“Courts and camps are the only places to learn the world in.”

– Letters to his Son, Lord Chesterfield (October 2, 1747)

Before there was a Camp Morasha, Moshava, Mesorah, Ramah or Yavneh, there was a Camp Massad. Indeed, not only were the former helmed by alumni of it, but they were patterned after it. We didn’t eat in the dining-room, but the Chadar-Ochel, didn’t swim in the lake, but in the Agam.

Difference was, the former encouraged speaking Hebrew; Massad demanded it.

I recall one color-war (excuse me, Maccabiah) our team lost the game, but received more points because our opponent exulted in English.

Speaking Hebrew in Massad was like speaking French in Quebec. If you didn’t speak it when you arrived, you soon learned it to survive.

It was a two-month, 24-hour unremitting Ulpan. Before long, you were thinking, dreaming, singing in Hebrew.

(I recall being enthralled by the poetic Hebrew folk-song Le’an Neelmu Kol Haprochim?, then being disappointed, after returning home, by the prosaic Kingston Trio-translation “Where Have all the Flowers Gone?”)

I subsequently discovered, eventually traveling to Israel, Massad was more committed to Hebrew than Israel was.

My first summer there, learning evenings in Jerusalem can be chilly, I need to buy a sweater. Entering a........

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