MBI Commences!

Phew! It has been quite a busy 2 days getting everyone off to Israel but the last flight to Israel left this morning at 11:55am.

By and large everything went quite smoothly yesterday. With the unfortunate exceptions of the cancelled Detroit flight, extremely delayed Oakland flight, and the lack of air conditioning on the early Moshava bus. Due to these issues I had not posted earlier as Kenan, Jamie and I ended up staying at a hotel in Newark with the wonderful group of MBIers from the Detroit and took them to JFK early this morning for their flight to Israel.

The first 4 flights have arrived in Israel already and everything seemed to go just fine with those flights. As each flight arrived a bus and madrichim (counselors) were there to greet them at the airport and whisk them to the first place they will be staying which is called Ohalo, and it is a beautiful Kibbutz hotel situated right on the Kinneret(Sea of Galilee). The MBIers can walk out of their rooms and see the Kinneret as well as a stunning view of the Golan Heights. It truly is a great place to stay and start their journey this summer.


As the first three flights arrived, the majority of MBI was present and activities commenced on the program. They had a lovely summer snack of juicy, sweet Israeli watermelon which of course makes most American melons pale in comparison. They then proceeded to play several rounds of Icebreaker games led by their madrichim (counselors) and generally had some fun getting to know each other. Then they settled down and Leon(Rosh MBI) reviewed the rules and expectations of the program. They also had a peula (educational/fun activity) that was an introduction to Israel and a beginning to their acclimation and familiarizing process to the country. Overall everyone seems to be in quite good spirits and excited to be with the group!

Tomorrow morning they will have a couple peulot with the counselors. They will again be more activities to acquaint everyone in the group as the final flight will have already landed by then. It will of course also be more introductions to the program and some of educational goals we will be stressing throughout. It will also tie into the afternoon where they will go to Hatzer Kinneret which is located a very short drive from Ohalo and is location of where the first Kibbutz in Israel was founded. There they will begin to hear, see, and understand the story and foundation of the Kibbutz movement. It is a very fascinating and inspirational story to look back at youthful pioneers and their role in building the state of Israel.

Two quick reminders: Please remember when you are posting on the Guestbook to write the full name of the MBIer and once they get their bus number, the bus number as well. Also you'll notice I have added a link to the right side panel, and that I list below, that I think may be useful resource. It is an interactive map of Israel that details many of the places MBI will be going and often includes pictures and explanations of certain places. One for example is Hatzer Kinneret! Feel free to check it out: http://www.eyeonisrael.com/

Below their is a note for the families of the Detroit flight. Feel free to read it but that's all for now!

Michael

Detroit Families and Minkoffs: The Flight to Israel is ELAL flight 22 that is scheduled to arrive at 5:10am and I will post a message as soon as I hear it has landed. Unfortunately as many of you know, many of your children did not get their luggage as Northwest continues to earn its place as the Central Office's least favorite airline. Kenan and myself stayed after their flight left to check on the status of the missing bags and actually managed to identify almost all of them as they arrived to JFK on a noon flight from Detroit. However, one of Erez Brandvain and Olivia Hern's bag were not found but Northwest will continue to search for them, as will I. They are going to be sent to Israel via KLM airlines and probably will take another day or two before they make it to Israel.

In the meantime when they get to Israel we will make sure to buy them some clothes and toiletries and of course once I have more news about their luggage I will be letting you all know. It has been a trying ordeal but soon they will get to Israel and eventually they will get their stuff. I want to thank Renee Pinsky for all her efforts yesterday at the airport to help this great group through all these complications and getting them on another flight so that they could make it to Israel. I look forward to talking to you all soon and having some good news to report.