Jewish Communities Kennes!

Today the baltimore cohort packed up and took a long bus ride to sde boker in the Negev. This kibbutz is where David Ben Gurion spent the latter part of his life and is actually buried. After a pretty lengthy bus ride of singing disney theme songs and playing the headsup app on our phones, we finally arrived and joined the other cohorts for opening ceremonies. We presented ourselves as the objectively most spirited cohort and made new friends from the US, Canada, and South Africa when we were assigned to our smaller color groups. Within these color groups we learned about how David Ben Gurion led Israel in its earliest years and then made connections to how we can be leaders in our own communities. Later, we listened to a guest speaker named Neil Lazarus who brought us up to speed regarding the middle eastern conflicts while entertaining us with his British humor. The twenty of us were more than excited to settle into our rooms at the end of the day and soak in all that we had learned and all of the new Diller Fellows we had met. While our first day of Kennes was exhausting, it was both fun and memorable. 

Jessica