Happy Thanksgiving!!

Hey guys. The past three weeks have been pretty fun.

Three weeks ago was the summary week of how to function as a four man squad. The entire week was spent in the field with the squad. No commanders except for when they brought us food. We had missions and navigation to do every night. I had blisters on my foot so I was in agony all week long but my commander simply refused to let me stop. Needless to say, that sucked. I can honestly say that since the moment I lost a lot of respect for him because he knows that I am not the kind of soldier that looks to get out of as much training as he can like many other soldiers do. Though I may complain like everyone else, I have never in my army experience tried to get out of something hard just because it was hard. Anyways, though I was in great pain, it was still a very cool week where it was just us soldiers having fun without our commanders. All night long as we walked, we were joking and complaining; when it was cold, we would cuddle together for mutual warmth, and all in all managed to find the silver lining.

Two weeks ago we started doing solo navigation. Whereas before all our navigation we did in pairs, now all aspects of the navigation became solely each person's responsibility. Learning all the points, their descriptions, learning the path and memorizing it, etc. I am average when it comes to navigation, I usually bring the majority of my points and don't get lost too often. I really enjoyed the week because I got to set the pace of the navigation and so I went much faster than usual. There are many things in the army that I am sure I will forget once I am done with the service, but there are other things that I have learned that I will never forget; life lessons and skills that will help me in the future.

Two skills that pop up in my mind as significant are my gun and navigation. Before joining the army, I had never touched a gun and stood very firmly on the side of gun control laws. But after training and learning how to use the weapon, you realize just how important having trained and responsible people with weapons is. I still firmly believe that most citizens should not be carrying weapons but in Israel, we live in a very volatile neighborhood and the fact that the majority of the citizenry here know how to handle a weapon is comforting. The second skill is that of navigation. I can now usually find the directions of the compass at most hours of the day without too much trouble and can dissect terrain to know where rivers and wadis flow, where there are shoulders, ridges and peaks of mountains on topography maps. Simple survival skills that are now ingrained in my head.

This past week we spent up north learning how to fight in the underbrush of northern Israel. This basically consists of running up steep slopes filled with the thorniest bushes you can imagine- all of course while in full gear and with the machine gun. Of course, this past week was very rainy and so we were filled with mud and quite miserable. It was quite a scene to witness. Twenty soldiers covered in mud during an exercise in a torrential downpour! But we got through the week as best we could. The best part of the week was getting out early Thursday however because of Thanksgiving! I went to two dinners in Tel Aviv and then went out with my friend to a bar. It was so great to go out and enjoy myself.

Aside from that, things are going well. Two and a half months left until we finish training (who is counting?), guys are great, kibbutz is great, and feeling pretty healthy. I plan on coming back to the States for Pesach and I can't wait for that moment.

Final observations: There has been a lot of terror attacks recently in Israel and I can only hope that the families of those killed find comfort somehow in the wake of their terrible tragedies.

In regards to the proposed Jewish State bill: I am deeply opposed. As Jews, we know what it is to be forever the minority and forever being the stranger. So why then do we need to inflict that same feeling on the Christian, Druze, and yes, Arab communities of Israel? Are we not confident enough in the state that we have built to have to pass a law like this?

Dealing with army life: Shoulder on

When I last left off, my two American friends had left the tzevet and we were starting the hardest part of our training. The past few weeks have seen me do the second week of that crazy hard shooting week that I wrote about last time. It was brutal, tons of push-up position, sprints, short times and other small little rules that kept us miserable all week long though of course, at the end like always, give you great material for jokes and stories afterwards.

I also participated in a battalion-wide exercise in the Golan Heights the week before that as a machine gunner which was pretty sweet. A little more about that: I was supposed to be sent to snipers course, but they kicked out our previous machine gunner and so I returned to being the machine gunner, which meant that I couldnt go the snipers course. I am super bummed about that because the course is interesting and important.

In fact, the past month has seen a lot of factors come together to make my army experience much harder. Two friends leaving, losing snipers course, being the machine gunner again etc. You just have to shoulder on because though it is easy to fall into depression or self-pity, these emotions will only prey on you and make the army that much harder. A conscious decision to take it a day at a time and to remember that you made this decision and therefore you have to live with the consequences are what kept me from getting too upset about the whole situation.

Finally, this past weekend was our second Shabbat Garin, a year since our first one. Its truly incredible to see how much we have grown together as a Garin and as Israelis since we started the army about an year ago. We have people going into commanders and officers courses.

And socially, our Garin is super tight-knit, and everyone is pretty comfortable around each other. Its a wonderful framework though I need to get off the kibbutz more on my free time.

I know this update was a little bare in terms of details and dates but that fact is that this past month has been so busy with so many stories that it is hard to write all of them down. If anyone wants to hear more about what I have been up to they should feel free to email me at nsjaphet@yahoo.com and I would be happy to respond to their questions.