After dropping his writing routine for a day, Aaron has trouble picking it up again. He tries to write about Eliezer, then the strange incidents at the beach, but he feels like reality itself is slipping from his grip. That the events are so bizarre, that he can’t make them sit on the page reliably. He doesn’t back down from the challenge, goes over the pages again and again, tries to find the hidden throughline—but, as stubborn as he is, he’s getting tired. Good writing, like good sleep, needs quiet and calm, and Aaron fails to find both. 

Aaron is on the brink of despair when his sister calls, and he welcomes the distraction. During the conversation, the idea of volunteering comes up. The Expo Tel Aviv compound, she says, that only a month ago hosted technology and fashion fairs in open, humid air, now hosts the volunteering operation of Brothers in Arms. Next to it is a farmer’s market where farmers from the Otef sell their produce, picked up and delivered mostly by volunteers. 

All of this takes place not in the Expo itself, but under it in the parking lot at floor minus two, which is, as much as rockets are concerned, a safe space. It’s not just that it would be impossible to smoothly evacuate so many people in case of a rocket alarm—it’s that everyone feels calmer underground, now. 

His mom wants to go to the market to pick up some vegetables, so they travel together. The car ride is calm. Her deafness would prevent her from grasping anything he said, as she can’t see his lips, so he sits there silently while she tells him how the war is sucking the joy out of her life – not just because her beloved volunteering frameworks have closed down, but because the conversations she enjoyed having with her friends have now been conquered by the subject of war. Aside from their repetitiveness, and the painful subject itself, these discussions have a divisive element—Aaron’s father and mother, longtime lefties, wince every time close friends that they’ve known for more than fifty years call for the complete annihilation of Gaza, unconcerned with its two million inhabitants. 

They arrive at the assigned parking lot and drive to the wrong spot. Aaron patiently waits for his mother to notice, knowing that trying to notify her of the mistake would only distract her and delay her eventual discovery. There’s an analogy somewhere in there to what it’s like being a citizen under a government that was not chosen by you.

At last they find their way to the market and descend the road leading to the underground parking lot. The market is small and crowded, tended to by volunteers with matching smiles and shirts (white, with an improvised looking logo that says “Otef Market”). The vegetables are cheap, and seem significantly better than the vegetables Aaron has seen so far in Tel Aviv. His mother thinks the exact same thing. “Isn’t it great to give back?” she jokes.

They buy one pineapple each, something Aaron could never afford in ordinary days. He realizes he almost didn’t eat any vegetables during this visit, because every time he went to the shop they were too expensive and too ‘tired’. He carries his vegetables to her car, bids her farewell, and goes to find the volunteering compound. 

This part of the parking lot is well marked, with masking tape and signs pointing to the numbered stops where later in the day vehicles will arrive to pick up toys and clothes and personal hygiene products. There are two rows of pickup stations, which not long ago used to be ordinary parking spots, and behind them piles on piles of cardboard boxes, spanning dozens of meters. At the front, facing the entrance, is a DJ station, hooked up to the lot’s speakers. In it, a very young man, whom for some reason Aaron immediately dislikes, is DJing with vigor and candor. I know it’s not possible, but when I try to remember it now, it feels like all he played remixes of “He Who Believes Doesn’t Fear¹,” by Eyal Golan², all day long.

Aaron finds the registration stations where three volunteers are seated and they sign him up, give him a sticker with his name written in marker, and send him to a guy who comes across like a young manager in a tech company, with jeans and a button-down. Confidently, in English, he explains to Aaron and two others (one a middle-aged French guy and the other a huge, young American dude) the work they are expected to do. They will receive reservations³ and fill them out, finding the requested items and piling them up in the correct pickup spot. They finish the tour in a single minute, and there’s no work to do yet, so he sends them to pick up torn cardboard boxes from yesterday. They’re done quickly, and go to drink coffee and wait.

“Nice beard,” the American giant starts a conversation with Aaron.

“Thanks; it grew all by itself.” He looks at the American’s dense stubble. “Don’t you wanna grow one also?”

“I tried. A month ago I was walking around with a full-on Jewfro and a huge beard. But it was itchy, and super hot.”

“For real? Where are you from?”

“New Jersey.”

“What’s it like, over there?”

He shrugs his massive shoulders. “Smells like a factory chimney, and there’s nothing to do.”

“When did you get here?”

“A week after the war started. I was on Birthright⁴ years ago, and when friends told me they needed volunteers here, I knew it was going to be interesting. Much better than being in Jersey.”

They part at the coffee station. The place is alive with activity—volunteers come and ask ‘how’s it going’, ‘what happened yesterday after I left’, ‘you know what I think about [latest news]’. The coffee station also has tea and cookies, and an elderly Russian lady makes sure there are always disposable cups full of ice water on the table. 

Aaron makes himself coffee and meets a guy he hasn’t seen in many years. Asian facial features, with hair and skin as black as coal. Malaysian? Indonesian? Aaron never asked. 

“Hey,” Aaron starts. “Any chance you went to Yisgav high school?”

“Walla, yeah.” The guy turns as he picks up a disposable cup, thanks the Russian woman. “You too, I assume?”

“Yeah. Also, about sixteen years ago, I fell asleep on the bus on the way to the base, and you woke me up in the Tzrifin station. I was so shocked that I didn’t thank you.”

The guy smiles, embarrassed. “I don’t think it was me. I never served in Tzrifin.”

Aaron didn’t either. He took the bus there once to see a military psychiatrist, who told him that in his professional opinion Aaron could benefit from serving, but with his family history he’s going to recommend a release unless Aaron really, really wants to serve. Eighteen-year-old Aaron didn’t really, really want to serve.

Aaron doesn’t tell the guy that he’s never met anyone who even remotely resembles him, and he already recognized correctly that they studied in the same elementary school, so he changes the subject. The guy says that it’s better to volunteer than stay at home and do nothing, and Aaron agrees, though at no point did he consider doing nothing.

Finally an old and authoritative Moroccan woman calls, “Come, everybody come here. I wanna start!” and even those who don’t understand Hebrew obey. “I’m Talia, and I’m supervisor of Toys. Before we begin, I’d like to take you on a tour of my office.” She takes exactly one step back and points at a gap between two big cardboard boxes, where two pairs of scissors and a roll of masking tape are hidden. “You see, this is our greatest treasure. If somebody comes over from Food or Cleaning Appliances and asks you for tape, ask them how much they need and cut it for them. Don’t give them the whole roll because you won’t see it again. The first thing we’re going to do is sort out the boxes of toys that arrived yesterday, by age, youngest in the front and the oldest in the back. There’s going to be a section for sports stuff, and one for puzzles, and don’t separate boys and girls because it complicates things too much. Apply your own judgment. Yalla, pair up.”

Aaron finds himself paired with a pale guy, with a softness in his speech that Aaron recognizes in himself, something that happens to an Israeli after spending enough time outside of Israel. He tells Aaron that he took a break from his doctorate in Holland to come and volunteer, that it’s his last day in the Holy Land. 

“How is it over there? What do the Dutch think about all of this?”

“Look, they’re cuties, but at the end of the day they’re surrounded by antisemitism, and their opinions are very antisemitic.”

“Do you really think that’s the reason? Can’t somebody be against Israel without being antisemitic?” 

“Look, it’s a long story, but there was a time that I worked as a bartender in Australia. And I’m standing behind the bar one evening,t, a guy comes in—looks Middle Eastern, Iranian or something—and asks for an espresso. I serve him, of course I don’t care or anything, whoever comes is welcome, but then he asks me where I’m from and when I tell him he makes this face, like he’s surprised, and goes to the bathroom, like to collect himself, you know? And when he comes back he just starts yelling at me. ‘You kill babies! You kill babies!’ That was maybe ten years ago, yeah? But it’s the same story now.”

“What makes that antisemitism?”

“Come on. The Americans are wreaking havoc in Pakistan and Afghanistan, they destroyed Iraq over a rumor, and nobody starts yelling at Americans in Australia that they’re baby-killers. It’s only with us that they allow themselves to do that.”

Aaron doesn’t know if he’s right. 

A girl Aaron’s never seen before, loud and with highlighted hair, places a hand heavy with rings on his shoulder. Before he recalls the correct way to tell a stranger to get their fucking hand off him she asks in a very authoritative tone, as if she was already introduced as the event’s administrator, if he’s willing to go outside and guard the entrance. “Just go to the guard,” she says. “Tell him you’re there to switch with the other guy.”

“Sure,” he says, shrugging her hand off his shoulder. She pats him again, and one of the rings lands right on the tip of some shoulder bone, in a way that’s surprisingly painful. Before he even gets a chance to say “Ow!”  she notices his pained expressions and embraces him, holding both of his shoulders in her hands and putting her face so close to his he’d be uncomfortable even if they were first cousins. “Oh my god! I’m so so so sorry!”

Aaron forgives her, wishes the doctorate student good luck in Holland, and climbs up the road towards the guard’s stand. The guard himself is a mix between the young manager and the detective who went through Aaron’s suitcases when he got into the country. Clever, well presented, direct. Black pants, white shirt with the security firm’s logo, pistol at his hip. 

He explains Aaron’s role to him. “You sit here, so people have to pass you. Ask them where they’re going, and if they say that they’re here for the Otef Market, tell them that all of the vegetables are gone and there are only cacti left.”

In practice, everyone who enters goes to the armed guard and asks him how to get where they want to go, so Aaron just sits there with the guard and they chat between interruptions. Not far from them, in the shade, sits the DJ with some others Aaron recognizes from the day, talking and laughing. 

“The guy who was here before you,” the guard says. “They were really uncool with him. You could see that he was bummed out.”

“What happened?”

“People came to volunteer, actually set aside time to help, but there were already more volunteers than jobs. So they started yelling that they’d come from far away, that their entire morning was ruined, that it was the only day they could come. Do you get the absurdity? People wanna help, from the bottom of their hearts, but they go about it the only way they know how.” 

“Well, that’s what I came for.”

“What do you mean?”

“I was in Canada for the past year. Do you think anyone there start yelling over when and where they can help?”

“I got you. You came back because of the war?”

“Nope. Sometimes I think the war started because I came back.”

They chat some more, but Aaron realizes that he isn’t really being useful, and it’s really hot, so he tell the guard that he needs to be somewhere, leaves his post and returns to the cool underground parking lot. People are now lining up at a table with boxes of homemade food—pasta, schnitzel, beet salad. He gets in line behind the guy from Tzrifin, who tells Aaron to go ahead and take a plate and cutlery now, before there aren’t any left.

Who is being denied said plate and cutlery when he takes them, Aaron doesn’t ask. He takes what he needs and gets back in line. A girl Aaron snuck glances at the entire day, with glasses and beautiful legs she worked tirelessly, stands behind him and Tzrifin introduces them. They pile food on their plates (they ran out of schnitzel before Aaron arrived, and he realizes that if he’d spent more time guarding upstairs, there might not have been any food left at all) and go to sit in a relatively quiet spot.

The DJ returns and plays “He Who Believes” record-breakingly loud. A group of women Aaron doesn’t remember seeing before start dancing in a circle. They look happy, as if they’re celebrating this heroism, this spirit of giving, particularly when the guy with the camera gets close enough to see each of their expressions separately. They sing along, almost shouting when they reach the line “And we have the King of the World⁵”.

“This place is good for me,” Glasses says, looking down at her plate. “When I was in the army, I worked really hard and nobody appreciated it. It really gave me trauma. Here I work the best that I can, and everybody tells me how good I am. It’s really nice. I was supposed to be studying now, but it got postponed, and I’m not one of those people who’s good at staying home.”

“You’ve come here every day for the past two weeks,” Tzrifin says. “And worked like a machine. It’s super impressive.”

“Yeah,” she says and looks at the women, dancing as the camera guy walks in circles around them. “I guess.”

NEXT: Immigrants

1.  Translated roughly, the chorus goes something like – 
   He who believes doesn’t fear
   Losing his faith
   And we have the king of the world,
   And he will protect us from everybody
   ↩︎
2.  Israel’s most prominent singer, who narrowly escaped a prison sentence over multiple accusations of statutory rape of underage fans. His father did prison time for the charge, and both claimed the Eyal was unaware of the fact that his father was sleeping with fans. I think we should stop playing his songs in public. ↩︎
3.  Sic. ‘reservation’ and ‘order’ translate to the same word in Hebrew. ↩︎
4. Taglit-Birthright Israel, also known as Birthright, is a free ten-day heritage trip to Israel, Jerusalem, and the Golan Heights for young adults of Jewish heritage between the ages of 18 and 26. (from Wikipedia). This author feels obligated to note that it is, based on multiple testimonies, a total fuckfest. ↩︎
5.  God. ↩︎