The past 10 days = a rollercoaster. A very long, exciting, and dreadful rollercoaster. Last Wednesday, we all packed up our things and officially, although temporarily, moved out of Kibbutz Tzuba. Our first stop on our rollercoaster of a week was the Masada Youth Hostile where we spent the first half of the night sleeping (until about 4am) and the second half of the night and most of the morning hiking 900ft to the top of Mt. Masada. Rather than explaining the experience, let me just say that it looked and felt like someone dumped a gallon of water on me, and my roommates and I spent the entire hike down arguing over who got to shower first. The next day, we journeyed through paths interrupted by springs that varied in depth from our ankles to our bellybuttons. Our destination was quite the surprise: a glorious waterfall that cascaded down into a large pool of fresh water. It only took about ten seconds for us to strip down to our bathing suits and run straight underneath the waterfall. I must admit that this experience was the first that was purely fun, meaning there was no Jewish History to learn while we were swimming in the refreshing natural pool. Let me tell you that these two days were absolute heaven compared to what lied ahead of us in the next five days.
Gadna was.....well, it was Gadna. Imagine the dirtiest bathroom you can and multiply that by eternity and that MIGHT come close to the disgustingness of the bathrooms we were forced to bear with. Now imagine the worst food you have ever eaten and multiply that one by eternity, too. I promise that the food at Gadna was worse. However, not every single aspect of those five days was completely terrible. The one part of Gadna that I will never forget was, unsurprisingly, shooting the gun. Before I even left for EIE, one of the things I was most excited for was to experience what it is like to be in the I.D.F. and to learn how to use the weapon that every Israeli uses to defend their country. After all, this event was a once in a lifetime experience within my once in a lifetime experience. When the five teams of EIE arrived at the shooting range, everyone began to either jitter with excitement or overflow with anxiety. Personally, I was a mixture of both. I was surprised at my own reaction because I was nothing but excited before the day came, but I guess the reality of it all finally hit me and resulted in my worry. I distinctly remember the feeling of butterflies in my stomach and the lump in my throat before we, the very first group to shoot, entered the small 3-wall building where the actual shooting took place. How vivid the memory in my mind is when the instructor told us to put on our headphones to protect our ears from becoming deaf and the sudden silence that I was consumed by. It was just me and the gun at that point, or so it felt. In reality, there were 11 other girls in the little shack-like building with me probably feeling the same way I was, but all I could focus on was getting the little tip of my scope directly on the center of my target. After all the other detailed instructions were told, and the commander shouted "ESH!" (fire in Hebrew) I suddenly froze, my finger steady on the trigger. I didn't want to be the first one to shoot. What felt like ten years, but was really only about 2 seconds later, I heard the first bullet shot and I reacted by pulling my own trigger. The first bullet escaped from my gun and in the literal blink of an eye, it was gone. I had no way of telling if it had hit the target or the giant mountain of sand behind it, but I didn't care so much. The burst of adrenaline that had shot through my entire body was my only focus at that point. Quickly, but not too quickly, I shot the other four bullets. The feeling was exciting and nerve-wracking all the same. It was most definitely the highlight of my week at Gadna. Experiencing this once in a lifetime opportunity really opened my eyes to how powerful a gun is. While others did not enjoy the experience as much, for some reasons that are different than others, I enjoyed it simply because it was pure excitement and gave me a feeling of honor and respect toward soldiers around the world. The way Israelis view a gun is so incredibly different from the way Americans view a gun. Defense vs. attack. Help vs. harm. Purity vs. destruction. It's tragic to see the many deaths that guns have caused in America, especially in more recent years, but it was rewarding to gain a new perspective on the weapon and learn to respect it rather than despise it. This lesson, and this great opportunity is one that I will never forget.
