Summer 2015 Archives - Page 3 of 4

Day 13: Yad Lakashish, Aleh, Hatzalah, & Geriatric Home

NCSY GIVE had an incredible day today! It was fun and chessed packed!

Bus 1: We started off the day with the amazing chaburot that the advisors prepared for the summer! Yad Lakashish was our first stop! Yad Lakashish is a place that allows the elderly to come and use their artistic abilities and work! They supply them with hot meals, a job, and a bus card. It was so impressive to see what they can all make. From challot covers to pillows, these men and women knitted and painted with their amazing talents! After watching them work and seeing their beautiful creations, we went to the gift shop. At the gift shop everyone was able to buy the artwork, from the elderly working at Yad Lakashish. We then walked to Ben Yehudah and all had the time to get ice cream! Yum! Later, we went to the OU center and heard about the Arab-Israeli conflict. It was very interesting and the girls enjoyed the discussion. Aleh was our next chessed. Aleh is a facility that takes care 0f special needs children and adults. Aleh is different from any other special needs organization because the children and adults there are extremely low functioning. They can barely respond to you when trying to talk or sing to them. Although this chessed was a bit more difficult, it did not stop the GIVE girls! All the girls went in dressed up and excited! We danced, sang, and held their hands. Even though it was hard to see their reactions, we knew how much they loved it. Here and there a child or adult would show a little smirk and giggle even though it is difficult for them. It is moments like those when you know you are impacting someone’s life. Seeing that smile is pure happiness. There is nothing else like it!

Bus 2: The day started off in the geriatric home. As always, the girls entered with simcha and joy! They sang and danced around with the elderly! Many of the girls not only sang to them, but also had conversations with them! Many of these elderly people don’t get visitors often, by GIVE coming to have fun with them, it meant the world to them. After the geriatric home, we went to Hatzalah! There they taught us about the procedures of Haztalah, how to do CPR, and the importance of it. At the end of our day we then traveled to Ma’aleh. Ma’aleh is a school for film making. We watched two films that were so impressive and powerful! One was about the Kotel. It showed the different perspectives of the Kotel and the different people that go there to visit.

Both buses ended off the day with a presentation about an organization called Emunah. Emunah is a place that accompanies and supports children from abused or underprivilegded homes. They make a new home for them and care for them. The man who started the organization spoke to us. It is incredible to hear from a person who dedicated their life to this. We had an awesome day and GIVE and cannot wait for tomorrow!!!! Who’s excited?!?!!?

Day 12: Green House & See, Run, Paint!

Today was a great start to an awesome week! Early this morning we woke up and started with chaburot. We then all left Arad and went to a green house in the desert! You don’t see that everyday, do you?! It was one of the coolest and most interesting experience! We arrived and began with a tour of the green house. The green house consisted of tomatoes, strawberries, carrots, melon, cucumber, etc. We got to pick off termites and strawberries and eat them! They were delicious! It was so special to have the opportunity to eat holy fruits and vegetables from Israel! Afterwards we met with the man who started the green house. He explained to us that he wanted the South to bloom because thats what Ben Gurion wanted. He started it all on his own, with only his family. This was really inspiring for us to all hear because it showed passion and motivation. He even gave us the ability to try little samples of tea that were grown in the green house, as well as passion fruit slushies! It was so good! YUMMM! Next, we had the chessed aspect to the day — We picked off all the rotten and bad tomatoes and put them in a bag to go to the garbage. It was super special to help out in the desert farm and was, for sure, different from any other day we’ve had on GIVE!

After a long day out in the sun we finally made our way bak to Mevaseret! We had a delicious dinner and then started our night activity! We played See, Run, Paint! It was a great team building game and we all really enjoyed it. But, like all games that include paint, it resulted in one MASSIVE paint fight! Woohoo!

What a great day on GIVE 2015! Tomorrow here we come!

Day 10: Handing out Shabbos Candles & Shabbat in Arad

Written by GIVEr: Ayelet Rosenwasser and Miri Rogoff

Hey everybody!!! It’s Ayelet Rosenwasser from Chicago, IL ? and Miri Rogoff from Five Towns, New York?! This past Weekend was AMAZINGGG- as usual! It all started on Friday when we decided to do a very special chessed of packaging hadlakat narot ??beautifully and handing them out in the mall, in Be’er Sheva, to strangers for Shabbat. When we arrived at the mall, it was so special to see how a few of the women we gave them to, didn’t usually light candles for Shabbat, accepted our candles and told us they would light this time just because WE gave it to them??. Afterwards, we arrived in Arad with surprise guests from a Mach Hach bus ?!! As soon as we got there we started getting ready for Shabbat and we couldn’t wait for it start. We were so excited for another amazing Shabbat with GIVE!! As soon as Shabbat started we welcomed it in with a beautiful kabbalat Shabbat ? in the desert. It was so amazing to see the sun setting ? as everyone davened to Hashem ?? . After we finished davening maariv we made our way to the chadar ochel for the Shabbat meal. It was mmmmmmm delicious ??????!!! We had the privilege to spend Shabbat with our Shabbos Abba and Ima, Dr. and Mrs. Luchins. Since we shared a dining room with Mach Hach #ACHDUS , we had a cheering battle and OBVIOUSLY GIVE won ?!!! Later in the meal we heard inspiring divrei Torah, sang beautiful zmirot ?, and bentched out loud together. After our meal, we had an awesome Tish with lots of snacks and singing, visited by the camp “Rabbi and Rebbetzin” (aka Zisse and Daphna!!) Who were hilarious! Shabbat day, we started off with Tefillah in the morning and an amazing speech by Mrs. Luchins. Then we had kiddish with yummy snacks and drinks. After we had kiddish, we had an amazing and inspiring Chabura with our AWESOME advisors!! In between our Chabura and lunch, we played a game with the whole camp where everyone was split up into groups and two people would be behind a sheet and once the sheet went down, the people behind the sheets would have to say the name? of who was opposite them behind the sheets . It was such a fun icebreaker! After our lunch and rest hour ?, we had Beit Midrash, where we were able to learn Torah ? with any of our AWESOME madrichot on any topic we wanted! I loved it! Then we had Seudat Shlishit with yummy food and great divrei Torah. While Shabbat was ebbing away, all the GIVErs got together in a circle and sang beautiful songs. Towards the end, Mach Hach joined us B’achdut and we sang ? the last song together while Shabbat ended! After that, all the GIVE girls got together and cheered ? and sang together. Our havdalah was sooo beautiful! As our night activity, I experienced something that I have never experienced in my entire life before. Instead of an ordinary night activity, we decided to take 15 min as time for hetbodidut, where we separated ourselves from everyone else while sitting in an open field with the stars right above us ? without any distractions, like our phones. It was just between me and Hashem, developing a stronger ?? relationship with ourselves and a stronger relationship with Hashem. It was so inspirational for me and it really made me think about how special it is to be a Jew . It was truly such an amazing weekend and I’m so happy I was able to spend it with NCSY GIVE 15′!!

Day 9: (Bus 1)Ohr Meir Ubracha, Beit Shel Susane, & One Family

Written by GIVEr: Meira Greenland

Hi everyone!! ? My name is Meira Greenland, from Chicago-represent ? Let me tell you about our amazing day on GIVE. How fortunate are we, to all be together here in This Holy land?? Baruch HaShem for this experience!!

Bus 1 had a jam packed day filled with chessed, which means it was awesommmme! We first went to Or Meir U’VBracha, where we packed boxes of fruit and challah to send to families who can’t afford it. I am blessed with amazing parents who always taught me that giving is better than receiving, so this felt really good. I felt so good to know that we are helping people tremendously and even though we did not know where these boxes were going, it was so special and even, maybe, better than knowing. We met an amazing lady there named Leora, who despite her busy life, takes time to do so much chessed for terror victims and helps them in so many ways. Israel is filled with so many amazing people like Leora, it’s such a pleasure to be here. We ended off this experience with a bracha from Leora’s mother, which was super special and holy. What an honor to be in her presence. Such a Tzadaket. After this we went to a park for Chaburot and a delicious lunch. Thank you HaShem for food. After this we went to Beit Susan, which is a place that takes kids that are on the streets and teaches them art skills and allows them to create and sell their creations to get back on their feet. It gives them a family and people to talk to about their situations and how to get help. How cool is that?? We decorated “Chamsas” and then had a chance to buy some of the kids’ art, if we wanted to. That was really a beautiful place, and really fun too! After this we had free time at a mall in Jerusalem, and had time to do some shopping ? We then went to a place called One Family Fund, which helps terror victims of all ages in many different ways. We watched a video of what they do which was truly inspirational and an amazing cause. We actually met a terror victim and she spoke to us a little bit. That was really nice and definitely a great end to Bus One’s day. We cannot wait for tomorrow!!

Layla tov,

Meira Greenland

P.S hey mommy

Day 9: (Bus 2) Pantry Packers, Old Age Home, Chames Israel, & Blind Museum

We started our day off by going to a place called “Pantry Packers”! It’s an organization that packs rice and spilt peas for people who are in need of food. We started off by watching a video of the organization and why it’s important that we came. We then got our hair nets and aprons on! We were ready to begin! There were a few stations. Some of us had to fill up the machines with rice, put stickers on the bags, and even seal the plastic bags! We had a lot of fun! Then we made our way to an old age home called Melabev. We sang, danced, played the bongo, and had conversations with the elderly. They all sang along with us and had the biggest smiles. They appreciated it so much that they came and told us “kol hakavod!!” It was such a good feeling!

We met up with Bus 1 for lunch and Chaburot in the park, Gan Sacher!

Later that day, we went to hangout with the kids of Chames Israel. Chames Israel is a school for special needs children. They were all so cute! We played freeze dance with them, limbo, and just danced and had fun! The simple act of dancing, singing, and a smile goes a very long way! Last but not least, we went to the blind museum!! It was such a cool experience! We were able to be put in the shoes of a blind person. We went through the exhibit and could not see a thing! There were different scenarios we walked through. We had to feel around and hear the sounds around us to try and recognize where we are. We then got the opportunity to ask our tour guide questions about her/him being blind.

What a jam packed day on GIVE! And as always we are looking forward to tomorrow!

Experiencing The Kotel for The First Time.

Written by GIVEr: Tzivia Appleman

Monday, July 13. It was meant to be one of the most important days of my life- the day we go to the Kotel. For me and many girls on this trip, we have been waiting for this day our entire lives, as it is our first time in Israel. Going to the Kotel was all I could think about the entire day. I was feeling every emotion possible- happy, scared, nervous, excited. On the bus ride to the Kotel, tears of happiness were welling up in my eyes. When Erin got up to make an announcement, my heart started beating very fast, knowing that we were about to hear the instructions for getting off the bus. I couldn’t wait any longer.

My heart dropped when the announcement was the exact opposite of what I expected it to be. Because of the high security around the Kotel due to Ramadan, we were unfortunately not able to go to the Kotel that night. My tears of happiness quickly turned bitter. The moment I’ve been waiting for my entire life was taken away from me so quickly. Why?

These unusual circumstances must mean that this happened for a reason. These past two days, I’ve been trying use every new experience as a way to enhance my Kotel experience. Maybe our journey to the Kotel was delayed so that we could first go to the Nefesh B’Nefesh flight and gain a stronger sense of nationhood. Maybe it was so we could go to the Blind Museum and truly appreciate the fact that we would be able to physically see the Kotel. Maybe it was so we could go to the army base and meet our future husbands. Whatever the reason was, I know this for sure- That original bus ride to the Kotel was necessary for me to genuinely reflect on myself, and the moment that was about to happen, even though it didn’t happen that night.

But that Kotel moment- that experience- happened last night.

Eyes closed.

A thousand thoughts and memories were rushing through my brain. This is the wall where the holiest temple stood, where my parents had their first date, where generations of Jews before me have cried out their Teffilot.

Eyes still closed. I start to cry.

As I’m passing through, I hear two women talking in Hebrew. One of them sounded worried that I was crying, but the other woman reassured her- ״לא. היא בשמחה. ״ No. She is happy. Happiness is an understatement. 15 years I’ve been waiting for this moment. 15 years I haven’t felt that connection to Israel, and my Judaism and connection to God have suffered as well. This was it.

I open my eyes.

There are no words to describe the feeling of bliss as my Father greeted me. Touching the Kotel for the first time felt like holding God’s hand.

And now, I’m home.

NCSY GIVE WEEK 1

Day 8: Bnei Tzion Hospital, Army Base, & Kotel

Day 8 on GIVE was amazing! We started off the day on the bus to Haifa! We went to the Bnei Tzion Hospital there. A GIVErs sister started a project called Project Hug. She raised and collected money for the Bnei Tzion hospital instead of having a bat mitzvah or getting any gifts. It was a beautiful thing to see and motivated us to continue giving. Afterwards we went to an army base in the Shomrom! A חיל (soldier), gave us a speech about the different weapons they use and what the protocol is. We then had the opportunity to meet different soldiers and take pictures with them. Girls gave them snacks and a few even gave balloons. It was very exciting for all the girls to have the unique experience to interact with Israeli soldiers. Once all that excitement was over, we had more to look forward to! We finally made it to the Kotel!!!!!!

It was a very intense and powerful experience for many girls. It was some of their first times and others have been there before. Either way, girls were in awe of the beauty of the Kotel and really felt connected. Girls cried, laughed, and davened. Thank Gd we had the privilege and opportunity to go to a place where many of our ancestors weren’t able to go. The girls recognized that, and were so thankful!

After a long a powerful day, we are looking forward to tomorrow!!

Day 7: Nefesh Bnefesh, Blind Factory, Leket, & Blind Museum!

The start of our day today on GIVE was truly a unique one. Together, we all woke up at 5:15 to travel to Ben Gurion Airport.

Why you might ask? We went to greet a Nefesh B’nefesh flight!!! 200 new Olim made Aliyah today and GIVE had the privilege and unique opportunity to support them and greet them! As each bus arrived, filled with olim, we all sang and cheered for them! We congratulated the olim alongside other summer programs and citizens of Israel! As we sang together B’yachad, you could look around and see people smiling, dancing, and even crying tears of joy. The smiles on the faces of the new olim were like no other. You could just feel the simcha, passion, and love in the area! Although we didn’t know the new olim personally we all still felt a sense of pride towards them and accomplishment. God willing one day we will all get to join them!

Bus 1 : We then made our way to Leket! We packed over 250 boxes of clothing in under two hours to send to poor families!! All the girls showed intense and great team work! It was great! After lunch and having chanurot in Ra’anana, we went to the blind museum.

The blind museum allows for people to feel what it’s like to be blind while in the museum. It’s dark and you need to use your other senses to get around the museum.

We learned that we can never judge another person and we need to be grateful that our bodies work! It’s a gift we take for granted!

We all had a fabulous day on GIVE! It was filled with inspiration, Chessed, and fun!

It just keeps on getting better and better everyday!

Bus 2: We then traveled to the blind factory. The blind factory is a factory where the blind, deaf, and mute work. They put labels on products, organize different metals and tools, and seal products. We all sat down at one of the stations and began to work side by side with the disabled adult. It was extremely fascinating to see how they can work. The blind was able to work 100% sufficiently, despite his/her lack of sight. Seeing this allowed for us to appreciate what we have and to realize we can do anything if we try hard enough. Girls started to communicate with the adults who were blind, deaf, and mute by writing a Hebrew word into his/her palm. There is always a way to communicate with someone to get to know them! It was very special to experience something so different then what we are all use to. We then split up and half the bus went to help organize a library and sort the books, while the other group went to a facility that helps abused women and their children. The building was stunning! We played, did arts and crafts, and just hung out with the kids! They were adorable! It was so moving to see the time and dedication these people give the abused victims just so that they can live more comfortable lives!

Day 6: Nursing Home & Shalva (Bus 1). Yad Lekashish & Aleh (Bus 2)

What a day on NCSY GIVE today! After having an awesome weekend up north doing team building activities, we finally made it to Mevaseret! It was officially our first day of Chessed! We spent the whole day around Jerusalem! Bus 1 started the day off by going to a nearby nursing home. As we sang, blew up balloons, and danced for the elderly, many smiles were forming. Not only did it bring happiness to the elderly to have guests but it was very special for the GIVErs to see how much joy they brought to THEM! Afterwards we headed to Gan HaPa’amon to have a delicious lunch. Later that day we went to visit the organization, Shalva. Shalva facilitates children and adults with disabilities from birth until age 21. The facility is open 24/7. We met with a man named Yossi Samuels. Shalva was started because of Yossi and his condition — he is blind and deaf. Yossi made everyone on GIVE feel like the sky is the limit in what you want to do. Despite Yossi’s condition he learned how to speak and read sign language. He also works and rides horses. What the people of Shalva accomplish was extremely inspirational and touching. After we got a tour of the colorful and fun building, we got to hear the Shalva band! They were so talented! We were all in awe as to what these kids could do! As the kids and adults of Shalva performed, GIVE danced along with the rest of Shalva! We then got onto the buses and drove to a place called Maaleh. It is a film making school. We watched a film that a women created about a personal life story. She explained to us how the process works and what it takes to make a successful film in the school.

Bus 2 began their day by going to Yad Lekashish — a facility for elderly foreign individuals to provide an opportunity for them to have different working opportunities. Such as, jewelry making, metal melting, and painting. The girls got to meet these individuals and see their beautiful artwork! After meeting them, the girls got to go to a gift shop that contains all the various artworks created by them. They then met bus 1 for lunch in Gan HaPa’amon! Later that day, the girls heard from Neil Lazarus, from “Awesome Seminars”. He spoke about the current political situation in the Middle East. Following that, bus 2 went to a place called Aleh. Aleh is a home for individuals with physical disabilities. The girls sang, danced, and played guitar for both children and adults. After all that excitement, both buses ended of the day with a big boom! We had a huge yummy meal at Papagayos!!!!! After a long day filled with dancing and smiles it’s time to call it a night!

We can’t wait for tomorrow!!!