Wednesday June 24

Today we learned about Bnei Akiva’s slogan “Torah v’Avodah” which means combining Talmud Torah with hard work, especially the physical work of building Jewish society in Eretz Yisrael. In the daily skit-by-the-Roshei-Eidah on the shekem shack roof today, they taught about Kibbutzim, communities organized around the values of hard work, cooperation, building and farming. As religious Zionists, we appreciate the Kibbutz’s emphasis on hard work and Eretz Yisrael and incorporate that into our vision of Torah life and Avodat Hashem. As a fun “going to remember that for a long time” moment, every camper, along with their shekem today, was given a hard-boiled egg and a big green olive to really get into that kibbutz feel!

The weather was picture-perfect, so all of the peulot were held as scheduled and planned: biking the relatively new camp forest trails, climbing wall and high ropes. Volleyball, swim, ceramics, slip n’ slide, archery – you name it, it was happening here today!

Dinner was a favorite: chicken nuggets and chicken wings! Guess how many nuggets and wings we consumed? If all calculations are correct, this blogger has determined we ate approximately (give or take a few) 2,000 wings and 2,000 nuggets. Let’s be honest: most of that was eaten by Eidah Daled boys 😊 Of course a salad, rice and some cooked broccoli and cauliflower rounded out the meal. Thank you to the amazing Mitbach staff who work from (literally) the early morning until way after dinner clean up.

Tonight’s night activity was by eidah and gender. Each Eidah’s Rosh/Roshim decided on the game or activity. Eidah Bet celebrated one of the camper’s becoming a Bat Mitzvah with a birthday/Bat Mitzvah party!

Kaytana learned about the values that Moshe and Aharon each had and were known for. Aharon and his peace-loving and peace-chasing and Moshe with his humility along with his strength and confidence. Rumor has it that Moshe and Aharon are sometimes the Kaytana color war teams, so they are all waiting for some sort of breakout to announce a Color War day…I’ll keep you posted, of course! They had a fun peulah today which had them completing tasks and running around camp, like an Amazing Race. They ended in the Indoor Beit Knesset and opened up a Torah to see the inside calligraphy and parchment, up close. They talked about a sofer and the mitzvah of Talmud Torah.

Machal hiked the short-gorge hike today, passing a beautiful waterfall. Hamburger dinner was followed by a s’mores dessert.