Celebrating Yom Hazikaron and Yom Hatzma'ut

We recently celebrated two holidays here in Israel that we don’t celebrate in America. The first is Yom Hazikaron, which is Israel’s Memorial Day when we remember Israel’s soldiers who fought and died for Israel. It’s very different from Memorial Day in America though. Instead of going down the shore, having barbeques and fireworks, it’s a very solemn day. The night before, when it officially starts, we went to the Kotel (Western Wall) where there was a big ceremony that everybody all over Israel watches on TV. It was very crowded so we couldn’t really see, and it was all in Hebrew so we couldn’t really understand, but I know that there were important people there making speeches. Our Israeli counselors tried to quietly translate it for us but some Israeli’s yelled at them because they were too loud, which isn’t fair because they know what is going on and we don’t! There were a lot of soldiers in the ceremony who were doing left right left stuff with their legs and everything, and it reminded us of Gadna. There were only a few Orthodox Haredi Jews, because they don’t really support the IDF because they don’t enlist. They had their kids running around screaming. The next day we had another service in all Hebrew at the cemetery next to our Kibbutz. It was interesting to see, but the fact that we couldn’t understand made it hard to be solemn. The rest of the day, everybody in Israel was very sad and quiet, stores and restaurants are closed, everything.
The next day was Yom Hatzma’ut, and it’s crazy how fast Israel’s mood changes! Yom Hatzma’ut celebrates Israel’s Independence, so it’s basically the Fourth of July but so much better! The night before, we went to Ben Yehuda Street, a big touristy yet Israeli cultural street with lots of shops and good food. There’s usually all Americans everytime we’re there, but this time there were Israeli’s, and a ton of them! The Street was packed, it was so hard to get through! Everybody had Israeli flags and were shouting and screaming. There was lots of people selling Israel pride things on the street outside of the stores. There was loud music and even a concert with a mosh pit of people! It was crazy and so much fun. We got there around 10 PM and left at 1 AM! The next day we slept late and then went to the beach, where we had a really good barbeque. Then that night there was a show on the Kibbutz that all of the Kibuutzniks and us went to, where people sang, did skits, and even danced. A group of kids from EIE performed a traditional Israeli dance and it was actually really good! I was proud of us.