And so a new month in Israel begins. What, I wonder, will November bring?

Due to the currently poor internet connection this appears to be the only time I can actually get online.

Last Wednesday we had our first of 4 day trips/tiyul. We took a bus into the desert and continued onto two mini hikes to almost unreal sand dunes and a beautiful Red Stone Canyon. Our day continued with a potter around Eilat. It really was an incredible opportunity to see the peace and beauty of Israel in its element and we also had the opportunity to consider some of the religious and historical links about our land and the Torah. On our way home we made a stop off at a lookout point over Egypt. This particular viewpoint enabled us to see Jordan, Israel and Egypt all in simply one look. It was fascinating to see the remainder of the rock pillars that implied the immense advancement in security to what is now a high security border fence.

Last weekend we attended the first keshet seminar, a weekend intended to bring together almost two hundred, cross communal, year course participants and give them an opportunity to learn about and discuss each others views and practices. An interesting experience to say the least, full of debate, controversy and finally a mutual agreement within the group of their appreciation of being in Netzer. There were a couple of truly fascinating sessions about Zionism, highly controversial political issues, the Israeli army and Jewish Identity. Not so interesting was the lack of FZY attendance who, despite having the most people at the weekend, could easily have been mistaken for not being there at all. Another issue many of us had was that unlike the concept of keeping shabbat in public places to respect the more religious BA participants (which I was ok with), we were extremely taken aback to hear that BA had been banned from attending anyone else's services on shabbat despite the fact that three others were taking place and the entire point of the weekend was to learn about each others ways of practising Judaism. Saturday evening saw a bus full of weary Netzer-niks sleepily but happily returning to Kibbutz Yahel.

Sunday and Monday day time was a mish-mash of date bag folding, ulpan and chinuch sessions. The volunteering we are getting used to, the ulpan we are actually beginning to learn some useful stuff and the educational sessions continue to spark controversial debates. On Sunday night we had a great Halloween party with better costumes created in the middle of the desert from nothing than you see in most Halloween parties in London. Myself and the two other girls called Sophie dressed up as the tribe of Sophies.

The Tribe of Sophies

Having a truly incredible time, only slightly marred by the stress about getting onto machon and my interview next week. Other than that kibbutz feels like home and I already cannot imagine how weird its going to be to leave here in a few weeks.

Beginning to miss everyone a lot...come and visit me!

Love you all

S x