The day began once again with a bright and early 7:30 breakfast. Although the quality of the food was somewhat questionable, we dared
not let it tarnish our eager minds and hearts. Baruch hashem we had any at all!! Just to clarify; "ba-woo-ch" hashem (like a "twoo"
Israeli). All jokes were pushed aside as our iron-lunged Yeme-knight in shining coach bus, Jobi, picked us up and drove us to Tel Aviv's
Rabin Square; the location of Israeli prime minister Yitzchak Rabin's assassination. We listened intently as our tour guide/stand-up
comedian/musician/Israeli sass machine, Yossi Samet, taught us all about historical implications of this major tragedy. Although the mood was somber, our day brightened upon our arrival to Qiryat Gat's Shprinzak Elementary School. We spent the next few hours
participating in a handful of various activities with the kids; English-Hebrew "Memory", soccer, darbuka drum-offs, dancing (most
notably to Psy's Gangnam Style), and more. I was a bit apprehensive at first, as the student I was paired up with didn't speak a lick of
English, and although we had no idea what each other was saying, we bonded over climbing fences, jumping over benches, and burning
holes in leaves with magnifying glasses; I had found a little Israeli version of myself! This experience in particular was one of the highlights of my trip. The students were very sad to see us go, but to unnecessarily quote Shakespeare, parting is such sweet sorrow. Next up on the day's itinerary was arguably one of the trips' most important. If one was to attribute the existence of the state of Israel in itself to one person, crediting anyone else but David Ben Gurion would be a crime. We paid our respects to the simple, yet beautiful gravesite of the country's first prime minister by placing stones on the graves. As the day began to wind to a close, we left for our hotel--and by hotel I mean tent in the middle of the desert. We arrived sometime later at what can only be described as a Bedouin resort of sorts--complete with bathrooms, rock sinks, dining rooms, and of course a gift shop. Shortly after our arrival we were graced with the opportunity we had all been waiting for, riding camels! The models we rode on unfortunately didn't come with A/C, but they seemed to at least get great gas mileage. We ended the day by singing songs and looking at stars, preparing ourselves for the next morning's 4 a.m. wake up call.
Submitted by Benjy Wax
