Yes, I lived on a kibbutz for a number of months (not quite six, but it was a good chunk of time). Anyway, I'd read up on them before I left for traveling after graduating from high school in 1981 (yes, I'm THAT old...). Back then, there were four separate organizations of kibbutzim -- each kibbutz was "affiliated" with one or the other. I copied down the addresses of three of them before leaving (one was a religious one and I'm not Jewish).
Anyway, when I it started to get cold in Europe that Fall, I flew to Israel to begin my stay. I simply went to the closest one of the three organizations (no appointment), walked in and told them I wanted to live on a kibbutz. They interviewed me first, asked me some questions, etc. I just gave them the same BS you would on a job interview: "I've always admired the Israeli people's drive to reclaim the desert, yada, yada." And within a couple hours, I was on a bus (they paid) heading towards Kibbutz Shoval.
Shoval is located not too far from Beersheba, on the edge of the Negev Desert. I told the driver to yell when we got there, which he did, I hopped off the bus, walked up to the gate and showed them my papers. The Kibbutz resident who was the foreign volunteer coordinator showed me where I'd be living, where the central dining facility was, introduced me to my Austrian roommate, and so on.
At dinner that evening, the Danish guy, Yorck, who was the foreign volunteer in charge of assigning us our duties, told me where to go and who to meet in the morning. As foreign volunteers, we worked 6 hour days, 6 days a week. Saturday was our day off, and each month you got two extra floating days off. We'd usually sandwich them around a Saturday for a long weekend. On my weekends, I went to Jerusalem, the Red Sea for snorkeling, and so on. My job was a great one. I assisted the guy who ran the General Store, and drove a tractor that picked up and delivered the laundry.
The volunteers were a really tight-nit and partying community. We ate for free at the central dining facility, had our laundry done free, were given toiletries and work clothes and even a small stipend (which we usually spent on beer). The vols were from all over the world, about half and half on men and women. We had a group arrive from Finland at one point, and all of us guys were excited about all the Scandinavian chicks descending on the kibbutz. The young men of the kibbutz were too, and while it was fairly common for a volunteer woman to date a male kibbutznik, it was almost unheard of for a male volunteer to date a female kibbutznik. Religious differences, or frowned upon by the community -- I'm not sure.
Anyway, during the end of 1981 and beginning of 1982 while I was there, Britain's job market was in the dumps. We had a trio of Brit ladies that had been there for years. It was a very comfortable lifestyle. It was easy to sit back and "tune out" of the rest of the world, working your hours, doing some sightseeing in Israel, enjoying the warm climate. The kibbutz treated us well, even piling all of us volunteers onto a bus and taking us for weekend trips every couple months. It would be very easy to spend months, even years, there.
I think, besides the sightseeing, what I enjoyed most of my time on the kibbutz was the international community of the volunteers. We got along with each other well, and I have to admit I would love to see some of the folks again. Last summer, Yorck flew through Columbus and paid me a visit at the airport where I work. We shared memories, talked about how the area has changed so much in the two decades since our time there, and indulged in nostalgia.
So, would I recommend staying on a kibbutz for other travelers? One hundred percent, whole-heartedly. It was a central time in my growing experience...
worldwidemike
I worked with a number of Israelis at one point and they piqued my interest about visiting Israel.