Month: January 2024

I am a confirmed urbanite, and until now my only fruit picking experience was long ago at Chudleigh farms (near Toronto), where we would take the kids apple picking each autumn; always finishing with at least 10 times more apples than any normal family could ever use.

This changed last Tuesday, when I joined the ever growing cohort of urban volunteers helping to bring in the harvest in Israel. Every day there seems to be a new organization making this happen. They sponsor buses, connect with agricultural communities in need, cover insurance, and sign up urban volunteers to pitch in. From major organizations like Leket and Birthright, to synagogues, and now municipalities like the city of Tel Aviv, they try and find a fit for everyone. One enterprising organizer even came up with the idea of having a “singles only” bus. What more romantic way to meet your soul-mate than picking vegetables? Who needs Tinder anyway.

My day started at 5:30 (yes, in the morning!), with a quick coffee and a piece of toast. It was still cold and dark, so Mike gallantly walked me over to the Reich community centre where our bus was due to depart at 6:30. (And to our surprise, it more or less did.) As recommended, I wore a long sleeved shirt, long pants, “high shoes” (not to be confused with high heels), and a few extra layers; it’s cool in the morning.

We were 18 in total, ranging in age from 60-something to 80-something, heading to Moshav Ahitov, about an hour’s drive north and east. The Moshav* was established in 1951 by Iraqi and Iranian Jews, and among its claims to fame is that it supplies some 70% of Israel’s cucumbers. This seem incredible since cucumbers are a staple in the Israeli diet — and there are more than 9 million of us! Driving in, it was impossible to get a sense of how such a volume could be grown on one Moshav.

Granted the greenhouses are huge:

And there are a lot of them…. Here is an aerial view of Moshav Ahitov.

So there you go — cucumbers for a nation.

But enough about cucumbers: our mission was to pick, sort and pack grape tomatoes. This was very well suited to our cohort, which is not to say it was without effort.

First, we had to climb down from the cucumber greenhouse (pictured above) and across to the tomato greenhouse, which is when we all understood why “high shoes” were recommended. I wore boots, and I still have not been able to remove all the mud that stuck to them. Once inside the greenhouse we were on solid ground again, but since the ground was covered in bits of tomato vines and twigs, the mud on my boots expanded into a mat-like mess, extending well beyond the boots themselves. I felt like I was gradually growing roots.

We were then given a pair of rubber gloves and a box of plastic cartons, along with a short tutorial on our duties for the morning. Our job was to pick tomatoes that ranged in colour from light orange (not yet ripe) to fully red. We were to make sure that the lighter ones went into the bottom of our plastic cartons, where they would continue to ripen. Then we filled up the top few layers with perfect red ones; first because they were ripe and ready to eat, and second because they look better to the buyer. (Marketing 101.) We picked, sorted and packed as we went along. These cartons, by the way, are what you see in every grocery store, but I have never seen anyone buy a whole one; a few at a time is all anyone can afford. (And now I know why — they are very labour intensive.)

These are my first six cartons; I think I got them just about perfect if I say so myself. (And I do.)

We picked for a little over three hours, and in that time I filled 10 of those plastic cartons (including the six above). I felt a bit inadequate about this until I got home. I had purchased one of my cartons (at a token price), and I decided to weigh it. One carton weighed in at 1.2 kilos. So 10 cartons were actually 12 kilos (I am feeling better already); and that would be equivalent to 26 pounds (okay I am amazing…); and then I worked out that that is about 2,000 little tomatoes. No wonder I was so exhausted. It wasn’t just me by the way; the bus was noticeably quieter on the way back. ( And despite our best efforts re. mud removal, the floor was a mess.)

By the way, I figure if I picked 12 kilos, then collectively our group of 18 picked about 216 kilos (476 pounds) — which seems amazing, but that is how the math works out. And that is a lot of tomatoes! Kol Hakavod to the Reich Centre pickers.

We each got a row and this was mine. There were at least 10 rows running in this direction, and another set behind me.

Notice that the tomatoes grow from ankle-height to about 7 feet tall. There was a lot of stooping down and stretching up going on, and it wasn’t long before I had removed all my layers and was cursing the long sleeved shirt. It gets very hot in greenhouses…who knew?

Although the tomatoes look pristine on the vine, your hands can get very dirty if you are not wearing gloves (as my friend Amy can attest), and after a morning of picking, the rest of you doesn’t look so good either. It is not that the tomatoes are dirty; it is the vines and stems, some of which ended up in my hair. How, I don’t know.

Sooner than expected, we were finished for the morning and on our way home, many of us with one of those 1.2 kilo cartons of grape tomatoes, (about 10 times more than we would usually buy). Just like our apples so long ago.

It was a hugely rewarding experience for all of us to feel that we were doing something concrete, however modest, to help the farm sector, and by extension, the country. We all agreed we would do it again in a heartbeat. Maybe next time we’ll get to pick some of those cucumbers.

* A Moshav is a type of cooperative agricultural community consisting of individually owned farms, which operate with shared harvesting equipment, storage etc. A Kibbutz, on the other hand, is more communal; all assets are pooled, and resulting wealth and income are shared. Originally 100% agricultural, a kibbutz today may also specialize in industry or tourism.

Given “the situation”, it is not unreasonable to wonder how it is that we came back to Israel when we could have stayed in the relative safety of Toronto, or even Florida. We did not make the decision lightly, nor without some concern. As the fog of those first terrible weeks began to lift, our friends here were divided in their opinions. Some advised us to stay safe in Canada. Others felt we would be happier in Israel doing something practical, rather than sitting at home reading/watching the news and wringing our hands. In this they were right, even though the “doing something” did not materialize quite as I had imagined.

Our decision was, in many ways, due to a mix of emotions rather than reason: a feeling of solidarity with our people here, an irrational sense of guilt in having it easy when Israel was in such crisis, and a desire to make a contribution to the war effort (something my historian husband never thought we would say in our lifetime). We were also shocked at the ugliness in our home town, with mobs of pro-Hamas demonstrators breaking all kinds of hate laws with apparent impunity. (Not to mention the small matter of winter weather.) As it happened, by the time Air Canada was ready to be be flexible with our ticket, we couldn’t wait to leave. I should be clear that this did not require any special bravery on our part; by mid-November the situation on the ground was much safer, and our resilient fellow citizens were doing what they have been doing for the 75 years since the State was established; getting through yet another existential challenge.

When we got here, I knew that there would be a tremendous need for volunteers to do all kinds of work, especially helping to bring in the harvest. One of our friends pictured us gathering strawberries in the fields, and indeed I did hope I could do something along those lines. This romantic notion did not last long however. Strawberries are grown on the ground and apparently you need good knees for picking them; ladders (and balance) are needed for tree fruits; a car is needed to get to the farms; and so it went. This was not going to be so simple.

I then joined some friends who do a regular gig chopping vegetables in a professional kitchen preparing meals for soldiers. For this, I have the requisite skills. As it turned out, the kitchen was closed on the day that we went! Undeterred, I subsequently got into the kitchen’s WhatsApp group, only to find that all the volunteer spaces were booked out as far as the eye could see. They were however starting a farm harvest group…

So here is where I ended up:

This is the current home of “Eran’s Angels” a huge volunteer-run depot located in the underground parking lot of Building 1 at Tel Aviv’s Expo grounds. At one end of the lot they take in donations of both used and new items. In the pictured area, they sort the items into broad categories like childrens’ clothing (must be new), bed linens and towels (both new and used), adult clothing, toys, and so on. And from there it gets more granular. In the bedding and linens area where I usually work, the new items are destined for evacuees, and used items for soldiers in the field. Sheets, towels, blankets, pillowcases, comforters, and duvet covers are all sorted by size, then folded, packed and labeled so that orders can be filled efficiently.

Volunteers can come and go on their own schedule any time from 11:00-4:00 and there are lots of them. The first day I was there, I worked with a young woman from America who had taken three weeks vacation specifically to come over to volunteer. She is not by any means unique. There was another group of young men who were on an organized volunteer mission; and more and more groups like that show up every day. Often there are more volunteers than there is work.

There are pros and cons to working in a space like this during a war. On the one hand we are in an underground parking lot, so if there is a missile attack we are already effectively in a shelter: no need to make a mad dash to safety. On the other hand, the warning siren is also happens to be located right down there. These ear-splitting devices are designed to alert whole neighbourhoods to incoming rockets; and trust me when I say that you don’t want to be standing next to one when it goes off — which it did — the first day I was there. For our overseas volunteers, it was their first direct experience with the war, and they were very shaken up; unlike the Israelis who just kept working. And the booms of the interceptions were also louder than usual, which didn’t help.

We found out later that there was good reason that the interceptions sounded so close. They were. The rockets actually came further north than usual, as far as Hertzliya. School was just out, so the kids hit the ground just as they are trained to do. Somehow, in all the reporting on the Gaza war, most of the media neglects to mention that in addition to holding the rest of the hostages, Hamas is still firing rockets at Israel: emerging from somewhere in their 300 miles of underground tunnels where they have stored massive amounts of weaponry.

The last time I went to the Eran’s Angels depot, the oversupply of volunteers was official, and I had nothing to do. This is actually a good news story, as Jews from all over the world are now coming in droves to help out. But before them came the cowboys. Yes, cowboys! I am not sure how many of you have seen this story, but they made quite an impression here. https://www.jns.org/american-cowboys-work-the-israeli-heartland/

However, I was going to have to find somewhere else to contribute. Luckily, my local community centre (home of my yoga classes, Zumba, and 5K walking group) has come to the rescue. In coordination with the city, they have arranged for us to travel to a farm to sort and pack produce, which I am assured is a very age appropriate activity. We leave at 6:30 in the morning. The first session is next Tuesday, and I’ll let you know how it goes. To be continued…