw the City of David and the Hezekiah Tunnels, went to the Israeli museum and lastly to the shuk so my parents could get an authentic taste of Israel.  At night we walked around Ben Yeuhda, the old city, and had a nice dinner. After Jerusalem, we headed into the Negev and crawled through the caves in Bar Kochba and hiked in Ein Avdat. I always like the hikes in the south, with all the canyons and everything. We ended the day eating with Bedouins and riding camels. The next day we started off the morning repelling down the Ramon crater, then we rolled down some sand dunes legit in the middle of nowhere, and then my favorite hike-- red canyon. Red canyon was so cool—my 10-year-old self loved climbing through the cracks, playing on the rocks and exploring the canyon- I would definitely like to go back there. We then made our way to Eliat. Which unfortunately was rainy the day we were there, but we just walked around, ate, and relaxed for a day, resting from our packed schedule we had the rest of the trip.

         From Eilat we went to Jordan for 2 days—I was impressed with Petra, but not so much with Jordan. Israel is so much better. It’s weird to me that Jordan is a kingdom, seeing the picture of their king hung in every building is a bit to idolish for me—I don’t know, I just didn’t feel the same comfort I do in Israel. Plus, the food in Israel was much better. Petra was cool though, and I would recommend people go see it, but you don’t need to stay an extra day- go back to Eilat. 

         Our last couple days were in Tel Aviv over Shabbat and new years. I showed my parents around a Tel Aviv- a city I can actually get around, and took them to my favorite café to eat, play cards, and relax. I explained to my parents that this was a usual thing to do on Shabbat, and had a discussion about what Shabbat means for all kinds of people in Israel. In the US, with exception of super religious people, Shabbat is not observed, but in Israel because things are closed everyone kinda has to observe it in some way. I like that you can’t run errands on Saturdays, and that you’re a forced to relax a bit and spend time with your family and friends. Overall the trip was wonderful and it was a great bonding time for me with my parents. I impressed them with my Hebrew skills and shared my knowledge of all things Israeli, as well as exploring new fun things with them. Thanks mom and dad! 

Sar-El

For two weeks, I along with 9 other Otzmakim volunteered with a paratrooping army base. Upon arriving to the base, we got our uniforms, which would be our wardrobe for the next two weeks. We started to do our volunteering by helping to organize some of the warehouses, although we spent just as much time taking breaks (hafsakas) as actually working. This was true for the majority of the time we were there.

The first night we had a welcome activity with our madrichot and afterwards we celebrated Hanukah and one of our soldier’s birthday. Then Tracy and I watched the newest combat soldiers training, which we later found we weren’t actually allowed to see. It was legit though, some soldiers invited us to go with them, and it was really cool. The commander was much nicer than I had thought to them; he managed to yell at them with encouragement rather than intimidation. He went around to all the soldiers and hit them to try to throw them off balance and prepare them for unexpected circumstances. He did however punish them by making them crawl with one person on top of another, instead of by themselves—although I wasn’t sure what they did wrong to deserve that. Also, he emphasized teamwork. As they were doing the drills, when there were only a few people left to finish and they were tired and he had them stop, wait for all the soldiers to go where they were and finish together. It was amazing to me that none of the soldiers seemed to be bothered by having to redo those parts all over again. At that moment it was so easy to see how the soldiers form a brotherhood. They all had each other’s backs and it was a really great atmosphere. The base in general was had very welcoming atmosphere. Everyone in the army is like a big family; forever connected to each other because they all had to go through the same stuff and they went through it together.

         The next morning we did a flag rising, which we did every morning.  We stood in three lines in the proper positions and then one of us would raise the flag, after which we would salute the flag and sing the hatikvah. That night our madrichot explained to us the drafting process and what happens in basic training and then we experienced parts of it. We took the intelligence test, which was 4 math problems, and a maze, of which almost nobody (including myself) passed. Then we went outside and learned how to properly receive the commander. This includes correctly saying a sentence in Hebrew without anyone laughing or smiling. Every time someone laughed we had to run back and forth and do pushups until someone said it correctly without anyone laughing. Richard took a crack at it a few times, and then Ariel stepped up to try and do better and accidentally said she wanted to sleep with the commander instead of receive him. Overall it was really entertaining and a great look at the first steps of the army.

         The next morning Tal and Laura gave us our unit assignments based on our intelligence tests and physical skills as they observed the night before. I would apparently be an educational officer. After that we had our worst day of work the whole time, which was cleaning out a warehouse that had been broken into some time ago. There was bird poop and dirt everywhere- it was a disgusting mess. It was ok though, because that night we had fun learning Krav Maga—the Israeli combat defense training. It was really fun and a great workout. The “warm-up” knocked the wind out of pretty much the whole group- there was lots of running and jumping and switching of directions. It was really fun though and gave us lots of energy to work on the kicks and punches to follow.

         The next day, we cleaned guns, which was really cool at the beginning, but after a while began to lose their excitement. We took lots of pictures with the guns and marveled at the fact we got to work with them, but then it was just a lot of grease and repetitive cleaning. That night though things got way more interesting, Our madrichot had told us in the morning that Syria has hidden weapons and that Israel was thinking of attacking. Because of this they were doing a test run of the attack on the base and we had to go to bed early so we wouldn’t be in the way. They also said we couldn’t tell anyone because the info was top secret and we weren’t even supposed to know. We clearly were very gullible, because we all bought it. There was no test run, or a plan to attack Syria, what happened was a crazy midnight mission/initiation for all of us. Our madrichot along with some other soldiers came in and yelled at us to get dressed in like 30 seconds and get outside. We put on all the army gear- helmets, vests, pads, and were split into two teams look for cardboard people they had hidden. We had to run, crawl, duck, and practice what soldiers would do on a mission. At the end, we were presented with dog tags-, which every soldier gets to show they are part of the army.

         I went to Tel Aviv for the weekend with most of the group, where we went out and relaxed. We ate lots of yummy non-army food and enjoyed the Tel Aviv nightlife. I also went shopping and finally got some much needed boots to keep my feet warm. At the end of the weekend, it was raining like crazy, so we stayed mostly indoors. We came back to the army base and it rained a lot the next couple days, so we didn’t work very much. It was so cold!! So we drank lots of coffee and tea, layered up, and played lots of cards. Eventually we a worked a couple days and had a few other evening activities. We concluded our 2 weeks with a trip to Akko and Haifa, which was really fun. Overall, the whole experience was really great and I learned a lot about the army and it’s place in society.