I could not even begin to explain the situation...

"I'm in a situation that I could not even begin to explain." - Teddy the Bellhop, Four Rooms, Sticking his head out of the window, right after he ran into the bathroom to find heart medicine for the guy who a minute before had him at gunpoint, and then pretended to have a heart attack, and right before he is vomited upon from three stories above.

This is a similar situation, but I'm going to try to explain it. Bare with me if it gets a little complicated.

B'nei Akiva has done more than its share to screw us over. We don't have gas masks, they've put us in poisonous rooms, they surprised us with a six week stay in the West Bank, etc. However, we really can't blame B.A. for the kidnapping fiasco I talked about yesterday. They hired the bus driver, but they had no way of knowing what he would do.

I do blame them however, for hiring the same guy, the next day.

New Years' Eve, we were kidnapped. On January first, we left Beit Rimon for three months of Yeshiva. Since we weren't permitted to store our stuff whilst we were at Yeshiva, we had to take everything with us on the bus. To further complicate matters, we had our bags in different places, and we were going to different places.

All of the English speaking Hachshara had been at Beit Rimon. All of the Kibbutz Sde Elijahu half had some of their stuff with them, while the rest of it was being stored in Jerusalem, while the British half had most of their stuff left on the Kibbutz En Hanatziv. Following that, all of the boys' stuff was to go to Malie Gilboa, whereas all of the girls' stuff was to go to Jerusalem. Needless to say, the bus's size dictated that we'd need to make a few trips. (briefly, Beit Rimon is 160 km from En Hazatziv, which is three km from Sde Elijahu, which is 20 from Malei Gilboa, which is 200 from Jerusalem.)

The battle plan was that we leave Beit Rimon with what we had, go to En Hanatziv, where the guys on that kibbutz would drop off their stuff, and the girls would get the rest of their stuff, and put it on the bus. Then we'd go to Sde Elijahu, and do the same thing. Then, we all had to go to Jerusalem for a B'nei Akiva meeting, so everybody, and all of the girls belongings would go to Jerusalem. Later that night, the girls would then go to their Midrasha with all their stuff. The boys would then be driven back to the kibbutzes, where they'd pack all of their stuff onto the bus, and then go to Malie Gilboa.

^It was going to be a fun day,^ and we were not looking forward to do it. But we really had no choice. There was only one problem.

"What do you mean you won't drive us?"

"I can't go driving you guys all over the place. I'm not a yo-yo."

"Well, what else can we do?"

"�� ���� ��." {Lo hechpat li.} [It's not my problem.]

"Look, we're paying you good money to do this."

"Maybe in Mexico, or England, or America you pay drivers to be your servants. Here, we don't do that."

"We're not asking you to be a servant; we're asking to do what you're being paid before."

"I can't work like that."

"Look, we don't like it either, but we really don't seem to have a choice."

"�� ���� ��." {Lo hechpat li.} [It's not my problem.] So, the madrichot two very timid girls, ask for his boss's phone number. He spits it out to them, when we get to the first stop at the Kibbutz, they got off and called it. Meanwhile, we had to put ALL of the girl's stuff on the bus, and it took a good half hour. The madrichot come back, told the driver that his boss had been called, and would he make sure that his own cell phone was on.

So, we finish at En Hanatziv, and we go to Sde Elijahu. There's less stuff here, but we break for lunch (with the driver), so it takes us about forty-five minutes. The passive madrichot, told Boaz to talk to this guy. First, Boaz calls up the boss again, and is once again told that the boss can't reach the driver.

"��� ���� ������� ��� ����?" {Atah batuach shehapelephon shelcha patuach?} [Are you sure that your cell phone is on?]

"����" {Bevadai} [Definitely]

So, Boaz goes back, to call the boss again. Meanwhile, we get ready to go. We're back on the bus, when Boaz goes up to the driver. I was sitting two seats behind the driver. Boaz again asks if he's sure that his phone is on.

"���!" {Betach!} [Definitely!]

So, a couple of minutes into the ride, I saw him turn on his cell phone. Quickly, it starts ringing. "����? ����? ����? �����, �� ���� ����� ����!" {Allo? Allo? Allo? Selicha, lo yachol lishmoa otcha!} [Allo? Allo? Allo? Sorry, I can't hear you!] -Click- He hangs up the phone angrily.

Two minutes later, it rings "����? ����? ����? ����� ,��� �� ���� ����! ��� ���� ������ �� �����, ��� ���� ���� �����! ��� �� ���� ����! �� ������, �� ���� ������! �� �� ����! ��? ��?!? ��, ��� �� ���� ����� �� ��. " {Allo? Allo? Allo? Selicha, atah lo rayeeta otam! Sha'a vechatzi bekibutz En Hanatziv, sha'a vechatzi bekibutz sde Elijahu! Atah lo rayeeta otam! Hem tipshim, kol hazman medabrim! Hem lo yetachain! Mah? Mah? Mah?!? Lo, ani lo yachol la'asot et zeh.} [Allo? Allo? Allo? Sorry, you haven't seen these people! An hour and a half at the first kibbutz, an hour and a half at the next! You haven't seen them! They're stupid, always talking! They're impossible! What? What?!? No, I can't do that!] Angrily, he again hangs up the phone.

Ring, ring, ring, " ����, ����. ��. ����, ��� �� ���� ���, ��� �� ������ ���, ��� �� ����� ���. ��, �� ����, ����!" {Allo, tireh. Lo. Tireh, atah lo hachaver sheli, atah lo bamishpacha sheli, ain lecha hashanim sheli. Lo. Lo Yachol. Shalom!} [Allo, look. No. Look, you are not my friend, you are not in my family, you are not my age. No. No, I can't. Goodbye!] He slams down the phone. Ok, so we wind up in Jerusalem.

I have no idea why they needed us to go there. I don't think they knew either. They dropped us off in Jerusalem at around two and left us to wander the streets till around seven thirty. Everything we had was packed and locked on the bus, and nobody wanted to be the one to awaken this driver who was sleeping there. Consequently, I was one of the few who had any money.

So, we're outside, jacketless, our stuff locked away, no money, no food, out to walk the streets of Jerusalem for five hours, on New Years' Day. We couldn't get on to the bus; the driver had threatened violence, in a serious way, against us. This is the closest I've come to ever wanting to slash tires.

At around seven thirty, B'nei Akiva decides to open its doors, and lets us inside to discuss the situation. Gilad, one of the higher ups in B.A., went to go tell the bus driver to wait a little bit longer, and, intentionally, none of us warned him about how to deal with this particular driver.

So, we were told to quickly unload the bus, and we then got a new bus and driver. While we were removing the articles off the bus, I turned to Gilad. "You did know that this was the guy who kidnapped us yesterday? Right?"

"Yes Michael, shut up."

So, we unloaded all of the stuff, and brought up some stuff that had been left in Jerusalem. By the time we had all this stuff on the street, the next bus came, and we loaded all of the stuff onto bus #2, all hoping never to see driver #1 again, ever.

So, with that done, it was around nine, and BA invited us into the building for a gripe session. First, to show their apologies, for keeping us outside in the cold without food, they showed their generosity by buying each of us a slice of pizza. Then, we had our gripe session.

I really don't know what we hoped to get out of this session. We had a great deal of complaints, and so I guess we decided the best person we should talk to was the person who was in charge of BA, world wide. So we went to Schtiglitz, who is this big basketball of a man, and listed our complaints in an orderly fashion.

Again, I don't know why we bothered. We got the same thing from BA we got every time, Schtiglitz passed the buck. He didn't know where the money had gone, he didn't know who was responsible, it wasn't his fault, blah, blah, blah. He even went so far as to call the head of the English kids back home a liar, so that he could protect himself.

I realized this wasn't going to get anywhere, it was around ten fifteen, so while the others went on venting their frustration, I went to go lie down on the bus.

I came back up a minute later. "Uhhm, Mr. Schtiglitz,"

"Michael, wait your turn."

"Well, hold on, this is kind of important...uhm...the bus is gone." He looks out the window, and points.

"It's right there, look."

"No, I was just down there, that's not the bus." So, they call up the bus driver and tell him to come back.

"No, Yussie, don't leave without the kids this time." ^Brilliant guy.^ So, the driver comes back, it's around eleven, and the others still think that they can get through to these people. I go to lie down on the bus.

At around eleven thirty the rest of them file on to the bus, looking bedraggled. I was not about to insult them by asking if they got anywhere, plus we were all too tired. At around eleven forty five, we dropped off the girls, and went back to the kibbutzim to get our stuff.

It was around two at this point. We had all had a miserable day, it was now two in the morning, and we were all dead tired. We had just finished at the kibbutzes, loading all of our stuff on to the bus. Despite our state, we actually managed to smush all of the stuff on to the bus in under ten minutes. We just wanted to get done. We didn't know where Malei Gilboa was, we just wanted to get there throw our stuff on the floor, drop dead, and forget that this horrible omen to 1998 ever occurred.

So, we file back on to the bus, the driver turns around and says to us, "Ok now, who knows how to get to Malei Gilboa?"

Get me outa here!!!

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---

Michael Kadish

"God helps him who helps himself." Aesop. (Not the Bible!)

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