Weekly update by Max and Elinor
We are writing this, sitting in a mud dome looking out on the red mountains which separate Israel from Jordan, with a cat purring near by. This is a relatively peaceful atmosphere for what has been a busy last week.
We arrived in Kibbutz Lotan last Wednesday and it instantly felt like Shnat was real. After exploring our mud dome homes, compost toilets and eco showers we met the southern Ma’ayan shantties, who were very welcoming and friendly. We spent our first Shabbat with the southerners, with us running puelot for each other which has given us lots of vital information to help us on our journey.
Our arrival Kibbutz met with a massive sandstorm which hit the middle of our bonding games, later that evening a huge thunder storm arrived making us a at the butt of all the ‘you brought the english weather with you’ jokes, also not all the mud domes could survive the downpour which did leave us a little damp.
Our new routine consists of chores such as: cleaning the toilets, showers and kitchen, at 8 o clock, then a ma’amad ( creative prayer service) at 9:30 and then a range of fun and engage activities the rest of the day, our favourites have included making mud bricks and then building a mud wall for the nursery, making our very own compost, finally beginning hebrew classes, going on a beautiful hike and helping make dinner for the whole Kibbutz.
We have met many fascinating people from the Kibbutz including some of the founders, some shinshins (Israeli gap year participants) and volunteers here. We were all assigned different families to join for dinner on Saturday night and have all got to know them very well, further increasing our understanding of the kibbutz.
For more photos, and Netzer’s update, click here!