Pamper Hampers: Cohort 6 Impact Project

The final culmination of our Diller journey was the Alumni Impact Projects. Every fellow was given the opportunity to reflect on issues that he/she saw apparent in the community and then we formed groups based on similar interests. The next step was designing a project that will help fix the problem in our Montreal community.

Our group decided to take on the issue of domestic violence by teaming with the Auberge Shalom women’s shelter. After meeting our project mentor, Joanna Kolb, who is a shelter counselor at Auberge Shalom, we came up with the idea of Pamper Hampers. We set out to make baskets filled with cleaning supplies to be given to women once they are ready to leave the shelter. Poverty is a very serious issue for women leaving the shelter and providing them cleaning supplies, in order to restart their lives in a fresh home, was something that we felt was very important. Cleaning as a basic need, and those supplies can be expensive for someone living on a fixed income. 

In order to collect items for the baskets, we had collections at Bialik High School, Herzliah High School and Hebrew Academy, and then we purchased the remaining supplies. Each hamper contained a laundry basket, toilet paper, multi-purpose spray, lysol wipes, a toilet brush, toilet cleaner, a mini duster, laundry detergent, glass cleaner, a hand towel, 2 sponges, cleaning gloves, paper towels and dish soap.

Thanks to our amazing volunteers, our excellent mentor, Joanna, our fabulous coordinator, Sarah, and to all of the alumni working on this project, we are proud to say that our event, Pamper Hampers, was a huge success!!

by Rebecca Gotteiner and Noah Adessky

Shabbaton #2: Leadership and Self-Management

Finally, the second shabbaton has arrived! This was our first big opportunity for self-management. After all the preparations the Diller teens put together, we were finally ready to experience these activities we organized. After meeting up at the Y, we loaded the bus and we were off to Camp Kinneret! On the bus, we talked, laughed, and had conversations on what we had been up to since our last workshop. Once we arrived at our destination, we quickly unloaded all our baggage and the food from the bus. We settled in our bedrooms and prepared ourselves for the most amazing shabbat of our lives!

We brought in Shabbat by lighting the candles all together. We sat together and heard an amazing poem, found by the Rituals committee, about how every soul is just like the flame of a candle. We read that just like a flame is pointing up, we too are always searching up. Following this inspiring poem, we sang the shabbat services beautifully. Then we ate a delicious Friday night dinner, also overseen by the Diller teens, specifically the Food committee. We then had an amusing and fun-filled program prepared by Buddy, Emma, and Elisheva. The program consisted of us splitting up into 3 groups and we competed in a few courses against each other. First, every group had to find a creative name for their group. Then the group had to pick a representative to do the following activities: make him/her into a Garbage Queen out of a garbage bag, toilet paper, and scotch tape and have him/her do a model walk down the hallway, (round 2 was the bathing suit competition) have a pudding eating race, and have a relay race with getting a ball on a spoon past a certain distance. Afterwards, we all went outside to get some fresh air, and played a few of our childhood games in the snow together like red rover, and cops and robbers.

When we got back, we ended the night with a Ma’agal Laila with our staff. This Ma’agal Laila consisted of us sitting in a circle with the lights shut off and our eyes closed. We were tapped on the shoulder by one of our staff and were told a sentence like “tap someone who gave you knowledge” or “tap someone who inspires you”. That person would tap someone on the head who affected them in that way. This activity was really interesting and thought-provoking because the discreet environment made people feel more comfortable to let people know how much they’ve affected them. So too, that night the people who were tapped were not only tapped on their heads, but they were tapped on their hearts as well. When someone knew what a difference they were to another person, it left them with a heartwarming feeling inside of them and gave them a good night sleep.

On Saturday morning we were awoken by our leader of the day, Leah, and we all went upstairs, leaving our smelly basement to have an extremely delicious breakfast thanks to the Food committee. Following breakfast, (which was eaten while a heated conversation about Hebrew Academy’s famous colour war took place) we had a very relaxing yoga session run by our JC, Maya, which helped us reflect on what we are thankful for and what we are proud of.

After that, we all got in our winter gear and exited into the gruelling & freezing weather. We did a leadership activity where we were each given a role of either a certain type of leader or follower and we had to work together to build a snow fort. Since all our roles were exaggerated, the only thing we did successfully were getting stuck in piles of snow and Elisheva getting hit in the face with a shovel. At that point, we went inside to continue the activity by building a house of cards instead of a snow fort, which was unsuccessful as well. We then discussed the activity and learnt about the leadership compass, where we all fell on the spectrum, whether we were a visionary, a teacher, a healer, or a warrior. We then enjoyed an amazing lunch followed by a break.

Once our break was finished, we got all geared up again and went outside to play games, which we were really excited about since the winners were promised a very cool prize! So we split into groups to play a game of hide and seek around the camp. We then went on a mini nature walk and found a field where we played an intense game of capture the flag, which resulted in Gabriella’s hat getting lost and Buddy suffering from a leg injury. We went inside and enjoyed hot chocolate while nervously waiting to find out what the prize that the winning team was going to receive. We were all hoping for Diller swag and then our JC’s revealed to us that indeed it was Diller baseball tees! But they told us that there was only 5 and not everyone would be able to get…we were immediately all struck with sadness and someone pointed out that swag is Stuff We ALL Get, and then… surprise! They had shirts for all of us!!!

Next, we ate seudah shlishit and had an activity where we learnt about the history and geography of Israel. We were split into 2 groups. We were given names of Israeli cities and we had to place them how we thought they actually are geographically. Then we were given historical Israeli events that we placed in chronological order. This was followed by a meaningful havdalhah done by the Rituals committee and we each wrote on a paper what we were proud of in the last week and what we were hoping to accomplish in the next week.  We then ate dinner and we were given the chance to design our own Diller T-shirts!!!

Later on Maya represented the Educational committee and led us in an activity where we were split into groups and we had to make a lemonade stand! Each group was given a certain amount of theoretical money and we had to buy all the supplies to make lemonade, an advertising poster and a jingle. After the allotted amount of time was up, we presented to the judges (Phil, Maya and Sarah). None of the lemonades were perfect; one was too sour, one was too warm and too sweet, and the other was too watery and cold. However, there was still a winning group; and we then discussed how each of our groups split up the responsibilities and leadership.

When we finished cleaning up, we had a very meaningful Ma’agal Laila run by our JC’s. We began in complete darkness, and one at a time we cracked our glow sticks (we struggled, but we did it) and we spoke about our roses & thorns (something good and something bad in our lives). The next part was deep questions that helped us open up and learn a lot more about each other. Before turning the lights back on, we all decided to be artsy and take creative pictures with the glow sticks. Then we cleaned up and most people stayed upstairs to watch a movie. When it got too late, we went back to the smelly basement and went to sleep.

The first thing that happened Sunday morning was obviously that we woke up and had breakfast at 8:30. Luckily, there was still lots of nutella left for us to devour. Afterwards, we had a feedback session where we pointed out the positives and negatives of the shabbaton so that in the future, our shabbatons will be so much better, which I don’t even know how that’s possible. Then came the dreaded 10:30, the moment we all wish didn’t happen; we packed up our bags and headed onto the bus to return back to the city.

                                                            By: Miriam Abadi, Leah Bessner and Matthew Stendel

Workshop 5 by Joshua Evans

Cohort 7's most recent workshop started off with a nice, “hello” as many of us did not see one another over Christmas break. This was then followed by an introduction of our Israelis. At the beginning of January, we were assigned pen pals from the Diller group in our partnership region of Be'er Sheva-B'nei Shimon. One by one each of us talked about our Israelis and what we had in common. We then in our committees presented what we had prepared, and in the process we learnt about Parsha Bo, played a game where we uncovered our fears and also we created the conspiracy that Tove Lo, the singer, may be Jewish due to her name.

Following this we learnt about the Journey of Milk and Cookies, which outlines the Diller way to plan things, as self-management is a big part of Diller. The Journey of Milk and Cookies can be briefly described in four steps: Mission, Vision, Goals and Objectives. By going through each of these steps, we learned how to plan by envisioning the big picture and zeroing in on individual tasks. We are using this technique in planning for certain parts of our upcoming shabbaton.

 We were later given the pleasure of meeting Leah Berger, from the Planning and Allocations Department at Federation CJA. Leah spoke to us about what the organization does with the considerable funds that are raised during campaign season. Staying on the same topic we were put in groups where we discussed how much money each agency of FCJA would be given if we had $1,000,000 to distribute. This brought up interesting discussions and was lots of fun. There are so many worthy organizations in our community that do great things, there was no obvious way to divide the funds. As participants in the Diller Teen Fellows, which is a recipient of some of that generous funding, this was a great learning experience, and made us very grateful for what we have been give.

Written by Joshua Evans

Has Diller Changed Me? by Matthew Steinberg

When my mom first told me about the Diller Teen Fellows program about 2 years ago, I didn't really think much of it at first. It sounded like such a huge commitment for a three-week trip to Israel that I could do with any other program. And I must admit, when the workshops first started, I wasn't very happy to be there either. It was a lot of discussions about topics that didn't really appeal to me, and A LOT of seemingly pointless icebreakers. I really was not sure that I had made the right decision by joining the program at that point, and I know some other fellows were having similar thoughts as well. However, we were told that everything would all come together in Israel, and everything we were doing would 'all make sense then'. So I decided to give Diller a little more time, and looking back on that decision now, it was definitely the right one.

I started to realize this on the first Shabbaton last October. Yamit was still our coordinator and for me, it was the first time I really got to know some of the other fellows a little better. I remember actually enjoying myself that Shabbaton both during the sessions and while talking to some of the other fellows, which definitely made me more excited about Israel and continuing with the program itself. Then, a few weeks later, we were told that Yamit would no longer be our coordinator and that they were in the process of looking for a new one. This news obviously came along with a lot of uncertainty about the remainder of the program, but once again, we all stuck with it and hoped for the best. And the best is exactly what we got when we all met Sarah and went on our 2nd Shabbaton with her a few weeks later.

From that point on, time seemed to fly by and before we knew it, the Israelis were in town for the North American Seminar and a week of home hospitality. For me, meeting the Israelis and spending time with them was definitely the most interesting and exciting part of Diller. It was amazing to see how similar these kids really were to us, despite living half way across the world and leading very different lives from ours. Looking back, I think this is what really makes Diller such a special program; they unite Jewish teens from different corners of the world over a strong set of common values and beliefs. Hosting the Israelis in our homes and spending that week with them was such an amazing experience and a lot of fun for all of us. After that, we were all so excited to come to Israel in the summer and spend an even longer period of time with them.

And then, days before we were supposed to leave in July, the bad news came. We would not be going to Israel this summer and the trip was delayed indefinitely. After all the excitement leading up to the trip, this was a pretty big let-down. Although we all for the most part understood and agreed with the decision to cancel, I think it's safe to say that we were still pretty disappointed, and understandably so. And for a 3rd time, we all had to stay positive and hope for the best in terms of getting all we had hoped to get out of Diller.

Before we knew it, December had come and we were finally on a plane to Israel, where the best is once again exactly what we got. Whoever it was that told us that everything would eventually come together in Israel at the beginning of Diller was so right. I think we realized that all the planning, all the discussions, and all the excitement that we had built up in the year and a half leading up to Israel had paid off the minute we stepped out of the Arrivals area at Ben Gurion airport, where we were greeted by the Israelis who were cheering and who were as excited to see us as we were to see them.

The first three days in Israel were a great way to start off the trip, and consisted of a good balance of fun activities and more serious discussions about different values in Judaism that were relevant to Diller and to being in Israel. We also visited Yad Vashem, which I found to be a very powerful experience, having done the March Of The Living earlier this year. On the fourth day of the trip, we travelled down to Be'er Sheva, the home of our Israeli counterparts and the place where we would be spending the next 5 nights with our host families. Once again, this for me is simply the best part of Diller, and that was definitely re-affirmed during these amazing 5 days. It was so interesting to see the similarities and the differences in an Israeli family's day-to-day life to ours, and it was really cool to experience life through their eyes with them. And of course, we all had so much fun during that week. Last but not least, after saying a sad goodbye to the Israelis, we travelled to Sde Boker for the last two days of the trip for 'Kennes' with all the other North American Dillers from around Canada and the US. Here, we had the opportunity to once again meet some new people and engage in some pretty interesting conversations with them, while also getting to hear an excellent guest speaker in Avraham Infeld, who talked a little bit about Peoplehood, and what it means to be Jewish. All in all, it turned out to be an amazing trip, and experience as a whole. It was all we had hoped for and more.

I'll end on this note: At the beginning of our very first workshop we had almost two years ago, one of our JCs told us all that Diller was going to 'change us' and that it was going to be one of the best experiences we had ever had. I also remember the exact thought that was going through my mind at that moment: it might have changed them, but it certainly won't change me. Now, I have about 20 new best friends in Israel that I will stay in touch with and try to see whenever I am back there, 18 more people that I have become very close with here in Montreal, and I can definitely say that because of Diller, I think about certain things slightly differently. I often find myself referring to the topic of a conversation I had in Diller while in the classroom, during homework, and even in everyday life, and the leadership skills and values such as Tikun Olam and the love of Israel will stay with me for the rest of my life. So, does this mean Diller has actually changed me? To what would greatly surprise my younger self, I believe so.

Written by Matthew Steinberg, Cohort 6

North American Kennes by Noah Adessky

Kennes Day 2- December 31st, 2014

Obviously with 200 North American Jews all staying at the same kibbutz, things were bound to get interesting. The second day of Kennes was no exception. We started the day with designing our own communities in our colour tribes, which consisted of a mix of Fellows from the nine North American cities represented at Kennes. There were many important factors to think of in this task, such as the layout of the town, whether it would be pluralistic or secular or religious and above all what was important for each group member. Groups were asked to choose five guiding principles to decide on what institutions would be apparent in our town centre. The great part about this activity was that every single town was completely different. The important qualities in each North American community were apparent in our ideal towns and thus they were all different as North American Jewry is different everywhere.

The next activity focused on the leadership of David Ben Gurion and everything he accomplished during his lifetime. This activity was very relevant as Sde Boker, where Kennes was held, is the burial place of the former Prime Minister.

The third activity of the day was a direct continuation of the Liat Cohen Raviv's lecture from the night before. We focused on the development and the differences of North American Jews. We looked at the biggest communities, how Jews first immigrated to America and the importance of having so many different communities in North America.

Avraham Infeld was the guest speaker of the North American Kennes. All cohorts had spent time learning about his theory of the five-legged table of Judaism. He concluded that if each Jew chooses the three legs that are most important to him/her then every Jew will be able to connect on some level as they will always have at least one thing in common. These five legs are Memory, Israel, Covenant (Brit), the Hebrew Language, and Family. He also spoke about Judaism in general. He stressed that Judaism was not a religion, but rather a peoplehood. He explained how one does not need to be religious to feel Jewish and one does not need to be Jewish to feel religious. This stresses the point that Judaism is not a religion but instead a peoplehood.

The last programming of Kennes was called Looking Kadima. We started the program with discussing what we would have to remind us if we forgot everything. We then discussed in smaller groups what the five main characteristics of North American Jewry are today. Each group chose the values and shared them with the entire group. From these 15 qualities, we had to narrow it down into five. My group actually had a lot of trouble narrowing down our values. This is because Jewry is different in each community. The conversation ranged from how each community engages with Israel, the importance of tikkun olam, the different levels of religion in North America. For example, San Francisco is more of a reform community while Miami is a very modern orthodox community. We also discussed the development of the "Judaism" movement, where people do not choose a sect of Judaism to be devoted to and rather would just be "Jewish" instead being labeled as "conservative" or "reform." In the end, I realized that while Judaism is based on the same books, the way that Judaism acts itself out in different communities is completely different.

Our last Maagal Laila focused on the end of diller. We sat outside in the dark overlooking the cliff in Sde Boker. Two questions were asked and in order to answer the question, you had to break a glow stick and hold it up. The two questions were "what would you tell your pre-diller self?" and "how do you feel about the whole diller journey?" Everyone answered each question and what was amazing to me is that everyone's answer was different. We all connected differently with Diller but everyone thought that it was an amazing journey. By the end of the answers, everyone was sitting surrounded by glow stick light. The next part of the maagal was something called "Last Will and Testaments." Before the trip, our JCs, Maxwell and Alizée, left each fellow with a gift based on a memory. These memories came from different experiences from the Diller journey. We also created a list of gifts based on Israel jokes and memories. It was a very nice way to end both our Israel and Diller journey, with laughs and revisited memories.

We ended the night with a New Year's Eve countdown overlooking the Sde Boker cliff with the other North American Diller communities. What a way to say goodbye to 2014!