Post Pesach Shenanigans

After the Pesach (Passover) holiday we all returned to Hadassa Neurim. We embarked on a grand two day, one night trek through the Israeli wilderness with an Israeli group called "Walk About Love". This is basically a group of Israelis whose mission is to hike from the very southern tip of Israel to the very northern point. All in all it is about a 1000 kilometer walk and takes between 2 and 3 months depending on pace, weather conditions, and various other factors. We were only joining them for two days, which was a bit humbling since they had already hiked hundreds of kilometers. Despite this, they were a very gregarious people and did not hold us in contempt of being the idiotic tourists that everyone else thinks we are (and which to a certain extent is true anyways).

The first day of hiking was a 17 kilometer trek. Now in my humble opinion I think I am in pretty good shape, but at times I am also incredibly lazy, and walking 17 kilometers with a bunch of Israeli hippies was not something that I was dying to do. At first I thought our guide said we were only walking 7 kilometers, but after several hours of hiking I realized that I was fooled by his thick Israeli accent and I was informed of the true distance. Despite this, the hike actually went by very fast. The weather and scenery was beautiful and a few of the Israeli hikers only had minimal hippie traits and were therefore tolerable. The rest of them, however, wreaked of hippie in the most stereotypical fashion possible. Even if you take into account their poor hygiene as a result of their extended time in the wilderness, most of these people were full-on, hardcore hippies in the most un-redeemable way possible. If it wasn't their dreadlocks, glazed eyes and suspiciously colorful clothing that irritated me, their anti-western, anti-capitalist (a.k.a. anti-freedom) rhetoric vindicated all of my negative sentiments towards hippies in general. Despite this, the hike was still a fantastic experience and a great way to see the Israeli wilderness that wasn't desert.

After the hike, we returned to Hadassa Neurim wreaking of mother nature, nothing a good shower couldn't take care of. The following morning we woke up for our first Judo session in the new facility, which is easily three times as large as our old one in Hod Hasharon. We also have a gym that is literally 10 feet from the dojo, so we can go back and forth for a great workout. It had been about two weeks since my last training session, and I could feel the absence of training in my workout. But its all good, I know that after a week of training I will be fine again. The only thing that is a little annoying is how little reserve the human body has after training so much, only to loose so much if one slacks off for a short period of time.

This past weekend was very relaxed. Nothing special to talk about other than an excessive amount of sleep and beach time. So, yeah...

-MG