Machaneh Choref (winter camp) 2010

Shalom Gilboa Families,

We are all here safe and sound with lots and lots of snow! It started snowing the day we arrived and hasn’t stopped. Lots of snowmen, snowball fights and beautiful scenery for us.

Yesterday we all arrived to a hot pizza lunch and soft snow falling. The day continued with orientation, and tochnit erev (evening program). The theme of this machaneh choref (winter camp) is “Snow What? – Melting Apathy”, with several activities throughout the week dedicated to talking about apathy, the role it plays in our lives, and how we can step out of it and engage both locally and globally. Last night’s tochnit erev consisted of the chanichim (campers) working through a series of fun challenges to free the madrichim (counselors) from the spell of Mr. Apathy, and imprisoning him for the rest of machaneh.

We woke up this morning to a fresh blanket of snow and made the most of it with a machaneh wide game of snow capture the flag/ snowball fight on the sports field. After taking a camp picture we continued our focus on the machaneh theme with a machaneh wide peula (activity). In three different stations chanichim explored the three ingredients of apathy: fear, ignorance, and privilege. In the Privilege Station different groups received different quantities of cookies, and had to explore how this affected them personally, as a part of a group, and the relationships between the groups. At the Ignorance Station each person received an ingredient, without knowledge of what other chanichim received, and had to figure out a way to build a gingerbread house. They had to overcome the barrier in order to cooperate and manage to build it together. A game of tag emphasized overcoming fear in order to create a functioning society. Experiencing these concepts and how they exist in the world was incredibly powerful and interesting for everyone, and lots of conversations followed.

In the afternoon chanichim engaged in chugim (interest groups) ranging from dance, drama, board games, and more. Dinner is soon to follow.

Much love.

Machaneh Gilboa