"All that you are capable of is mixing soda into the mush," Jamus asserts. "If you come and visit me at my kibbutz, then I will show you how cooking should be done!"
"What do you mean - soda?" asks the cook in an innocent tone. "You think we don’t know that you sprinkle soda over our food?" asks Jamus. There is a rumor that soda or bromide is mixed with the food in the training camps, to damp down the sex drive of the "pupils." There was no evidence for this. But experience has taught us to believe rumors. Most rumors that spread through the army turn out to be true, though nobody knows where and how they arise.
"Of course you do that!" shouts Mundek. "Since I’ve been on this shit course I haven’t had a single hard-on."
"I don’t suppose you ever have had a hard-on," sneers the cook. "Then why did I on Yom Kippur?"
"On Yom Kippur that was the finger of God."
"Your God seems to have plenty of fingers!" Mundek’s remark is greeted with a roar of laughter. Everyone is happy to get revenge on the cook.
"Do you want me to prove that there is soda in the tea?" Jamus ventures. "Listen: the day before yesterday we were trying out the Vickers in the field. Then we noticed that it was leaking. The cooling water for the hot barrel had leaked away. Since we still had the tea from breakfast in our water bottles, we poured it in. And you know what happened?"
"What?"
"The barrel bent till it was pointing at the ground!"
The cook blinks, trying to understand the joke. He has no sense of humor. Then he twigs.
"Your brains are like blocked cesspits!" he exclaims. "Get out of here and give the others a chance!"
In the tent there is only one theme of conversation: the attack that began four days ago along the whole length of the front. Those of us who are taking part in the squad leader training course are seen as valuable human material. So we are not allowed to take part in any fighting before the end of the course.
"Only a dog would stay here and train, while fighting is going on over there!" Mundek shouts. He is one of the most popular people on