When our bus pulled up we were immediately met by four members of the Kibbutz who were going to be working with us for the next month. They are all part of an organization called Keren Kolot, which is a foundation set-up at Ketura that is in charge of the groups that come to visit and volunteer at Ketura. That evening we had an orientation with the Kibbutz Keren Kolot members and they introduced to us what our month on Ketura was going to be like. Between two and three times a week Neshama will have work days on Ketura. We are given choices such as working in the experimental orchards, date fields, guest-houses, or even the laundry.
Every person gets to sign up for what work they want to be doing the night before.
In the first week we had three work days and already everybody has worked on various jobs from cleaning the irrigation system in the date fields to painting offices on the Kibbutz. Either one or two times a week we have seminar days. These are the day we get to sleep a little later, and we have workshops and seminar sessions throughout the day. Throughout the first week we have learned about the history and life on Kibbutz Ketura. During each seminar day we also have chugim, or groups, which we split into for about an hour and a half to discuss a topic which we specifically chose that interested us.