Days of Miluim

Just came back (yesterday) from 3 days of reserve duty. It was the first time since I got out of the army in Aug. 2003 that I was called up. Not a bad break and I guess the Army would have caught up to me at one point or another.

Anyways, I will not go into to many details since I am not sure what I can write in an Internationally read blog. I will start with my disappointment. As I have mentioned in the (Far) past, I was in Netzach Yehuda (Nachal Charedi) in my Regular Service (Aka - "Sadir"), and when I got out there was talk about making such a unit in the reserves in order to absorb all the soldiers in the Active unit. I was put on the list of officers that will be placed in this new unit. About 6 months ago the decision was made not to create this unit, instead I was put into a General infantry unit that is under the same command as Netzach Yehuda is. Part of the reason I wanted to be in the Netzach reserve unit was so that I could be with all my friends/soldiers from the Sadir. so knowing that, that was not going to happen was a little bit disappointing.

so, after being placed in this new unit, I got a call for 3 days of Reserve duty - in what was defined to me as a commander practice. So, Monday morning I got into the car and
headed down to Tze'elim. For those of you who have not had the pleasure of being there it will suffice to say that it's south of Ofakim. I got to the base and got an idea of what it feels like to be a new kid in class. Everyone knew each other already and I was the New Guy, actually the New officer, or at least of the New officers. It was a little strange, but I will admit that these people are all really nice and I found my place amongst them quickly enough.

As for the practice it self, once again with out going into details, I will say that we got to play Paintball on Tuesday. Of course when you do it in the army it's a little different than the ones you go to in any other place, and that's because you are surrounded by a bunch of people who know what they are doing, it makes the "game" a lot more interesting, oh ya and painful - still have Battle scars from that one.
But the high light was waking up at 2:30 a.m on Wed. morning to go do a pre dawn exercise. That was a lot of "fun". After that was over we did a "Navagating Run" - given a map and points to find in defined areas (usually done in city like environments) and just as it sounds - running from on point to the next in a sort of Race. To end this day and Practice we did a "Bochan Pluga" - Platoon Test - and being the infantry soldiers that we are - it involved Running and stretchers, oh ya and shooting of course.

All in all it was not to bad although I think I got a heat stroke yesterday, and I am a little sore from all the running/walking that I did in the past 3 days.
It was also interesting to listen to the high ranking Officers and their look at the upcoming months and years, and what it means to Israel in general and to Us Miluimniks specifically (the Miluim Law - that will come into play starting next year). I was also fascinated by the number of religious people we had in our Platoon. Considering we were placed there from all over the army, and no one knows who you are when you are placed in a specific platoon, it was amusing to see that about 50% of were religious, and even more than that joined us for Minyans during the day. It is also interesting to listen to everyone speak about their life back home, unlike when I was in "Sadir" where Life was the Army, here everyone has a job/school, most of us had a wife back home, some had kids ETC. Life was on a break for 3 days, but in the age of cell phones, all that becomes all more there - like hearing someone talk to his office while in the field in the middle of no where, and seeing 15 people at night outside the tent talking to their wives and kids and so on. Miluim is an interesting experience.

Until the next time I guess, which will most likely be sooner than later.