Day Eighteen

Am sitting on top of the miklat, in the dying sun. It's been a rough few days... I think it's flu. For a few days I was so drugged up...I even fell asleep - in the middle of someone talking to me - during lunch in the Cheder Ochel.

BH am all better now! On Friday, 'A' told me to go home, after I managed to succesfully struggle through the first bit of the morning, then 'B' told us all to take a 1 1/2 hour break during the day and then I ambled back into the Mitbach, feeling worse than ever, and A sent me home. Noice!

So I slept it off, then prepared for Shabbat. Was really nice this week - two meals in the Cheder Ochel then did seuda with two of the Londoners, with loads of ice cream, cake and hummus. It was really, really nice and relaxed, and they didn't seem to mind that I was only half-alive and slumped on the bed throughout - during lunch, I ate a bit then left ASAP for a four hour nap.

As it turned out, leaving ASAP was actually leaving early, before everyone in the Cheder Ochel said zimun, infact, so despite us having benched already and so thinking it was ok to leave (some of us being highly drugged), it wasn't really, in the eyes and manners of kibbutz protocols/minhagim.

Later, during Maariv, the same lady who the week before had made a point of singing extra loudly (down Hungarian's ear at Shabbat lunch, in order to emphasise that we too should be singing) came up to us and very publicly (and VERY LOUDLY TOO) admonished us for being so disrespectful, and leaving before benching. My later reaction would have been to do a very over-hyped impression of Mel Brooks and mutter something about 'acting like the goyim', but I didn't really have the strength.

Instead, I calmly (very calmly - it must have been impossible to muster any passion with the amount of Nurofen cold and flu/paracetomol/etc that was in my system) explained that, actually, my friends were doing a mitzva because I was ill and they had to pretty much schlep me all the way back to my room. She replied that, if I was that ill, what was I doing in the beit knesset, and not in bed?

Now, I believe there were two possible insinuations here - 1. if I was so ill, surely I shouldn't be in beit knesset, if I was well anough to be there but not stay half an hour longer for group benching, 2. If I wasn't datia enough to stay an extra half hour for zemirot and zimun on Shabbat, why would I then be able to be in beit knesset? However, ignoring all of this and just wanting to get back to bed, I told her that I hadn't been to beit knesset yet on Shabbat, and I was making an extra effort to be there for havdala, having slept through the morning services. She merely harrumphed, turned and walked off. So I'm guessing I sort of had the last word. I don't know the verbal jousting rules of kibbutz yet, but I probably won the moral victory.

Today I started work in the machleva (dairy). It hurst my throat quite a lot just being in there and around the milk and cheese. But work finishes approx 1-1 1/2 hours earlier than the mitbach, so I'll keep at it.

After work, I went and bought loadsa cake ingredients, because it's New Jersey (although she's not on kibbutz for a week) and Aussie guy's bdays, so me, Holland and two Londons came with me to E's house, where we baked an epic cake, which we'll surprise Aussie with later. We're having a party, with a film and drinks and now a cake too. Chocolate cake.