Camp Galil's last Shabbat of 2016

Hello Parents, and welcome back to our final Shabbat of the summer! This morning we had cinnamon buns and scones for breakfast, how exciting! Everyone went to extended avodah this morning so that we took a little more care of our machaneh today. Once that finished, all the chanichimot tried their hardest to try and get the last Golden Broom of the summer by cleaning their tzrifim so that they looked spotless. After sweeping, mopping, and making beds, the chanichimot went to peula shikvah with their madatzimot to have them run an activity for them instead of their madrichimot.

Bonot at the creek

The Madaitzimot always try to run a really fun and exciting peula for the chanichimot, so that they can win over the affection of their kids. After pish ends, everyone gets dressed up in wacky clothes and goes to the mini-mo for Shabbat Shira, where we do Shira and learn some old songs from the past that not everyone remembers, except today we choose our songs from a specific group of songs that we like to teach on Shabbat, typically these songs hold more value and have a deeper meaning than the other cheers we typically do.

People in a tree house, some of them pretending to vomit

Kids will get called up by shikvah, one at a time to go get lunch, which is always a colorful assortments of pizzas! Everyone tries to show as much ruach(energy) as they can in order to get called up first. Pizza for lunch might be one of my favorite parts about Machaneh, especially Shabbat. When everyone is finished eating pizza, the kids all stay to do Hyde Park, where kids can go up one at a time to suggest changes they think will benefit Machaneh in the future.

Kids serving pizza

Next kids can participate in mischak ha’shavuah(sport of the week) and this week’s sport is . There will also be time for kids to take long showers and pamper themselves as they get ready for Shabbat dinner. We will be meeting by mishpachot(families) and discuss how our weeks have been and share with everyone our favorite parts of the week, maybe even tell a few funny stories as well. Then we all walk down the road and group together to give out hugs and take more nice pictures with each other. Then the Madatzimot will perform the last kabbalat Shabbat of the session and I’ve heard them practicing all week for it. Then our Rosh, Lia, will tell us a story about herself that has underlying morals and themes that we should all take to heart as we end the summer of 2016. Following that everyone sings a few more songs and then heads off to dinner with our guests who came to join us for Shabbat. However just before this happened we had a very special surprise! One of the fathers to a few of our chanichimot is a helicopter pilot and flew his helicopter into the middle of the kikar! It was a great way to kick off the final Shabbat of the summer.

Helicopter surrounded by people

Dinner ends and then we all go to the Refet(barn) to watch the oneg(skit) that will be put on by the Bogrimot. The oneg will end and everyone will get ready for rikud. We will be doing many Israeli dances and it will be super intense and at the end, people who stay the whole time will get a special treat due to their dedication. At this point kids will be going to bed and they’ll be getting a good night sleep since we get a sleep in until 10 am tomorrow morning.

We’ll see you on Monday for the last two days when Shabbat ends, but for now, enjoy your Shabbat!

-Guy