So that's how it all started. Preparatory meetings in the Hod Hasharon offices of Ran Tzahor, the lead director. In the photo: Amos Tamam and I, and opposite us Ran and Eli Weisbert, the scriptwriter. In the meeting, we first talk about dividing up the lights (for example: When to cast Rona Ramon, who will clearly excite the audience in particular? And also: Is it more appropriate for me to portray the religious girl and the haredi woman who were chosen to light a torch, or rather the other way around?). Then we go over the text, word for word. Eli went in a very human and not pompous direction in his writing, values-based but not full of pathos, and we both connected.
And this is what the cards with the instruction text look like. The innovation this year is to forgo the phrase "With respect!" at the end of each call to light, and only say "Raise the beacon!".
Rehearsals on Mount Herzl begin. The singers and artists who were perhaps waiting for the "VIP room" - came across these tents backstage. The participants spend hours and hours here, waiting for another rehearsal and another, and then for the filmed dress rehearsal. Some have speculated that the conditions are a tribute to the era of the pioneers, the builders of the country.
This is the tent in the entire complex. The tent of the torchlighters. In the picture, Ran the director answers their questions before the dress rehearsal: What to do if they get too emotional and cry? In what tone does he think they should say "and for the glory of the State of Israel"? And of course, how many tickets for family and friends can they give out? (The answer: six). Incidentally, in the picture you can see the bus driver, Herzl Biton, in his last moments of anonymity.
Over a hundred thousand people come to Mount Herzl at this time of year, for memorials, events and ceremonies. I was surprised to discover that there are even tour guides who give tours of the graves to the public, with fascinating historical stories from the days of the underground to the present day. Pictured: In the midst of Memorial Day, while the sound and set crews are toiling away in preparation for the ceremony, guide Avichai Avraham leads a group around the mountain.
And maybe he's the real beacon lighter. Meet Micha Pink, the manager of the company responsible for the lighting itself. He used to have a mechanism that remotely lit the beacon, without the lighters actually doing anything. Today they light it, but he remotely regulates the amount of gas, which creates the lighting.
I've seen a lot of fireworks in the sky in my life, but not in such a concentrated state. That's how they wait to be lit.
Wednesday. Still Memorial Day. If we need a precise definition of the two well-known words "in a sharp transition," we get it when Rona Ramon arrives - straight from the memorial in Nahalal, where her husband Ilan and her son Asaf are buried - to Mount Herzl, to light a torch.
Want to know who Amos Tamam is? Well, two main things kept him busy behind the scenes, even minutes before going on stage - recording "Mazal Tov" videos for birthdays that he was asked to record (while making sure to have a personal version for each one!) and receiving updates from the Torah class that he missed, because of the ceremony. Here in the picture, he is reading a summary of what was learned, from one of the friends who summarized it.
The babysitter is already asking what's going on, because the ceremony is long over. Good night, Mount Herzl. Everyone has already left. It's customary to say that in the media they say "good evening" at the beginning of the newscast and then spend an hour proving to you why that's not true. The torchlight ceremony is an annual opportunity to say good evening, and to prove that it really is good, and that we too are better than we think.
• From the Facebook page of Sivan Rahav Meir
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