Volunteering in Beersheva

The Atidim program was cancelled today, which was very frustrating, cuz we were actually reasonably prepared. So instead, I played chess with a small Indian child named Amir. We played five games, I won 4, he won 1, though I helped him a lot. Still, he showed dramatic improvement each game. And he's 11 and a half and extremely smart. He speaks four languages, Hindi, another Indian language, English and Hebrew. His Hebrew is better than mine, and he has lived in Israel only a year and a half. I asked what he preferred, India or Israel. He said it depended. He thought the food in India was better, and he had more friends, though the people were nicer. When I asked him what he liked about Israel, he couldn't say anything specific. He just said he liked it. I imagine that he has more of an economic future here, especially as being quadrilingual.

Of course I'm going to try to continue volunteering regularly. But I figure if I make one real connection with one of the kids at the Mercaz Klita, my mission will have been successful. So I'm going to play chess with Amir as often as I can.