It’s A Small World After All

Last Wednesday we had a tiul, or field trip to Rahovot and Jaffa. Rahovot, now somewhat of a southern suburb of Jaffa contained three highly interesting places: The Weismann Institute, which has it’s very own particle accelerator; the site of one of the largest British military outpost in the middle east; and Ayolan Institute, the place that we came to see. Before its conversion into the ghost of its former self, the Ayolan Institute was an active functioning kibbutz, with an underground bullet making operation. From the late 1930s-through the 1940’s there was an illegal arms race between Arabs and Jews. The British who had control over Palestine at the time forbid both groups from gathering arms. It was a capital punishment under the British Mandate to produce weapons. All around Palestine at the time there were secret operations producing the guns for the coming war between Jews and Arabs, but the secret factory at the Ayolan Institute was the only place producing bullets for these guns. The factory itself was located underground between the laundry room and the bakery. I still can’t believe that they did the whole operation within a mile of the largest British base in Palestine.

After the Ayolan Institute, we took a quick tour of Jaffa. In Jaffa we went shopping in the shuk and flee market, but since cleaning out Mary’s house, I can’t look at so much junk and have any intention of buying it. The bus ride back took 2.5 hours (a trip that should take about 40 minutes). We basically took every side street from Tel-Aviv to Natanya.

Nothing particularly interesting happened the rest of the week until the Friday night of Purim. A newly arrived Ulpanist from Zurich, Liat, invited us to her cousin’s party in Tel-Aviv. None of the people who went to the party wanted to stay the night in Tel-Aviv, so we rented a sherut for the night. There were 9 of us who split the sherut. Before the party started we went to this bar where the bartenders were dressed as bees. It was pretty funny, seeing a fully grown man in a bee costume meant for a petite girl. At the bar I ordered my first beer ever from a restaurant. It was so exciting!

After the bar we headed to the party. It was located about a mile north of the Florentin neighborhood of Tel-Aviv. We got to the building and the door was locked. Luckily, a friendly face from a nearby balcony shouted the code: 1357. After walking up 4 long flights of stairs, we ended up on the roof, for a misebah al roof. I felt a little awkward at first because it was a costume party and I didn’t have a costume. Once the party got underway though, I felt much more comfortable. It was so much fun. Unbeknownst to everyone from the kibbutz that came to the party, except for Liat, Liat’s cousin did the Ulpan at Ma’agan Michael a year and a half ago (ulpan 107, we are 110) , and a lot of the people she invited to the party had done the ulpan with her and lived nearby in Tel-Aviv. I also met a couple other Americans my age who are also taking a gap year and going to college next year. Altogether, it was a very exciting and fun night. The sherut picked us up at 2:45 and we were back at the kibbutz by 3:20; much faster than the bus on Wednesday.

Here is my friend's beard costume I tried on for a picture, I sort of had the right them with cowboys and cacti on my shirt.


We got class off on Sunday because of Purim, but I still had to work in the afternoon.
Today in class we had a giant misebah (party) to celebrate Purim. Luckily, our teacher brought some play costumes for us to use for the party, and I actually found a great costume; a French painter, barrette, palate, and everything. I am planning on wearing it to the kibbutz’s Purim party this weekend.

Tel-Aviv: Early Nights?

Last weekend was the first time since I arrived that I left the kibbutz. After an eventful Valentine's night, where I captured my first valentine, I ditched the Kibbutz early Friday morning at about 7 because I didn't have any work. Since the shuttle to Binyamina (a town about 5 miles away with the closest train station)didn't operate until 12 PM, my plan was to walk to the nearest bus station about a kilometer from Ma'agan Michael. While walking, I was going to hold out a thumb hoping for a car leaving the kibbutz (specially marked of course, so it is safe) to either give me a ride to Tel- Aviv, the train state, or the bus station. Luckily, I didn't even have to walk out of the entrance before someone offered me a ride. The friendly driver who so nicely offered to take me to the train station, was a girl who works at the school on Ma'agan Michael who was going to Jerusalem to visit her family. Once I got to the train station, it was smooth sailing (besides the train station's inability to take an American credit or debit card) to Hashalom station. Although, David Chertock recommended taking a bus to Dizengoff square, I was feeling a little antsy after the car and train ride, so the twenty minute walk to chateu Chertock seemed like a nice change of pace.

When I arrived at the 14 Zamenhoff, Tel-Aviv, I was greeted with a smile and a warm welcome from David Chertock, my dad's good friend from Columbia University. After I settled my stuff in to the apartment, we went to do double errand: get me breakfast, and pick up hallah and food for the weekend. It so happened that we were able to accomplish this at the same place. Yachanan!, a little restaurant about a kilometer or two south of the Chertock's apartment. The best way to describe it would be a mix between a waitressed Stone Oven and the ready made food section at Whole Foods. David's mission for the weekend was to keep me better fed than a Jewish Bubbi. At Yochanan's, I ordered french toast and a cappuccino. I was ecstatic when the dish came with real maple syrup, not kibbutz corn syrup syrup, or Omaha's hot syrup, REAL MAPLE SYRUP! I also tried some of David's herring. Delicious. We also got an assortment of salads, meats, and some vanilla toot jam.


We returned to the apartment, and shortly after Hanush, David's wife, arrived. Then about half an hour later, David and Hanush's son Noam arrived. He was in a hurry because he had a pre-army thing, for the community based army service he is going to enter next year. After Noam left I decided to go to the mall and get a few essential items that I had been lacking the past few weeks, which included: extra socks and undies, a power-cord with 4 outlets (we only have two working outlets in our room of three people), and an extra towel. The Dizengoff mall, though not humongous, was utterly confusing. It consisted of uneven ramps that went up about 3 levels or 4 levels depending how you counted that spanned two small blocks. The narrow hallways would not have been a problem if by 2PM everyone had not stormed the mall, and there were no street vendors making food inside the hallways, thus creating narrow gaps for people to pass through. All in all the shopping trip was successful. After shopping, I took a walk by myself to the Tel-Aviv port, about two miles away. The farmer's market was just closing, but I did manage to get some fresh squeezed carrot juice and cooked sugar coated pecans and cashews.

Here is a pic of the port, now a shopping area.


When I got back to the apartment, Mika Chertock, their 16 year old daughter, was back, but soon left for her friend's house concert. This left me with no kid plans. Since in Israel I am a full adult, I decided to embrace it, so I ended up going to Django Unchained with David and Hanush. While the movie was enthralling, it was violent enough to even give Hanush, an Israeli worn by many years of Israel's conflict, nightmares. So much blood! The movie ended at 2, and I was to bed by 2:30AM. Although this sounds late, in Israel, especially Tel-Aviv, the night is young until about 4:30AM. When we got back we found Mika, in her pj's. Apparently, the concert had been broken up by the police due to sound complaints.

Since Noam was gone, I got his room for the weekend. I got sooooo much sleep. I slept until 11AM. To put this in perspective, usually, after a 4:30 AM Friday night, I wake up at 8:30 or 9. The bed was so comfortable. At about 1PM I went to get coffee at a cafe a few blocks over per David's recommendation. One by one, the three Tel-Aviv present members of the Chertock clan joined me. I had another delicious cappuccino, and a frittata with potato and Gouda cheese on top. It also came with bread, jam, and a delicious 3% spread.


For the afternoon David took me to the Tel-Aviv Museum of Art. According to Hanush, our resident art expert, the museum recently experienced a change in leadership, so the main exhibits encompassed many more modern and contemporary pieces. The most interesting exhibits in the museum were the photographs by Pinchas Cohen Gan, and the artistic movies by Douglas Gordan. My favorite part of Gorden's large exhibit entitled, I Am Douglas Gordan was his 90 minute film of Zidane, the French soccer player. It plays on two wide screens next to each other and was of one of Zidane's game shot at 12 different camera angles, which alternate and fade in and out at different times.

After the museum I took a long nap, then went out to yet another amazing local restaurant with a Greek Mediterranean theme. David and I split some fish, a burekka with an egg inside, and ... sweat breads, which weren't that bad. After dinner, Hanush dropped me off at the markaz train station and I returned to the kibbutz.

Lets go to the beach

Its been a couple of days since my last post and a lot has happened. Unfortunately, it's way to much to put into this small blog experiment so I will try to go over the highlights in chronological order.

Friday after work, which ended at 11AM, everyone went to the beach for an afternoon filled with sun. After relaxing for an hour or so on the sand, I decided to go for my long run of the week-- a 10k on the beach. While it was a hard run, I think I did it pretty fast for my first 10k especially in sand. When I returned back to where everyone was hanging out, two Aussies, my roommate Alex and I decided to swim out to the small rocky island about 300 meters into the sea. The water was freezing! When I stepped onto the rock, to my surprise, pain went shooting up my foot. Luckily, I didn't cut anything, but the island turned out to be a dead coral reef that had been pushed up above water. We managed to find a smoothed out part of the coral and rested there for about 15 minutes, before swimming back. Later, we found out that to kibbutznicks , the coral was basically nothing because they are used to rough surfaces from running around the kibbutz barefoot at such a young age. I guess Friday was my partial triathlon day, I just forgot about the bike part of it.

Saturday, while most people slept in until 11 or 12, i made sure to wake myself and my roommates up early enough to catch an 9:30 breakfast. After breakfast we went to the beach until 12. Then we went to lunch. I made sure to save some of the salad being served at lunch for dinner, because the Kibbutz does't provide any food for Saturday night. After lunch, we went back to the beach for 4 more hours. I got in on a game of soccer (football), and learn how to play the Israeli beach game with the wooden paddles (I still don't know it's name).

FYI, for all those concerned I wore lots of sun screen and remembered to reapply.

Around 7PM I returned to the beach with some of my friends and we had a great barbecue cookout on the beach. Because no one had an actual grill, we dug a hole in the sand, put wood in it, and had a small metal frame over it. We also made a second larger fire for light and heat. In addition to the salad I nabbed from lunch, I had mini veal burgers I bought from the merkolit . The burgers were delicious and everyone else agreed. There was a lot of other food too: hot dogs, salchichas, bruchetta, kebabs, and marshmallow. We sung a lot of songs by the fire too, but none of them were in English so I just clapped to the beat.

Sunday, was sort of sucky going back to work and classes, I really wish we had two day weekends here instead of one day weekends. My class and work schedule changed. This week I have class in the morning, and work in the afternoon. Even though class starts at 715, it is so close to my room I don't have to wake up until 7 AM. Although I am tired in the morning, I find that from years of early school days, I learn better in the morning. Habit I guess. In the afternoon my work partner Ofir came down with something, so I was by myself with Yizack (Isaac) and Nomi (the woman who had her birthday last Thursday who's name I forgot). I actually had a really nice conversation with Yizack while pealing and shredding (through a machine) 4 full 15 kilo bags of onions. As a side note, normally the kitchen uses 7 of these bags a day, yet there is rarely any dish where you actually see onions, it is a mystery to Ofir, Nomi, Yisack, and me to where Shlomo, the chef, hides all of these onions. Anyways, Yisack has 3 children. A daughter in her 20's just finishing the army. He has an 18 year old son, who is a dancer. And he has a 14 year old son who came into the kitchen today (Monday), to make cookies with his friends.

Speaking of today. Today I while cutting 3 boxes of eggplant, I found an especially Jewish eggplant with a great sense of smell :)

One Week In

It has officially been a week since I arrived at Kibbutz Ma’agan Micheal. I have finished a week of class, four days of work, completed a load of laundry, and taken five runs. As an update to my post “Maybe it’s jetlag, maybe it’s the coffee.” I figured out why I couldn’t sleep. It was neither the coffee nor the jetlag. It was the mattress and the lack of a pillow with any cushion. Luckily, I was able to get a second pillow and switch my mattress. I can say with certainty that I have been getting my nightly eight.

Today, a lady from MASA came to check up on all the tourists. She told us that around this time in the program we should be getting over our first hump of acclimation to Kibbutz life. I would say her assessment is pretty accurate. I don’t get lost anymore. I have a great group of friends who I can talk to and feel comfortable hanging out with. My room is not a mess anymore.

This week I have been testing the waters with a new form of exercise. No, it’s too cold to swim. I have been running all around the kibbutz and on the beach. Most of my runs have been after class lets out, but today I decided to take run between work and class. The strong beach breeze provides a great way to cool off during the run. Here are some of my favorite pictures from my runs. The sunsets and sunrises here are so beautiful

Life is really laid back here. With the myriad of cultures on the Kibbutz, it is really fun how almost nothing is off limits for conversation: from shit to stereotypes. For example, today in class I asked my Mexican friend, Moses, what kinds of maids and housekeepers they have in Mexico (I meant this to be a little jab at him since he had to be the maid of the class this week: sweep, and clean after class). He calmly responded mostly Mexicanas and Guatamaltecas. Needless to say he got the joke.

Actually, my Spanish has been super helpful here on the kibbutz. About half of the program is from a Spanish speaking country. Without Spanish, I would be lost.

Today I found out that every Thursday in the kitchen we have a staff meeting where we celebrate occasions. Today it was someone’s birthday so we had pop ice cream and cake.

For now the week is over and Shabbat is near. I am not going anywhere this weekend, but next weekend I plan to venture out somewhere. L’hitraot for now.

The New Norm

Yesterday was the first day of work and class. The way the schedule works is that everyone works 24 hours a week, and we have 4 hours of classes Sunday through Thursday, but don’t have class on Friday or Shabbat. Each week we switch off who goes to class in the morning and who works in the morning. For me, this week I start work in the kitchen at 7 AM, get a break for breakfast at 9AM, then work again from 9:30AM- 11:30AM. I start class after lunch at 1 PM in the afternoon. It goes until 5 PM and we have two breaks. Every other week, when I have class in the morning, I actually don’t have anything on Friday. This means I have Thursday night and Shabbat to travel throughout Israel on these weekends.


So far, the ulpan class has been very interesting. I am in Kitah Bet (class 2 of 4). Although, everyone in the class knows Hebrew in some form or another, the teacher, moreh Tamar, explained that we would start from the beginning, but do an accelerated version of Kitah aleph. So far we have been learning the aleph-bet, not in the regular order of things, but in a way that we can create, and read simple words. The strange thing about the class is that about half the class learned Hebrew in a Synagogue Hebrew School setting, so they can read and write, just understand very little of what is spoken and/ or written in complicated sentences. The other half of the class never learned Hebrew in a class setting. Though they can communicate to the teacher in Hebrew without any hesitation, when it comes to reading and writing, they act like dyslexic kindergarteners, messing up reading two letter words. The teacher said that two weeks more in and we would all be in the same place. I am a bit worried that when the Hebrew speakers learn the phonetics, they will leave the non-hebrew vocab lacking people in the dust.

(my friend Moses from Mexico, who I sit behind)



Working in the kitchen has been pretty fun so far. The first day of work Yaron gave us bad information about our start time. He told us to arrive at 9:30 instead of 7. So we only worked half a day. There are six of us that work in the kitchen. Justin, a 22 year old, self-made, internet advertiser, works unloading shipments, while my roommate Noah, another gapyearie Emily, and another kid (I haven’t bothered to learn his name yet) work in the hot kitchen. I work in the cold kitchen with an 20 year old, Olim (new immigrant) from Australia: Ofir. Although she is technically a returning citizen (she was born in Israel), I still group her in the category of people who are staying in Israel after the kibbutz-ulpan program ends. The first day, for the whole (daunting) 2 hours, I just shredded onions through a food processor. It went by quickly just talking to Ofir.

In addition to Ofir, a man older man named Yizach, and a middle aged woman whose name I can’t remember at the moment work with us (I will find her name out tomorrow). Well actually they tell us what to do, how to do, and when we are doing it wrong. But they have been very nice so far.
Today, it was a little challenging getting up at 6:45 AM since I haven’t been used to it for almost a year (2nd semester senior year I got up the latest I possibly could with being late, usually 7:20). It is a little weird working for two hours without breakfast (breakfast doesn’t open until 7:30 AM so we can’t have breakfast beforehand), but I managed. Today I got to do more of a variety of mindless tasks. I got to cut up sweet potatoes, shred zucchini, shell hard-boiled eggs, and peel avocados.

The last two were to be used for a salad that was to be mixed together. The time went by pretty fast, and before I knew it, the end was upon me. The people were very nice. When the shift ended they gave us free freshly baked pizza that was being served at lunch, so I didn’t need to even buy lunch today!!!

Beach and Hike

For Shabbat a few days ago everyone decided to go to the beach since it was the first day that the sun was out. At first all the guys were just doing pull-ups on these tent frames that lined parts of the beach. Although most of the guys here are in great shape because they are training for the Israeli Army, after about 20 minutes of macho-showing off, everyone's forearms were too sore to continue.

About an hour after this the South Americans attempted to organize a futbol game. Between round the circle sips of yerba mates, and lots of arguing, we managed to organize ourselves into teams of 7. My team was decent. We had a couple non-football oriented South Africans, a Canadian, some others, and then there was Arielle. He was the core of our team. He scored almost every goal. We ended the game after an hour because everyone's feet began to kill from running on the shells. For clarification this was more due to the hardness on the top part of the shells, no one got any cuts on their feet.

Then we had another mate break.

After, the South Americans began to sing Spanish pop songs to the tune of drums and a guitar. Although, I couldn't join in, due to a lack of knowing the lyrics and being able to sing, I offered moral support and enjoyed the music. We stayed on the beach until about 5, then it got cold and we left.

The rest of Shabbat was pretty chillax. Nothing happened.

On Sunday, I coerced everyone to get up early for a hike. About a group of 15 of us went on the hike to a park, the Ramat Hanadiv Gardens, about 3 miles inland of the kibbutz. In order to get there we had to walk on the road for about a mile and a half, then find a path that lead up the hills that were maybe 500 feet high. At the top of the park we had a great view of the whole kibbutz and the sea. To our surprise, there were two hidden gems up there. The first was a special yellow flower that had an edible stem. There were hundreds of them and they tasted like organic, earthy warheads. The second surprise was at the park there was this fabulous play ground. It had a giant slide the used canopy ropes to get people up to the top. It also had a log swing that looked like a connected Newton's Cradle. I don't have too many pictures of it now, but when I get them off of other peoples camera's I will try to post them. This all was Sunday morning.

(a future CWRU student Giddon with the edible warhead flower)

Sunday afternoon was a whole nother story. It was what most people would call an orientation to the kibbutz, but Yaron, the head of the program, insisted it was the "opening ceremony". The first thing they did was separate everyone into groups by native language, in order to talk to us about behavior, what to do and not to do, mostly use common sense and all. I learned two things. Don't go to the beach alone at night. I also learned to avoid punching, being punched, and anything of the sort. I don't know what happened at the last ulpan 109 (we are ulpan 110), but everyone was alluding to there being a fight, with punching of course. And actually, later in the day Yaron, begged us to not be like 109, which he outright said was a failure.failure!failure!! They also warned us against "going for romantic walks with yourself on the beach."According to Yaron there are camera's all over the kibbutz. While I am sure the cameras are for security, everyone couldn't help but laugh at the thought of the kibbutz using the cameras to get a little extra money. ;)


I also found out i was going to work in the kitchen starting Monday. I hope it isn't too boring.

Maybe it's jet lag, or maybe its coffee?

Today was my second morning waking up in Kibbutz Ma'agan Michael. Again, I woke up before 10 AM, what in Cleveland has become my typical get out of bed time! I am not quite sure what the problem is with my biological alarm clock.

My first night and second day on the kibbutz I had no coffee, no sleep on the plane, yet i went to bed at 1 AM and woke up at 6:45 AM.

Last night was a whole nother story. So after a fantastic Shabbat dinner, a food post will come eventually, they were handing out free espresso in the coffee shop next to the hadar ochel (dining hall). Naturally, missing my Phoenix coffee shop mochas and feeling a bit tired with the big discotech night ahead of me, I had 3 lattes.

The discotech was a very new experience for me because being under 21 I have never gone clubbing. The way the discotech works is that adolescents from all around the area come to the pub at the kibbutz for a giant dance party. If you are from the Kibbutz or living on it like all the Kibbutz- ulpan students it is free to enter, otherwise you have to show an I.D. and pay about 30 shekels or so to enter. At the pub the drinks are pricey. I think the reason the kibbutz hosts the giant parties is to make money off the entrance fee and the over-priced drinks. Anyways, I danced with my fellow students until about 3 AM when I tried to go to bed, but because the pub/discotech is 50 feet from my room, I wasn't able to fall asleep until 4 AM.

This is where strange things started to happen. This morning I woke up at 6:15AM, just as the sun was rising through the clouds

Though this picture looks cloudy, it was the first time since I got to Israel that there was a touch of sun, and it wasn't spewing rain. I walked around the Kibbutz for about 30 minutes and ended up wandering into an artist's studio. Although his name eludes me for the time being, he offered me some tea (perhaps later I will post my favorite sculptures of his). He recommended that I get a friend and take a day trip hike to the nearby mountains a few miles east of the Kibbutz. Ramat HaNadiv nature park is the name of the area. According to him, it is 4 hour or so hike/climb, and once there I can get a beautiful overview of all of Kibbutz Ma'agan Michael. I think that will be my afternoon today since everything is closed on Shabbat anyways.

Lastly, I want to let my readers know I am in heaven here. For the longest time my dad has wanted me to ease up on my expensive coffee addiction (mochas, lattes, cappuccinos, etc.) On the Kibbutz not only is there free espresso Friday nights, but in the dining hall, there are 6 different espresso/coffee/hot chocolate type machines to choose from.

Here are just a few of them


The total cost of a mocha is a shekel, or about a quarter!

Though the good inexpensive coffee here plus jet lag have contributed to my lack of sleep, I am very confident that soon enough I will have a full and healthy sleep schedule. :) ZZZZZZzzzzzzzzz.........

First Day in Israel

Hi everyone, I got to Kibbutz Ma'agan Michael safe and sound.

My flight over was pretty comfortable. My mom couldn't stop taking pictures of me with her before I left: in the airport garage, around security, check in, etc. The flight from Newark to Tel-aviv contained a mixture of ultra orthodox families, payos and all, with christian pilgrims. I ended up sitting with a nice Christian couple from Te

Once I got to the airport I bought a cell phone, and in the process missed the train that hour to Bimyamina. I ended up waiting at an airport cafe for about 45 minutes and sat with a French-Israeli women. Anyways, I caught the train to Bimyamina, then took a taxi to the Kibbutz.

After getting all the official stuff done in the office with the program's director, Yaron, I moved into my room.

The room is pretty small for three people, but when this picture was taken my roommates had yet to arrive. In fact, they didn't arrive until 8 PM. After I got my clothes labeled (for laundry) and unpacked, I went exploring around the kibbutz with a girl named Amber. Though technically from Vienna, Amber grew up in India at an English school, so communication was not a problem. (Actually, what I have found in general is that even though there are only about 10 Americans at the Kibbutz so far, almost everyone speaks English. Hopefully I will learn a little Hebrew though :) ) Amber and I found the Kibbutz's beautiful beach.

We walked around the beach for a little then went in search of the petting farm on the Kibbutz. We didn't find it, though we did end up going through a gate that locked us out of the kibbutz. We had to climb the fence back over.

My roommates arrived around 7 PM. They both were from the USA. I think the program directors did this on purpose so no one would feel too lonely. One of my roommates Alex is also taking a gap year next fall will be attending MIT. My other roommate, Noah, goes to a commuter college in Denver, but is taking a break from his degree. He is 22. Alex is 19 like me.

Last night everyone hung out at the pub. Although I am technically legal I didn't order any drinks. The ulpan is very worldly. So far the people that are at the Kibbutz are from: USA, England, Canada, Italy, France, Austria, Holland, South Africa, Australia, Venezuela, Colombia, Argentina, Brasil, Mexico, Ukraine, Russia, Greece, Sweden. But altogether there should be 26 countries represented here. Everyone has been so friendly and outgoing so far.