Tuesday June 16 – Welcome and Opening Tochnit
Welcome home Machane Stone!! It was so great to see all of the chanichim come off the buses to meet their hadracha, counselors who have been preparing for them for a week now. We had the most perfect weather for a first day, b”h. We began in true Camp Stone fashion….at the Zionist Congree in 1897. Everyone heard from our Roshei Moshava, Didy Blau and Yaffa Klausner, as they portrayed Theodore Herzl and . Some representatives spoke up about pushing their agenda – Ahad HaAm, Zev Jabotinsky and others tried to persuade everyone to focus on what they decided was a priority – politics, religion, agriculture, self defense. Tought to decide where we should put our energy as we start to think about returning to our Homeland after nearly 2,000 years in exile. Each Eidah walked around the camp, meeting these figures and their party lines, in a bit more of an experiential way. Leo Pinsker met each eidah on the road, as they walked by, and handed out leaflets – the Chovevi Zion Quarterly – and yelled out loud and clear that the focus needs to be political zionism. Next up – A.D. Gordon and his passion for farming. He and his helpers gave out hay, oranges and dates and tried to convince everyone to focus on agriculture as we return to the Land. When we all walked around the Agam, we met workers who were draining “the swamps” from the malaria-infested waters. And lastly, we encountered Rav Kook and his passionate cries of “We are returning to build the Beit haMikdash!!” followed by our musicians singing and playing on their instruments יבנה המקדש. It was a wild ride through this moment of history where we had so many different voices as we tried to rally around this earth-shattering plan to return to Eretz Yisrael! Stay tuned for more about our Shivat Zion learning and living!
Dinner was our favorite – fresh chicken and rice and veges followed by some fresh peaches. Thank you to our Mitbach staff for cooking thousands of pieces of chicken for our first homemade dinner of the summer. Plan for the evening: unpacking, getting to know each other and getting some sleep before 7:30 kima.\
Kaytana follows Jewish national history from בראשית until the end of דברים, the Jews’ arrival into Eretz Canaan – yes, five books in 2 weeks; buckle up! Today, we began with surviving the flood, and walking from the boat (pirate boat in our kids’ playground) out into a world of…bunnies! (taken from our Camp Stone refet of animals) Nothing like cute, little, furry bunnies to kick off a great first few hours at camp! During dinner, our youngest campers looked like pros eating on their own quiet porch and helping to clean up and wrap up the tablecloths.
Machal began their month with an exercise in helping each other and being self-sufficient. They did not wait for Plugah’s help with their luggage, but rather helped each other shlep the bags to the bunks on their side of Machane. Those chanichim are so excited to be back for their final month as campers. They received their shevet name tonight with the traditional shelet-aish: AMIKAM (translation: my nation rises up) and were assigned their מספרי ברזל, the number they will use multiple times a day for count-off to check that everyone is present. That number will stay with them for years and years. Tonight they unpacked, and tomorrow they will head out for their first of many hikes and outdoor overnights with a BBQ for dinner. We look forward to seeing them Friday afternoon at the pre-Shabbat Mifkad. Their Roshim Micah Eizen and Maayan Berkowitz are in contact with our office through Yael Weber hourly until then.
Layla Tov Sugar Grove 🙂 Feels great to be back in 16350 🙂
