Gibush

Sorry I haven’t written in a while.

I have been training all week for a gibush or a tryout for tzanchaniem (paratroopers)

That meant that I was running, doing pushups and sit-ups.

Yesterday was the gibush.

We woke up at 5 in the morning to take a bus to Tel Hashomar, the place where we become soldiers. From the main gate, we were lead to a large play area, where we got to see the competition for the gibush. There were over 2o0 people. Many of the people were from Micvah Alon (the army's Ulpan program.) The rest were from either Garin Tzabar (my program) or from outsides areas. The only thing that connected all of us in the gibush was that it was for Oliem Hadasheim or new immigrants. In the play area, we had to fill out paperwork, such as medical information, parent info and rate ourselves on how happy we are, how much determination we have and other factors.

We were then split up into our groups. The groups contained anywhere from 26 to 30 people. We were then taken to an area full of open tents. We had to place our bags down and we were sent to the doctors to get a quick physical. The doctors really only really checked our pulse and took our temp. Then we were broken up to another group of 40 and given a new number. My number was 160. Then we were lead back to the tent area and told to stretch. Finally, the group was lead to the perimeter fence and we had to run 2k for the bar or test (or the first physical fitness test for the gibush). We had to run on sand and dirt for 2k under 10 min. Once we were done, we were all given madim or uniforms and new numbers. We were then told to stand in a circle and wait. During the waiting time, the mifaced or commander pulled aside two people. The rest of us were sent off to dinner of hotdogs and mash potatoes. The reason why the people were pulled aside was because they didn’t run the2k under 10 min and were therefore not thought to be physical enough to pass the gibush. We saw the guys gain at dinner, and after a quick goodbye, we were sent back to the tent area to wait. During this whole time, we also had to drink between 5-6 liters of water.

After a quick wait, we were given another new group and a new number. Mine was 26. This was going to be my group for sprinting in the morning. We were then sent off to bed. The time was 8.

At 3 in the morning, we were all woken up. At night we slept in the tents on military cots. The problem with Garin Tzabar is that we weren’t told what to bring and so none of us (26 who remained) didn’t have sleeping bags. As a result, we all got scaves (a thick wool blanket which has been known to give people scaves.) Anyway, in the morning, we had to fold up the beds and take the mattresses and blankets over to an area. We then had to stand in the waiting area and wait for the mifaced to arrive. Once they did, we were led out into a field, where we were told to sprint up to a tire, around it and back to the starting point. After about 8 of these, the mifaced then told us that the first 5 people would need to stand at the side, while the rest of us would stand in the center and wait. While we were waiting, anther mifaced would write down their number and save it. The point of the day was to come in the top 5 as many times as you can and if you did it a lot of times it means that you are physically fit and would probably make it to the unit. We then had to run around the tire 2, 3 and 6 times. On one of the 1 times and one the 3 times, I came in first.

The next sprint we did was with an alunca or stretcher. The point of this race was that the first four back would take the alunca, lift it up and run again, while the rest of us would only run there and back 2 times with nothing. I got the alunca 1 out of 6 times. The next race we did was crawling on our hands and knees. This was hard, because we never really practiced this and so it was hard to do. After crawling, we had mind games. One was where we were given new numbers and without talking or looking, we had to stand in a formation in our new numerical order. Of course, we failed and so we were punished by doing sprints. The next mind game was where we were given a long pole and an old oil drum. We had to use these objects to get across the "river filled with minds" and if anything touched the water it would exploded. We tried the game three times, each time failing and punished with sprinting. Of course everything was timed. Drinking water, sprinting, the games and everything. If we went over the time, we were given a punishment. If we did something wrong, we were punished.

The final physical thing we did was a masa or a journey that was 3k long. During this masa, we had to run with an alunca, jerry cans and sand bags. Everyone had to hold the alunca at least once and at least one bag. The whole time we rotated so that meant I got the alunca 3 or 4 times and the bag 2.

The next part of the gibush was an interview. The reason for this is because they know that everyone is not physically equal, and so they might be more mentally smart. So we had an interview. My interview went really well, because both of the people asking me question went scuba diving. So when I said I do scuba diving, they both looked at me and smiled and we had a whole conversation on it. It went really well.

After the gibush, me and Matti (the only other kid from my kibbutz) returned home and have been here ever since.

We won’t find out the results for another 10 days but we both feel confident that we passed and are now tzanchanim soldiers.