Blood, sweat, and tears were poured into this year’s color war by all, from student council and Rabbi Ney to the captains and players. After three days of fun and exciting activities, the seniors emerged victorious.
This year’s theme was the Wizard of Oz, featuring the freshmen as the scarecrow and theme of Chochma, the sophomores as the tin man and Ahavah, the juniors as the lion and Gevurah, and the seniors as Dorothy and Medinat Yisrael.
The wild, three-day adventure started with Purim festivities, including a viewing of the fourth annual Purim shpiel, created by Hadassah Bixon (10th), Yael Sterenfeld (10th), and Avi Stein (12th), and a performance from the Peter Dinklage Band, consisting of juniors Jacob Rosmarin, Itai Beaudoin de Roca, Molly Fox-Cohen, Rina Reich, and David Gillinski.
After Color War break-out, the students headed to Skyzone for their first activities. Students split up by grade and engaged in a best-of-three dodgeball tournament, with the seniors coming in first, followed by the juniors, freshmen, and sophomores. After, the 10th and 11th grade teamed up against the other two grades in a trampoline relay race to finish off the day.
On Tuesday, the school went to TY Park, where the boys played a football tournament, while the girls participated in a volleyball tournament. The seniors trounced the freshmen and sophomores on their way to first place in football, while the juniors (led by Rena Kahn, Eden Shushan, and captain Ava Horowitz) soundly defeated the sophomores and seniors to take the volleyball championship. Coed kickball games followed, with a barbecue lunch sandwiched between the first games and the championship round. Later, the staff faced off against the seniors in a thrilling kickball game, with the seniors (led by captains Gabe Apoj and Julia Ohana) coming on top against students and faculty alike.
For the final activity of the day, students participated in Minute-To-Win-It. Between the frosting, saltine, jalapeño, and watermelon eating contests, all participants finished smeared with shaving cream, flour, and various food items.
The highlight was definitely the frosting-eating competition, which pitted freshman Abigail Gottleib, sophomore captain Noah Dobin, junior captain Caleb Katz, and senior Avraham Hilu against each other. In a feat of bravery, Abigail Gottleib downed her tub of icing before any of her older compatriots.
On the final day of color war, everybody returned refreshed for the last day’s events, including the closing ceremony. After davening, students participated in one of three human board games: Hungry Hungry Humans, Human Battleship, and Human Sorry, where participants took the place of the game pieces. The whole school then convened in the gym for tug-of-war and monster ball, where teams attempted to hurl a massive 60 pound ball over the volleyball net.
Finally, it was time for the long-awaited closing ceremony, which featured the skit, song, banner, and video. Each team had strong showings, and the victories were mostly distributed. The sophomores won the video (made by Zoe Sugar, Eden Grosz, and Brian Garcia) and banner; the juniors earned first place for the song with tyheir version of Katy Perry’s Roar; and the seniors put on the best skit, which featured Sara Fuchs as a modern-day Dorothy who was transported to an alternate version of the Hebrew Academy where Avraham Hilu won the student council election and the administration alcohol tested everybody, leaving only Jack Benveniste-Plitt at school (where he still sold chocolates). After the final tally of the scores, the seniors came out on top followed by the sophomores and juniors, with the freshmen taking fourth place.
Freshmen students and captains Brian Saka and Yael Bister were satisfied with their performance.
“I think we had so much fun, and it doesn’t matter what place we’re in because we actually played as a team for the first time in forever, and we all had a blast,” said Kayla Wolfson (9th)
I think that our main goal was to have fun and that’s what we achieved,” said Bister. “Even though we didn’t win, it’s more that we brought our grade closer together.”
Most juniors felt similarly about their finish in color war.
“I’m really happy with our team’s performance,” articulated Rena Kahn. “People expected the worst out of us, and we gave then third place. What more can you ask for? When other people try to drag you down, you drag them up.”
However, other juniors hoped for a better finish.
“I should have stayed a senior,” remarked Jack Esformes (11th).
The sophomores, championed by Noah Dobin and Yael Sterenfeld, were also happy with their second place finish, improving on their fourth-place finish last year.
“After a slow start and a lot of of misbehaving on our team, I feel that we did so much better towards the end, and our closing ceremony was great,” said sophomore captain Noah Dobin. “Overall, it was a lot of fun, we had good players on the team, and I had a lot of fun and I think our team did too.”
The senior class was ecstatic with their grand accomplishment in victory.
“It’s a huge, tremendous honor, and I’m so glad that I was able to be captain for that,” Julia Ohana related. “I was really proud of my team, and it’s really sad that this is our last year together, because I’ve seen how we’ve grown throughout the years, and color war is really a time where we all got together, and it was just a really great way to end senior year.”
Activities Director Rabbi Ney was proud of the effort that all placed into making this year’s color war.
“I’d like to thank the student council as well as Avigail Kahn who did all the artwork, as well as anyone who put their best effort into making this the most successful color war yet,” said Ney.
Student Council president Daniel Yerushalmi (12th) echoed this sentiment.
“It was a lot of hours, long, long days setting everything up,” stated Yerushalmi. “This year we wanted to do a lot more creative things; we didn’t just want to give two teams a ball and say go play a football game, we wanted to also make big board games, stuff like that. I want to thank Rabbi Ney for doing everything and just giving us our guidance and constructing the whole thing while we helped him, and I wanted to thank the administration, and I just want to thank everyone who had a good idea and a positive impact on everything in color war, because the whole thing is for that. Anyone who participated in putting a smile on anyone’s face during color war is the real MVP.”
By: Jack Benveniste-Plitt (10th Grade)
