Journey into Zionism: Socialism 101

I recently relocated to Kibbutz Ketura, a small agricultural compound in the heart of the Arava. I live with three of my fellow Otzma volunteers in Gimel-3, a sheirut-sized apartment in the dilapidated volunteer housing neighborhood. There are two bedrooms between the four of us, and we share one grimy bathroom and an ant-infested kitchenette.

My first task upon arrival was to write my laundry number (664) into all of my clothes, thereby branding myself as a communist until I have enough money to replace my current wardrobe. I then set out to unpack all my belongings, which was a relatively straightforward procedure with only three shelves and the black hole under my bed as storage space. Next I was informed of my job assignment of Lunch Lady in the cheder ochel, my first food service job since scooping ice cream part time in high school.

Fast forward a week.

After only seven days of working for the man, he put me in charge of kosherizing the machine. To clarify, the so-called "machine" is just one of the many new vocabulary words I've learned since officially becoming a kibbutz volunteer:

Machine - noun - a fancy word for dishwasher. Oh, but this is not your ordinary dishwasher. It consists of a conveyer belt of trays that rotate around and around so I can sit back and watch everything come out all clean and sparkly, no scrubbing necessary.

Pub - noun - a fancy word for barn. It's kind of like when your neighbor installs a light bulb and a mini-fridge in his garage and then suddenly it's referred to as a den or a boom boom room, because the pub on Kibbutz Ketura is pretty much a former stable with a counter on one side and a disco ball in the corner.

Pub Night - proper noun - an excuse for volunteers, students, and kibbutzniks to drink beer and mixed drinks out of water bottles in a dark room with loud music every Thursday night. Oh, and it's BYOB; no cash accepted.

Kosher - adjective - when we say kosher, we mean, "Ha, that's what you think!" You have no idea how many times I've unloaded meat trays from the machine during dairy meals and found dairy utensils in the salad bar during meat meals. But I guess what they don't know what hurt them.

Kosher for Passover - adjective - see "Kosher." For the rest of the Jewish world, this means something along the lines of dishes and cookware that don't touch bread. I haven't yet figured out the Ketura definition though.

Anyway, back to the machine. On Tuesday morning, my boss in the cheder ochel taught me how to kosherize (kashrut?) the machine, which has to be taken apart and hosed down in between meals to play along with the whole "kosher" theme. This complex job is usually entrusted only to members of the kibbutz who are spending more than a two- or three-month time frame in the dining hall, but due to my undeniable hotness he decided that I ought to learn how to do it too.

Or maybe it's his way of sucking me into the kibbutz permanently; regardless, this is the communist way of being promoted to something more meaningful than refilling vegetable buckets and squeegeeing the floor. At least now I know that I can always fall back on a career in manual labor, because apparently I'm just so damn good at it.