Tryout for the paratroopers

So I tried out for the paratroopers on the 29th/30th of April. This was 2 days after i landed in Tel Aviv. Here's what happened:

The tryout was held on a military base near Tel Aviv. The first day was mostly "hurry up and wait" so ill just give you the highlights. I walk in around 8 am and there were somewhere around 200 17/18 year old guys sitting on rafters filling out paperwork. I started filling out paperwork too, and people kept coming until all the rafters were full and people were sitting on the floor. Im guessing by the time we got started there were 400-500 high school seniors...and me.

We all checked in by showing our summonses and our medical permission slips from our doctors and then we got split into 7 or 8 groups of 60 kids each. At some point during this time the officer in charge of the whole tryout came and described what was going to be happening over the next 2 days and then the head doctor came and told us to be honest about any illnesses we may have, especially recent ones, as kids have died of heat stroke recently doing these tryouts and just the day before us a kid got heat stroke and was taken to the hospital and the chance of surviving is only 40%.

On that happy note some of the groups got taken to get their uniforms (the tryout is done in army uniforms) and then they went to see a doctor so he could clear them to participate. my group was one of the last ones so i sat around forEVER. I spent most of the time reading Even Cow Girls Get the Blues, which is funny because what i was doing was pretty much the exact opposite of everything advocated by the book. (i just finished it yesterday by the way, thanks Todd)

After waiting around forever, we went to get our uniforms, which were all either comically large or ridiculously small, and all in pretty bad shape. We looked like little kids playing soldiers, (which reminded me of slaughter house five and "the children's crusade") though i suppose even when we get our real uniforms we'll still be little kids playing soldiers, but thats a topic for another day.

Once we were all dressed in our olive green finest, we waited to see a doctor so he could clear us to participate in the tryout. The doctor could'nt speak, i guess he had a sore throat or something, so he spoke through a younger soldier, it was like sitting with the godfather, pretty funny. It became less funny when he decided i might be jet lagged and i shouldn't participate in the tryout. I told him i flew all this way and that i felt fine and i don't get jet lagged etc. He ended up letting me go.

At this point we had to drink some more water. That doesnt sound bad right? wrong! the water drinking regimen was one of the hardest parts of the whole tryout. Each person was issued a dirty ass 3/4 liter water canister that we had to fill to the brim with rank, hot water and drink within a couple of minutes, 3 or 4 times a day. When we were done we had to hold the bottle over our head to show it was empty. This is done to prevent dehydration, which has caused a few deaths in the past. This is the army in it's polish mother best. So much over-protection it literaly makes you puke. After the water we got a "meal" consisting of 2 slices of bread, some spread, and few fruits and vegetables to share.

The meal was followed by more waiting, and then finally around dusk we went out for the 2k run, the first part of the tryout. It was done on a long trail in the field near the base, i had so much pent of energy from waiting all day i almost looked forward to the run. I did alright, i was a bit behind the first group to finish, i think i did it somewhere around 8:40. Anyways that was day one. We put our shit in a tent with like 10 people and went to sleep around 9, froze through the night, and woke up at 3 am, though im not sure anyone slept much. this is when the real fun began.

at 3:30am everyone sat together in a courtyard and our names were read, splitting us into new groups for the rest of the tryout. i was in group 1 so i didnt have to wait long, but i feel bad for the people in the last group, because they read the names until everyone who passed the first day was put into groups, and then if your name didnt get read you knew you got cut. so it was a long nerve racking wait for some people. Im not sure how many people got cut at that point, somewhere around 30 maybe.

so now i was with my new group of 30, we each got a number to tag on so the people watching us could differentiate us and then we got half a slice of cake for breakfast, drank another disgusting bottle full of water, and off we went to the field to start the actual tryout. The guy in charge of us was this overweight, mean looking, no-nense reserve officer. He got us out to the field around 5 am and started making us sprint to this poll, maybe 100 meters round trip. then we sprinted to a sand bag and had to round it and come back. we did this for about 40 or 50 minutes, i was ready to caugh up a lung and he kept saying this was a warm up and that the tryout hadnt even started yet and we should quit and stop slowing down our friends because theres 30 of us and he only needs the first 4. it was tiring and demoralizing but then it was over.

on to station number 2, where i think we did more sprints but the first 8 people each time had to do the next lap with a stretcher on their shoulders. we did that for maybe half an hour. then we did military crawls in the dirt, my mouth became one with the desert, i was spitting dust for hours. we had a couple of group exercises where they gave us some impossible mission like crossing an imaginary river with a big log of wood and a barrell and a tire, it was impossible but they just wanted to see us argue. after all this we had the circuit that really almost broke me. it was sprinting, crawling, 10 sit ups, sprint crawl, 10 push ups, sprint, crawl, 10 "down ups". we did this over and over again to the point where i was doing "girl" push ups and barely able to do those. i almost died, but then we stopped and the worst was over. then i puked, hah, then i collected myself.

After all this we had the final stage, the trek with the stretchers and water canisters and everything. we would jog behind the officer and he would start walking faster and faster through hills and dunes and when he raised his hand if the two stretchers werent right behind him he would turn around and make us walk back in the wrong direction. i carried the stretcher a good deal during this, the stretcher is weighted down with sand bags, this thing is heavy and it rips your shoulder to shreds. it was not fun. when i wasnt carrying the stretcher i was carrying this water container that had broke off of its base so you couldnt carry it on your back anymore and it was ever worse than the stretcher. this went on for maybe half an hour and then we got back to the gate, 9 am, 4 hours after it started, it was over.

After all that we did some clean up, and then i waited around for 4 hours until i had my interview, the interview went alright i think, i took a bus home, never felt sicker, got home, took off my shoes, discovered my toe nail was black, took a shower, went to sleep at 4pm, woke up at 2am to puke, went back to sleep and woke up at 8 am.

So there it is. a week later, and im almost fully recovered. my toenail is still black, my knees are scraped up a bit and my shoulders are still bruised, but all in all im fine. ill find out if i got in next week or the week after. Im not too hopeful, because not as many people quit during the tryout as usual so a lot of people made it to the interviews. But we'll see what happens. i'll keep you posted...(posted...get it?) hah.