Helping out lone soldiers

I have been off from the army since Thursday. I stayed the weekend in Jerusalem and hung out with my commander from basic training, Albert. He introduced me to this awesome couple from Tennessee who came to Israel about 10 years ago to basically dedicate their lives and everything they have to support lone soldiers - give them a place to sleep and eat for Shabbat or any time they need help. We went for Shabbat dinner where there were about a dozen other lone soldiers. The dinner and company was fantastic and Scott and Theresa are without a doubt the nicest and most helpful people I have ever met in my life. Even though it was a relatively short encounter of only one evening, I learned that they are extraordinary people who go to any length to make a lone soldier's life easier so that we can concentrate all our energy on our job of defending Israel. There are a lot of people and organizations that also address the same needs of lone soldiers but the most amazing part about Scott and Theresa's story is that they are not Jews, but Christians. To see their website and find out more about these truly incredible people, here is a link to their website.

A while back I was told about a big event for lone soldiers on passover. At the time when I requested to go I was told that the spots were full and I would not be able to go. Three days before the event I was told that a spot opened up for me! On Monday morning we headed to the event - a hotel right next to the beach. There was tons of food, entertainment, and more gifts for lone soldiers. In total there were about 500 people there. The best gift that was given out was received by one of my friends who lives with me on the kibbutz. He was chosen "randomly" from the crowd to come up on stage and have some small talk with Gabi Ashkenazi - the IDF's Chief of Staff. That in itself is pretty cool, but there were several other gifts that I would have preferred. So, after getting over the basics - where are you from, where do you serve, etc. he was asked if he could ask for anything in the world right now, what would it be? Trying not to say the wrong thing he was at lost for an answer, so with the hints given by Ashkenazi he answered that he would want to see his parents. Ashkenazi then told my friend to turn around, and when he did he was staring face to face with his parents. The IDF flew his parents in from the US to surprise him, and it worked. Not only was this my first Passover in Israel, but my first passover not spent at home with my family. Aside from the great time I had over the 2 days there with my friends, it was hard not to miss home, and the passover seder with the family and the best food cooked by mom.

I head back to base for just over 2 weeks, but when I get out, its for a long weekend. The Sunday is Yom Hazikaron (Israel Memorial Day) followed by Yom Ha'atzmaut (Israel Independence Day) on the Monday. I have 2 very interesting weeks up ahead, so make sure not to miss the next blog.

Chag Pesach Sameyach!

The following is a letter from a lone soldier that I read. I didn't write it, but it definitely is all true, and applicable to all lone soldiers.

What does it mean to be a soldier in the Israeli Army? It means freezing through cold winter nights and sweating in the sweltering desert sun. It means harships that you never knew existed and was sure that you could never complete. It means frindships so strong and rare that no words can describe them. And it means walking through the streets with your head held high no matter how tired or sore you are because you are a soldier in the Jewish army.

What does it mean to be a lone soldier? It means living in a new country and struggling with a new language and a different culture. It means having Israelis not fully appreciating how hard it is to go through this journey alone with your family on the other side of the world. It means coming home exhausted to a bedroom and having no mother or father to hug and welcome you back, no warm home cooked meal waiting for you on the kitchen table; just an empty fridge and a bag of meager items you picked up on the way. With the endless bus rides and ever growing pile of laundry, it is easy to wonder how different it would feel to come home to a caring family. It also means having random people in the streets hugging you and thanking you for coming, and taxi drivers inviting you over for dinner. It means feeling special that you are one of the few who have made this commitment and it means being able to look every Israeli in the eye and say "I know what you have gone through, I've done it too; you are not alone we are all in this together."

For some, the army is a military experience learning new skills and overcoming difficult obstacles. For others it is a social encounter with a diverse set of individuals. But for all it is an affirmation of our desire to actively connect to the Jewish people and be a part of creating the next chapter of our ancient story. Volunteers come from every corner of the world to serve. We speak different languages and have different customs. Nevertheless, we have several things in common with one another; we are all Jews, we are all dedicated to Israel, and we are all people of action who have given up much to come. Some have put their dreams of college and careers on hold. Others have left without the support of their families who don't understand why they would leave 'safe' and 'normal' lifestyles. The reality show us that although ideals are beautiful, words are not enough for us and that instead of dreaming, we have decided with our hearts to stand on our own two feet and with our own two hands make a difference.

Being a lone soldier in the Israeli army is far from easy, but the knowledge that our presence here is appreciated by Jews around the world is a great comfort. Moreover, a few words of appreciation, a package for the holidays, and fun day at the beach and an occasional phone call means a lot, because it reminds us why we are here and shows us that we are not standing alone.

-Avi and Yoav Schaefer

The warm up

After a nice relaxing shabbat on base, Sunday ended up being an extention of Shabbat - guarding and sleeping. They took us to a place near Be'er Sheva, which is a place where tons of soldiers go Sunday mronings on their way back to base to do guard duty. It was going to be a perfect day - 2.5 hour drive to get there, a few hours of guard duty with breaks in between and then a 2.5 hour drive back to base. What made the day even better was that the bus broke down on the way there for 2.5 hours so it was an extra 2.5 hours of sleep instead of guarding.



This week we finally started practicing in the tanks. Our company commander described this week as the warm up before the run. We mainly practiced fires and evacuating the injured. The loader has the most work to do in all the exercizes. In fact, aside from button pushing and joystick moving I did ALL the work. For the injury exercizes I have to drag the injured to the back door of the tank, which is no simple task at all. All the space in the tank is taken up by either weapons, weapon related systems or ammo. It is not made for spaceous lviing or accessibility. So aside from the fact that I have no idea how Asaf, the 6'2" 200 pound gunner gets into his chair in under 15 seconds (starting with his feet on the ground outside the tank) I have no clue how I'm going to drag his limp body through the tank hwere all the help I get from the commader is that he moves his legs to the side s oAsaf can squeeze by as I drag him by the straps on his vest. There is absolutely no easy way to grab a hold of the injured. hopefully I will only need to do this in practice be cause those exercieses were hard and obviously no fun at all.



On wednesday night during our hour of free time, my commander came and told me just after I had gotten out of the shower that our tzevet had 7 minutes to be dressed and at the tank - obviously that meant that we didn't check the tank properly and that we forgot to do something. After spending about a minute and a half trying to find everyone else in my tzevet, needless to say I didn't have much time remaining. I did however have enough time assuming I didn't screw up getting dressed. I think you can figure out where this is going. After I finished lacing up my boots I realized I had my pants on backwards. Decision time: be late and dressed properly or on time and hope that my commander doesn't notice. It would only be maximum 5 minutes at the tank and it was relatively dark outside. We finished with the tank and he didn't notice the backwards pants. I rushed back to my room to change before any of the commanders bug me for anyting else. Before I could start getting undressed another commander tells me that the social worker is waiting to see me... now. Ugggggghhh.... okay... I find her and she says follow me. Where do we go? Right into the office of the company commander. SHIT! He tells me to sit down. I strategically placed my gun over my crotch to hide where the buttons should be. After a minute of small talk he wished me a happy passover and gave me a give (Lone soldiers get lots of gifts at the holidays). Now for the exit: I stand up and take steps backwards and sideways as not to turn around so he doesn't see the buttons on my ass. I maange to make a clean exit and get changed be fore anyone noticed (I hope). At this point I can only hope that the company commander hasn't lost all his faith in me.



Along with a bunch of gift certificates Ialso received the most ironic gift ever from the Friends of the IDF. For passover they gave me a sandwhich maker. No explanation needed, but for those who don't get it passover is a holiday where amongst many other things we dont eat bread.



Thursday I go tthe day off which was fantastic. Aside from the obvious plusses to a longer weekend I missed a day full of cleaning the tanks and barracks. On top of that they were doing passover cleaning which means that if cleaning were made a sport, passover cleaning would be the extreme version of it.

Where the hell am I supposed to be?

Sunday it was back to base to really start our advanced training. I was excited to get back to start training and the only thing that was goingto stop me was traffic. It took me 9 hours to get back to base :-(

We got our tanks and there is one other tzevet that shares the tank with mine. The plus to this is that all the cleaning is split into half, but not to worry because there is more than enough sand in the desert to keep me cleaning the tank for eternity. Our 2 tzevets are responsible for hte upkeep on the tank. In basic training we were not seriously held responsible for the tank's upkeep nor were we assigned to a specific tank. Now for example, if something isn't done right with respect to closing up the tank atthe end of the day they wake you up in the middle of the night to go to the tanks to fix it.

So in the middle of my deep sleep I got woken up in a daze by the company commander. To put that in perspective, it's not really his job to be waking up soldiers - think of your principal coming into your class to wake you up. Without having time to fully wake up and figure out what was going on he asked me where I was supposed to be. Rightfully so, he wanted to know why I was sleeping when everyone else was awake. I asked him what time it was and he said 530. Still unsure of anything I asked "in the morning?" He then responded, "no in the evening." Well that was a stupid question, right? (It was - I should have known damn well it was the afternoon). What did I say next? I glanced around the room and saw nobody else in their beds, I looked outside (it was still light) and I looked at my watch (it wasn't 530, but it was 1730) and then said in a completely serious tone "really????" He obviously wasn't lying the first time so he responded yes. Okay, so now there was no doubt in my mind that it was 530 in the afternoon, but I still had absolutely no idea where I needed to be. All that came out of my mouth was "ummmmm. ummmmmmmmm. ummmmmmmmmmmm." holding the "ummmm" as long as I could before having to take another breath while trying to st all for time and figure out wher ethe hell I was supposed to be! Still not a clue, and there was nobody else to help me. Obviously seeing that this was going nowhere, the company comander said "weren't you working in the kitchen earlier?" AAAAAAAAAAAAAAAHHHHHHH. Finally that was the kick start my brain needed. I was back to life and could communicate like a normal human being not asking moronic questions. I told him that I was on break from the kitchen and he said okay and left me alone. So here is the story that accompanies the moronic ending and me looking like a complete idiot in front of the company commander.

We had a masa this week - it was more of a ceremonial masa as it was only 4km plus another 2 with the stretcher. At the end we received the tag of our batallion. Until now we have had the tag of the school of shiryon, but now we finally have the tag representing my batallion. All this happened in the middle of the night where they woke us up and we had to get dressed and outside as fast as we can. I managed to be one of the first ones dressed and I managed to grab the heaviest thing - the 25 pound radio. I have mentioned before that more we might makes it more fun, but with the radio it is even better because I actaully have a job as opposed to carrying only dead weight. In layman's terms I was a prtable receptionist. I had to listen to the radio chatter and give the phone to the commander when required. The masa occurred at midnight which was already after our room got woken up by the commander to arrange the things in our room and then again after I got woekn up to do my shift of guard duty. We went back to bed a 230 and I had to wake up earlier than everyone else in order to go work in the kitchen all day.

After the lunch rush I was put on the most difficult, annoying and worst job in the kitchen - scrubbing all the pots and pans from lunch that was required to serve the food for over 2000 people. Ther ewere 5 of us working and we were told that once we finished we could leave and have a break until 630. We all hauled ass for 3 hours and managed to get a 2.5 hour break! I went back to my room and passed out cold on my bed. My complete exhaustio from the hard work as well as horrible sleep othe night before added onto always being constantly exhausted led to me waking up to a complete daze and not knowing where I was.

Tank mem peh!!!!!!!

After 9 days off it was back to the army to start 4 months of advanced training. 9 days off was the perfect amount of time off. After such a busy vacation I returned to the army already exhausted (it probably didn't help that I only slept 3 hours the night before I had to go back). This week started out great with a 2 day tour up north to see what life is like after we finish training and start guarding the border with Syria. The first thing I learned was that we were not staying shabbat on base this week!

We went to visit two different bases and saw how they live. The first base used to be an old British hotel with a beautiful view - now the building looks like an abandoned one turned into a makeshift army base. So what do they do all day? Either 4-4 or 4-8: 4 hours of guarding and 4 hours off or 4 hours guarding and 8 hours off. During your time off you also have to do other random jobs so its not like you have all that time to sleep. How long does this last for? Approximately 2 weeks straight and then you get a few days off for an extended weekend. The guard duty is not done in tanks - its just regular guard duty. A large part of the 2 days was spent traveling and therefore we had a lot of time to sleep. We ended up sleeping in 20 person tents at night and were happy to return to the base the next day. The best part of going back to base was that it took about 7 hours - meaning lots of time to sleep on the bus. We get off the bus in the evening and begin to pitch the same tents again - 40 meters from our new barracks. aaaarrrrrggggg!!! Apparently the rooms "aren't ready yet" - whatever the hell that means.

Tuesday was spent loading dishes in the dishwasher in the kitchen from 7AM to 9PM. I was working alongside my old samach - one of the guys that ordered me around all day and made me do push-ups only one week earlier. He is on his way to officers training and before that he also has to spend time doing bitchwork. Everyone came by to laugh at him and the fact that he was working alongside one of his old soldiers.

This week our commanders are spending the week getting things ready so they send us to do bitchwork because there is nothing for us to do. On Wednesday we woke up and after our commanders gave us the standard amount of time to get ready for the day he never returned to tell us what to do when the time was up. Everyone went back to bed and I got another 45 minutes of sleep. After breakfast I did about an hour of physical labour. Throughout the day I did an hour of guard duty and aside from that the remainder of the day was spent sitting on the bed in the tents or lying down resting and dozing off to sleep. Fast forward to dinner time where they told us to be back at the tents at 630. Again our commanders never showed up. After another hour nap, conversing and writing the blog until this point its 915 and time for another nap. 40 minutes later I was worken up and we were given our standard hour of free time before bed - what a great day!!!

Thursday we moved into our new rooms, got our equipment, met our commanders and got put into our tzevets and machlakot. My tzevet is 4 people - Ohad the driver, Asaf the gunner, myself and the commander. For the next 4 months the 4 of us will be doing all our training together. Each commander in the company (pluga) has its own tzevet except for the company commander (mefaked pluga - mem peh for short) and his deputy. IF (emphasis on the if) we end up doing a company wide exercise then they have their designated tzevets which are decided at the beginning (now). I was chosen from 17 loaders in the company along with my other tzevet members to be in the company commander's tzevet. So what does that mean? IF there is a company wide exercise, we get to shoot more shells, do more work, and therefore have more fun!

Once we got into our rooms I was wishing we were still in the tents because at least there was some breeze. Did I mention that this week was absurdly hot? How hot was it? I will put it this way - I was happy to have guard duty right after bedtime at 930PM standing next to the tanks with exhaust smoke and dust blowing in my face and my entire body instead of having to be in my room trying to sleep in what felt like a sauna. This week the temperature was probably a high of 35 degrees Celsius and a low of 15. I can already foresee things getting worse as we approach the summer months. This is a serious question: is it even spring yet in Israel or still "winter"? Is there a thing called spring? Did I somehow miss it?

We were told our schedule for the next 4 months and what we will be doing. I'm not going to spill the beans now - the entire point of the blog is that you continue to read it. I will say though that the training is going to be intense, hard, interesting and hopefully also fun. I will say that during the training we will have a week of training that is called "war week". The scheduling itself is awesome - most importantly all the holidays off- the passover seder, Remembrance Day and Independence day, and Shavuot.

Starting this weekend, now I finally get to go home with something that identifies me as a combat soldier - my gun! Until now while I had my green training beret I was obviously a trainee, but once I got my black beret I could easily be mistaken for something worse than a trainee - a jobnik (someone who has a regular job in the army). Now it feels good to have my gun off base, but I'm sure very shortly its going to start to be a pain in my ass. I'm sure I will constantly end up bumping into people with it on buses and trains and other annoying things like that. Until that happens I will just enjoy looking like a combat soldier.

9 days off!!!!

After 4 months of service every soldier gets a scheduled week off the army. So after 6 months I finally got mine!! Since it spans 2 weekends my break is 9 days! Most soldiers spend their time sleeping or doing nothing at home. For me, this week is one of the busiest weeks ever. When I get off for a regular weekend (get home Friday late morning and have to return to base first thing Sunday) I am pretty much restricted to doing only one thing because the buses stop running on Shabbat leaving me no way to get around. Now that I have 9 consecutive days off I have the opportunity to do what I couldn't do before - ride the buses! With my week all planned out utilizing my time maybe too efficiently I am traveling back and forth across the country meeting up with friends and family. A couple of my initial plans didn't work out but I was able to reschedule and it ended up working to my benefit as I managed to see a few other friends in the last minute because of the change. In order to succeed in my mission of seeing as many people as possible, aside from Shabbat I am not spending more than 13 consecutive hours in the same city. It is a very good thing that Israel is a small country and that soldiers ride the bus for free.

So here is what I did on my very exhaustive week:
After getting back to my kibbutz from base at 1130PM on Thursday I left Friday morning to Kfar Saba to visit family for Shabbat. After sleeping 13 hours I was forced to take an hour and a half nap just to get through the rest of the day. If you were thinking that it seems like I am a very busy person and I possibly over planned my week off and that I should take some time off for myself to sleep this is my response to you. Whats the point in sleeping if I am going to be just as tired when I wake up. All I end up doing is wasting all that time that I sleep. I still managed to sleep my 6 hours a night (without having to wake up inthe middle to do guard duty) catch some extra ZZZZs on the bus rides and I am still constantly exhausted. After Shabbat ended it was off to the neighbouring city of Ra'anana to party with my AEPi brothers.

Sunday was a double holiday, with the first being Purim. Having been in Israel for 9 months, this is the first holiday I am not on base for. I did get Yom Kippur off, but that doesn't count. I took a bus and train (2 hours) to Rehovot to have purim lunch with my family. In the evening I met up again with AEPi north of Tel Aviv to celebrate the second holiday - Canada beating the US in the gold medal hockey game of the olympics! What a game it was - I only wish I could have been back at home for the celebration. We were at a bar with a fair amount of both Canadians and Americans so that made it more exciting but nothing close to what it would have been like back home.

Monday it was off to Jerusalem to have lunch with a good friend. I also continued my unsuccessful search for a manetachen (haman ear) (a special cookie you eat on Purim) that comes anywhere close to my mom's. I stopped off at Marzipan - the bakery that has the best rugellah in the world in the hopes that this would also be true for the hamentashen. This was not the case. I headed back up north to my kibbutz (2.5 hours) for a place to sleep and managed to meet up with a friend that was with me in Mikve Alon for dinner in Afula, which is next to my kibbutz.

Tuesday I met up with 3 friends that I haven't seen in a total of 7.5 years - one of which was on my birthright trip 4 years ago and I haven't seen him since. First thing in the morning it was 2.5 hours back to Jerusalem to see 2 of those friends and then in the evening it was off to Tel Aviv for the night.

Wednesday it was 2 hours back to the kibbutz in order to pack my things for the army. I don't have a chance to get back to grab the stuff I need, so now I started carrying around 2 massive bags because the army made me take everything home. In the evening I went to Haifa to see another friends I haven't seen in 2 years.

Thursday I went to Mikve Alon for the day to visit with my old commanders. In the evening it was off to Herzliya again for AEPi chills which included one friends from the states.

Friday morning it was off to Jerusalem to have lunch with my commander. Now that basic training is over and he is no longer my commander we have 'broken distance' and I can speak to him like a real person. I found out he actaully speaks nearly fluent English as opposed to the next to nothing I though up until now. We ended up getting a 10% discount and a free shot of Arak when he found out we were both lone soldiers. After Jerusalem it was off ot my cousin's house for Shabbat where there wasn't much time to relax because of all the insane young kids.

After 9 long crazy days its back to the army for I think 2 weeks. I don't really know what we are doing, but you will find out when I get back off base!

Here is a video that I came across. I think its hilarious and that its applicable to where I live (my tank) with a few minor changes. In addition to a 7.62mm machine gun on the turret I also have a 12.7mm (1/2 inch) machine gun and the 120mm main cannon. On top of that my house isn't a glass house, but its a TANK!!!
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fK2Bw1tI_-k