A Survey of Murals on the Kibbutz

So the kibbutz has a school either attached to it or on the outskirts of it. Today I rode my friend's bike through the school, called a beit sepher, and took some pictures of the murals that decorate the school. Here are some of my favorites.



This picture above is a view from the Kibbutz at sunrise.

In other news I spend this past Shabbas on the kibbutz. Basically it was the most relaxed atmosphere I've ever been in. It was a very enjoyable Shabbas and I would recommend spending a Shabbs on a religious kibbutz to anyone. The 700 people who live on the kibbutz are all Shomer Shabbas. There is no one in work clothes, no one is driving, and it's a powerful Shabbas energy to anyone who pays attention to it.
This Shabbas I'm being set up in Jerusalem at a Chasidic man's house.

Kibbutz

So I'm living now on Kibbutz Sde Eliyahu. The kibbutz is about 5 km away from Beit She'an, a city with Roman runis. My day basically goes like this:
I wake up at 5:00. It's awful and I hate it, but I haven't a choice. I go to work which has so far only been in the kitchen. While in the kitchen I do a lot of work that will never ever help me in any professional field outside of janitorial work. I do a lot of cleaning and moving of vegetables. I sometimes cut vegetables. They like to give me cucumbers or eggplant, but never tomatoes because they're too tricky. I spend a few hours in the kitchen cutting or moving food around and then I go to breakfast. I eat a sizely breakfast here because I'm away for about three hours before I get to eat. After breakfast is more work till around 1 when I get to go to lunch and have the rest of the day to myself. The women who I work with aren't from the kibbutz. Working in the kitchen
isn't highly regarded because it isn't a money making venture so they have to bring in outside help to run the kitchens. So I've met a lot of non-kibbutz people.
With my free time I work out, learn with a guy named Sarel, read, listen to music, and hangout with the other kids on my program. I've developed a whole workout regiment that utilizes my body weight mostly.
I learning about ten new words of Hebrew a day and it's very exciting and challenging for me.
Here as some pictures of the kibbutz.

This the horizon at about 6:20 AM. That mountain in the distance is Jordan.

This is a really cool tree.

This is a playground and not a junkyard.

This is a a cat in a man made pond at the entrance of the Kibbutz.
Marc is in Israel and I will be spending Shabbas with him.

Kibbutz and Chofest Part II

I decided to switch from my army program into the Kibbutz program. Although I tried to make due with my army program, I decided in the end that I wasn't going to get out of the program what I wanted to get out of my year in Israel. The program wasn't religious-orientated in the least bit, and I came to Israel for mostly religious reasons. So now I'm spending my first day at Kibbutz Sede Elliyahu. From what I've seen of this place it is absolutely beautiful. Next year will be their 70th year in existence. I'll take some pictures soon and put them up.
The Kibbutz is religious so the men are expected to wear kippot and the entire Kibbutz is Shomer Shabbas (observes Shabbas) every week. I'm very excited to be in a community like this where it's both very small and accepting, but also religious.

For New Years I went to a bar in Tel Aviv and partook in a decent amount of shenanigans. I slept at a friend's place in Ramat Gan which is a small city just outside of Tel Aviv. I then went back to Jerusalem to lay low for a few days. I watched a bunch of movies, read a bit, and worked out. For Shabbas I went to a moshav called Mevo Modiim with the very religious part of the program called Shalem. I had a very good time with in the moshav and had a very interesting Shabbas afternoon. I went for a walk with some friends and one girl started petting a dog through its gate. The owner of the dog came out and told us that her goat had just given birth about 45 minutes ago and that we could see it if we wanted. The moshav is very a small , close-nit community of only 40 families and the woman seemed nice so we proceeded into her yard. Her yard is basically a small zoo with bird cages of parrots and peacocks and many small farm animals like lambs and goats. She showed us this tiny, adorable goat that was failing at feeding from her mother. She was worried about the baby goat's feeding so we went on an adventure to find hay. First the woman, Judy, sent us by ourselves to her neighbor's to ask for some spare hay. We go to the neighbor's place and she basically chews us out about how she's a volunteer and how Judy should get her own hay and blah blah blah. We went back to Judy's and she told us we went to the wrong neighbor so we went to like four other people's houses looking for this one guy who owns a horse. We finally found him and he showed us his beautiful horse and gave us hay and we went back and chilled with the baby goat for a bit before going back to do Shabbas things.

So I'll be on this Kibbutz for the next two months and I'll update with the jobs I do and other things like that.