During my time in the movement, I have always yearned to have that last coolest t-shirt. I started by receiving my first shirt when I first went to machane in Mexico in 1992, it was “Machane Intertnuati” with Hashomer Hatzair and Hechalutz Lamerchav. The t-shirt that we got as a souvenir from machane was white with a brown silhouette of a bunch of people raising their hands in the front and the name of the machane and participating movements written in the back.
It was hard to hide the pride of wearing that shirt, I worked in the machane so hard (and I was only a chanich) that it felt like I earned it. The feeling of coolness and satisfaction of wearing that shirt are hard to explain, all I know is I wanted the next one!
As years went by and I got more and more t-shirts, I realized I started to get some compliments on some of the shirts from my collection. Some people like more the really old ones, and others the smartly designed. But they all seemed surprised by the number of items in my collection and show either distress or respect.
Wearing these t-shirts also forces me to have some unusual conversations. Unkown people recognize the semel and start up conversations with you, sometimes we end up realizing that we know somebody in common or that we knew each other many years ago.
Something similar happens in the movement of Hanoar Haoved ve Halomed (NOAL) in Israel. Some time ago I got a backpack (tik comunar) from NOAL and the same thing started to happen, some unusual people have sat with me on the train and struck up conversations in bus stops and other random places. A few weeks ago I got my hands on the newest tik comunar and I started to realize a difference that I hadn’t experienced with the t-shirts. People assume different things on me, depending on the tik comunar I carry. The first thing I started to notice was that people assumed I was a certain age, then I started to notice that when having the older bag, the young ones didn’t approach me, and when using the newer one, the young ones do (especially soldiers).
The other day, a guy and a girl stared at me mischievously for twenty minutes before they passed by, showed their NOAL bags on their backs and then came to me and struck up a conversation, investigating (of course) what shichva (age group) I am from, what I do and who I know.
Now, before I pack my bag to go away on a seminar I have to think with what kind of people I might be interested in having a conversation during my travel time, or if I want to leave the tik comunar at home and use an unidentifiable backpack, maybe or maybe not wearing a Habonim Dror t-shirt… it all depends.
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