April 30, 2017- Yom Hazikaron

This will be a relatively quick post, as we have an early morning tomorrow and time on the bus to add more stories and photos. Our morning began in Ramat Gan, helping in a center for the blind. We got to sit with them in small groups and to help them assemble screws for an electrical device (sorry I can’t be more specific about the actual task) and to chat with the blind individuals. We all got to practice our Hebrew as we heard their stories and after an hour, we were singing songs with them. And after an hour of repetitive manual work, the group also realized the value of education and vowed to stay in school.

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Our next stop was Machon Ayalon, the Ayalon Institute, next to Rechovot. This was the site of kibbutz which housed an underground ammunition factory before the War of Independence. Below you see how the washing machine hid one entrance to the factory, and then we got to go down into the factory and see models of how the bullets were manufactured. They literally had to steal the machinery from Poland in 1938 and smuggle it into Palestine. The insight that the Hagana had at this time to do this is absolutely remarkable, and can certainly be one of the reasons that Israel is a state today. (along with warm beer…ask your students about that!)

From Machon Ayalon, we went to Yafo (Jaffa) for lunch and some shopping, followed by a walking tour of the old city of Yafo. (see group photo below). We returned to the hotel to get ready for an early dinner and a Yom Hazikaron (Memorial Day) ceremony in Petach Tikvah at a local school. Rabbi Tsipi was invited to speak in front of the whole community- we were very honored to be included in the ceremony (even if it was all in Hebrew and a little hard to follow). It was extremely moving to see the community come together and remember the names and faces that have been lost in defending Israel over the years. Tomorrow we head up to Ma’alot, the town in the north where Tsipi is from, and where we will connect with local teens for Yom HaZikaron and Yom Ha’atzmaut (Independence Day).

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