The weekend of March 19-21 I went to the south with OSP. On the first day, we did two hikes. The first was at the Big Crater and the second at a nice stream (I forgot the name). We stayed at a hotel in Arad--a poor town constructed in the middle of the Negev desert. That night (with no mention of Shabbat) OSP arranged an interactive concert in the hotel for us. A few men dressed up as Bedouins played some cool instruments like the digeridoo and a steel multi-toned drum from Switzerland.
On Shabbat, we hiked for four hours in the Negev around Sde Boker, the army base where I did gadna on seminar three summers ago! It provoked many feelings to see the base from the outside; many memories were running through my head that I hadn't thought about since leaving that base almost four years before. I remembered being forced to stand in the formation of a ח for long periods at a time in the summer heat of the Negev wearing a longsleeve green army uniform, doing 25 pushups at a time when we did something incorrect, and sleeping on a mattress that felt like a rock in the tent I could see from our hike. I remembered when my best friend hooked up with a soldier named Tzvika, shooting an M-16, and when Neumie asked me to be his girlfriend. At the end of the hike, we went to Ben Gurion's grave. We learned that he requested to be buried in the Negev, where he worked on a kibbutz and that he hoped the Negev would bloom like the rest of the country. There is a beautiful view of the Negev from his and his wife's graves. That night, we had dinner in a Bedouin tent. It wasn't as memorable as it was on Seminar, maybe because I realized this time that the people serving us were Israelis dressed up as Bedouins. Under their white tunics they were wearing jeans. Also, the famous tea and baklava did not taste as good as I remembered. Oh well.
team bonding-the classic sitting in a circle game
David Ben-Gurion's grave
On Sunday, we went to Ein Gedi. The hike there was nice, and it also brought back a lot of memories from Seminar (for example, remembering the spots where I ate ice cream before and after the hike). It was the perfect time of year to go as it's not too cool and not boiling hot like in the middle of the summer. The hike is through a few streams and little waterfalls, and we even got to have a dip in our bathing suits. Afterwards, we went to the Dead Sea. The sea has noticeably shrunk since I was there three summers ago! There is not enough rain in the desert to sustain it, and it is evaporating very fast. After a stop in the smelly sulfur pools, having a mud treatment (falling into a tub of mud) and an effortless float with a newspaper in the sea, the trip was complete (and my skin was silky smooth for weeks!)
On Shabbat, we hiked for four hours in the Negev around Sde Boker, the army base where I did gadna on seminar three summers ago! It provoked many feelings to see the base from the outside; many memories were running through my head that I hadn't thought about since leaving that base almost four years before. I remembered being forced to stand in the formation of a ח for long periods at a time in the summer heat of the Negev wearing a longsleeve green army uniform, doing 25 pushups at a time when we did something incorrect, and sleeping on a mattress that felt like a rock in the tent I could see from our hike. I remembered when my best friend hooked up with a soldier named Tzvika, shooting an M-16, and when Neumie asked me to be his girlfriend. At the end of the hike, we went to Ben Gurion's grave. We learned that he requested to be buried in the Negev, where he worked on a kibbutz and that he hoped the Negev would bloom like the rest of the country. There is a beautiful view of the Negev from his and his wife's graves. That night, we had dinner in a Bedouin tent. It wasn't as memorable as it was on Seminar, maybe because I realized this time that the people serving us were Israelis dressed up as Bedouins. Under their white tunics they were wearing jeans. Also, the famous tea and baklava did not taste as good as I remembered. Oh well.
team bonding-the classic sitting in a circle game
David Ben-Gurion's grave
On Sunday, we went to Ein Gedi. The hike there was nice, and it also brought back a lot of memories from Seminar (for example, remembering the spots where I ate ice cream before and after the hike). It was the perfect time of year to go as it's not too cool and not boiling hot like in the middle of the summer. The hike is through a few streams and little waterfalls, and we even got to have a dip in our bathing suits. Afterwards, we went to the Dead Sea. The sea has noticeably shrunk since I was there three summers ago! There is not enough rain in the desert to sustain it, and it is evaporating very fast. After a stop in the smelly sulfur pools, having a mud treatment (falling into a tub of mud) and an effortless float with a newspaper in the sea, the trip was complete (and my skin was silky smooth for weeks!)
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