The traumas of the expulsion from Gush Katif have not gone away, but are merely being dealt with in various ways including with psychodrama.
The girls of the Nvei Dekalim ulpanah high school - presently located in Givat Washington, near Ashdod, but hoping to relocate soon to Nitzan, home to hundreds of former Gush Katif families - spent the past year dealing with their pain by writing and performing a striking and vivid play about their experiences. A dramatic sampling of their performance can be seen on the Katif.net website by clicking here: katif.net/pirsom/banot.wmv (the file is likely to take longer than expected to open).
Entitled "Pictures of Our Lives," the show was written by the high school girls themselves, with the guidance of their drama teacher Toby Klein Greenwald of Efrat and choreographer/dance teacher Rivka Azulai of Beit El. Greenwald has past experience in directing four successful plays performed by the Raise Your Spirits Summer Stock Company.
"Pictures of Our Lives" has been performed twice in the past month in the Heichal HaTarbut Cultural Hall in Ashkelon before women-only audiences. Some 1,200 women have seen the play thus far; additional performances might occur this summer.
The play tells the story of a Gush Katif family, whose lives become increasingly more difficult and tense as the twin threats of mortar shells and expulsion become increasingly stronger. The expulsion itself is depicted in various scenes of drama and dance, and the climax is reached when the heroine of the story discovers that her fiancé was a soldier who actually took part in the expulsion of her neighbors and friends.
Director Greenwald told Arutz-7, "We first began working on various drama exercises designed to help the girls deal with their feelings about what happened and also to provide an enriching drama experience. The actual writing of the play only began about halfway into the year [a year ago]. The play gradually began to take shape, with the girls deciding who the players would be, what the scenes would be, what would be depicted - I guided them, but this was their show, written by them. It was very important that the ideas come from within them, both for artistic and psychological reasons."
Rivka Azulai, who directed the dance scenes, agreed. "Many of the ideas for the dances, and what kind of music and the like, came from the girls themselves," she said. "This was very important... It was more than just a play; I felt that it was a great privilege to be working with them, and that I was even on an important mission. For instance, when they showed me their new auditorium, one girl said wistfully, 'But you know it's not really ours...' and I told her, 'Nothing in this world is ours; it all belongs to G-d. We must understand that' - and she did..."
Perhaps the most dramatic dance scene involved a long line of "faceless" soldiers wearing masks who ultimately trampled a lone girl trying in vain to wake them up to their destruction of people's homes and lives. Other dances portray the heartfelt prayers that were so ever-present throughout and prior to the expulsion; the centrality of the beach and sea in their past lives; the people who came to live in Gush Katif in the weeks and months prior to the expulsion; and more.
"Don’t think the play transmits only despair," Azulai said, "as might be inferred from the powerful 'faceless soldiers trampling the girl' dance. The girls were full of faith, hope, and vision for the future, including the rebuilding of the Holy Temple, and they made sure this was brought out in many aspects of the play... True, they poked fun, for instance, at the social workers who came to help them after the expulsion, demanding of them, 'Where were you during the expulsion? Why didn't you help out then?' But now, they know that the question is not 'Where were you then?' but rather, 'Who are we now? What do we believe in? How will we transmit it further?'"
"When we finished," Ms. Greenwald said, "I cried the whole next day - tears of joy for their success, mixed with tears of sorrow at the overwhelming experience of watching them reenact and relive the so-difficult months that they had lived through."