The Posts That Never Were I: Shvu'ayim Shetach, Hagnam, and Tekes Hashhba'a

Because I was in the army, I didn't have much time at home, and when I was, not much time on the computer and especially to blog.

There were a number of posts I started writing, but never finished/posted. I decided I'd post them now.

May 21, 2007

The past few weeks have actually gone by really fast. It was April 29, starting the 2 weeks of shetach (we leave base for a week and, for lack of a better description, camp out), M16 b'sisi (where we shot all week and learned how to shoot in all positions), and sada'ut, a taste of what being a chayyal is really like. M16 b'sisi was really fun, I mean, shooting a gun is fun. You get to know your gun (which I named Ayelet) really well that week. I did really well until we got to 100 meters, and I kinda dropped off. I think I still have a chance of becoming a sharpshooter though, so I'm ok.
Sada'ut is the hard week of shvu'ayim shetach. No cell phones, not even watches, and the few people that are allowed have their watch scrambled up. No connection with the world at all. Our sada'ut though was easier than most -- it was cut short because it was too hot to do anything. We went Sunday night, did Masat Pil (with everything on our backs) for 3 km, set up the tents, ate went to sleep. We woke up, davened, did another 2 km to a base called Tevetz to sit under their shade and have shiurim about sada'ut. All day we had these shiurim, even going til the night. We learned to crawl, and then we played a game called Melech HaHar, King of the Mountain, where the sergeant had a sticklight and we had to steal it from him. But we had to be unheard, if he or the other commanders heard us, or saw us standing, they told us to go back down the mountain a little. Then we went to sleep at 330 (someone who snuck a watch told me), woke up at around 530, davened, ran, went back to sleep til 2, then went back to our own base. It wasn't so hard, but the annoying thing about shetach is that you can't stay clean. I like being clean, so I had to get used to that. It was really hot, and after during a masa you sweat alot, but since we're in the shetach, you're not allowed to take off your uniform, and obviously you can't shower. You have to sleep in those uniforms drenched in sweat, wake up and do it again, for 3 days. In M16 b'sisi even longer, 4 or 5 days. 2 weeks straight of this. Fun fun, right?
After sada'ut we had whats called Hagn"amim, short for haganat machane, basically doing shmirah all week, from Thursday til Thursday. The unit was split up and each machlakah was at a different base. I wasn't with my machlakah because during M16 b'sisi I hurt my knee and couldnt do regular shmirah, so I stayed at my own base with Machlakah 2.

The swearing in ceremony was at the Kotel, Sunday May 20th. I have to say, I felt kinda stupid walking that way; "Smol yemin smol! Smol yemin smol!" It was cool though, having quite a bunch of people there, being a chayyal bodeid and all, who don't really have many people there. Talya, Adina and Shifra came, that was awesome. Yesodei came, my aunt with Saba Yosef came, and the Bogners and Solomonts. Thank you guys. We even went out to dinner after.

Til next time...