On a sunny Sunday in August, I was on a bus with other volunteers from all over the world; Argentina, America, Brazil, Holland, England… We were on our way to the base, close to Beer Sheva. Once on the base, we rested for a few hours before they put us to work. At 1pm we were split off into groups of four. As we approached the workstation I saw two lines of huge white and red trucks. We were handed a stencil, a sponge and a small bucket of paint. The assignment was to paint three numbers on each front side of every truck. As I started completing more trucks, they started to look more like numbers. I don’t consider myself an artist but I thought it turned out pretty well.
The next day I was sent with another volunteer to a nearby office who would send us to the workstation. We arrive there and the the overweight Russian commander says “Ain avodah” (There is no work). I say “What? Didn’t you talk to my counselor, Tal? She sent us here and told us that you have work for us.” He replies with “Lo mevin. Ain avodah po” (I don’t understand you. There is no work here). So through sign language and broken Hebrew I understood to get paper to play games. After two hours of hearing soldiers and commanders speak over each other while trying to concentrate on my Hangman game, I thought to myself how useless I felt. The purpose of volunteering was to help out and learn something.
Monday night at around 10 pm I’m hanging out with a few soldiers and volunteers outside. All of a sudden I hear the loudspeaker come on and say something in Hebrew with the word Adom (red). A volunteer explains to me that it means Red Alert. As I envision a rocket right behind me, I sprint 30 feet to the bomb shelter. After reaching cover ten seconds later, I look back and the soldiers are strolling toward me. As I scream “C’mon”, they were laughing at my reaction to this whole thing --- they have been dealing with this their whole lives and don't think it's a big deal. As I enter the hallway full of soldiers, my counselor runs upstairs to wake up the sleeping volunteers since the second floor is not built as a bomb shelter. I proceed to sit next to the other volunteers and talk about what just happened. To my right are soldiers; men calm and collected, girls a bit shaky and one on the phone crying. About fifteen minutes later we get the okay that it’s safe to go.
When an area is hit they have a certain amount of time to reach shelter. Beer Sheva has 1 minute, Mishmar has 40 seconds, and Sderot has 15 seconds. The times are based on how far the area is in comparison to where the rockets usually come from.
On Wednesday, I was assigned to kitchen duty after dinner. After all of the soldiers, commanders, and volunteers left the dining hall, I was left with another volunteer and the kitchen staff who instructed me what to do in broken English. “Dis” – pointing to the mop “like dis, chacol. Beseder?” When we were done, I went to Shlomo and tried to communicate in my broken Hebrew that we had finished. “Zeo. Tov?” I said. “Ken. Toda haverim,” he replied. On my way out, I thought to myself how much I hated that job and that was only one hour. Imagine doing that for three years! Soon after, I called my father. “So what did you do in the army today?” he asked. “I’m an immigrant mopping the floor and cleaning the tables after dinner. Now I know how Chepita feels.”
When we boarded the bus Thursday at noon (the weekends here start on Thursdays), we got news about rockets hitting open field in Beer Sheva, only a meter or two away from where we were. After hearing my counselors at the front of the bus yell the frightening news, I couldn’t help but cry. What have I gotten myself into? What am I doing here? Is this what I want my life to be like? This is the way of life here and I knew that going into this. This news report just made it so real.
I decided to change bases for the next week since I didn’t feel like I was doing much at the first base. I went to the medical base. This is a completely different scene. It’s just a bunch of warehouses filled with supplies that need to be sorted. First I sorted syringes, Latex gloves, bandages, and so on, into the appropriate labeled boxes. We continued by grabbing a medium-sized plastic bag, where we placed the indicated number of items in each bag and added other bags with more supplies, to make a medical bag. The last thing would be a checklist of supplies for the medic. We filled a bin up with about forty bags. We would place four plastic bags in a cardboard box, where it would proceed to storage. The warehouse full of cardboard boxes was where the medical supplies from Israel came from that were sent to Japan during the earthquake this passed March. The duties would change from sealing the bags, to putting in the contents. These tasks seem mindless but on the other hand, if you forget one item, it could be crucial.
