53.5 million people in the world have cancer, including around 9,000 kids. Cancer is something that impacts you and everyone around you, whether it is visible or not. Chai Lifeline is an organization that gives kids with cancer the best life possible. They do fun things to bring joy and laughter back into the kids’ lives. Every year they take twenty kids to different places for two weeks. This year, they took the kids to Orlando and Miami. More importantly, they brought the kids to JLA. JLA had the chance to bring joy to their lives, and in exchange, Elad Maimon, the director of Chai Lifeline, came to speak to us.
Elad Maimon started volunteering 20 years ago because he is a cancer survivor and knows what it is like battling cancer. He said many people don’t have it in them to be a volunteer. Remember how I mentioned that having is something that impacts you and everyone around you? Well, some people can’t stand watching someone suffer (if you think it is only you, don’t worry, it is me too) but you can help in another way then just helping physically. You can donate or even find donors for the trips and everything else they do.
During their visit, he came to talk to us with Tomar, one of the fourteen kids on the Hope tour battling cancer, who talked about what happened when he was in Israel. Elad Maimon talked about what Chai Lifeline does to help the kids, and what activities they do. After the talk with him, we went down to the Beit Midrash and got a special performance from the highschool choir from Ramaz! It was spectacular, and the Chai Lifeline kids really got it to it, because after that, we all had a yummy lunch with an awesome performance from both Ramaz and the Chai Lifeline kids! Then, to end the day off, we had many games, but two fun ones were soccer and volleyball. It was Ramaz and Jla versus the Israelites, and let’s just say it was very intense! Both teams showed incredible skills and had a more entertaining game than the FIFA world cup in 2022!
All-in-all, this experience was one of the best I’ve had from this school, and that is saying a lot. I got to meet all different people, from New York to Israel, and got to experience what it means to have the time of your life! The Ramaz and the Chai Lifeline kids are nicest (and are the most energetic) people I have ever met, and are definitely one of my favorite memories I will take and keep for the rest of my life.
