My first two-week block

"Daniel, come here."  I stop my conversation with another soldier to see a Mefaked (commander) summoning me to join him on the kitchen’s loading dock.  "Go down there."  I walk down the stairs and stand by a dumpster.  "Do you know why I called you here?"  I look around and notice that in a day spent doing nothing but cleaning, there is a conspicuous lack of uncleanliness on the ground around me.  "Yes, I know," and before the Mefaked could order me to do so, I get down on my hands in a pushup position.  “Echad/One!”  I lower my chest to an inch off the ground and wait.  For the next ten seconds, I hold this position as the Mefaked calmly explains to me why I am being punished.  “Shteim/Two!”  I extend my arms to push my body back up.  After about seven minutes, “Koom/Stand.  Speak Hebrew.  Goodbye.”  Supposedly, I’ve learned my lesson.  It’s a new thing that two of the three Mefakeds in my machlekah (company) have taken to doing every time they hear me speak English.  If anyone in my machlekah sees me on the ground with either of these Mefakeds standing next to me, ordering me up and down, they know, “Daniel spoke English.” 

I woke up Sunday morning at 5:30 to catch the 6:30 ride from my kibbutz to the train station in Hedera and arrive at Beersheva around 10.  Thus started the first of my many weeks in the army when I will “close Shabbat.”  What that means is you have to be on base for the entire weekend, you are not given time off to go home.  Even though the weekend breaks are really about 36 hours, it is so good to put on the Aleph uniform and get away from the military.  These past two weeks for me was a good introduction, I feel, into what the army will be like during my training.

That week was devoted to shooting our M16s.  We fired from the schiva (prone) position the entire week.  The commanders taught us how to hold the gun correctly, how to make sure you have five contact points between your body and the rifle, the importance of proper breathing techniques, and so on.  We would fire five bullets at a time, looking to create tight circles with our shots.  Even from twenty-five meters, it’s difficult to tell where exactly your shots hit.  After a round, we would run to our targets downrange, tally our bullet holes, and take the proper measurements to know how to realign our sights.  Most people had their sights aligned after about three or four sets of firing.  It took me more, not because I was firing wildly or missing the target; actually, I would consistently create a cluster of three, four or five bullets within three or four centimeters, but they would always be a few centimeters left of center.  I would realign my sights and fire again.  This time, my shots were clumped right of center.  I would undo the realignment.  This went on for seven or eight sessions of five bullet sets.  Finally, I had my sights aligned and then graduated to the Mefrolight, a holographic dot-sight on the top of the gun that makes shooting more accurate during the day and, quite frankly, possible at night.

You can check out my post ("שטח Shetach: the End of the Beginning") about shooting at Mikveh Alon to know what it felt like to shoot an M16.  I certainly experienced the same sensations.  However, this time, I not only felt my own emotions, but I felt my fellow soldiers’ guns as well.  What do I mean?  In the firing line, we lay on our stomachs in schiva position, with as little as a meter or two distance between soldiers, put in our earplugs, lay our barrels on sandbags for stability, and then, upon the commander’s command, fire at will.  While the recoil on the short M16s is minimal, you feel its force and power with every inch of your body.  And you feel the soldier on your left and the soldier on your right’s rifles.  The bullet travels 920 meters/second.  It can travel relatively straight for 200 meters before gravity and other forces pull it to the ground.  The bullet comes out of the gun with such force that it actually rises.  But learning about all the ballistics in the world will not teach you that when you are next to these rifles, they create a mini-shockwave with such a punch that even after days of firing, it is still difficult to not react with a flinch or bat of the eyes when the guy next to you lets off a few rounds.

Also that week, we filled the six magazines we carry around with the designated twenty-nine rounds.  We learned to insert a nylon string into the base of the mags to make them easy to pull out of our combat vests, and wrap the bottom in tape to prevent dirt from jamming the spring.  Whenever we have our guns on base (which is almost all the time, to be explained later), we need to have a magazine on our person as well.  Every few nights, before our free hour, the commanders will give us seven or eight minutes to spring to our rooms, get into full combat gear and report back outside in a chet.  Full combat gear is six full magazines, two filled canteens, combat vest, helmet on your head, and knee-pads on your knees.  If you drop a magazine, even accidentally, you have to shout “Aza!/Gaza!” and sprint away from your dropped item, jump to the ground and count “twenty-one! twenty-two! twenty-three!” to mimic a grenade being tossed at you.

On Wednesday night, we went on our first masa (hike).  It wasn’t very long, only four kilometers, but it was fun and challenging in its own way.  Tzanchanim is known for its masas, the longest and last one being the masa koompta (beret hike) to culminate advanced training, when we hike 74 kilometers in eighteen hours to Jerusalem.  This first masa was the first step towards that final one.

After dinner, we were ordered back to our plugah (battalion), the buildings where we sleep. Just like at the gibbush, we had to fill up our canteens and drink the entirety.  We did this three times to make sure everyone was hydrated.  We were also told to wear nothing but our Bet uniforms, no undershirts.  The night was getting chilly as we strapped on our combat vests and other equipment.  The Mefaked went around the unit, applying camouflage face paint to every soldier.  Finally, we were ready to move out.  We walked around the base to the gate that led outside to nearby hills.  There were a half dozen other kitahs (squads) there, some coming and some leaving.  To every kitah, there had to be someone who carried extra water, one with the stretcher, and a soldier with the radio.  They all, so far, have the hardest jobs, especially the water-guy.  Whatever you do, I would suggest trying not to be him.

As we waited for our turn to start the masa, all twenty of us walked to a ditch along the side of the road and relieved ourselves of most of the water we had just drank.  We were set to go.

If this masa is indicative of how future masas are at Tzanchanim, then let me just say how ridiculous Mikveh Alon really is.  As you can read in my previous posts ("from beneath the cows to above the clouds"), on the few masas I had there, every so often we had to jump to the ground, or assume a firing position, or begin crawling.  For the Tzanchanim masa, we did nothing but speed walk the entire time.  The Mefaked started off on a fast pace and didn’t let up.  I found the pace to be quick but not overly difficult.  As a tall guy, I was able to keep up without any issue.  There were two things that made this masa somewhat difficult.  First, every so often the Mefaked tells us to push the vest of the guy in front of us to help him out.  Well, I’m pretty sure the guy behind me was pulling on mine.  I would try to tell him to let go as we climbed the hills, but I always felt like I was pulling for two.  The second difficult was that the guy in front of me couldn’t keep pace with the Mefaked, so he would have to run every few seconds to catch up, which required me to run as well.  Next time, I’m definitely going to try to get near the front of the column.

The masa took us a half hour to walk four kilometers.  When we got back to our plugah, we ran to our rooms, quickly ripped off our vests, placed them on our beds, and ran back outside to stretch.  Over the next half hour, the entire plugah gathered in the center courtyard.  As we waited, the Mefakeds of my machlekah would make all of us, them included, do pushups.  As we would take a break, another machlekah would begin pushups.  Seeing their display, we decided to do some more.  Then they would do some.  Then us.  Even with guys sweating and barely being able to keep their knees off the ground, we did more and more pushups, proving that Machlekah 3 is superior to Machlekah 1.  Enjoy:

That ended our combat-related activities for the week.  And the next thirty-six hours were to be some of the worst of my life.

Ok, maybe that’s a bit of an exaggeration, but not exactly far off.  Me and two other soldiers awoke the next morning to begin work with the Rassar, a kind of non-commissioned officer who’s job is to do all the maintenance work on base.  Well, for this particular job, we were to leave base for the night and pack accordingly.  We got in a truck and left…to the Dead Sea!  That was awesome for the two hour ride.  But then we turned inland and ended up at some random spot in the desert.  Evidently, there was to be a mini party for all the battalion commanders in Tzanchanim that evening and we were to build a camp.  “Clear this entire area of rocks.”  Excuse me, sir, but this is the f***ing desert!  You pull up one rock and three more pop up!  Didn’t matter, we had to do what we were told to do.  We worked all day and into the night, even doing guard duty on the jeeps when the commanders pulled up.  Slept outside, not even in a tent, woke up four hours later to help serve breakfast, clean up and drive back to base.  Didn’t need anything I brought with me.  Wonderful.

The next day was Friday.  That evening was Shabbat.  For dinner, everyone has to be in their Aleph uniform.  At service, the synagogue was packed, which made the experience even better.  It didn’t seem like we were in the military; everyone greeted each other as if we were just at any other synagogue in Israel or America, except that we were all strapped with our M16s and fifty-eight bulletes in two magazines on our belts.  After services, we lined up outside the dining hall and as we waited for our commanders to send us into dinner, one of the machlekahs in my plugah started singing songs and dancing around.  And they’re one of the reasons Shabbats on base will be fun: they guys in this machlekah are all religious; they split time between the army and yeshivah.  After dinner and meals the next day, they would automatically begin to sing prayers or songs.  As we sang and danced before dinner, I looked around and say a group of Mefakeds standing there, watching us.  A few of them wear kippahs, but most don’t.  Either way, they know what it’s like to be in the group, joyously celebrating the coming of Shabbat and I could tell that a few wanted to join in.  It was the first time I felt happier to be a soldier than a commander.

Right before sundown on Saturday, as we were finishing dinner, the religious guys formed a big circle in the middle of the dining hall and sang prayers.  As people finished eating, we would move our chairs to accommodate the newcomers.  And this scene, I have to say, was what it is all about for me.  This was the reason I am here: a group of Jews, singing about Judaism, in this particular place to fight for Jews.  I’ve always said that the one thing that really helped me reconnect with my Jewish identity was just the unconditional love we can display for our fellow Jews.  This is no truer than on Shabbat.  Singing songs and prayers, dancing in circles, not caring who’s on your left or your right, a friend or a stranger is a loved one because we’re all Jews.  And then here we are, in Tzanchanim training base, learning how to fight, to become soldiers to protect what we cherish most.

Earlier in the week, we finally had our first flag-raising ceremony.  It was similar to the ones we had a Mikveh Alon, but this, for many reasons, I’m sure you can understand, was much more significant.  Yes all the necessary commanders would say a few words.  But what moved me the most was that when the Israeli flag was hoisted to the top of the flagpole, and we started singing the national anthem, Hatikvah (the Hope), it wasn’t a quite, shy, embarrassed hum like at Mikveh.  Instead, a hundred guys belted out the words.  Even though my Hebrew is progressing rapidly, I still cannot always hold in my mind the idea behind the meaning of each word.  But here, this time, I truly started to understand that “להיות עם חופשי” were not just foreign-sounding noises that I took to mean to be words that translate into “to be a free people.”  Instead, I looked around and understood that I am fighting the same war that Jews have been subjected to for 2,000 years.  And now to be in the land for sixty years, I am in the next generation of Israeli defenders.  What a feeling.

But that feeling was almost lost when the new week started.  We put away our guns (not literally) and started a five day stretch of long days with little sleep.  From Saturday night to Tuesday night, my machlekah was in charge of guard duty for the entire base.  The shifts were for two hours, just like at Mikveh, but unlike my previous base, you couldn’t sit down after fifty minutes.  Perhaps surprisingly, standing for two straight hours isn’t as difficult as it at first seemed.  The difficult part was waking up at 3:30am for a 4:00 shift, and finding something to occupy your time.  The day shifts aren’t so bad; you get to watch and observe the daily activities of the base, get some comments by passing soldiers, seeing a few of your friends, etc.  But at night, you can’t tell passage of time by the sun, can’t gauge how long it’s been by seeing a unit of soldiers leave the firing ranges for dinner and then return, can’t hear the sound of rifle fire and trying to guess which gun it is, and can’t enjoy the warmth of the sun after so many days of cold. 

In addition, while your machlekah is charged with guard duty, there also has to be a crew of five guys plus a Mefaked who are on automatic emergency response.  Day or night, and much to my chagrin I do mean all hours of the night, if someone starts shouting in the plugah, it is your responsibility to be in full gear, with your assigned equipment (radio, fire extinguisher, stretcher, etc), ready to go within minutes.  What this means is essentially you sleep in your uniform with your shoes and knee pads on.  You go to sleep and forty-five minutes later hear the emergency call.  You race downstairs and strap on your vest while the commander counts down your time.  It’s not good enough, he says.  So you return back to your bed, knowing that sleep is impossible with a second call imminent.  And the call comes, ten minutes later.  This time your more prepared and your reactions are quicker and actions more fluid.  Everyone is synchronized, ready to go in half the time.  The commander is pleased and lets you go.  You retire to bed, your training shift ending in an hour, but knowing you have just three hours to sleep until you have guard duty.  But you wake up and press on, knowing that you are the army’s property, and you will do with your body whatever it is they want you to do.  Wake up, run, respond, fire, stand, pushups, sit, shekit!

On Tuesday and Wednesday, my machlekah had kitchen duty.  Never again will I complain about cleaning up after a meal.  On Tuesday, me and two other soldiers were assigned to the Container Room, a place where we washed every single container that was used for all three meals.  I had to have washed a hundred containers alone.  We woke up at 5:00am to be in the kitchen by 6:00 and left around 10:00 at night.  Hour break, then go to sleep, then wake up and do it all again.  From Saturday night to Wednesday night, I think I got about twenty hours of sleep, and no more than three uninterrupted hours.  On Wednesday, I can say that I was one of about fifty soldiers who made the entire kitchen for the Tzanchanim base kosher for Pesach/Passover.  That required scrubbing and cleaning every inch of the kitchen.  It was one of those few days where I really put my Bachelor’s Degree to good use.

The week ended really well though because I was able to get a Yom Siddurim on Thursday.  Yom Siddurim is a day soldiers have once a month to take off from the army resolve any personal issues, such as bank problems, apartment contracts, etc.  After two weeks on base, I wanted the extra day to accomplish some things.  I bought new running shoes with a voucher that every soldier gets from the army.  What should have cost me about $185 dollars, I paid less than $20.  Pretty awesome.

These next two weeks are going to relatively easy.  Pesach starts on Monday night and continues for eight days.  We get a few days off this week and the beginning of next week.  Look out for a new post in the middle of this week!

A few quick notes: as always, thank you for reading (and making it this far!).  In addition, I have received Facebook messages and emails from people interested in joining the IDF.  Please, keep them coming!  I try to respond as best I can but especially being at base (for two straight weeks, nonetheless!) it isn’t always the easiest.  Also, I am going to try to supplement the link of military terms with my own page.  It’s a project that will be ongoing.  Finally, if you’ve searched for me on the Jerusalem Post and haven’t found my blog there, you aren’t mistaken.  I, along with another soldier, was temporarily removed pending the approval of the army, which I got and should be back on the blog page this week!

Pesach sameach! פסח שמח