4/4/14
On Friday everyone arrived at the JCC. It was the first time we got to meet the Israelis face to face. We were all incredibly excited. When we got onto the bus we had a chance to meet everybody. We played an icebreaker called speed dating. An American would pair up with an Israeli and talk to them about whatever they wanted. Every 5 or so minutes we would switch seats and start conversing with someone else. Once we arrived at EKC we had an activity where we decorated candle holding jars.
After that, shabbat started and we all went outside to the porch and said some Shabbat prayers. Next, we went to dinner. We said kiddush and began to eat. We had matzah ball soup, chicken, salad and potatoes. After that we had some quality bonding time with each other. We talked until really late and had a ton of fun until we all went to sleep.
-Jacob Buchinsky
4/5/14
Saturday we all woke up with just as much excitement that we had the day before. I think we actually got a record amount of sleep for a Shabbaton that night, reasonably because the Israelis were exhausted so went to bed somewhat early on Friday and we followed shortly after. It was a cold morning and unfortunately didn’t warm up too much during the day; and if it was freezing for us Americans I can’t even imagine what it felt like for the Israelis. After breakfast, we had our Shabbat experience, which David and Jess led. We started by sharing and explaining our own different sects and practices of Judaism, as Reconstructionist, Reform, Conservative, and Orthodox are not titles of Judaism that the Israelis are very familiar with. We also learned that in Israel, Jewish practices and beliefs are often defined as religious or non-religious, without specific titles. However, as a group we collectively agreed that our own forms of Judaism cannot be simply defined under such broad categories and that we all have to define it for ourselves. We continued the Shabbat experience with prayers from the amazing siddurim that Jess and David made for us all. Next, we had ODT (outdoor training) led by the JCs, in which we did three activities that all showed us different ways of communicating. Two of the activities were done in complete silence, which we successfully completed to prove to ourselves that the language barrier could be worked around and that there are more ways than just speaking to be able to communicate. After these activities we had a little bit of free time before lunch, so some of us stayed to play football and basketball while others went back to the cabins to hang out. After lunch we had about three hours of break to do whatever we wanted. A lot of us went down to the beautiful lake at EKC to hang out for a while. We also got some good basketball, football, baseball, lacrosse, frisbee, and soccer going on the sports fields which was a lot of fun. Some took advantage of the down time to get some rest, and others just hung out at the cabins. Regardless, this time brought all of us closer together. By now we had already formed some amazing friendships in only 24 hours; which at that point was crazy to think it had only been that long and we were already so close.
Our next program, led by Chris and Nir, was all about our cultural differences and learning about each others countries and ways of life. The first part had us all laughing hysterically as we were split into groups to portray the stereotypes of Americans and Israelis. In the end we decided that although these stereotypes are somewhat based on fact, they are in no way true for everyone and that we can’t make those assumptions about people we have never even met. Next Yarden created for us a memory game with cards of various things with one card as the Israeli part and its match as the American part. Through this we saw the differences in some aspects of our lives, but also were able to see that some parts are actually quite similar.
Switching gears a little, we did a program in which we were broken into small groups and had to design a community. Institutions, such as temples and schools, were represented by small squares of paper with each having their own specific dimensions, and the whole town had to fit on a piece of paper we were given. There was a total of six groups- one all Americans, one all Israelis, and four mixed. It turned out that all six ideal communities were not all that different, which again brought us back to that idea that although we come from very different places, the American teens and the Israeli teens are not in fact all that different.
We then had dinner, where we also packed up our breakfasts to bring on the bus to Washington, D.C. early the next morning and received our NAS t-shirts. After dinner we were split into our committees for ISS and did some team building activities, which were very important, as we will be working hard in these groups planning for Israel. Following this we had a beautiful Havdallah and Ma’agal Lilah bonfire. When we returned to the cabins we had to pack everything up so that everything could be loaded onto the bus early in the morning. The girls never seem to be too good at the whole packing thing, not to mention our room was a complete disaster as always. Nonetheless, we got everything done and hung out for a little while before we finally all went to bed, excited to go to D.C. the next day, but not so excited to wake up at 5 A.M.
-Allie Shepard
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On Friday everyone arrived at the JCC. It was the first time we got to meet the Israelis face to face. We were all incredibly excited. When we got onto the bus we had a chance to meet everybody. We played an icebreaker called speed dating. An American would pair up with an Israeli and talk to them about whatever they wanted. Every 5 or so minutes we would switch seats and start conversing with someone else. Once we arrived at EKC we had an activity where we decorated candle holding jars.
After that, shabbat started and we all went outside to the porch and said some Shabbat prayers. Next, we went to dinner. We said kiddush and began to eat. We had matzah ball soup, chicken, salad and potatoes. After that we had some quality bonding time with each other. We talked until really late and had a ton of fun until we all went to sleep.
-Jacob Buchinsky
4/5/14
Saturday we all woke up with just as much excitement that we had the day before. I think we actually got a record amount of sleep for a Shabbaton that night, reasonably because the Israelis were exhausted so went to bed somewhat early on Friday and we followed shortly after. It was a cold morning and unfortunately didn’t warm up too much during the day; and if it was freezing for us Americans I can’t even imagine what it felt like for the Israelis. After breakfast, we had our Shabbat experience, which David and Jess led. We started by sharing and explaining our own different sects and practices of Judaism, as Reconstructionist, Reform, Conservative, and Orthodox are not titles of Judaism that the Israelis are very familiar with. We also learned that in Israel, Jewish practices and beliefs are often defined as religious or non-religious, without specific titles. However, as a group we collectively agreed that our own forms of Judaism cannot be simply defined under such broad categories and that we all have to define it for ourselves. We continued the Shabbat experience with prayers from the amazing siddurim that Jess and David made for us all. Next, we had ODT (outdoor training) led by the JCs, in which we did three activities that all showed us different ways of communicating. Two of the activities were done in complete silence, which we successfully completed to prove to ourselves that the language barrier could be worked around and that there are more ways than just speaking to be able to communicate. After these activities we had a little bit of free time before lunch, so some of us stayed to play football and basketball while others went back to the cabins to hang out. After lunch we had about three hours of break to do whatever we wanted. A lot of us went down to the beautiful lake at EKC to hang out for a while. We also got some good basketball, football, baseball, lacrosse, frisbee, and soccer going on the sports fields which was a lot of fun. Some took advantage of the down time to get some rest, and others just hung out at the cabins. Regardless, this time brought all of us closer together. By now we had already formed some amazing friendships in only 24 hours; which at that point was crazy to think it had only been that long and we were already so close.
Our next program, led by Chris and Nir, was all about our cultural differences and learning about each others countries and ways of life. The first part had us all laughing hysterically as we were split into groups to portray the stereotypes of Americans and Israelis. In the end we decided that although these stereotypes are somewhat based on fact, they are in no way true for everyone and that we can’t make those assumptions about people we have never even met. Next Yarden created for us a memory game with cards of various things with one card as the Israeli part and its match as the American part. Through this we saw the differences in some aspects of our lives, but also were able to see that some parts are actually quite similar.
Switching gears a little, we did a program in which we were broken into small groups and had to design a community. Institutions, such as temples and schools, were represented by small squares of paper with each having their own specific dimensions, and the whole town had to fit on a piece of paper we were given. There was a total of six groups- one all Americans, one all Israelis, and four mixed. It turned out that all six ideal communities were not all that different, which again brought us back to that idea that although we come from very different places, the American teens and the Israeli teens are not in fact all that different.
We then had dinner, where we also packed up our breakfasts to bring on the bus to Washington, D.C. early the next morning and received our NAS t-shirts. After dinner we were split into our committees for ISS and did some team building activities, which were very important, as we will be working hard in these groups planning for Israel. Following this we had a beautiful Havdallah and Ma’agal Lilah bonfire. When we returned to the cabins we had to pack everything up so that everything could be loaded onto the bus early in the morning. The girls never seem to be too good at the whole packing thing, not to mention our room was a complete disaster as always. Nonetheless, we got everything done and hung out for a little while before we finally all went to bed, excited to go to D.C. the next day, but not so excited to wake up at 5 A.M.
-Allie Shepard
