The Blog Post Where You Learn More Army Slang Than You"ll Ever Need to Know

Imagine you're sitting in class on the day of a big test. Maybe it's a biology test, and you need to get at least a B+ to raise your average. You've been studying for days, if studying means looking at pictures of the new French exchange student on Facebook. I mean, you had a study guide open in another tab, easily accessible in case your mom walked by, which she often did. She knows how important this test is. After all, how are you going to get into Columbia (shout out to my crazy-smart sister) with a C- in biology? But you opened your textbook for the first time last night. You were up all night studying. Sure, pictures of cute French boy were dancing in your mind, but they were interspersed with images of a double helix and the dominant/recessive chart. You made flash cards, you created mnemonics, you even had a song listing the names of all the bones that you learned from that episode of Hannah Montana. Maybe you could've been better prepared, but you're ready. You know you are. You're almost certain. Oh my god you're never gonna pass Mr. Johnson hates you and wants you to fail and the girl you cheated off of earlier in the semester is in France on the exchange program and the girl who sits in front of you now is a total idiot and how are you ever gonna concentrate when the back of French boy's head is sooooo darn French-looking? No, you got this. You breathe. 

Mr. Johnson walks around, passing out the thick packets of doom facedown as he weaves between the desks, his malicious smile lurking behind an icy stone face. As he reaches your desk and practically hurls your test down in front of you, you swear you see a lick of fire flame up behind his eyes. That man is the devil. You wonder how a man so clearly not human got licensed to teach biology, let alone to teach human children. You look to the side and see that French boy isn't in school today; good, he won't distract you. You briefly wonder if he's OK. No, clear your head, relax, think only of biology. Mr. Johnson cackles his evil laugh (at least, you swear it's a cackle. You'll testify in court that the man cackles, if you need to) and tells the class to flip over the test. "Best of luck," he hisses. 

You turn over the packet, close your eyes, breathe deeply. You open your eyes with a picture of the study guide planted firmly and clearly in your brain. You read the first question and chuckle to yourself. Easy. You scrawl out an answer, detailed and thorough, the way he likes it. You marvel at your own genius. You read the second question. Oh god. You know this! You flip through your mental study guide but the part that answers this question is a blur. What, devil-man Mr. Johnson just expects you to memorize everything? He's the worst. WAIT! Wait. You DO know this. It's... It's... The answer is starting to formulate in your head. OK, you got this. You start penning your answer as the information floods your mind. You begin to scribble furiously, so furiously that at first, you don't hear the loud alarm that has gone off around you. All of the sudden, students start rising from their seats, you don't know why. Only then do you hear the alarm. What is this? Is this part of the test? You hear one of your classmates breathe "Saved by the bell," but you don't understand. Is it some kind of alarm that outlaws unfair tests? Fire drill, whispers your brain. You know what this is. But what do you do? Your mind is blank. "We're kind of in the middle of something!" you want to shout. But more than half the students have already filed neatly out of the room. The other 49% are standing by the door, waiting to exit. Only you remain seated at your desk, looking around with confusion and panic slapped onto your face. It's the first Monday of the month, of course there's a fire drill. But what do you do? How are you supposed to remember what to do when -- the test -- dominant/recessive -- you're stuck. What do you do? Mr. Johnson sees you and gives you a funny look. He says your name.

 "I--" you stammer.

 "It's a fire drill," he gives you a look. "Don't be a smart-ass."

You look around at the mostly empty classroom. What do you do??

There's a term for this person in Hebrew. It's called a shockist, or for a girl, a shockistit. It's when you're in such a state of shock that you completely lose all common sense. You forget your habits, your logic, your instincts, everything that makes you a capable human being. It usually happens when something you're not expecting happens, rendering you completely useless. Finding this type of person is extremely common in the army, especially in basic training, when a kid from a comfortable lifestyle is suddenly thrown into a world of orders and tents, commanders and long-underwear, guns and cleaning human excrement off the shower floor. At best, a shockist is someone who freezes up and doesn't do anything. At worst, it is someone who does something stupid. You know this guy, you've seen him before. It's the student who asks if there's going to be a test on this material, giving the teacher ideas.  It's the guy on the basketball team who scores a perfect 3-pointer on his own basket. In the army, it's the guy who meets with a high-ranking officer, and upon leaving, forgets to take his gun. 

This time last year, I, Rebecca Gabrielle Richman, was a shockistit. 

In fact, looking back, it's safe to say I was the biggest shockistit in all of Israel. 

There is another word in Hebrew, or at least in Hebrew army-slang, that you should know in case you're ever in a situation where you need to know random Hebrew words that are only applicable in the army, and that is pazamuledet. Your pazamuledet is the day that you drafted into the army. For example, I drafted December 17th, 2012, and so yesterday, December 17th, 2013, was my pazamuledet. The significance of this day is twofold: one, it means I have been in the army for an entire year, and two, it means I have half completed my army service. This may not sound like much, but a big part of army culture is wanting to get out of the army. So while I did choose this life, and I do enjoy it immensely most of the time, I'm still counting down to the date of my release. But for me, the main significance of my pazamuledet is that I can look back at my actual draft date and laugh at how young I was. As a wizened old soldier, hardened by a year in the army, with an unbreakable heart of concrete, I really can look back and see exactly how big a shockistit I was. 

As I mentioned earlier, the defining feature of a shockist is someone who forgets some basic facts in the face of pressure. The common sense that I lost first was this simple truth: people are people. A year ago yesterday, I got off the bus at a strange base and right away I was bombarded with instructions. It was there that I first lost sight of the fact that the people yelling at me were people. No, I was certain that they were divine creatures, that every order they issued must be treated like it came from the mouth of God. A few of the other girls believed this as well, but I was different in one important aspect: I didn't speak Hebrew. Imagine if all of the sudden, God Himself boomed His voice down to earth and, with an inexplicable sense of urgency, commanded you to do something. But He commanded it in Swedish. And you haven't brushed up on your Swedish recently. So you don't know what to do. That was me, all the time. I wanted to be a good soldier, I really did, but every time a commander yelled at me, I just cocked my head to the side and put on a pretty convincing puppy-dog face that I can only hope portrayed my utter lack of understanding. And because I wanted to follow orders so badly, I sometimes filled in the parts I didn't understand with my own information. For example, I knew I had to be somewhere at 2:45, I just didn't know where. So I assumed it was the dining hall. I assumed wrong. And not once in that entire month of basic did I ever think to myself, Hmm, this commander is human, maybe if I ask him for help, he'll explain something to me. Nope, that just never occurred to me. 

The second truth that I lost was this: if you seem mean and snobby, people aren't going to like you. It was only after basic training that I realized that the girls I was with probably didn't understand how little I spoke Hebrew. To them, I was that weird girl who was always doing the wrong thing and answered all their questions with one word answers. In addition, there were two other Americans in different platoons in my base, so of course I was immediately drawn to them. I seemed cliquey and snobby and still I was so hurt that none of them wanted to be my friend. But it's only because I seemed to have lost all the basic friend-making skills that I learned in kindergarten. 

However, the main thing that made me a shockistit exactly one year ago yesterday was that in addition to the shock of the army, I was also experiencing some pretty heavy culture shock. The very first day in the army, when we were given uniforms and being assigned serial numbers, a girl next to me made a crude Holocaust joke. You can't say that, I thought, and I classified her as the kind of girl I wouldn't want to be friends with. But apparently that's acceptable in Israel, in this weird country where no one is apologetic for even their most egregious of flaws or most offensive of actions. I was stunned by how arbitrary everything seemed, but that's just how Israel is. They see a need for something, they create a solution however they can. They need to make a ceremony seem special, so they choreograph a ridiculous gun routine and play cheesy music. They need a soldier to stay for the weekend to fill manpower quotas, so they make up a rule until someone breaks it. It's hard to adjust to a system that's constantly changing without a clear reason, and my stumbling journey through basic training was a testament to that difficulty. 

But the beauty of a pazamuledet is that I can look back and laugh. Everything has improved exponentially since my days of friendless, Hebrew-less basic training. The past year has been simultaneously the hardest and most fulfilling year of my life thus far. I'm in an interesting job where I've made some pretty great friends (though I'm still with one of the American girls who was my only friend during basic, so I haven't branched out that far), my officers have become human in my eyes, and while I still respect them (most of the time), I feel comfortable expressing my needs and asking for help. My fear of the army has faded into a minuscule speck in the back of mind, and would disappear completely if it weren't for the need to remind me not to do anything illegal. I now have the simple confidence of a person who knows what he or she is doing, and I don't take it for granted because of the very long time that it took me to get here. Of course, I still have my shockistit moments - just last week I forgot my gun in the shower for 10 minutes before running back to get it - but for the most part, this year has gotten me pretty well adjusted. I do have a feeling, however, that by the time I'm fully adjusted to this army life, it will be a year from yesterday, and I'll be getting released. 

My fellow American friend and me on one of our first nights of basic training. 

The same American friend and me at the shooting range months later, looking like pros. 

You Can't Fulfill Your Dreams Unless You Dare To Risk It All

Sitting in a room full of crying girls - blotchy cheeks, runny noses, smeared mascara, the works-  may seem like a man's worst nightmare, but it can also be a lone soldier's dream come true. 

A few months ago, during my course, my commanders took all 35 girls up north for a trip. During the day, we toured and learned and hiked and laughed, and I watched as girls around me made the kind of friendships people talk about when remembering the army. Whether it was the fact that they thought I didn't understand them or my inability to tell a joke in Hebrew without people thinking that I'm just highly confused, I often found myself outside of the bonding, and I resigned myself to the fact that I probably would never be close to these girls, but so be it. 

Then one night, my officer called all the girls down into a large room, set up so that the chairs were facing a screen, and asked us to sit. We obeyed, as good soldiers always do, and as familiar music swelled and familiar pictures filled the screen, I began to cry.

45 minutes later, every single person in the room, be it officer or soldier, had tears streaming down her face. The soldier leading the program wiped her face and laughed nervously, then stood and asked for reactions to the movie. "That was really beautiful," one girl said. "I never thought about how hard it must be to be a lone soldier," said another, flashing me and the two other lone soldiers an empathetic glance. "It makes me proud to serve Israel," said a third. Then my commander looked at me. "He was from Philadelphia, right?" I nodded, somehow pulled myself together, and stood. I spoke about how Michael Levin, the subject of the documentary, came from my city, participated in my region of USY, and attended my summer camp. I spoke about how his death is one of the few things I remember from the summer before 7th grade, about how I watched as it deeply wounded my community. When my voice was breaking and I couldn't speak anymore, I sat down, and as my hands covered my face, I felt a hand rubbing my back. 

Everything changed from that moment on. Girls who had been cliquey and exclusive approached me and asked me questions about my Aliyah, they made an effort to ignore my glaring grammatical errors and listen to what I had to say. I suddenly found myself a part of the friendships I had previously envied. 

7 years earlier, August 1, 2006, I sat in a forest with my age group at camp, after a long day of kayaking, and listened as the head of the group explained what happened. Michael Levin, a community member and a former Ramah camper, had been killed in Lebanon while fighting as a soldier in the IDF. The rest of the trip was - in our selfish, middle-school minds - tainted by the tragedy that had struck our community. 

I had already fallen in love with Israel a little more than a year before, but hearing about Michael and his story brought an entirely new dimension to what had up until then only been a fantasy. I could actually move to Israel. I could even serve Israel. Hearing about his life - after his death - was the first time I realized that this is something I could actually, literally do. Visiting Israel at 10-years-old may have been the first step in the journey I'm on right now, but Michael's story was the second and the biggest. 

And 7 years later, as I sat in my olive green uniform and cried with my friends over the death of an inspiringly beautiful person, Michael influenced me again and told my friends what I had been unable to tell them, told them that this is a hard journey, and I'm going to need friends to make it through.

I see the flowers and pictures and Phillies memorabilia that overflow at his grave, I hear the accounts of so many people who were touched by him, I see the metal bracelets with his name that so many of my friends wear, and I see the baseball card with a summarized version of his story that I keep in my wallet, and I can only hope that he knows his legacy. If his dream was to serve Israel, then he did not stop fulfilling it in his death. Whether it's the Michael Levin fund, from which I personally did benefit, or some girl on Birthright crying at his grave with a new found love for Israel, or the pride that the Israeli girls in my course felt after watching the documentary, he is absolutely still defending the State of Israel. 

Michael Levin, z"l

August 1, 2006

Disclaimer: Reading This Blog Post About A Specific Moment Will Take More Time Than The Moment Itself Did

Sometimes the army sucks. Sometimes it's fun, or interesting, or exciting, but sometimes it just sucks. No matter how much I love my job - and I really do - nothing makes me forget that I still have to wear a uniform in this could-bake-cookies-on-the-sidewalk weather. Even a great day in the army is tainted with the fact that I am literally forbidden from wearing anything other than a black or brown hair band in my hair. I can't wear nail polish unless the color is what I like to refer to as a "Grandma color." (Sorry, Grandma!) I have to wake up much too early. If I accidentally miss a belt loop in the morning, I could potentially go to jail. You can see how this utter lack of personal freedom makes a great day at the office still seem restricted and therefore less enjoyable.

But everyone once in a while, when the planets are aligned or there's a blue moon or whatever happens in the universe to make rare things occur, there's a moment of pure happiness that makes everything else disappear. I don't know how often other soldiers experience one of these ground-shaking, smile-inducing, game-changing moments, but I just had my first one this past Wednesday morning.

After attending my first Israeli wedding on Tuesday night, I woke up early on Wednesday and begrudgingly zipped up my uniform to return to the army. It took a full minute and a half of waiting outside for the sweat to start beading on my forehead. My boyfriend Ben and I started lugging our bags down the road, fretting about bus times and the potential punishments for late arrivals. We were gross and sweaty, and more than resentful that we had to return to the army after such a fun night. (Most of the time, at least in my limited experience, moments of pure joy are immediately prefaced by moments that seem completely hopeless, so prepare yourself for a 'But then -'.)

But then, while we walked along the road in a small settlement outside of Teveria, we passed what has to be simply the happiest scene I've ever witnessed. Across the street from us, there was a class of preschoolers, all holding hands in a line behind their teacher to prevent the wanderers from wandering as they skipped and dawdled and ran cheerfully down the shaded sidewalk in this gorgeous town. Even their bright, mismatched clothes couldn't distract from their brighter smiles and beautiful giggles. It felt like the road that stood between us was a clear divide that kept our state of bummed-hood from infecting them. But the road couldn't keep their simple and inexplicable happiness from permeating our little bubble of self-pity, and so the first little girl in the line raised her free hand and waved at the soldiers across the street. Now, you could be the toughest soldier in the world, you could be a vicious businessman, you could be a super-villain, but when a little girl waves happily at you, you wave back.

And so of course I did, which made the goofy smile on her face grow wider, and her arm wave faster. I began making funny faces at her, which she gleefully reciprocated, all the while keeping her hand high in the air. A few of the other kids started waving as well, until we had the attention of all but the ADD kids in the class. That's when the teacher noticed us. She turned to her class and, in the Hebrew version of the very recognizable pre-K-teacher tone of voice, said, "Look kids! How exciting! Does everyone see the soldiers?" The ADD kids tuned in. "Wow! Everyone say thank you! Have a good day! Everyone wish them a good day!" The kids were smiling and shouting as they echoed her words, staring at us in awe as we labored our way down the road. They kept shouting and waving long after we passed them, and their words reverberated in my mind long after I got to my base.

The weirdest and most powerful part of this brief moment was that essentially, it was an interaction between soldiers and future soldiers. When you look at a pre-K class in this country, you know that in about a decade and half, the same kids are going to be the ones with guns slung across their backs protecting the country. This is just a fact of life for them, but it makes their childhoods a little more precious, their laughs a little lighter, their admiration of us a little more endearing. Granted, my job in the army isn't one that requires me to put myself in any great risk. But seeing that class of preschoolers made me ask myself, Is there anything that I wouldn't do for these kids? The army makes us do stupid, pointless things sometimes, but if there's even the slightest connection between the color of my hair bands and the safety of this class, is it even imaginable that I would complain about it?

The answer was no. Of course, the moment passed, and later in the day, the army sucked again. But the memory is strong, and it's much more powerful than the inconvenience of waking up early. So yeah, sometimes the army sucks. But for many different reasons, I'm happier here than I ever thought I would be.

Shabbat Shalom!

A Day in the Life

To mark the official end of my two-month-long hiatus, I'm going to use this blog post to answer the question that I get most often from my friends and family back home: what exactly do I do all day? As soon as people hear that I'm a soldier in the Israeli army, they tend to assume that I spend my days in a Rocky workout montage, an M-16 slung across my back as I fight terror and make phlegm-filled Israeli sounds. As close to the truth as that is, there's a lot more to it. So, ladies and gentlemen, I present to you an army-approved summary of my daily life in my course.

5:25 am

My phone vibrates once before Destiny's Child's Bootylicious begins to blast at full volume, effectively waking me up just enough to blindly find the snooze button.

(Song and official music video for your viewing pleasure.)

5:30 am

Bootylicious begins to play again, waking up all of my roommates, but never me.

5:35 am

"Becca! We have 10 minutes! Get up!" And the song begins to play again. I jump out of bed, throw on my uniform, and race to bathroom to beat the crowd of about 40 girls to the five sinks for washing and brushing. I never beat the crowd.

5:43 am

"Two minutes!" We find our spots, stand in formation, and wait to receive our commander - a 19-year-old boy who quite obviously woke up no more than two minutes before he came to give us orders. We have our morning workout, followed by breakfast. Out of respect for food everywhere, I'm not going to get into what qualifies as "breakfast."

7:25 am

Misdar. Imagine you were preparing a dining hall for a grand dinner with the Queen of England. You dust, you wash the floors, you scrub all surfaces, you organize drawers and cupboards that she isn't even going to see. Imagine that the Queen's royal cleaners come and clean the entire room again. Then my dearest mother comes and does a final cleaning just to be sure. This room would not pass an IDF inspection.

7:55 am

We stand in front of the flags (the Israeli flag and the flag of my unit) in three rows: each row must be perfectly straight and perfectly parallel to the the other two rows. We receive the commander of the course, go through this weird choreography that ends with us holding our guns up in front of us, and raise the Israeli flag. This part of the day is important because it has the highest rate of misbehavior. Scratch your nose during this process and you'll be punished. Hold your gun with an arm that is not quite at a 90 degree angle and you'll be punished. Breathe loudly, you'll be punished.

8:05 am

Arabic class. This includes a test on the 28 vocabulary words that we learned the day before.

هذه الفقرة هي من باب المجاملة مترجم جوجل وليس الجيش الإسرائيلي. بقدر ما أود أن أدعي أنني بطلاقة، وأنا لا. تهانينا لأولئك منكم الذين تستطيع قراءة هذا و / أو كان بمعنى لترجمة ذلك! مكافأة الخاص بك هو نكتة: خبط خبط. من هناك؟ النقدية. نقد من؟ لا شكرا، ولكن أود الحصول على الفول السوداني بدلا من ذلك! (لدي شعور أن هذا لم يترجم إلى اللغة العربية بشكل جيد.)

1:00 pm

Lunch! (Usually a potato-themed menagerie of barely edible morsels.)

1:55 pm

Right after lunch, we have another class where we learn about our unit. Once I begin my job (sometime after April 25th), I'll write another post about what it is that my unit actually does. This class also usually has a daily test - in Hebrew of course - and is a lot harder.

6:30 pm

Dinner! During this time, I usually like to entertain myself while I down my potatoes by texting two lovely girls from my last course who deserve nothing but the shout-outiest of shout-outs. So Danna Price and Ayala Lesser, thank you for being my dinner-time entertainment and reminding me that there is life outside of my army base.

7:55 pm

Remember that awkward gun-dance we did this morning to raise the flag? Reverse it.

8:15 pm

We get in formation, each soldier wearing the following:

1 very heavy vest with...

36 billion pockets

1 very heavy metal helmet

2 magazines

1 M-16

2 water bottles that if, when shaken, they make any noise at all, you will be punished

1 full uniform

1 can of pepper spray

1 set of dog-tags

Then they do an equipment check to make sure that everything is in order. This takes forever.

9:00 pm

This varies. Sometimes we have a student-led class on something related to ethics or culture or something else interesting, sometimes we have a night work-out, sometimes we take a test, sometimes we have a meeting where we complain about things to someone in charge and then listen while he/she tells us that he/she is not going to do anything about it.

9:45 pm - 11:15 pm

The best time of all. This glorious hour and a half is when we are permitted to change into civilian clothes and study, shower, call home, read, hang out, compose blog posts in my head with Beatles' references in the titles. This is the only time throughout the day when my time is really my own.

11:15 pm sharp

Lights out. There's a pretty consistent rotation of thoughts in my mind during the 5-7 minutes before I fall asleep. My third to last thought is always, I could be at a frat party right now. My second to last thought is always, But I would never choose that life over this one, as hard as it may be. And my last thought, though I cannot fully articulate it, is a dreadful knot in the pit of my stomach as Bootylicious plays in my mind.

Drumroll, Please...

And the winner of the 2013 "Name Becca's Blog" Contest is....




Hilarious friend and avid commenter, Akiva "Tiger" Carr!

Thank you all (read: 4 or 5 of you) for your submissions! Check back soon for a new blog post under the new name!

TOP SECRET: For Your Eyes Only

It's come to my attention recently that I have no way of knowing how many members of Hamas read my blog. Now, normally, I try not to hold any prejudices, but I would hate to make my job any harder by revealing all of the extremely important, very classified secrets that I as a two month army veteran have been exposed to. In order to make sure that I maintain my high level security clearance, I've decided to encrypt the wacky tales of my service with an advanced form of coding used by military officials known as "Mad-Libbing." To make it even more secure, I'm not telling you which words have been altered. Keep in mind that my life is pretty crazy right now, so just because something may seem too crazy to be true doesn't mean it isn't...

My Life as A Soldier in the Israeli Defense Bicycles

Two important things have happened since I last posted. The first is that, after a little over a month, I finally laid down my broom and graduated from basic training. The way the army marks the end of this swirly month is with our swearing-in ceremony. My plugah (company) and I stood in a blob formation while the company commander read a few sentences for us to repeat. Then, one by one, we were called up to hold a tanakh (bible), and our gun and swear to uphold our duties to the IDF. The ceremony itself wasn't anything special -- the army has this funny way of throwing a bunch of random things together and expecting you to take it seriously just because it's the army. This is the only explanation for the flashing light sticks scattered stunningly on the floor, the tree branches arranged in the shape of a Jewish star, or the old, cheesy music playing in the background. It all seemed very contrived to me, and as I stood at attention and watched my friends get called forward, I snickered to myself at the obvious symbolism that the commanders were forcing upon the occasion.

And then my name was called.

I took a deep breath and took a step up to my commander. He handed me my bible and my gun, and waited for me to say my part. All at once, eight years of dreams came flooding back to me. I saw myself at 10-years-old, standing at the Western Wall for the first time, feeling a holiness that I could not and still cannot explain, letting my most sincere words to God spill onto a ripped sheet of paper. I saw myself at 14, visiting my sister in Israel and finding that my longing to live here seemed to release me from my angst-filled and impatient adolescence. I saw myself at 16, frustrated with the knowledge that two years of wanting may as well be an eternity, sitting at a computer until the wee hours of the morning and Googling programs to finally bring me home. I saw myself at 17, enjoying my summer program but angry that I had to be a tourist in the land where my heart was born. And I saw myself at 18, cleaning the same chairs for the fourth time, doing push-ups, tears streaming down my face because the language barrier seemed impossible to break. A thought popped into my head and the sheer force of it was enough to literally make me take a step back: I realized that this moment was what I had been waiting for. All of that anticipation and longing and frustration that built up over eight years was just leading up to this very moment. It may be the hardest thing I've ever done, but the icy chill slithering slowly up and down my spine told me that it was all worth it, that this moment was mine to remind me of the pain and the beauty of fulfilled dreams. It was as if 10-year-old me, 14-year-old me, 16- and 17-year-old me, and even basic-training me were all suddenly overcome with an inexplicable happiness that tugged at my heart and had me on the verge of tears. I clutched the bible and my gun, smiled, and finally let the tears dance down my face as I said, "Ken ha'mefaked! Yes, commander, I swear!"

For the rest of the ceremony, I was on such a high that I barely heard my commander when it was over and he ordered us to go clean the bathrooms for the billionth time.

The second important thing that's happened since my last post is that I began my course. The day after we left basic training, I showed up at my base in Disneyland, where I'm learning to do the job that I've been assigned. The other soldiers in my course are really great. We're 10 girls and about 30 boys, which is actually good because boys aren't catty and they don't complain about not having time to apply a thick layer of make-up every morning. We also don't live in bulbous tents anymore, which is good for my sanity, my personal hygiene, and my average body temperature.

The only real difference between this course and basic training is that every day, for 4-6 hours, I sit in a classroom and learn either Arabic or knitting. Everyday, or sometimes twice a day, we have a test on the material. Arabic is hard because I'm learning it in Hebrew. This means that I'm using an incredibly hard language that I have yet to master to learn an equally hard language that I've never heard before in my life. The knitting classes are also pretty difficult, but only because they don't allow us enough time to really learn all the information before we're tested on it. Thankfully, my teachers, Shakira and John Adams, are really nice and usually willing to help.

We also do more interesting things than we did in basic training. Of course, we still clean more than I ever thought possible, but we also took a field trip to Mount Olympus last week to learn about what our job entails and to talk to people who are currently doing it. I'm still not 100% sure what I'll be doing, but at least I could tell that it's supposed to be stimulating and hopefully enjoyable. As soon as I actually start my job, I'll get a clearer picture of what's expected of me, and I'll try to let you know. Until then, wish me luck with the rest of my course, and know that I'm tolerating and even enjoying my life as an Israeli Trombonist.

(I'd like to thank various members of my kibbutz for supplying me with an impressively random selection of words for my Mad-Libbing.)

P.S. I have an announcement to make. Someone commented recently that the title of this blog is embarrassingly sappy. In hopes of finding a new blog title, I'm holding a contest. If you have any ideas for a funny, witty, or just less corny title, let me know. The winner of this contest will be announced as soon as I decide a winner. Thanks!

A Hard Day's Smole

I've officially been in the army now for three weeks. In those three weeks, I've learned a lot about myself and about the girls I'm living with, but most of all I've learned a lot about the army that I'm serving in. The following is a comprehensive list of things that taught me something about the IDF.

Top 10 Things I've Done in Direct Defiance of My Own Sense of Logic Simply Because I Was Ordered to and the Alternative to Obeying These Orders is Jail Time:

1. Eat nothing but potatoes.

Growing up, I remember hearing about the ideal balanced diet. We learned about the food pyramid in school and spent many a health class discussing the biological effects of our food choices. This is why I'm baffled every time I enter the cafeteria and see a steaming platter of potatoes before me. In the morning, it's hash browns. In the afternoon, it's sweet potatoes and baked potatoes mixed with a questionable-looking sauce, an at dinner time it's mashed potatoes, or what they euphemistically call "purée." Lunch and dinner usually include a side of what may be stew, potatoes floating menacingly at the top. And to go with the stew, there's almost always rice. Now, I may be wrong, but I've always been under the impression that an all-carb, all-starch diet is detrimental to the health of a human being. In addition, our work-outs and running are limited to two or three times a week. But before every meal, we are given a speech in Hebrew that can be directly translated to "there is no situation in which someone does not take and eat the food that is given to you." So now I see why people say that in the army, "boys get hunky, girls get chunky," and why they always give us a uniform at least one size too big.

2. Wake up before the sun

The sun is the strongest element known to mankind. That is why it is absurd that we mere soldiers of 18-years-old get less sleep than the sun does. Before I joined the army, back when things made sense, I would go to sleep when it was late and I was tired, and I would wake up when the sun shining through my window told me it was time to start the day. Now, I go to sleep when my energy is at its peak (9:00 pm) and wake up between 3 and 5:30 am. 3o'clock in the morning is not a time for people to be awake. It is too dark to do anything safely, so we should be warm and cozy in our beds. Instead, at 3o'clock in the morning, I'm racing to the sinks to beat the rush of girls. By law, this stage of the army requires that we get at least 6 hours of sleep a night. But waking up when the moon is still high in the sky is ludicrous.

3. Desert my definition of the word "clean"

Before I came to the army, I had certain expectations about what it would be like. I pictured living in a small, messy room with 5 or 6 other girls, our backpacks exploded just by virtue of our girly-ness. I knew that there would probably only be a few bathrooms for more than a few girls, and that massive amounts of hair in the shower drain was inevitable. I set my standards of cleanliness very, very low. These standards have now been lowered to nonexistent. Never mind hair in the drains; I was ordered to clean something off the shower floor that I can't mention because chances are you just ate, or are eating now, or plan on eating sometime in the future. Suffice it to say that after cleaning it and proceeding to shower in that very shower (with flip flops, mind you), I can no longer be shocked by anything. If you had any misconceptions about girls being a clean breed, abandon them now. That room I pictured is not a room but a tent, and it's not 5 or 6 other girls but 15. Any cleanliness now is merely a luxury.

4. Cleaned clean things

Despite the grossly obvious lack of cleanliness, we do a lot of cleaning. I've broken this down to examples for your convenience.

a. I cleaned an entire kitchen with 6 other girls for a solid 4 hours. We worked quickly and efficiently, and by the end of that 4 hours, the kitchen was spotless. (It's ironic that the army demands a clean kitchen when the only requirement before handling food is that the medic must look - literally only LOOK - at our hands.) when we finished, we proudly called our commander to tell him we were done. Our reward for finishing so quickly was that we had to clean the kitchen again. Because we finished before the scheduled time, there was nothing for us to do. But since they can't just let us relax for a little, we cleaned a spotless kitchen.

b. My platoon (I'm not sure that this is the right translation) had to clean the same chairs FOUR TIMES, because our commander didn't tell us how he wanted it done the first time.

5. Cleaned things that are meant to be dirty.

This one has also been broken into examples.

a. I've squeegeed a floor dry literally seconds before a hundred muddy soldiers came trampling in.

b. I've poured a bucket of water outside into the dirt, then squeegeed the mud away from the door. Why I couldn't just pour the water elsewhere is beyond me, but so be it.

c. I've swept a sidewalk and watched helplessly as the wind blew the same dirt back onto the sidewalk.

6. Live in a 1940s WWII movie

When you picture an army, you don't picture a bunch of girls cleaning the kitchen in uniform. You picture soldiers marching, helmets in place, uniforms neatly pressed, boots clean, footsteps in sync. We do that too. Whenever we march anywhere, our commander saunters alongside us chanting "smole, smole, smole yamin smole." For those of you who don't know Hebrew, that's the same as when the harsh but good-intentioned commander (probably with a mustache) yells "left, left, left right left." The first time we did this, I could not stop laughing. If you ever want to feel incredibly stupid, march in time with 50 other girls. I got in trouble for laughing, so I needed something to distract me from the foolishness of this old-fashioned army I've joined. I came up with a game where I try to see how many Beatles' songs I can fit into the beat of our marching. At any given time, the following is playing in my head: "She loves you yeah, yeah, smole, yamin, She loves you yeah, yeah, smole, yamin, smole." Basically, I've created an entire mental soundtrack of these songs, extending beyond the Beatles once I exhausted their repertoire. Some of my favorites include "Can't Buy Me Smole, Yamin, Smole," "A Hard Day's Smole," and "Bridge Over Smole, Yamin, Smole," by Simon and Garfunksmole. Once I get through this genre, I'm moving onto country music, so stay tuned.

7. Complain

There is a certain stereotype that Israelis are aggressive, and it is 100% accurate. I, being American, lack whatever gene gave them that aggression, and I've been told more than once that I'm obviously foreign because of how polite I am. I always thought that this was a good thing. And then I got yelled at for it. My commander literally yelled at me for not nagging about things that I wanted. He told me I was too shy. I am not shy. But I have, over the years, learned that complaining is usually the least effective way of getting what you want, and so I wait patiently until an opportunity to ask nicely arises. Which seems like quite a good reason to yell at me.

8. Measure my days in minutes and seconds

It's a well known fact that a watched pot never boils, and a watched clock never moves. Everyone knows that if you want time to pass quickly, you must avoid looking at the clock. The worst possible thing you could do is watch the seconds tick by. Which is exactly what we do. All orders that are given to us follow this general formula: "You have (short amount of time) to (impossible task). (Same short amount of time), MOVE." And thus all my seconds feel like minutes, all my minutes feel like hours, and all my hours feel like years. You say I've been in the army for 3 weeks, I say I've been in for approximately 300-some odd years.

9. Take orders from people my age

This one seems rather self-explanatory. It's rather demeaning to be told what to do at every second throughout the day. But on top of that, the people telling me what to do hardly know anything more than I do. When my commanders go home, they're going home to their mommies, and their 18- and 19-year-old friends, and their childhood rooms. They're just people, just kids like myself, really, and I'm subject to their every whim.

10. Call my mother instead of shower

Every day, in accordance with the rights of soldiers, we are required to have an hour of free time. This, I assume, is intended to ensure our sanity. However, this hour is not really free, it is our hour to set up our beds and shower and brush our teeth and relax for a second. It is also our time to call our mothers. But with so much to do in that one hour, we have to pick and choose what we do. Either you put on pajamas and go to sleep hungry, or you go to the vending machine and sleep in your uniform. Either you charge your phone, or you brush your teeth. For me, it's either I call my mother, or I shower. Now, I know my priorities, but I'm still a little ashamed to admit that I haven't showered in four days. My smelliness is a testament to my love for my family, my odor the stench of a good daughter.

I would like to point out that somehow, despite the arbitrariness, the foolishness, and the futility, the IDF still stands as one of the strongest armies in the world. Though I sometimes have trouble remembering why I volunteered to wake up at 3:30 am or clean horrendously disgusting shower floors, I'm proud to be a part of something so intricately designed. If nothing else, this is an amazing experience that will provide me with quite a few stories to tell. There are certain times when I can feel the real army shine through, like when I'm sitting on a bus in my uniform and an old woman smiles at me. For all she knows, I could be in some super secretive, elite unit. All she knows is that my friends and I make her feel safe. And this makes all the rest of it worth it.

Happy 2013!!