The exciting news is that on the Sunday I went to Tel Aviv to pick up my plane ticket. Thanks to the Friends of the IDF (http://www.fidf.org) they are paying for my round trip flight! After being in Israel for 1 year and 5 months I finally get a chance to come home for a 2 week visit starting in mid october!!!!!! After running around the city in the morning to get the plane ticket I met a friend for lunch in Tel Aviv, then it was off to Jerusalem to meet up with 2 other friends and unexpectedly bumped into a 3rd. Monday it was back to the kibbutz to catch up on some movie watching. Within a 24 hour period I managed to watch 6 movies. It had been months since I had seen any movie, so it was good to catch up on them and also discover new box office hits that I never knew existed. For example, the movie 'The Other Guys' with Will Ferrell and Mark Wahlberg - I never knew such a movie had ever been made despite it being a major box office hit during the summer. Based on its ratings and its cast I decided to watch the movie and it was hysterical. I had no idea what I was missing!!!! Tuesday I managed to pull myself off the couch and meet a friend for coffee. All in all, my regila was very relaxing and stress free. I actually had time to relax, unlike my 4 day weekends where I try and do as much as possible.
My biggest accomplishment of the week and the year (yes, both 5771 and 2010) and maybe even longer is that I successfully packed my suitcase (alone I might add) not just hours or days in advance, but an entire MONTH in advance of my flight!!!! One can look at this from several angles. The first being that having been given a week off from the army, so now I have plenty of time to pack my suitcase so why leave it to the last minute? If you think that this is my train of thought you probably have no idea who I am. In fact, I am more of the type of person to leave things to the last minute. So why the change of attitude? Well, I haven't really changed my attitude. Despite the fact that I finished packing an entire month before my flight I still managed to do it at the last minute. How does that work? Well, chances are the next time I will get to my kibbutz will be the day that I have to go to the airport. I will have exactly enough time to be completely stressed out and have to run to my kibbutz grab my bag and run out the door to go straight to the airport. Before I left the base I had asked my company commander when I will be let off base before my flight in order to arrange my things and get to the airport in time. Hopefully I would be given a real answer that would allow me to pack before heading to the airport. He told me not to worry. That statement "don't worry" actually causes the exact opposite effect; not only does it cause me to worry, but it also causes massive amounts of stress. The last time I was told not to worry was in fact not that long ago. I was concerned about when I would be going home for my regila. I knew I was going home on wednesday, but that was precisely the problem. Since Wednesday night was the start of rosh hashana the buses stopped running in the afternoon. The problem was that the people that were coming to replace us were arriving Wednesday morning and we weren't allowed to leave until sometime after they arrived. Long story short, I caught the last bus home, and got there one hour before the start of the holiday. So whats the big fuss? Firstly, if I didn't get off base on time I would have been stuck on base for the holiday meaning the next bus out of the base was Sunday morning. Additionally missing the bus would have been being stuck up north without a place to spend for 3 days. That would be better than being stuck on the base, but not much better. So when my company commander told me not to worry about packing and getting to the airport in time, for me that translates to 'pack now while you still have the chance. Maybe we will give you enough time to get to the airport on time. I can't promise anything and you will receive an answer only at the last possible minute.' I don't know if I will be back at my kibbutz before my flight, so this is how I managed to pack a month early, yet still at the last possible minute.
Its back to base for 2 more weeks. Back to Toronto in a month!!!!!!!!!!!! And finally some pictures!
Me by a waterfall on one of our hikes
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