You had me at “swinging chickens”

The day started off fairly normal, I had tefilot, breakfast, and then another day of Ulpan (with teacher Shelly, it was a little hard after missing yesterday… and I have a lot of homework….). I had been excited all week to go to Caparot, so when I got back from class that’s all I was talking about (except for the fantastic three hour nap that I took after lunch- I wasn’t really talking during that time…)!
For those of you who don’t know, and I had no idea what it was until this week, Caparot (כפרות‎, in heberw meaning atonements) is a traditional Jewish animal sacrifice that takes place on the eve of Yom Kippur. Classically, it is performed by grasping a live chicken by the shoulder blades and moving around one's head three times, symbolically transferring one's sins to the chicken. The chicken is then slaughtered and donated to the poor, preferably eaten at the pre- Yom Kippur feast.
Anyways what doesn’t sound fun about swinging a chicken over your head! I wasn’t really a fan of the whole ‘lets kill the chicken’ idea but hey I enjoy a nice chicken nugget here or there and I’m not dumb enough to think they grow off trees so I thought I would just deal. I also had the foolish idea to think that the slaughtering part wouldn’t be the first thing I saw when I walked in…. Well I guess Israel doesn’t have a P.E.T.A. because this was the most awful experience of my ENITIRE LIFE! Worse than the kotel experience on Rosh Hashana (just kidding… that was pretty bad). Let me try to explain the scene for you:
You walk in and there’s a fence inclosing the entire place so you don’t realize what you’ve got yourself into- all you hear are the violent screams of dying chickens and random chicken feet lining the street. You entire the gates and the first thing on you left is a slaughtering machine! Literally there is a guy chopping the heads off and then putting them in a machine that de-feathers and drains them of their blood. If you don’t want to barf and become a vegetarian for life then I will continue- blood was splattering everywhere, to the point where people were leaving with blood on them, and people were stepping in the blood and guts puddles (even me…). I instantly wanted to leave so I Jesse, Ally, and I all left and then went to the shekel and a half store….

So moral of the story: swinging a chicken might sound fun, but finding out where your shitzle comes from- not so much