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This machaneh looks at Cultural Judaism, and analysing the history of the Jewish culture and people as well as analysing what they can do to make Judaism more meaningful to themselves. Throughout machaneh they will enjoy different fun, yet educational peulot (activities) around this interesting theme.
Wednesday 1st August: Tiyul (Day 1)
Today the bus set off pretty much on time, and through the bus journey spirits were high and all the chanichim were singing on the bus. They arrived in Brecon - the town where they will be around for the next 4 days doing tiyul - at about 4.00 this afternoon, bang on time.
When they got off the bus they were split into their kvutsot (groups) which they were all happy with. There are about 12 chanichim (participants) in each group wtih 3 or 4 leaders in each group.
For the next few days the chinachim will be on "tiyul" (literally meaning a hike). Here they are with their kvutsah walking from one campsite to the next, and camping out in tents with only their kvutsa. The days are usually filled with bumping into other kvutsot where they usually have"singing matches" between them as to who can sing the loudest. The groups are responsibile for buying their own food and cooking for themselves - a time that the chanichim absolutely love.
They al successfully reached their campsites and put up their tents, and all are still standing! unfortunatley one group decided to take a shortcut, and took a left instead of a right, adiment they were going in the right direction. When it started to get dark, and they realised they had walked off the map, the carefully planned emergency procedures were put into action, and the organisers cars got to them within half an hour, with 2 taxi's by their side and everyone was driven safely to their campsite - an adventure for all involved!
Tonight the groups have been having dinner, with some groups having a bbq (described as delicious), and playing fun get to know you games along with learnign their kvutsa song.
You will be glad to know the weather was beuatiful today with sunshine and was even quite warm too!
Thursday 2nd August: Tiyul (Day 2)
Today was another fun day of tiyuling with again beatiful weather. The men in charge of the weather sure did scare us that it was going to be awful weather for camp, but thankfully it is holding out - lets hope it keeps it up till the end of camp.
Some groups had a great treat of a vegetarian pub lunch today (without the alcohol!), whilst others decided to have a bbq or even get pizza in for dinner.
During hte day lots of groups met up whilst walking, which inevitably led to groups arguing and siniging about who was the loudest (and therefore best!) group.
All in all, spirits are high, groups are bonding well, and they are having great fun.
Friday 3rd August: Tiyul (Day 3)
Another fun day in the sun for nemerim on tiyul. You will be glad to know that all tiyul groups are bonding extremely well and getting on like a house on fire.
They have had the usual day of tiyul - with some groups having bbqs and pizzas and take aways for meals.
They are now all enjoying their first shabbat on machaneh, most singing songs around a bonfire.
They are extremely looking forwad to tomorrow which is the Brecon festival. Not squite sure what that is, but I guess we will update you more tomorrow.
Saturday 4th August: Tiyul (Day 4)
Yesterday the chanichim decided that the Brecon Festival did not seem that appealing to them, so instead hung around the outskirts picking up the great atmosphere. After this most of them decided to spend their activities money on going to the cinema - to see Evan Almighty... which most of htem thoroughly enjoyed.
They said it was a great experience being in the cinema with so many friends.
One group decided to take a shortcut on route to the next campsite, to find themselves walking through a floded field with water up their knees, which is suprising considering the weather is really sunny and great. They all had a good laugh about it, and learnt the hard way that shortcuts rarely work.
All in all the chanichim are loving it, and are sad to be leaving tiyul tomorrow to go to mainsite.
Sunday 5th August: Tiyul and Mainsite (Day 5)
Today was the kids last day of tiyul. Whilst all sad, they were excited to be meeting up with everyone at main site.
The groups all got to mainsite at a staggerred stage, and were of course met by huge amounts of songs and ruach (literally meaning spirit - means lots of songs and chants), from the other groups (apart from the 1st group of course!).
The leaders say the noise these kids produce is incredible and everyone is singing so loudly they reckon their voices will be lost within the next 24 hours!
They all then had a huge games session with all 60 chanichim, followed by putting up the tents at main site - lets hope they stay standing for the next week!
They then went into a yummy dinner of pasta a la tomata, followed by an intro peulah where they met all the leaders for camp. Afterwards they had a camp fire with a shiron (song) session, which will be followed by a (no doubt lengthy) bed process...
Great day all around.
Monday 6th August: Mainsite (Day 6)
Today has been an extremely active day for the chanichim. They started off as usual with WUMBA (Wake Up, Mifkad, Breakfast, Avodah). Mifkad is where all the chanichim stand in a chet (similar to the army) in their groups, and they all sing their songs in the morning. There is obviously internal competition as to who is the loudest... also a good way to wake them up! Avodah is hebrew for "work" and is meant for tidying up.
After this they went into their first peulah (activity) which was looking at the Jewish calander and all the different festivals. This was done in an extremely fun and active element of a big sports day competition, which brought it all together at the end.
The next peulah looked at Social Action and why it is important in the world today. Many huge fun posters later, they were all ready to recycle the world!
Lunch was followed by looking at Jewish History which ended up in a hilarious Adam and Even Court room trial, backed by the chachim.
Afterwards was yet another great peulah looking at the different streams of Judaism, which took place as a form of a murder mystery – looking for the Jewish Mans stolen identity.
They then spent some time together in their kvutsot (groups) where the relived the amazing times they spent together on tiyul before going into the last activity of the night which was a huge carnival with different activities which rounded up by showing them why it is important to celebrate festivals.
Great fun all around.
Tuesday 7th August: Mainsite (Day 7)
This morning, after WUMBA, they were introduced to the day. For those of you that do not know, today is Succot, the first festival of the year. Well, at least it was on camp!
The first peulah they had was about traditions in the Jewish religion, and here the chanichim had great fun building succot before exploring why they do it.
The next peulah was about the importance of co-existence, where the chanichim had to a variety of tasks without talking, thus showing the importance of dialogue in modern day society.
After a lovely jacket potato lunch they had an activity about the Wondering Jew which involved a little bit of a play by the leaders followed by discussion about Jews in the diasporah.
Next was kibbud families. This is where they chanichim are split into two or three people, and each given a certain madrich. They are then given some chocolate, and they go off in there 3’s or 4’s to have a little bit of a snack, and more importantly for the madrichim to chat with the chanichim and check they are ok, having fun and no problems. They usually have kibbud families every day, and stay in the same kibbud families for the whole of machaneh.
After this they had chuggim (a choice of different fun activities). Some of the variety of choice was a water fight (due to the great weather), an army chug, a day out shopping in their mind, or extreme frog-home make over (there are apparently lots of little frogs in one section of the field… so they built houses for them).
After the peulah they are going on a Crystal Maze style activity looking at the Zionist Struggle before heading to bed after a busy eventful and fun day.
Wednesday 8th August: Mainsite (Day 8)
Today for the Nemerim chanichim was Chanukah! This, of course, meant that they were woken up in a lovely way by a little present (shame they are only having one day of Chanukah on camp!).
After the WUMBA process they went straight into a peulah of traditions and origins of chanukah, which dealt seriously with assault / obstacle course, pie throwing and many other forms of activities. Naturally, this accurately resembles the struggles of the Maccabi’s.
After this they had an importance of community peulah where each group had a role, and they had to negotiate with each other and had to make lunch as different groups. This showed the importance of working together and the benefits that they can game from it. They all had a rather amusing time I was told.
After lunch they had a Hero’s and Heroin’s puelah, looking at what traits were good traits. Here Mordachai, Esther, Ruth, Ram Bam, Moses and many more different peoples traits were auctioned off to them in a big auction house.
After this they had a ZK (group time) where they got down to planning MYOD. MYOD is short for Make Your Own Day (or in hebrew, "who else"). This is where the chanichim get experience (with the help of the leaders) to plan their own day. They spend time in their groups planning what they are going to do for a session on that special day, and then run activities for all the other chanichim (participants) on the camp. Its a bit of hard work for the chanichim, but extremely rewarding, and they always love it as they get to do what they want on that day!
After a great bbq dinner of fish and chips (I believe the chips were oven cooked and not bbq’d!) they had a final peulah of the day about contemporary figures and jewish culture, which took a very drama predominant role. One of the tasks, for instance, was to rewrite a well known film script in a jewish way.
They are now enjoying a shiron (song) session, with hot chocolate around a bonfire.
Thursday 9th August: Mainsite (Day 9)
This morning, Nemerim woke up to the usual WUMBA with a difference – all the leaders were in fancy dress! After a quick wake up, some of the more awake chanichim put on fancy dress and joined mifkad – all because today was purim!
The first peulah looked at the traditions and origins of purim through the story. Each group had a different part of the story and had to express it through a medium of song. Some had to sing to RnB, Hip Hop, Classical etc. It was very amusing and they had great fun.
Afterwards a fun sporting activity, with some people doing UCC (Ultimate Catch Championship), and others playing Football, whilst some chose to sit back and take the lazy approach of lying back and watching.
After an outside lunch (they have really taken to these at the moment) they went into a Women in Judaism peulah looking at predominant characters such as Esther, Zivia Lubetkin, Hannah Senesh, etc. This was done through a parade for womens rights!
Afterwards they went into a ZK planning MYOD, which was followed by a Darfur peulah. This was in the form of an exhibition, where they watched a short film, and carried on to expressing their thoughts and feelings in a group. They were hoping to set up a junior tsevet (team) of campaigners to carry on this important issue at home.
They then had the choice of different chugim to choose from including Giant Oragami Bat making which, if successful, terminated with a tea party inside the paper bat, chatting about the OC, boy band chug, awkward conversations chug along with a few others.
After a lovely BBQ dinner they went into a fascinating peulah about anti-Semitism which involved an identity parade which led them onto questioning their own thoughts, fears and prejudices before putting them into the fire (similar to putting your sins into a running river on Rosh Hashanah).
If time allowed, they would end off the night with a lovely bonfire.
Friday 10th August: Mainsite (Day 10)
Today was Pesach on Nemerim! After a rather unusual WUMBA (unusualy because two lucky chanichim got to lead Mifkad instead of hte roshim (head leaders), they went into their first peulah of traditions and origins of pesach. This took the method of a play relating to the ten plagues, followed by moving stations which represented different tasks of them moving out of Egypt.
After this they had yesterdays chugim, because unfortunately (without my own knowledge) they ran out of time for the chugim. I am told that the giant oragami bat making chug was great fun, but "didnt quite work to plan".
This was followed by an unscheduled power cut. You would have thought that people camping in a field would not be bothered by this, but we are not like the olden days chalutzniks and do things a little different, meaning hte indoor kitchen, and indoor activity room were pretty much out of use.
After a little while they were back up and running again and into their Exciles and Entry peulah, where they all "boarded" a "plane" and flew to all the different countries that the Jews were exciled from, learnign a bit about the culture of each of them.
This was followed by a Shabbat service and a lovely shabbat dinner of sweet and sour quorn stir fry, before they relaxed and headed to bed...
Saturday 11th August: Mainsite (Day 11)
Today they had a special Shabbat lie in, which apparently they needed because they have all been having so much fun and forgetting about the sleeping part! Today was a very chilled day, with a lovely Shabbat chilled atmosphere.
After a late breakfast they had their only peulah today which was about Fair Trade. This took the format of a cup game showing the difficulties of communication and thus negotiation.
They then had a chilled lunch which led to everyone chilling on teh grass, listening to music, and kicking a ball around in the sun. Afterwards they had a massive games session, followed by either a Football or UCC (Ultimate Catching Championshp) competition. Everyone is really getting into this new UCC.
They then had a shabbat service, followed by an optional parsha peulah looking at the parsha.
Afterwards they are having a BBQ followed by Havdallah and a camp fire.
Sunday 12th August: Mainsite (Day 12)
Today was Shavuot! The chanichim first looked at the traditions and origins here through two massive board games. One board game was impossible to complete, and represented the golden calf, whilst the other was easy with the instruction booklet – representing the torah.
Next they looked at texts of Shavuot in a fun musical way, where part of the text was missing and they had to fill it in in their own way.
After this was Fun With Nature, which apparently ended up in a massive game of UCC (Ultimate Catch Championship).
Last for the day was a Harmony peulah, where they were all split into groups of 3 or 4, plus a leader. They were put into groups of people they were completely not friendly with, and were all given a candle and sat around in a circle. They then had questions they had to answer, and talked about camp – it was a great way to make new friends for the last couple of days.
Monday 13th August: Mainsite (Day 13)
Today the chanichim had a great day on their day out! They went to a super theme park, where there were great rides. Everyone split up into groups and went round depending on what rides people wanted to go on.
Everyone had a great time.
When they arrived back to machaneh they topped off the day with a Murder Mystery which was based around famous fictional murders.
Everyone had an awesome day!
Tuesday 14th August: Mainsite (Day 14)
Today was MYOD. MYOD is short for Make Your Own Day (or in hebrew, "who else"). This is where the chanichim get experience (with the help of the leaders) to plan their own day. They spend time in their groups planning what they are going to do for a session on that special day, and then run activities for all the other chanichim (participants) on the camp. Its a bit of hard work for the chanichim, but extremely rewarding, and they always love it as they get to do what they want on that day!
Unfortunately it was raining quite a bit today, and it slowed the day down, but each kvutsah successfully managed to run a fun and interesting peulah relating to Israel.
They then went to have a BBQ in a McHabo style, which is going to be followed by Final Mifkad, and then a final night party with lots of ziggim (skits).
Wednesday 15th August: Mainsite (Day 15)
Today was the last day at camp, and of course was a sad day for all! After a bit of cleaning up, they all said their teary goodbyes to their new friends!
Everyone has said they are definately coming back next year - wicked!
Click here to see photos of Nemerim - Set 1!
Click here to see photos of Nemerim - Set 2! |
