Cardin School Updates

Motzei Shabbat, 3 Tevet 5767, December 23, 2006

Shalom Cardin parents,

Perhaps the best way to begin is to say that our kids are singing. From Kabbalat Shabbat services, to singing z’mirot shel Shabbat and other songs of the Jewish people at the Shabbat dinner table, to a party the kids threw for themselves later Friday night, to the gorgeous melodies that the Nesiya staff taught for meditation on Shabbat morning, to escorting Shabbat out with song late in the afternoon, and on up to and beyond Havdalah, our kids are singing. Beautiful, joyful, soulful, Hebrew, English, and Arabic songs, silly songs, the students’ hearts are full and song is only the most obvious way they are expressing their joy.

Our students were primed to sing thanks in part to the tireless refrain of Rinat – that ball of irrepressible energy that is one of our Nesiya counselors – in singing Sevivon Sov, Sov, Sov as we hiked up and down mountains on Wednesday, Thursday, and Friday. We sang it again, and again, and again, and again. What else is one to do while hiking in the magical, dry, forbidding, and inviting mountains of Eilat during Hanukkah? But I get ahead of myself. It’s been quite a week…

We arose at 7 as planned on Wednesday. A group of us said Shacharit – the morning service – overlooking the stunning Ramon Crater in the company of a small group of Yael-Ibex who have the beauty of the wild and the fearlessness of animals accustomed to being fed by people. The remainder of the group made final preparations for the Noded. Following breakfast we sat down to learn some Rules and Regs for the month and finally piled onto the bus and headed south. The clear sky became more so, its blue got deeper and the landscape became more alien. On either side of the road were dusty plains and low hills that rose up to formidable mountains in the distance. The scenery was vast and we understood that we were going to a very remote place. In fact, a portion of our journey took us inside and through the Ramon Crater.

On either side of the road as well were Israeli tanks and artillery positions conducting firing and other military exercises. Mr. Geva pointed to the class of tank he commanded during his army service and explained the difference between clouds of dust and smoke on the battlefield. When we passed through an Israeli military road block Mr. Geva made sure the students noticed the wonder of a woman soldier, just a few years older than themselves, and she was chewing gum! The students wondered what flavor gum it was… Fascinating! They were riveted. And we headed further south.

Finally we arrived at a parking area where a second bus was waiting. On board were students from Ashkelon’s ORT Afridar school who had traveled far, and given up days of their Hanukkah vacation, to hike with us and become our friends. First things first: A large delegation of girls set off with Mrs. Prince to pee in the desert. For many this was their first such experience. Chelsea put it this way: “Going as a group to find a bathroom was absolutely hysterical. It was one of the first, of many, bonding experiences with the other girls.” And Johanna commented: “I can pee without a bathroom! It was a challenge, even impossible at first, but I did it (thank you, Lindsay and Caitlin for being my peeing buddies!).” The boys had less of a challenge. Some even had fun with it. Our guides arranged lunch for us – deli sandwiches and fresh fruit. These went into our backpacks along with water we already had packed. Except for the kids from Ashkelon, who had water for a walk but not for a hike. And hats. The guides impressed on all of us – the Americans more so than the Israelis – that NO ONE hikes in the desert without a hat. We headed out.

The first day’s hike was moderate. It lasted only about three hours including stops for explanations, rest, taking in the view, eating, drinking, and playing getting-to-know-you games. Aaron volunteered to model the State of Israel for us. Ayelet – the guide for half the group - had him twist his body into a shape roughly like the outline of Israel and proceeded to put stickers on him to indicate landmarks like Israel’s cities and the Kinneret. Placing the sticker for the southern city of Be’er Sheva was a little tricky; we moved it north in the interests of modesty. The best was when Ayelet, by pouring water down the side of Aaron’s chest, demonstrated how water flows from the Kinneret down along the Jordan River to spill into the Dead Sea. Yonatan – the guide for the second group - was not only informative and amusing, but he shared with us his deep love for the desert through poems, personal anecdotes to accompany the view.

We concluded the hike at our first night’s campsite, a prepared area off a road but thick with mountains. Johanna describes what we saw: “We found tents waiting to be set up as well as soup, mats, and, to our great surprise, a porta-potty!!” When we first planned our itinerary we figured there was no need for a bathroom, and no need for tents. Well, the Parks Authority required the bathroom for a group our size, and the cold nights of winter in the desert made tents the right call. As for the soup and mats, that only begins to tell the story. Nesiya hires a company that provides tents, mattress pads, mats for eating on, and heaps of firewood for the campsite. The company also provides a vast supply of fresh, cold water. And then there’s the food. A small team of genius cooks provided a dinner for seventy consisting of: Hamburgers, Kabobs, Shippudim (chicken on a skewer), a vegetarian entrée, hot vegetable soup, four different fresh salads –chopped by the students, pita bread, humus and tehina, lemonade, and sweet, hot tea. All prepared fresh on site. We were really roughing it.

The tents mostly went up quickly and students who struggled with the poles and stakes got ready help from their peers. Two Americans, one Israeli, backpacks, sleeping bags, luggage and hiking shoes went inside, too. The sun was down well over an hour by now and it was cold and windy. As it was the sixth night of Hanukkah, we set about lighting Hanukkah candles. Ofir, the staff’s McGuyver, had tin Hanukkiyot, candles, and matches for all of us. There was a low stone wall along one axis of the campsite and Ofir realized that the wall might protect the burning candles from the wind. He directed students to gather stones to extend the wall to accommodate our dozens of Hanukkiyot. Instantly, a bunch of students, American and Israeli together, were hauling stones from the edges of the campsite to extend the wall and raise it by several inches. A small Herodian building project was underway. In the end, the wind defeated the flames but the group effort signaled that something important was happening in our community.

Later that evening a student from the Ashkelon group directed us in fun games and projects that all had burning candles at their center and that all required the combined efforts of the Israelis and our own students. Everyone had a terrific time and managed to stay warm as well.

When it was time for bed a hush settled over the campsite – NOT! While some of us slept here and there, and some slept through, many of us were up and talking, laughing, stirring for much of the night. The kids from Ashkelon were, in Heidi’s words, “an amazing group.” Pairs of students also took brief shifts as night guards for the camp throughout the night. This created a sense of responsibility and shared effort among the students, although our armed escorts were actually patrolling the camp.

Morning in the desert came with its incomparably changeable palate of colors, dramatically advancing shadows, and rapidly escalating temperature. While students packed up and dressed, our cooks served steaming hot tea, cocoa, and tea biscuits. An intrepid group marched up a low hill to pray the shacharit service with an inspirational view, and then everyone gathered for a full breakfast. Everything but our daypacks was loaded onto a truck that brought it all to our second night’s destination. No sooner was breakfast cleared than fixings for lunch were set out and everyone packed the sandwiches and fruit they needed to get through what promised to be a daunting hike.

We set out. After hours of hiking along a gentle rise and a long, steady ridgeline our guides pointed up to a high peak where we saw figures that looked tiny. That’s where we were headed next. Many hearts sank. Ahead of us was “the scariest thing” Sam Jessa ever did. It dropped many of us to our hands and knees crawling up in a few places for fear of tipping over a cliff if we stood. (Rest assured that the fear far exceeded the actual risk.) Sam remembers grabbing Alex Lichtenauer’s leg for support at one point, which worked well for her except that Alex thought she might pull him off the cliff, and her with him! At other points some slid down steep inclines for fear of slipping if we stepped down. Of course, other hikers took it all in stride. Still others provided essential, patient, effective support to the more nervous among us. Heidi credits Yoni with saving her life when she thought she’d tip over a cliff. Becca Snyder pressed on despite her significant fear of heights, and thanks to the quiet, unflinching support of Aaron Olszewski. At one point we made our way through a boulder by way of a gap so narrow that we had to press our bodies sideways against the face of the rock just to pass. Says Heidi, “I got extremely scared.” Holding hands, lifting up, pushing up, steadying, encouraging, and cheering one another on. Stopping often for water. And always the singing, each group with its songs.

The other major piece of our big hike was studying texts from the Nesiya source book. The Nesiya program begins in the desert so that the group can establish itself in a context totally different from normal surroundings. The strangeness of the setting forces the members to look to one another for strength and to discover with one another the place in which they find themselves. That place – and the journey to it – are at the heart of our tradition and continues to shape our identity. On the first day we studied the Lekh L’kha passage – the passage in Genesis 12 in which God first commands Avram to come to this land and to dwell in it. On the second day we studied a passage from Numbers which describes the Israelites’ desert diet of daily manna from God. We also spent some ten minutes in semi-solitude, separating ourselves from one another just far enough to feel alone and to hear the silence. This experience and study opened up wonderful themes of dependence and independence, generosity and control, fearfulness and trust, all of which we will draw on throughout our month here in Israel.

Our hike ended at our new campsite and this time setting up tents seemed normal and familiar. Again we lit candles. With McGuyver’s help we were more successful that the night before. The counselors facilitated a meeting of the Israeli and American students together to help address the anxieties and misunderstandings associating with the sudden mixing of two groups from two different cultures. We played games and had a campfire… Oh! Dinner! Whole chickens prepared on a spit over an open flame, of course.

On the third day we awoke and broke camp, played a tremendous round of games with the whole group, and finally sat down to a farewell exercise about what the students gained from one another, what they took from their desert experience. At the end of this program the kids from Ashkelon boarded their bus and headed home while the Cardin group headed out for a final three hours of hiking. This hike’s main event was a steady, steep climb up a broad path to the top of the Eilat mountains at their southernmost extent in Israel. In short, we hiked to the bottom of Israel. Our guides had us hold hands and close our eyes for the final ten yards and then open our eyes together. As one we saw the gorgeous view of blue, blue waters of the Red Sea alongside Eilat itself and Akaba. Across the water we saw the summer palace of Jordan’s King Abdullah and in the distance on either side an industrial zone in Saudi Arabia and the eastern border of Egypt at Taba. Most importantly, we looked behind us and our guide pointed out to us the long trail we had taken to walk up and down mountains and across kilometers over three days. We were duly impressed with ourselves and grateful for what we had learned, for the strength and confidence we had discovered, and for the encouragement and support of one another.

Excerpts from what Chelsea learned in the desert: “Pay attention to where you are, keep in mind where you are going, don’t forget where you’ve been, but don’t dwell on the past. Trust others, trust yourself, encourage and appreciate everyone, and always pee before climbing a mountain….Without the help of others the hike would have been hard to manage. Without trust in myself the hike would have been impossible.”

And from Johanna: “To some, this experience proved that any challenge can be overcome, any mountain, no matter how tall it may appear, can be climbed. To others, this experience proved that one can live without the privileges of modern civilization, and that nature is something beautiful and is a being to be respected. To me, these past three days served to expand my understanding and love for the Land of Israel. Our homeland is not simply about the people and cities, but it is about the land itself. The desert is part of the wonders of the Land of Israel, and I am glad that I had an opportunity to widen my appreciation for Israel, a land that I deeply love.”

We were back at the Field School by 2:45 pm, lunched, and, finally, gratefully, and in a terrible rush, SHOWERED for Shabbat which began at 4:30.

I think that will cover it for now! More in future updates.

Warmly,
Joel

p.s. Pictures coming soon!