1) Every single time anyone talks about the financial crisis, specifically the financial crisis back in the United States, I feel like a fucking refugee. I feel like the Americans in my class get sympathetic looks or even smug looks from the others whenever the subject comes up on the news we’re listening to in Hebrew. I wanna be like, “Oh yeah, cos things are just going swimmingly wherever the fuck you’re from.” Especially when we get the look from the Russians….
2) Today I finally took out the last bit of American money in my wallet. Even throughout my 4 ½ months here last time I always kept a dollar or so in my wallet. Why? I think I may have already brought it up, but I’ll explain again: the day after I got to Israel last time, I took my American money out. But then the first time I opened my wallet in Israel after that, I nearly had a heart attack. I thought, “Oh my G-d, I have no money!” Because, let’s face it, shekels look like Monopoly money. I thought I was walking around hundreds of Monopoly notes, which is great if I want to buy Boardwalk or Park Place, but is pretty worthless if I want things like food. So to quell my fears I took to putting either a 20 dollar bill or a one dollar bill in my wallet, so that when I opened it I saw green and my brain got the idea that I had money, and I wouldn’t panic.
But now that I’m a resident of Israel with all rights and responsibilities (besides the right to vote…still have to wait two months to get that right….meaning I’ll miss the elections), I feel that it is time for me to carry exclusively Israeli money when I’m in Israel. I’ve also decided to stop thinking of things in terms of exchange rates. A shekel is a shekel, it isn’t a quarter. And I’m also trying to get the hang of units of measure, like centimeters and kilometers and all that shit. And Celsius. I think that’s going to be the hardest, since shit like centimeters and kilometers and kilograms we had to learn in science class. Of course, I feel spectacularly European and pretentious when I use the metric system, but I guess that can’t be helped… I also feel like I need to call my high school science teachers and be like, “You know that irrelevant shit you taught us a couple years ago? Yeah, turns out that outside of the U.S. it actually IS relevant!”
But Celsius? We didn’t use that in high school science class. This is going to take forever to get the hang of, but here’s my understanding of Celsius so far:
0 Celsius: Warm jacket, gloves and scarf weather.
15 Celsius: Jacket weather.
40 Celsius: Underpants weather.
I think that’s a good base to start from, and hopefully my understanding of Celsius will grow. Either that or maybe come summer time I’ll die from heatstroke because I mistook an underpants-weather forecast on the news for a jacket-weather forecast.
Also, when I read the weather forecast in the news (or rather look at the picture of Israel with numbers next to cities), I feel like reading the numbers with a ridiculous British accent. Or maybe a Swedish accent. I don’t know.
3) So tomorrow (or I guess rather in the wee hours of Monday…) I’m watching the Super Bowl. Sure, doesn’t sound all that new or exciting, seeing as I’ve watched the Super Bowl every year since I’ve been alive, but what makes it exciting this year is that I’m watching it in a bomb shelter.
I don’t think I’ll ever get over the use of a bomb shelter as a social gathering place. I remember my dad said that growing up he had a bomb shelter (or maybe he just lived really close to the neighborhood bomb shelter…?) and he remembers it as this very scary place, and blahblahblah, something about the scary Russians, Cold War, blahblahblah. I know of one family that I knew growing up who had a bomb shelter. They were neighbors, they had a girl in my grade at school and a boy a year older than one of my older brothers. Their bomb shelter was this cold, scary, cement place in their backyard, and I remember on one occasion when I was about 8 or so that bitch of a girl tricked me into going into the bomb shelter, then locked me inside for about an hour or so, leaving me to scream for help and have it just echo…..urgh, it was horrible. So, as you can imagine, even growing up in a country far removed from war, I still find the idea of bomb shelters kind of creepy. And when I don’t think of them as creepy, I think of them as rare, bizarre, unnecessary relics of the Cold War.
Here, however, the bomb shelter is nicer than my bedroom back in LA.
Back on the kibbutz, there was a weekly dance party (sometimes a couple times a week) in the bomb shelter, and I even went down there for a few minutes with some friends on my last birthday. In this building, the bomb shelter is also a place of festivity. It is the nicest room in the building, with comfy chairs, a plasma TV screen (is this SERIOUSLY what the Israeli government is spending on its immigrants? I LOVE YOU, GOVERNMENT OF ISRAEL!!), ping pong tables, an exercise bike, and a bar. Granted, the bar is empty, but the fact that there is a potential alcoholic bar in. a. bomb. shelter. never ceases to amaze me.
So the bomb shelter has become, or us immigrants in this ulpan, THE place to gather to watch movies or have dance parties or do whatever. In fact, the bomb shelter is SO cool that in order to prevent things from being stolen or wrecked, the bomb shelter is kept locked and opened only for specific, planned social events.
I was talking to my mom about our bomb shelter and laughed at how we have to lock it and she, as mothers have a habit of doing, became hysterical. First of all because I said the word “bomb” and second of all because I used the word “shelter” and “locked” in the same sentence. “WELL WHAT IF THERE’S A BOMB??”
Which I guess is a valid point. I mean, G-d forbid and all that.
But if in the very unlikely event that Iran finally decides to bomb us at the same time that my ulpan is having a movie night in our bomb shelter, I can assure you that me and my classmates will have a VERY comfortable nuclear holocaust, complete with popcorn, ping pong, and cable TV.
Saturday, January 31, 2009
Thursday, January 29, 2009
“I can get you a Green Card…does that turn you on?”
I just remembered something that needed to be shared: so sometime during the war (or “operation” or whatever it was that just happened here in Israel), we were sitting in class when we heard a large number of helicopters and airplanes and whatever flying around Jerusalem. Whenever something like this used to happen back in LA or Chicago, I used to be like, “Goodness, are we at war or something? Haha…” And without thinking I totally said it here in Israel when, yes, we were indeed at war. Boy did I feel like an idiot.
So, about the job: I went in today, as I was asked…..and neither of my bosses were there are the moment, so I just sort of hung around and chatted with one of my (former, I guess) co-workers from Chile who is a very nice girl. And then the boss who told me to come in today to talk to my other boss entered the store, and immediately from the look on his face I could tell that I had done something wrong, though I didn’t know what. There was an awkward pause, then I said in Hebrew, “Is [other boss] here?”
And then in response he snapped at me as if he were just impossibly irritated and said, “No, he’s NOT here….I said CALL today.” Oh man did I feel embarrassed. Yesterday I could have sworn he said to come in tomorrow. He used the word “to enter,” “ticansi.” I remember thinking to myself, “Wow, that seems like a weird word choice, are you sure he said ‘ticansi’?” And I really thought hard and decided that that’s what he said, because I thought maybe “enter” can be like “come in” and then it’s like in English where you can be like, “Yeah, just come in tomorrow and we’ll talk.” And maybe it’s like that in Hebrew too, I don’t know, but APPARENTLY this is all irrelevant because he said ‘titkashri’ which is call. Fuck. I could have sworn he said ‘ticansi.’
So now, not only do I not understand Hebrew, but apparently I’m also deaf.
Oh man, I’m pretty sure my face was bright red, but I tried to salvage whatever amount of my dignity that I could. I tried to act like all these Israeli women I see walking around all the time in their boots and weird clothing, and their expressions that seem to say, “I don’t give a shit about what you have to say.” I said in the most confident way I could muster in the best Hebrew accent I could manage, “Fine, then I’ll call later.” And then I tried to waltz out of the room as if I had somewhere much more interesting and important to be.
Of course, I DON’T have somewhere much more interesting or important to be.
Instead I decided I’d walk down to the Old City and maybe check out the Christian sites, none of which I’ve ever seen before, or drop in for some praying at the Western Wall (which clearly I could use at the moment….). So I went towards the Kotel via the Arab market, because the Armenian Quarter isn’t all that exciting. And as I’m walking down the steps, I see this Arab guy on a cell phone. First he happily chirps, “Aywa!” (Yes.) Then a second later he yells even more happily, “Aywa!” And then completely ecstatic about something, he lets out a climactic, head-turning, “AYWA!!!!!” And then to top it off, “ALHAMDULILLAH!!!!!”
Anyway, I’m just glad SOMEONE in Jerusalem was having a good day….
So anyway, I was about to turn down the alley to the Wall, and then I thought maybe I would actually go to the Christian sites first. So I continued down the path through the Muslim Quarter, and suddenly a voice from behind me calls out in English, “It’s closed!”
I turned around and saw an Arab guy sitting in a chair a few paces back, across from the alley that gets you to the Wall. Basically every single time I’ve ever been to the Wall using this route or left the Wall using this route, there has been an Arab guy (a different one each time) sitting in that chair and yelling advice/travel advisories/directions to passing tourists. I have no idea how these men make money, the only way I can figure they can afford to do this all day is that somehow the government sponsors them. I’ve decided from now on to refer to it as the “Arab Ministry of Information.”
“What do you mean ‘It’s closed,’ what’s ‘it’?” I said to the man from the Ministry.
So apparently when the mosque is being used for prayers the route I was taking to the Stations of the Cross is closed. Whatever. So instead of doing the Jesus thang, I went down the alley to the wall, and instead of actually going down to it I stayed up on a balcony, grabbed the bars of a the railing in front of me and poked my head through for about 20 minutes.
Also, I have to say that in a sequel to what happened one time outside the Rambam’s Tomb in Tiberias, another yarmulke-wearing man who colored his speech with frequent “Baruch Hashem”s and “B’Ezrat Hashem”s tried to pick me up as I exited the Wall plaza. First he offered to take me to a bar for a drink (mind you, it was about noon at the time…), and when I politely refused he offered to take me to his apartment for drinks. So I have to ask: what is it with creepy religious men trying to pick girls up outside of religious sites?
On a final note, you know what it felt like to work? I felt like Laura Ingalls Wilder when she was teaching at the Brewster’s school, and she had to live with the Brewsters. If you’ve read the Little House series, maybe you’ll know what I’m talking about….
So, about the job: I went in today, as I was asked…..and neither of my bosses were there are the moment, so I just sort of hung around and chatted with one of my (former, I guess) co-workers from Chile who is a very nice girl. And then the boss who told me to come in today to talk to my other boss entered the store, and immediately from the look on his face I could tell that I had done something wrong, though I didn’t know what. There was an awkward pause, then I said in Hebrew, “Is [other boss] here?”
And then in response he snapped at me as if he were just impossibly irritated and said, “No, he’s NOT here….I said CALL today.” Oh man did I feel embarrassed. Yesterday I could have sworn he said to come in tomorrow. He used the word “to enter,” “ticansi.” I remember thinking to myself, “Wow, that seems like a weird word choice, are you sure he said ‘ticansi’?” And I really thought hard and decided that that’s what he said, because I thought maybe “enter” can be like “come in” and then it’s like in English where you can be like, “Yeah, just come in tomorrow and we’ll talk.” And maybe it’s like that in Hebrew too, I don’t know, but APPARENTLY this is all irrelevant because he said ‘titkashri’ which is call. Fuck. I could have sworn he said ‘ticansi.’
So now, not only do I not understand Hebrew, but apparently I’m also deaf.
Oh man, I’m pretty sure my face was bright red, but I tried to salvage whatever amount of my dignity that I could. I tried to act like all these Israeli women I see walking around all the time in their boots and weird clothing, and their expressions that seem to say, “I don’t give a shit about what you have to say.” I said in the most confident way I could muster in the best Hebrew accent I could manage, “Fine, then I’ll call later.” And then I tried to waltz out of the room as if I had somewhere much more interesting and important to be.
Of course, I DON’T have somewhere much more interesting or important to be.
Instead I decided I’d walk down to the Old City and maybe check out the Christian sites, none of which I’ve ever seen before, or drop in for some praying at the Western Wall (which clearly I could use at the moment….). So I went towards the Kotel via the Arab market, because the Armenian Quarter isn’t all that exciting. And as I’m walking down the steps, I see this Arab guy on a cell phone. First he happily chirps, “Aywa!” (Yes.) Then a second later he yells even more happily, “Aywa!” And then completely ecstatic about something, he lets out a climactic, head-turning, “AYWA!!!!!” And then to top it off, “ALHAMDULILLAH!!!!!”
Anyway, I’m just glad SOMEONE in Jerusalem was having a good day….
So anyway, I was about to turn down the alley to the Wall, and then I thought maybe I would actually go to the Christian sites first. So I continued down the path through the Muslim Quarter, and suddenly a voice from behind me calls out in English, “It’s closed!”
I turned around and saw an Arab guy sitting in a chair a few paces back, across from the alley that gets you to the Wall. Basically every single time I’ve ever been to the Wall using this route or left the Wall using this route, there has been an Arab guy (a different one each time) sitting in that chair and yelling advice/travel advisories/directions to passing tourists. I have no idea how these men make money, the only way I can figure they can afford to do this all day is that somehow the government sponsors them. I’ve decided from now on to refer to it as the “Arab Ministry of Information.”
“What do you mean ‘It’s closed,’ what’s ‘it’?” I said to the man from the Ministry.
So apparently when the mosque is being used for prayers the route I was taking to the Stations of the Cross is closed. Whatever. So instead of doing the Jesus thang, I went down the alley to the wall, and instead of actually going down to it I stayed up on a balcony, grabbed the bars of a the railing in front of me and poked my head through for about 20 minutes.
Also, I have to say that in a sequel to what happened one time outside the Rambam’s Tomb in Tiberias, another yarmulke-wearing man who colored his speech with frequent “Baruch Hashem”s and “B’Ezrat Hashem”s tried to pick me up as I exited the Wall plaza. First he offered to take me to a bar for a drink (mind you, it was about noon at the time…), and when I politely refused he offered to take me to his apartment for drinks. So I have to ask: what is it with creepy religious men trying to pick girls up outside of religious sites?
On a final note, you know what it felt like to work? I felt like Laura Ingalls Wilder when she was teaching at the Brewster’s school, and she had to live with the Brewsters. If you’ve read the Little House series, maybe you’ll know what I’m talking about….
Wednesday, January 28, 2009
Whine Whine Whine
WARNING: What follows is a shit-ton of self-pity. Don’t get annoyed with me for complaining and and pitying myself…it’s my fucking blog and if you have a problem with self-pity then you don’t have to read it.
Dear Readers:
Do any of you know of a really rich (or even moderately rich) man who would be willing to lower his standards and marry me? I’ve realized that the working world is not for me, and so my only hope is to marry a fabulously wealthy man.
That’s right, dear readers, I’m pretty sure that today was my last day of work in the t-shirt shop. Well, I’m not 100 percent sure—they told me to come in tomorrow (I’m not supposed to be working tomorrow) for a “talk.” This could be one of two things: 1) I’m getting a raise after only 2 weeks of really mediocre and borderline BAD work on my part or 2) I’m getting fired.
I’m pretty sure I ain’t gettin’ a raise.
I’m actually kind of laughing about all of this. The idea of me as a salesperson is kind of ridiculous, since I’m very afraid of strangers, honest at the wrong moments, and pretty shit at pretending to be friendly. Probably the only job worse for me than tourist t-shirt saleswoman is car saleswoman. Someone with my personality being a salesperson is almost as ridiculous as the idea of me being a lifeguard, seeing as I can barely swim.
Today someone asked me how work was, and I told them that I had multiple reasons to suspect that I’m getting fired (It’s more than just the fact that at work we’re having a “talk” tomorrow…actually, since maybe Day 3 I’ve suspected that I was going to be fired for being so shit, so I’m surprised that it’s taken them so long to actually go through with it). So of course they were trying to comfort me. I didn’t want people trying to feel bad for me, so I tried to stay positive and be like, “Well, everyone has to suck at something, and I’m just glad it’s selling t-shirts that I suck at.”
But then I realized that there’s a lot I suck at. I didn’t say it out loud to the person I was talking to, but when I got up to go to class I made a mental list: I suck at swimming, I suck at dancing, I suck at singing, I suck at speaking Hebrew (or any other language for that matter), I suck at seeing (without my really strong glasses prescription), I suck at dressing stylishly, I suck at science and math stuff, I suck at understanding how things like banks, interest, exchange rates and all that shit works, I suck at interacting with people like a normal person, I suck at eating healthy, I suck at making a decent cup of tea, I suck at having a discussion about politics or religion without getting overexcited or angry, I suck at bowling, I suck at soccer (and this breaks my heart to no end!), I suck at sewing, I suck at embroidery, I suck at drinking, I suck at drawing, I suck at every musical instrument I’ve ever tried to learn, I suck at giving blood, I suck at Judaism (if that’s even possible), I suck at setting up tents, I suck at keeping my room clean, and I suck at getting along with people. And a bunch of other stuff that I’d rather not get into right now.
So, really G-d, did you REALLY have to make me suck at selling t-shirts, too?
I’m beginning to get concerned that my life is just becoming one long, continual discovery of what I suck at. And to top it off Shabbat is coming up so now I’m like doubly depressed cos I feel like I suck at everything and then I get to spend the weekend in an abandoned building by myself moping about how I suck at everything. Great.
On the bright side, I’ve been told I’m really good at whistling……so….uh….that’s comforting, I guess.
Actually, I will share the most comforting thing I heard all day: so a friend from Brazil who is in my class was talking to me, and he was trying to comfort me. He tried to make it sound like my bosses’ fault, so he gave a weak, “Well, you know how Israelis are….” And I was like, “Well, that’s just it, they’re not Israeli, they’re from South America…Argentina, I think….”
And, oh man, did I strike a nerve. His eyes lit up and he was yelling, “I HATE Argentinians! They’re even worse than Israelis! Here, tell me something mean you want to tell them and I’ll tell you how to say it in Spanish to them!”
I kind of shrugged it off because I actually think my bosses are nice people—it’s not their fault that I suck at selling shit. So the two of us sat in silence for a minute, and then finally my friend said, “You think you suck at your job? I have a story for you….”
What followed was the most comforting story I’ve ever heard. So apparently this guy was volunteering on a kibbutz a few years ago when he was 17. He worked in the chicken house and his job was stacking eggs onto these large carts with multiple rows. So anyway, one day he was putting away a tray on the top shelf, and he was shorter at the time and couldn’t reach. His Israeli boss just sort of watched, but didn’t offer any help, so my friend just tried to finish the job on his own, because being a shy teenager he was too embarrassed to ask for help.
Well, he ended up tipping over his tray, sending tens of eggs to splatter on the floor. This would have been humiliating enough, but what followed was a spectacular chain of events. As he tried to catch the falling eggs from the tray, he ended up whacking the large cart he was loading eggs onto, completely knocking it over and shattering every single egg that was on it. And as he tried to catch the falling cart, he knocked into a neighboring cart and made a couple trays from that one fall to their death. So, all in all, in a single moment my friend ended up destroying HUNDREDS of eggs while working.
Seriously, this is something that is so spastic that I thought only I would be capable of it. And now I feel a little bit better about myself—not that I’m any more coordinated than this guy, but at least I know that there’s at least one other person in the world as spastic on the job as me…
FROM YESTERDAY:
Yeshiva Boys of the World: I seriously dislike you.
You speak like a Torah.
You speak Hebrew in Israel like you’d speak Shakespearean English in Compton.
You completely overcomplicate things. If we’re doing some stupid exercise in Hebrew where we’re filling in the blank, you need to spend five hours on each question and try to come up with the most complicated or interesting sentence that was ever uttered in Hebrew. It’s never okay to just spend a minute, pick a word and then say, “Next!”
You think everything warrants a 10 hour discussion. Everything needs to be picked apart and dissected like The Talmud. Nothing is too simple to be subjected to your analysis.
You refuse to accept something as an answer. If a girl tells you the correct answer to a Hebrew question during class, and even the teacher—a native Israeli Hebrew speaker--confirms to your face that it’s correct, your response is simply a cold, “Maybe.”
NO, you fucktard, it’s not “maybe!”
What’s so frustrating is that I noticed whenever a GUY suggested an answer, he was much more willing to accept it, but whenever me, some girl, suggested an answer, it was either “NO.” or “Maybe…” if he knew I was right.
Oh my goodness though, I almost killed this guy. Whenever he refused to accept my answers as correct, I wanted to slap him. Whenever he wanted to spew out an analytical essay on some bullshit, I wanted to grab him and shake him like a baby.
It’s going to be a long five months…
How the hell do religious Jewish women tolerate their husbands? I can barely tolerate religious guys for a couple hours during class, I can’t imagine what it would be like to have to actually LIVE with one of this asstards every day for the rest of my life. I mean, I can’t think of an easier way to completely lose faith in G-d than having to live with a former yeshiva boy.
Speaking of the religious, there are two things I’ve always wanted to do in Mea Shearim (an ultra-orthodox area in Jerusalem) :
1) Run through the streets completely naked.
2) Stroll through the streets singing Christian pop music (“Awesome G-d,” anybody?) and carrying Christian religious symbols
I’m 100% Jewish, and I am 100% NOT an atheist, but holy fuck do I dislike a large portion of religious people.
Dear Readers:
Do any of you know of a really rich (or even moderately rich) man who would be willing to lower his standards and marry me? I’ve realized that the working world is not for me, and so my only hope is to marry a fabulously wealthy man.
That’s right, dear readers, I’m pretty sure that today was my last day of work in the t-shirt shop. Well, I’m not 100 percent sure—they told me to come in tomorrow (I’m not supposed to be working tomorrow) for a “talk.” This could be one of two things: 1) I’m getting a raise after only 2 weeks of really mediocre and borderline BAD work on my part or 2) I’m getting fired.
I’m pretty sure I ain’t gettin’ a raise.
I’m actually kind of laughing about all of this. The idea of me as a salesperson is kind of ridiculous, since I’m very afraid of strangers, honest at the wrong moments, and pretty shit at pretending to be friendly. Probably the only job worse for me than tourist t-shirt saleswoman is car saleswoman. Someone with my personality being a salesperson is almost as ridiculous as the idea of me being a lifeguard, seeing as I can barely swim.
Today someone asked me how work was, and I told them that I had multiple reasons to suspect that I’m getting fired (It’s more than just the fact that at work we’re having a “talk” tomorrow…actually, since maybe Day 3 I’ve suspected that I was going to be fired for being so shit, so I’m surprised that it’s taken them so long to actually go through with it). So of course they were trying to comfort me. I didn’t want people trying to feel bad for me, so I tried to stay positive and be like, “Well, everyone has to suck at something, and I’m just glad it’s selling t-shirts that I suck at.”
But then I realized that there’s a lot I suck at. I didn’t say it out loud to the person I was talking to, but when I got up to go to class I made a mental list: I suck at swimming, I suck at dancing, I suck at singing, I suck at speaking Hebrew (or any other language for that matter), I suck at seeing (without my really strong glasses prescription), I suck at dressing stylishly, I suck at science and math stuff, I suck at understanding how things like banks, interest, exchange rates and all that shit works, I suck at interacting with people like a normal person, I suck at eating healthy, I suck at making a decent cup of tea, I suck at having a discussion about politics or religion without getting overexcited or angry, I suck at bowling, I suck at soccer (and this breaks my heart to no end!), I suck at sewing, I suck at embroidery, I suck at drinking, I suck at drawing, I suck at every musical instrument I’ve ever tried to learn, I suck at giving blood, I suck at Judaism (if that’s even possible), I suck at setting up tents, I suck at keeping my room clean, and I suck at getting along with people. And a bunch of other stuff that I’d rather not get into right now.
So, really G-d, did you REALLY have to make me suck at selling t-shirts, too?
I’m beginning to get concerned that my life is just becoming one long, continual discovery of what I suck at. And to top it off Shabbat is coming up so now I’m like doubly depressed cos I feel like I suck at everything and then I get to spend the weekend in an abandoned building by myself moping about how I suck at everything. Great.
On the bright side, I’ve been told I’m really good at whistling……so….uh….that’s comforting, I guess.
Actually, I will share the most comforting thing I heard all day: so a friend from Brazil who is in my class was talking to me, and he was trying to comfort me. He tried to make it sound like my bosses’ fault, so he gave a weak, “Well, you know how Israelis are….” And I was like, “Well, that’s just it, they’re not Israeli, they’re from South America…Argentina, I think….”
And, oh man, did I strike a nerve. His eyes lit up and he was yelling, “I HATE Argentinians! They’re even worse than Israelis! Here, tell me something mean you want to tell them and I’ll tell you how to say it in Spanish to them!”
I kind of shrugged it off because I actually think my bosses are nice people—it’s not their fault that I suck at selling shit. So the two of us sat in silence for a minute, and then finally my friend said, “You think you suck at your job? I have a story for you….”
What followed was the most comforting story I’ve ever heard. So apparently this guy was volunteering on a kibbutz a few years ago when he was 17. He worked in the chicken house and his job was stacking eggs onto these large carts with multiple rows. So anyway, one day he was putting away a tray on the top shelf, and he was shorter at the time and couldn’t reach. His Israeli boss just sort of watched, but didn’t offer any help, so my friend just tried to finish the job on his own, because being a shy teenager he was too embarrassed to ask for help.
Well, he ended up tipping over his tray, sending tens of eggs to splatter on the floor. This would have been humiliating enough, but what followed was a spectacular chain of events. As he tried to catch the falling eggs from the tray, he ended up whacking the large cart he was loading eggs onto, completely knocking it over and shattering every single egg that was on it. And as he tried to catch the falling cart, he knocked into a neighboring cart and made a couple trays from that one fall to their death. So, all in all, in a single moment my friend ended up destroying HUNDREDS of eggs while working.
Seriously, this is something that is so spastic that I thought only I would be capable of it. And now I feel a little bit better about myself—not that I’m any more coordinated than this guy, but at least I know that there’s at least one other person in the world as spastic on the job as me…
FROM YESTERDAY:
Yeshiva Boys of the World: I seriously dislike you.
You speak like a Torah.
You speak Hebrew in Israel like you’d speak Shakespearean English in Compton.
You completely overcomplicate things. If we’re doing some stupid exercise in Hebrew where we’re filling in the blank, you need to spend five hours on each question and try to come up with the most complicated or interesting sentence that was ever uttered in Hebrew. It’s never okay to just spend a minute, pick a word and then say, “Next!”
You think everything warrants a 10 hour discussion. Everything needs to be picked apart and dissected like The Talmud. Nothing is too simple to be subjected to your analysis.
You refuse to accept something as an answer. If a girl tells you the correct answer to a Hebrew question during class, and even the teacher—a native Israeli Hebrew speaker--confirms to your face that it’s correct, your response is simply a cold, “Maybe.”
NO, you fucktard, it’s not “maybe!”
What’s so frustrating is that I noticed whenever a GUY suggested an answer, he was much more willing to accept it, but whenever me, some girl, suggested an answer, it was either “NO.” or “Maybe…” if he knew I was right.
Oh my goodness though, I almost killed this guy. Whenever he refused to accept my answers as correct, I wanted to slap him. Whenever he wanted to spew out an analytical essay on some bullshit, I wanted to grab him and shake him like a baby.
It’s going to be a long five months…
How the hell do religious Jewish women tolerate their husbands? I can barely tolerate religious guys for a couple hours during class, I can’t imagine what it would be like to have to actually LIVE with one of this asstards every day for the rest of my life. I mean, I can’t think of an easier way to completely lose faith in G-d than having to live with a former yeshiva boy.
Speaking of the religious, there are two things I’ve always wanted to do in Mea Shearim (an ultra-orthodox area in Jerusalem) :
1) Run through the streets completely naked.
2) Stroll through the streets singing Christian pop music (“Awesome G-d,” anybody?) and carrying Christian religious symbols
I’m 100% Jewish, and I am 100% NOT an atheist, but holy fuck do I dislike a large portion of religious people.
Tuesday, January 27, 2009
Basically I'm retarded.
Oh fuck am I frustrated. Not frustrated enough that I wanna call it quits and pack up and go back to the US after only two weeks, but frustrated enough that it warrants a blog post. (Then again, what DOESN’T warrant a post on this blog? It seems like I talk about pretty much any minor thought that has ever crossed my mind at any point in my life, including some things I haven’t thought about since I was 5.)
Fuck, why am I so bad with this language? It’s humiliating because I’ll get on the bus carrying a newspaper in Hebrew (which isn’t too difficult for me to read), but the person sitting next to me will ask a question or something, and I’ll either a) not understand what the hell they’re asking or b) understand the question but not know the answer, and stumble helplessly through Hebrew as I attempt to explain how/why I don’t know. And the person either snaps at me with something like, “It’s a simple question!” or gives me this kind of sympathetic or embarrassing look that says that they understand I’m hopeless with the Hebrew language. And then I’m embarrassed to open the newspaper, because I’m afraid the person sitting next to me who just learned that I can’t speak Hebrew to save my life will think that I also can’t read Hebrew, and that I’m just pretending, like a little kid who picks up a book and pretends to be reading, but is in fact holding the book upside down.
Even more embarrassing is that the only bit of spoken media that I can actually understand almost word for word are children’s cartoons in Hebrew. Radio? Hopeless….maybe I’ll get the gist, but in terms of the finer points of the conversation? Nothing. Music? Nothing. TV news? Nothing. The only TV show that I could sort of understand was “HaAlufa,” and that had Hebrew subtitles, and it was also a soap opera so it was kind of easy to understand what was going on.
Instead I’m stuck watching “Winnie the Pooh” in Hebrew—and I can’t even sit back and relax as I watch it. I have to concentrate on every single word in order to understand it. So I’ll be in the TV room of my building, and me, a couple other immigrants, and a sizeable crowd of small children watch “Winnie the Pooh” or whatever else together.
On Friday at work I thought I was going to start crying. An Israeli came into the store (this is not all that common), and she was a girl about my age. I was trying to help her in Hebrew, and was doing just fine until she asked me a question that I didn’t understand. I hesitated for a moment trying to figure out what she could possibly have said, and then I figured I should ask her to repeat what she said. So she did, this time slowly and deliberately and loudly—not in a kind way that showed she was sympathetic to my language barrier or that she was patient, but in a way that suggested she was pissed off with me for being such an idiot. And I tried to catch every single word, but I still had no idea what she was saying. I felt really panicked, and I hesitated for a bit, and as I was thinking of what to say next, she snapped at me in completely exasperated Hebrew that I actually understood: “IT’S TERRIBLY EASY, WHY DON’T YOU UNDERSTAND! THIS IS NOT DIFFICULT!” At which point all words in any language completely left me, and instead I just let my face immediately turn bright red. Completely humiliated, I shuffled back behind the counter to grab my Israeli coworker to help this Israeli bitch.
The worst part is, I STILL have no idea what she was trying to ask me.
So I guess my point is that the life of an immigrant (or even the life of a long-term tourist, as I found last time I was here), is the life of people constantly telling you that something is completely simple or obvious or easy, when to you it seems impossibly confusing.
I don’t know. It’s just scary. I mean, for right now I’m not too concerned because I live in a kind of closed environment, surrounded by a crapload of other people who don’t speak Hebrew. But five months from now, I will no longer be in this building. Five months from now I’m going to be in real society, and I’m still not going to be fluent, and instead of just experiencing brief moments of being made to feel like an idiot when I’m outside of my apartment building, every single moment of my life is going to be me feeling like an idiot. And, oh fuck, I’m so scared of the army now—I don’t want to spend 2 years being the person in the unit that everyone else thinks is a retard.
There is some kind of silver lining in all this shit though: today my boss got into a huge argument on the phone with someone in Hebrew. Mind you, my boss is an immigrant. Hebrew is NOT his first language. But I was listening to him, and I was so proud to hear an immigrant holding his own in an argument. He was yelling in such fast Hebrew that I could barely keep up with the conversation, and he didn’t stop every other word for a long “ehhhhhhh” like new immigrants unfamiliar with the language often do. Minus his slight accent, he sounded just like a native Israeli.
Now, I’m not particularly close to my boss or anything (he’s a very nice old man, but I only started working there last week), but I was so proud of him and it actually made me feel really good about myself too. Sure, the subject of the argument was not exactly a happy one, but I couldn’t help but smile and think, “Wow, someday my Hebrew will be just like his!”
Unfortunately, my boss has been here for well over 20 years, maybe even 30…so it’s not all that comforting to think that maybe when I’m 40 I’ll stop sounding so goddamn retarded.
Fuck, why am I so bad with this language? It’s humiliating because I’ll get on the bus carrying a newspaper in Hebrew (which isn’t too difficult for me to read), but the person sitting next to me will ask a question or something, and I’ll either a) not understand what the hell they’re asking or b) understand the question but not know the answer, and stumble helplessly through Hebrew as I attempt to explain how/why I don’t know. And the person either snaps at me with something like, “It’s a simple question!” or gives me this kind of sympathetic or embarrassing look that says that they understand I’m hopeless with the Hebrew language. And then I’m embarrassed to open the newspaper, because I’m afraid the person sitting next to me who just learned that I can’t speak Hebrew to save my life will think that I also can’t read Hebrew, and that I’m just pretending, like a little kid who picks up a book and pretends to be reading, but is in fact holding the book upside down.
Even more embarrassing is that the only bit of spoken media that I can actually understand almost word for word are children’s cartoons in Hebrew. Radio? Hopeless….maybe I’ll get the gist, but in terms of the finer points of the conversation? Nothing. Music? Nothing. TV news? Nothing. The only TV show that I could sort of understand was “HaAlufa,” and that had Hebrew subtitles, and it was also a soap opera so it was kind of easy to understand what was going on.
Instead I’m stuck watching “Winnie the Pooh” in Hebrew—and I can’t even sit back and relax as I watch it. I have to concentrate on every single word in order to understand it. So I’ll be in the TV room of my building, and me, a couple other immigrants, and a sizeable crowd of small children watch “Winnie the Pooh” or whatever else together.
On Friday at work I thought I was going to start crying. An Israeli came into the store (this is not all that common), and she was a girl about my age. I was trying to help her in Hebrew, and was doing just fine until she asked me a question that I didn’t understand. I hesitated for a moment trying to figure out what she could possibly have said, and then I figured I should ask her to repeat what she said. So she did, this time slowly and deliberately and loudly—not in a kind way that showed she was sympathetic to my language barrier or that she was patient, but in a way that suggested she was pissed off with me for being such an idiot. And I tried to catch every single word, but I still had no idea what she was saying. I felt really panicked, and I hesitated for a bit, and as I was thinking of what to say next, she snapped at me in completely exasperated Hebrew that I actually understood: “IT’S TERRIBLY EASY, WHY DON’T YOU UNDERSTAND! THIS IS NOT DIFFICULT!” At which point all words in any language completely left me, and instead I just let my face immediately turn bright red. Completely humiliated, I shuffled back behind the counter to grab my Israeli coworker to help this Israeli bitch.
The worst part is, I STILL have no idea what she was trying to ask me.
So I guess my point is that the life of an immigrant (or even the life of a long-term tourist, as I found last time I was here), is the life of people constantly telling you that something is completely simple or obvious or easy, when to you it seems impossibly confusing.
I don’t know. It’s just scary. I mean, for right now I’m not too concerned because I live in a kind of closed environment, surrounded by a crapload of other people who don’t speak Hebrew. But five months from now, I will no longer be in this building. Five months from now I’m going to be in real society, and I’m still not going to be fluent, and instead of just experiencing brief moments of being made to feel like an idiot when I’m outside of my apartment building, every single moment of my life is going to be me feeling like an idiot. And, oh fuck, I’m so scared of the army now—I don’t want to spend 2 years being the person in the unit that everyone else thinks is a retard.
There is some kind of silver lining in all this shit though: today my boss got into a huge argument on the phone with someone in Hebrew. Mind you, my boss is an immigrant. Hebrew is NOT his first language. But I was listening to him, and I was so proud to hear an immigrant holding his own in an argument. He was yelling in such fast Hebrew that I could barely keep up with the conversation, and he didn’t stop every other word for a long “ehhhhhhh” like new immigrants unfamiliar with the language often do. Minus his slight accent, he sounded just like a native Israeli.
Now, I’m not particularly close to my boss or anything (he’s a very nice old man, but I only started working there last week), but I was so proud of him and it actually made me feel really good about myself too. Sure, the subject of the argument was not exactly a happy one, but I couldn’t help but smile and think, “Wow, someday my Hebrew will be just like his!”
Unfortunately, my boss has been here for well over 20 years, maybe even 30…so it’s not all that comforting to think that maybe when I’m 40 I’ll stop sounding so goddamn retarded.
Sunday, January 25, 2009
Also, so a couple nights ago I was sitting with a couple orthodox girls and we were discussing what we would like in a guy. And I've decided that what I'm looking for is a man who really likes the concept of Brigadoon. Basically, I'd like to marry a Steve Irwin-type, you know, so courageous that it borders on the verge of idiocy, but at the same time REALLY likes the idea of Brigadoon. If you know of any such people, please send them my way. Thanks in advance.
Rambling
I’m listening to “The Final Countdown” right now. Basically if my brother and I had a song, this would be it. When I was a junior in high school and he was a senior, every single day after school as we drove home we’d roll down the windows and put “The Final Countdown” on as high as it would go. On our last day of school that we’d ever have together, his senior year, the two of us sang an impromptu a cappella version of it in the student center…. Oh man. Nostalgia sucks. You know what though? Given enough time I’ll eventually have lots of nostalgia for things that happened in Israel.
Actually, it’s already starting to happen. For example, when I turned back on my Israeli cell phone for the first time in 4 months, I found that I had a song on it that one guy on the kibbutz would always play. I think it’s called One Sign or something by Galleon…. Anyway, not only was it this guy’s ringtone, but he’d also walk around the kibbutz blasting the song from his phone. And he’d just strut around like he was about to go to a club. He was totally serious, but I thought it was the funniest thing I’ve ever seen, especially since I would see it at least twice a day—like not even with a different song. Same song, same guy. So now whenever I hear that song I think back on the things at the kibbutz that were funny and heartwarming or whatever. No, it’s not quite the same as memories of brothers or family or whatever, but it’s fond nostalgia all the same.
I think years from now I’ll hear songs from Grease and I’ll think of my current roommate singing completely incorrect pseudo-English lyrics to “Summer Lovin’” as she never tires of doing right now, and I won’t be able to stop smiling.
Okay, my big problem of the moment? Europeans and South Americans. Oh. My. G-d. Please stop touching me. I had the same problem on the kibbutz, but now I’m going through it all over again. Seriously, you do not need to hug me and do the MWAH MWAH cheek kiss thing just because we haven’t seen each other all day. If you want to do that after I’ve been stranded on an island for 10 years and suddenly see you again after being rescued….okay, maybe we can work something out in that case, I’m totally flexible. But on a day-to-day basis I don’t need to be hugged and touched and whatevered by people. Also, I’m having a lot of problems adjusting to how close certain people from certain cultures get when they’re talking to you. Certain people feel like they have to get close enough that they could whisper a secret, when really they’re just talking about what they did today or asking a question about how my day was.
Also, I gotta say that I’m really thankful I’m a lone immigrant. I know that sounds weird, especially since on this blog you’ll never cease to “hear” me complain about how lonely things like Shabbat are for people like me…..but living in this absorption center here and being surrounded by a lot of immigrant families, I’m so glad I’m doing this on my own. All I have to worry about is getting ME around a foreign country. I don’t have to worry about my children adapting and getting them around and dealing with all their shit on top of my shit. All I have to worry about here is if I am happy, not if my husband or one of my children is unhappy. If I want to stay, I can stay, and if I want to go I can go, and I don’t have to worry bout where anyone else wants to be.
Weird Work Story? So today a woman comes in and starts trying to get things accomplished in Hebrew. I can tell from her accent that she’s English, but because I know how hurt I get when people answer to me in English after I worked up the courage to speak Hebrew, I stuck to Hebrew. So after a couple basic sentences, the woman switches into English, and I follow her into English. She initially looks surprised, but we continue our conversation…. So we’re talking to each other in English for maybe 5 minutes, and at the end as she’s walking out she stops and turns around. And she asks in her cute little English accent, “I must ask, are you from England as well?”
WHAT? WHAT???? I mean, it’d be different if a Canadian asked me if I was also from Canada, because we have similar accents. But an English person asking me??? EXCUSE ME?? Do you not hear my nasal, harsh American accent? Do you not hear how I actually pronounce my R’s, instead of pretending that they don’t exist like you folks do?
I figured that if I told her that I lived my entire life, all my 20 years (except for four months in Israel), in the United States, she might get embarrassed that she had done such a horrific job of placing my accent. So instead I said, “Well, I was BORN in the United States….” Which, if you ask me, is slightly ambiguous. Sure, it’s a totally true statement, but the emphasis I placed within it suggested a lie. By placing the emphasis on “born” I somehow suggested that I had roots in the United States, so I was not in fact English, but the emphasis also suggested that I had lived most of my life elsewhere, making her mistaken accent placement an easy mistake to make. It did NOT suggest, however, that I had made aliyah all of two weeks ago.
Of course, I have NOT lived most of my life elsewhere, so I’m not sure why this woman thinks my accent is anything less than American…
I seriously don’t understand these Americans who think I’m an Israeli who doesn’t speak much English, or now these English people who think I’m one of them (G-d forbid!). Or even more bizarre was a French friend from the kibbutz who, during the first few months of our knowing each other, was absolutely convinced that I was pure German from Germany. See, I think I look, sound and act American. I don’t think there is anything about me that is un-American even in the slightest, except maybe for the fact that I no longer live in the US (but I think the concept of immigration and learning to deal in a foreign society is an important concept in the history of the US).
I remember I was on a school trip in France in high school, and a bunch of us Americans were sitting around deciding which ethnicity everyone looked. It was like, “Oh, so-and-so, you totally look Greek!” or “You DEFINITELY look French, so-and-so.” I guess that’s the special thing about being from a place like the US, where everyone is the descendant of immigrants and everyone’s kind of a mutt, so you get to try to place where everyone’s from. Maybe it’s the same in Israel too since it’s an immigrant society. Anyway, my turn came and I eagerly awaited to hear which nationality I looked. And what was the unanimous response from the group?
“American.”
“Oh yeah, definitely American.”
“Yeah, I agree, American.”
So you can imagine that I find it extremely confusing when people don’t immediately recognize me as American.
Anyway, the best part of this story from work was that I even told it to my roommate and her response was the French equivalent of, “How the hell could anyone think YOU are English???”
My roommate continued, “Are you sad about it? It’s not good for Americans to be called English, eh? Don’t worry about it, she drank, she drank. She was drunk, it’s not a big deal.”
Actually, it’s already starting to happen. For example, when I turned back on my Israeli cell phone for the first time in 4 months, I found that I had a song on it that one guy on the kibbutz would always play. I think it’s called One Sign or something by Galleon…. Anyway, not only was it this guy’s ringtone, but he’d also walk around the kibbutz blasting the song from his phone. And he’d just strut around like he was about to go to a club. He was totally serious, but I thought it was the funniest thing I’ve ever seen, especially since I would see it at least twice a day—like not even with a different song. Same song, same guy. So now whenever I hear that song I think back on the things at the kibbutz that were funny and heartwarming or whatever. No, it’s not quite the same as memories of brothers or family or whatever, but it’s fond nostalgia all the same.
I think years from now I’ll hear songs from Grease and I’ll think of my current roommate singing completely incorrect pseudo-English lyrics to “Summer Lovin’” as she never tires of doing right now, and I won’t be able to stop smiling.
Okay, my big problem of the moment? Europeans and South Americans. Oh. My. G-d. Please stop touching me. I had the same problem on the kibbutz, but now I’m going through it all over again. Seriously, you do not need to hug me and do the MWAH MWAH cheek kiss thing just because we haven’t seen each other all day. If you want to do that after I’ve been stranded on an island for 10 years and suddenly see you again after being rescued….okay, maybe we can work something out in that case, I’m totally flexible. But on a day-to-day basis I don’t need to be hugged and touched and whatevered by people. Also, I’m having a lot of problems adjusting to how close certain people from certain cultures get when they’re talking to you. Certain people feel like they have to get close enough that they could whisper a secret, when really they’re just talking about what they did today or asking a question about how my day was.
Also, I gotta say that I’m really thankful I’m a lone immigrant. I know that sounds weird, especially since on this blog you’ll never cease to “hear” me complain about how lonely things like Shabbat are for people like me…..but living in this absorption center here and being surrounded by a lot of immigrant families, I’m so glad I’m doing this on my own. All I have to worry about is getting ME around a foreign country. I don’t have to worry about my children adapting and getting them around and dealing with all their shit on top of my shit. All I have to worry about here is if I am happy, not if my husband or one of my children is unhappy. If I want to stay, I can stay, and if I want to go I can go, and I don’t have to worry bout where anyone else wants to be.
Weird Work Story? So today a woman comes in and starts trying to get things accomplished in Hebrew. I can tell from her accent that she’s English, but because I know how hurt I get when people answer to me in English after I worked up the courage to speak Hebrew, I stuck to Hebrew. So after a couple basic sentences, the woman switches into English, and I follow her into English. She initially looks surprised, but we continue our conversation…. So we’re talking to each other in English for maybe 5 minutes, and at the end as she’s walking out she stops and turns around. And she asks in her cute little English accent, “I must ask, are you from England as well?”
WHAT? WHAT???? I mean, it’d be different if a Canadian asked me if I was also from Canada, because we have similar accents. But an English person asking me??? EXCUSE ME?? Do you not hear my nasal, harsh American accent? Do you not hear how I actually pronounce my R’s, instead of pretending that they don’t exist like you folks do?
I figured that if I told her that I lived my entire life, all my 20 years (except for four months in Israel), in the United States, she might get embarrassed that she had done such a horrific job of placing my accent. So instead I said, “Well, I was BORN in the United States….” Which, if you ask me, is slightly ambiguous. Sure, it’s a totally true statement, but the emphasis I placed within it suggested a lie. By placing the emphasis on “born” I somehow suggested that I had roots in the United States, so I was not in fact English, but the emphasis also suggested that I had lived most of my life elsewhere, making her mistaken accent placement an easy mistake to make. It did NOT suggest, however, that I had made aliyah all of two weeks ago.
Of course, I have NOT lived most of my life elsewhere, so I’m not sure why this woman thinks my accent is anything less than American…
I seriously don’t understand these Americans who think I’m an Israeli who doesn’t speak much English, or now these English people who think I’m one of them (G-d forbid!). Or even more bizarre was a French friend from the kibbutz who, during the first few months of our knowing each other, was absolutely convinced that I was pure German from Germany. See, I think I look, sound and act American. I don’t think there is anything about me that is un-American even in the slightest, except maybe for the fact that I no longer live in the US (but I think the concept of immigration and learning to deal in a foreign society is an important concept in the history of the US).
I remember I was on a school trip in France in high school, and a bunch of us Americans were sitting around deciding which ethnicity everyone looked. It was like, “Oh, so-and-so, you totally look Greek!” or “You DEFINITELY look French, so-and-so.” I guess that’s the special thing about being from a place like the US, where everyone is the descendant of immigrants and everyone’s kind of a mutt, so you get to try to place where everyone’s from. Maybe it’s the same in Israel too since it’s an immigrant society. Anyway, my turn came and I eagerly awaited to hear which nationality I looked. And what was the unanimous response from the group?
“American.”
“Oh yeah, definitely American.”
“Yeah, I agree, American.”
So you can imagine that I find it extremely confusing when people don’t immediately recognize me as American.
Anyway, the best part of this story from work was that I even told it to my roommate and her response was the French equivalent of, “How the hell could anyone think YOU are English???”
My roommate continued, “Are you sad about it? It’s not good for Americans to be called English, eh? Don’t worry about it, she drank, she drank. She was drunk, it’s not a big deal.”
Friday, January 23, 2009
Soundtrack of My Life
First of all, I’m thinking of starting a celebrity gossip blog where I just blatantly make shit up about celebrities.
Second: I have the room to myself this weekend. I’m thinking of taking this opportunity to learn the dance to the “Thriller” music video. Any support?
Third: Okay, the whole “Chariots of Fire” life soundtrack thing just goes to show you that my life is boring. I need to spice things up. My life needs a soundtrack and I’ve decided that I’m actually going to make one.
With the help of John Williams and others, I’m going to come up with a complete list of songs I need for the day, and when I’m done I’ll make a playlist and wear headphones all day. This list is mostly for my benefit, as I don’t expect any reader to be familiar with every single song off the top of his head….although feel free to youtube these songs if you wanna know what my life sounds like.
Waking up in the morning/turning on the water heater: The Star Wars Theme.
Eating breakfast/reflecting on my life at the same time: “What a Wonderful World” by that fat Hawaiian dude
Walking from my apartment to the bus stop: Zip-A-Dee-Doo-Dah
Riding the bus to my job in the tourist shop: Indiana Jones Theme. (hey, I’m coming from East Jerusalem, that’s pretty exotic and Indiana Jones-worthy)
Walking from the bus stop to work, down Ben Yehuda Street: The Jurassic Park Theme
Whenever this person I dislike comes near me at work: The Jaws Theme.
Sitting by myself during Shabbat while everyone else on the planet is with their family: “Somewhere in My Memory” from Home Alone.
Whenever I sneakily throw the trash from my apartment into the trashcans in the lobby of this building instead of into the dumpster (which is farther away) like I’m supposed to: The James Bond Theme.
Any time my roommate says something extremely American like “hamburger” or “cool” in a French accent: “Ces soirees-la” from Jersey Boys.
Whenever I walk by the Lishkat Giyus (Army Enlistment Center) and I see hundreds of Haredi men standing outside trying to get exemptions: “Tradition” from Fiddler on the Roof.
Whenever I hear my roommate having an emotional conversation on the phone with her boyfriend: “Sometimes When We Touch” by Dan Hill
Whenever the boys at work are nice to me: “Consider Yourself” from Oliver!
Immediately after successfully selling a t-shirt: the last minute or so of “I Believe I Can Fly” by R. Kelly
Whenever I get really bored during work and start dancing to the radio music: “SexyBack.”
Immediately after dealing with Israeli government bureaucracy successfully: the last minute or so of “You Raise Me Up” by Josh Groban
Whenever orthodox families come into the store with their million children and try to order a million things at once: a techno remix of that Moshiach song.
Whenever I walk up the hill to the beautiful look-out point near my apartment, where you can see all of Jerusalem: “Jerusalem of Gold” sung by Ofra Haza
Whenever I have a nostalgic, sad, whatever moment: “Catch the Wind” by Donovan or “Edelweiss” from the Sound of Music
Whenever I come to eat in the dining hall and I realize that I don’t know anyone else in the room and I feel like a total weirdo: “The Phantom of the Opera”
Whenever I wind down and sit around in the evenings doing sudoku in bed: “Ketchy Shuby” by Peter Tosh
Whenever I turn off the lights for the night and let orange glow of Jerusalem come into my room as I say prayers and drift off to sleep: “When You Wish Upon a Star”
Whenever I feel that I can’t understand anything someone is saying to me in Hebrew: the Welsh national anthem.
Any time I have a moment where I feel like I’m actually fitting into this country?
“Brigadoon” from Brigadoon…..because we all know moments like that are as rare as Brigadoon coming out of the mists.
Second: I have the room to myself this weekend. I’m thinking of taking this opportunity to learn the dance to the “Thriller” music video. Any support?
Third: Okay, the whole “Chariots of Fire” life soundtrack thing just goes to show you that my life is boring. I need to spice things up. My life needs a soundtrack and I’ve decided that I’m actually going to make one.
With the help of John Williams and others, I’m going to come up with a complete list of songs I need for the day, and when I’m done I’ll make a playlist and wear headphones all day. This list is mostly for my benefit, as I don’t expect any reader to be familiar with every single song off the top of his head….although feel free to youtube these songs if you wanna know what my life sounds like.
Waking up in the morning/turning on the water heater: The Star Wars Theme.
Eating breakfast/reflecting on my life at the same time: “What a Wonderful World” by that fat Hawaiian dude
Walking from my apartment to the bus stop: Zip-A-Dee-Doo-Dah
Riding the bus to my job in the tourist shop: Indiana Jones Theme. (hey, I’m coming from East Jerusalem, that’s pretty exotic and Indiana Jones-worthy)
Walking from the bus stop to work, down Ben Yehuda Street: The Jurassic Park Theme
Whenever this person I dislike comes near me at work: The Jaws Theme.
Sitting by myself during Shabbat while everyone else on the planet is with their family: “Somewhere in My Memory” from Home Alone.
Whenever I sneakily throw the trash from my apartment into the trashcans in the lobby of this building instead of into the dumpster (which is farther away) like I’m supposed to: The James Bond Theme.
Any time my roommate says something extremely American like “hamburger” or “cool” in a French accent: “Ces soirees-la” from Jersey Boys.
Whenever I walk by the Lishkat Giyus (Army Enlistment Center) and I see hundreds of Haredi men standing outside trying to get exemptions: “Tradition” from Fiddler on the Roof.
Whenever I hear my roommate having an emotional conversation on the phone with her boyfriend: “Sometimes When We Touch” by Dan Hill
Whenever the boys at work are nice to me: “Consider Yourself” from Oliver!
Immediately after successfully selling a t-shirt: the last minute or so of “I Believe I Can Fly” by R. Kelly
Whenever I get really bored during work and start dancing to the radio music: “SexyBack.”
Immediately after dealing with Israeli government bureaucracy successfully: the last minute or so of “You Raise Me Up” by Josh Groban
Whenever orthodox families come into the store with their million children and try to order a million things at once: a techno remix of that Moshiach song.
Whenever I walk up the hill to the beautiful look-out point near my apartment, where you can see all of Jerusalem: “Jerusalem of Gold” sung by Ofra Haza
Whenever I have a nostalgic, sad, whatever moment: “Catch the Wind” by Donovan or “Edelweiss” from the Sound of Music
Whenever I come to eat in the dining hall and I realize that I don’t know anyone else in the room and I feel like a total weirdo: “The Phantom of the Opera”
Whenever I wind down and sit around in the evenings doing sudoku in bed: “Ketchy Shuby” by Peter Tosh
Whenever I turn off the lights for the night and let orange glow of Jerusalem come into my room as I say prayers and drift off to sleep: “When You Wish Upon a Star”
Whenever I feel that I can’t understand anything someone is saying to me in Hebrew: the Welsh national anthem.
Any time I have a moment where I feel like I’m actually fitting into this country?
“Brigadoon” from Brigadoon…..because we all know moments like that are as rare as Brigadoon coming out of the mists.
Thursday, January 22, 2009
Haggling
Oh man. Having Americans turn to me and ask "Camah zeh?" never gets old. And then I tell them in my perfect English just how much that thing costs. And despite hearing my perfect American accent, they then ask, "And zeh?" or "And does this scarf come in 'yarok?' "
One woman was talking to me in English and turned to her husband in the middle of her sentence and asked, "How do you say 'pink' in Hebrew???" As if I wouldn't understand unless she told me in Hebrew.
I also realized that my fellow Americans have no concept of how and when it's appropriate to haggle. Here's some guidelines:
1) Israel is a modern country, not some crapass middle eastern village from the 19th century.
2) If you're in an actual store, and not a cart or some crowded bazaar or marketplace--don't even try to haggle. It's the equivalent of walking into GAP in LA and demanding a better price on your khaki pants.
3) If you're gonna be an idiot and try to haggle anyway, haggling doesn't consist of whining and saying, "But I don't want to pay that muuuuuch....."
4) Haggling is not whipping out a wallet full of credit cards and ATM cards and shekels and dollars, and then telling the guy at the counter that you only want to pay X-amount because you only have X amount----especially when the store you're at is literally 10 yards away from the central branch of a large international bank that allows you to withdraw money from pretty much any account you could possibly have.
5) And when haggling, don't turn to your friend/partner/husband or whatever and discuss how to go about haggling in English as if we can't understand. I'm American, I understand English perfectly, and the Israelis/South Americans I work with are pretty much fluent as well. On top of that, we were just helping you pick out shirts a couple seconds ago in ENGLISH, so you know damn well that we speak English. You just look like an idiot.
6) Only a total douche would haggle over what is essentially not even a full dollar price difference. Just pay the fucking extra dollar and help support Israeli businesses, you Hamas-supporting douche.
And finally, 7) In general, if you're American.....just don't even try to haggle because we suck at it.
One woman was talking to me in English and turned to her husband in the middle of her sentence and asked, "How do you say 'pink' in Hebrew???" As if I wouldn't understand unless she told me in Hebrew.
I also realized that my fellow Americans have no concept of how and when it's appropriate to haggle. Here's some guidelines:
1) Israel is a modern country, not some crapass middle eastern village from the 19th century.
2) If you're in an actual store, and not a cart or some crowded bazaar or marketplace--don't even try to haggle. It's the equivalent of walking into GAP in LA and demanding a better price on your khaki pants.
3) If you're gonna be an idiot and try to haggle anyway, haggling doesn't consist of whining and saying, "But I don't want to pay that muuuuuch....."
4) Haggling is not whipping out a wallet full of credit cards and ATM cards and shekels and dollars, and then telling the guy at the counter that you only want to pay X-amount because you only have X amount----especially when the store you're at is literally 10 yards away from the central branch of a large international bank that allows you to withdraw money from pretty much any account you could possibly have.
5) And when haggling, don't turn to your friend/partner/husband or whatever and discuss how to go about haggling in English as if we can't understand. I'm American, I understand English perfectly, and the Israelis/South Americans I work with are pretty much fluent as well. On top of that, we were just helping you pick out shirts a couple seconds ago in ENGLISH, so you know damn well that we speak English. You just look like an idiot.
6) Only a total douche would haggle over what is essentially not even a full dollar price difference. Just pay the fucking extra dollar and help support Israeli businesses, you Hamas-supporting douche.
And finally, 7) In general, if you're American.....just don't even try to haggle because we suck at it.
Wednesday, January 21, 2009
Oh fuck I'm awkward.
First of all, I think I've made it abundantly clear on this blog that I'm an introvert. Social situations involving more than three people besides myself are not my cup of tea. And social situations that involve actually interacting with strangers instead of observing them with interest from a distance are pure hell for me.
So tonight it was someone's birthday, so like 50 of us went to this bar in Jerusalem. Oh man. I seriously don't have words for how awkward I am--and I have words for everything. And if there's not a word for something, then I make one up.
Sometimes I don't feel weird because I'm an American in Israel, or a Jew in America, or whatever....sometimes I just feel foreign because apparently I come from the Planet Sam. Every single day of my life I become more convinced that I am foreign to this world, and that my brain (for the worse!) does not function in the same way as everyone else's, and that how I feel about things is strange in comparison to how everyone else on Planet Earth feels.
I have yet to meet someone else from the Planet Sam. Someone whose idea of a good time is NOT standing around in a dark bar, music blasting, surrounded by strangers and everyone trying to catch everyone else's eye......but whose idea of a good time is something like going for a leisurely walk or a drive with one or two people as they chat about their childhood or rant about something or laugh about something. And if we MUST go to a bar, it'll only be to watch soccer and to yell at the players on TV.
I wish that were the only symptom of being from the Planet Sam, but I'm sorry to say that it gets worse. I think I need a lobotomy or something, or shock therapy or something to stop being such a weirdo.
So, dear readers, if you happen to know someone who also comes from the Planet Sam and who happens to live in the state of Israel, please inform me!
First of all, I think I've made it abundantly clear on this blog that I'm an introvert. Social situations involving more than three people besides myself are not my cup of tea. And social situations that involve actually interacting with strangers instead of observing them with interest from a distance are pure hell for me.
So tonight it was someone's birthday, so like 50 of us went to this bar in Jerusalem. Oh man. I seriously don't have words for how awkward I am--and I have words for everything. And if there's not a word for something, then I make one up.
Sometimes I don't feel weird because I'm an American in Israel, or a Jew in America, or whatever....sometimes I just feel foreign because apparently I come from the Planet Sam. Every single day of my life I become more convinced that I am foreign to this world, and that my brain (for the worse!) does not function in the same way as everyone else's, and that how I feel about things is strange in comparison to how everyone else on Planet Earth feels.
I have yet to meet someone else from the Planet Sam. Someone whose idea of a good time is NOT standing around in a dark bar, music blasting, surrounded by strangers and everyone trying to catch everyone else's eye......but whose idea of a good time is something like going for a leisurely walk or a drive with one or two people as they chat about their childhood or rant about something or laugh about something. And if we MUST go to a bar, it'll only be to watch soccer and to yell at the players on TV.
I wish that were the only symptom of being from the Planet Sam, but I'm sorry to say that it gets worse. I think I need a lobotomy or something, or shock therapy or something to stop being such a weirdo.
So, dear readers, if you happen to know someone who also comes from the Planet Sam and who happens to live in the state of Israel, please inform me!
I AM AN ISRAELI
Well folks, today I finally felt Israeli.
Sure, I may not dress like an Israeli, I may not talk like an Israeli, I may not push in "line" for the bus like an Israeli.....
But I work in a store in Israel and every single tourist that comes in there thinks I'm Israeli, including the Americans.
They talk to me in Hebrew, as if I don't understand English well enough. And I watch the American tourists walk in and buy Tzahal t-shirts or little Jerusalem trinkets, and I get to think for once in my life, "I'm not THAT." I actually LIVE and WORK and STUDY and do EVERYTHING in Jerusalem. I'm not rushing to shove memories of Israel into a bag of souvenirs, because I don't have to catch a flight back home from Ben Gurion tomorrow. I get a rush knowing that inside my purse is my teudat zehut and a few measly shekels, whereas the tourist has his passport with his visa for a 3 month visit and a pocketful of money to spend. I don't have to eat falafel at every moment of my life, because I know the falafel places will still be there next week, and I don't have to whip out my map at every moment because I know where I'm going. On the couple occasions that customers in the store have wanted to talk politics, I actually get to refer to Israel as "we" whereas the tourists have to say "you." When no one is in the store I get to sit on a stool and listen to the army radio station, and laugh because I actually understand parts of the parody song "Chaver Aravi."
Today was even more awesome though because a couple from New York came in and wanted a bunch of t-shirts, and I was helping my boss (I'm still the epitome of 'trainee'). And the couple were talking to me in SLOW. DELIBERATE. AND. LOUD. English, as if I wouldn't be able to understand them otherwise, because they heard me speaking in Hebrew to my boss. And they asked me, "CAN. YOU. PUT. THIS. PRINT. ON. A. ONESIE?" And as I was about to respond, they interrupted with, "DO. YOU. KNOW. WHAT. A. ONESIE. IS?"
I didn't even know how to respond to that. I wanted to burst out laughing from how ridiculous the situation was, and I wanted to punch the lady for kind of insulting my English, and I also wanted to thank G-d that I managed to convince an American that I was actually not American and maybe even Israeli. So I just settled on a sweet smile and a nod. And the lady replied with,
"WOW. YOUR. ENGLISH. IS. SO. GOOD."
And that, folks, just made my day. I feel like my absorption in to Israeli society is complete
So my advice to olim? If you want to instantly feel integrated into Israeli society, I advise you to work in a tourist shop. Because finally you won't feel like a tourist.
Also, dear old women of Jerusalem: stop asking me about the bus lines in Jerusalem. I have no fucking clue where your bus stops.
Also, I don't understand why people always ask if Line X has already passed. What's the point of asking?
Sure, I may not dress like an Israeli, I may not talk like an Israeli, I may not push in "line" for the bus like an Israeli.....
But I work in a store in Israel and every single tourist that comes in there thinks I'm Israeli, including the Americans.
They talk to me in Hebrew, as if I don't understand English well enough. And I watch the American tourists walk in and buy Tzahal t-shirts or little Jerusalem trinkets, and I get to think for once in my life, "I'm not THAT." I actually LIVE and WORK and STUDY and do EVERYTHING in Jerusalem. I'm not rushing to shove memories of Israel into a bag of souvenirs, because I don't have to catch a flight back home from Ben Gurion tomorrow. I get a rush knowing that inside my purse is my teudat zehut and a few measly shekels, whereas the tourist has his passport with his visa for a 3 month visit and a pocketful of money to spend. I don't have to eat falafel at every moment of my life, because I know the falafel places will still be there next week, and I don't have to whip out my map at every moment because I know where I'm going. On the couple occasions that customers in the store have wanted to talk politics, I actually get to refer to Israel as "we" whereas the tourists have to say "you." When no one is in the store I get to sit on a stool and listen to the army radio station, and laugh because I actually understand parts of the parody song "Chaver Aravi."
Today was even more awesome though because a couple from New York came in and wanted a bunch of t-shirts, and I was helping my boss (I'm still the epitome of 'trainee'). And the couple were talking to me in SLOW. DELIBERATE. AND. LOUD. English, as if I wouldn't be able to understand them otherwise, because they heard me speaking in Hebrew to my boss. And they asked me, "CAN. YOU. PUT. THIS. PRINT. ON. A. ONESIE?" And as I was about to respond, they interrupted with, "DO. YOU. KNOW. WHAT. A. ONESIE. IS?"
I didn't even know how to respond to that. I wanted to burst out laughing from how ridiculous the situation was, and I wanted to punch the lady for kind of insulting my English, and I also wanted to thank G-d that I managed to convince an American that I was actually not American and maybe even Israeli. So I just settled on a sweet smile and a nod. And the lady replied with,
"WOW. YOUR. ENGLISH. IS. SO. GOOD."
And that, folks, just made my day. I feel like my absorption in to Israeli society is complete
So my advice to olim? If you want to instantly feel integrated into Israeli society, I advise you to work in a tourist shop. Because finally you won't feel like a tourist.
Also, dear old women of Jerusalem: stop asking me about the bus lines in Jerusalem. I have no fucking clue where your bus stops.
Also, I don't understand why people always ask if Line X has already passed. What's the point of asking?
Sunday, January 18, 2009
Fuck, I'm never going to learn Hebrew.
Oh. Holy. Fuck. I just had my first ulpan class? Oh fuck. I'm in a Level Dalet/Level Hay combo class (I'm only in level dalet--for my non-jewish friends, it goes alef, bet, gimmel, dalet, hay, vav, then fluency...or maybe level vav is fluency), and the woman talks SO fucking fast. And she has this weird bubble-voice.
I can understand everything she's saying (though RESPONDING is a totally different story...), but she talks so fast that if I blink or breathe or in any way divert 100 percent of my mental and physical effort away from what the teacher is saying, I get completely lost. I seriously did not think it was possble to speak so fast. I feel like even my liver and kidneys have to get in on the effort, and I feel like my body is just going to have to deal with unprocessed urine until I learn to understand without much effort. I found myself thinking during class, "If this teacher doesn't stop talking and let me not having to translate a million words per minute for just a second, I'm going to throw up. This has to end NOW."
To a certain extent, I felt really good in class because I thought to myself, "Wow, I can understand a lot," because at this point I've learned a large part of basic vocabulary in Hebrew and can kind of get by. But at the same time, I feel like I've now reached this mountain of refined and specific vocabulary that will take me a million years to learn. And basically I'm going to sound retarded for the rest of my life. Or I'll be one of those Ango immigrants you meet all over Jerusalem who, after years and years in Israel, still talk to Israelis on the street in English.
Also, my teacher's very funny because she'll make some sort of reference to an Israeli children's or folk song and sing a couple bars and move on, and all of us are totally confused because we have no idea what folk song she's talking about.....hahahah, oh the joy of being an immigrant....
I need some moral support. Call me if you know me.... and call me even if you don't know me but you have my number....which should not be anybody I don't know....
I can understand everything she's saying (though RESPONDING is a totally different story...), but she talks so fast that if I blink or breathe or in any way divert 100 percent of my mental and physical effort away from what the teacher is saying, I get completely lost. I seriously did not think it was possble to speak so fast. I feel like even my liver and kidneys have to get in on the effort, and I feel like my body is just going to have to deal with unprocessed urine until I learn to understand without much effort. I found myself thinking during class, "If this teacher doesn't stop talking and let me not having to translate a million words per minute for just a second, I'm going to throw up. This has to end NOW."
To a certain extent, I felt really good in class because I thought to myself, "Wow, I can understand a lot," because at this point I've learned a large part of basic vocabulary in Hebrew and can kind of get by. But at the same time, I feel like I've now reached this mountain of refined and specific vocabulary that will take me a million years to learn. And basically I'm going to sound retarded for the rest of my life. Or I'll be one of those Ango immigrants you meet all over Jerusalem who, after years and years in Israel, still talk to Israelis on the street in English.
Also, my teacher's very funny because she'll make some sort of reference to an Israeli children's or folk song and sing a couple bars and move on, and all of us are totally confused because we have no idea what folk song she's talking about.....hahahah, oh the joy of being an immigrant....
I need some moral support. Call me if you know me.... and call me even if you don't know me but you have my number....which should not be anybody I don't know....
You know what I love about French people? They have seriously awe-inspiring amounts of various sprays, liquids, perfumes, gels, soaps, etc etc. My French roommate has covered half of our table space with her ointments/balms/etc etc's, and I've also never seen so much clothing. I find it REALLY amusing. haha....oh man....she's nice though, so that's good.
Also, I may have found a job on Ben Yehuda Street. ...we'll see tomorrow.....
Also, I may have found a job on Ben Yehuda Street. ...we'll see tomorrow.....
Saturday, January 17, 2009
The U.N.
Friday Night Reflections:
So you think you live in a rough part of town or a tough neighborhood? Well, there’s U.N. peacekeeping base up the street from my apartment! Oh, you think you’re badass cos the police have to patrol your streets? I have the motherfucking U.N. patrolling my streets in their white U.N. trucks!
Also, I’m beginning to find that it’s hard being the youngest person in the ulpan. First off, none of the other girls qualify for obligatory army service, so I have no one else in the same boat…..and second off, I keep having conversations that go like this:
Friendly convo, friendly convo, small talk, small talk, then…
Girl I’m talking to: So what were you doing before you moved here?
Sam: Well, I was doing a couple years in college, but dropped out to come here…. How about yourself?
Girl: Oh. Oh wow. You’re young. I was finishing up my PhD.
There was also another awkward moment during Kiddush tonight when it was pointed out that I was the only one at the table and likely even the whole room who could not legally drink this same wine back in the U.S.
Another “girl” I was talking to today wasn’t even born in the same fucking decade.
Also, on this blog I’ve frequently stated that I have absolutely no family in Israel. Well, dear readers (all one of you….), it turns out I’ve been lying all along. Actually, it’s not lying if you don’t know any better. A cousin of mine (technically 2nd cousin I guess) told me yesterday on facebook that we have another cousin here in Israel, not too far from Jerusalem. How am I related to this person (and, by extension, his children and grandchildren)?
His mother and my great-grandmother were sisters.
So he and my grandma are cousins.
So I guess that makes his kids my mom’s second cousins I guess….?
And that makes his kids’ kids (apparently there’s like one 1 year old) my third cousins? Or what? I really don’t understand how this shit works.
Alls I know is, the most recent relative that we are both descended from are my great-great-grandparents.
THAT, dear readers (again, all one of you….unless you stopped reading this entry, Abraham), is my only family here in this country. And yes, I’m going to arrange meeting them. According to my cousin (who has actually met them), they’re very nice, so hopefully this will all work out nicely and not be horrendously awkward.
I’m also thinking that if I’m ever in need of more family here in Israel, I’ll just go door to door telling them that we have a great-grandma Sarah or Leah or Rachel or something in common, because as long as I got a name to match up then there’s no way they’d be able to tell I was lying.
So you think you live in a rough part of town or a tough neighborhood? Well, there’s U.N. peacekeeping base up the street from my apartment! Oh, you think you’re badass cos the police have to patrol your streets? I have the motherfucking U.N. patrolling my streets in their white U.N. trucks!
Also, I’m beginning to find that it’s hard being the youngest person in the ulpan. First off, none of the other girls qualify for obligatory army service, so I have no one else in the same boat…..and second off, I keep having conversations that go like this:
Friendly convo, friendly convo, small talk, small talk, then…
Girl I’m talking to: So what were you doing before you moved here?
Sam: Well, I was doing a couple years in college, but dropped out to come here…. How about yourself?
Girl: Oh. Oh wow. You’re young. I was finishing up my PhD.
There was also another awkward moment during Kiddush tonight when it was pointed out that I was the only one at the table and likely even the whole room who could not legally drink this same wine back in the U.S.
Another “girl” I was talking to today wasn’t even born in the same fucking decade.
Also, on this blog I’ve frequently stated that I have absolutely no family in Israel. Well, dear readers (all one of you….), it turns out I’ve been lying all along. Actually, it’s not lying if you don’t know any better. A cousin of mine (technically 2nd cousin I guess) told me yesterday on facebook that we have another cousin here in Israel, not too far from Jerusalem. How am I related to this person (and, by extension, his children and grandchildren)?
His mother and my great-grandmother were sisters.
So he and my grandma are cousins.
So I guess that makes his kids my mom’s second cousins I guess….?
And that makes his kids’ kids (apparently there’s like one 1 year old) my third cousins? Or what? I really don’t understand how this shit works.
Alls I know is, the most recent relative that we are both descended from are my great-great-grandparents.
THAT, dear readers (again, all one of you….unless you stopped reading this entry, Abraham), is my only family here in this country. And yes, I’m going to arrange meeting them. According to my cousin (who has actually met them), they’re very nice, so hopefully this will all work out nicely and not be horrendously awkward.
I’m also thinking that if I’m ever in need of more family here in Israel, I’ll just go door to door telling them that we have a great-grandma Sarah or Leah or Rachel or something in common, because as long as I got a name to match up then there’s no way they’d be able to tell I was lying.
Friday, January 16, 2009
Why I fucking love this place
First of all, I’m reviving Country Music Shabbat.
Also, I have to tell you something about the enlistment center. So I was sitting at a soldier’s desk and he was trying to figure out for me if I were obligated to do service for two years, or if I were exempt because I didn’t make aliyah until I was 20 (even though I entered Israel as a tourist at 19). So he called some office, and meanwhile many of the other soldiers in the room had been watching our conversation take place, because apparently they had nothing better to do. Then the soldier gave me the answer in Hebrew: “You are obligated to do two years of service.” I thrust my hands into the air as if I had just won the Super Bowl and let out a “YES!!!!!” and every single soldier in the room that had been listening to the conversation started laughing, including the soldier who was helping me…. Hahaha…. I turned bright red and the soldier said to me in English, through his laughter, “Don’t be embarrassed, but normally people beg for exemptions and try everything to receive an exemption…you’re very refreshing though, that’s why we are laughing.”
Two years of free bus rides? HELL YES! Two years of integration into Israeli society that many immigrants do not get to experience? HELL YES! Two years of free Hebrew immersion? HELL YES! Two years of guaranteed employment? HELL YES!
Just a HELL YES to everything!
My roommate is French. I haven’t talked to her very much since she’s been gone for most of the day, but she speaks very little English. This is GREAT! I’m gonna improve my Hebrew and my French! She also seems like she’s very messy, so this is also going to be awesome for me.
I’m slightly concerned though cos last night at about 6 pm she said she was going to go shopping…a few minutes later both of us went our separate ways. At like 10 pm or so I came back, and she wasn’t there. She did not end up sleeping in our room, and as of 2 pm today she still has (at least to all appearances) not returned. I’m slightly concerned because it doesn’t look like she took any of her stuff, so I don’t think it was a planned sleepover somewhere like for Shabbat. At the same time though, maybe she had an impromptu one night stand or something (maybe I just say this cos she’s French?), so I don’t want to embarrass her by raising the alarm on her whereabouts. When do you think would be an appropriate time to speak up to someone about her disappearance? Maybe it seems paranoid to be concerned about someone’s less than 24 hour disappearance, but she DID just say that she was stepping out to do some shopping, and I feel like she would have said if she were planning to be going out and doing something, and she would have brought stuff with her….hmm…..
On a different note: Oh man. I think I’m going to love this place. I just had lunch with a girl from New York, a Frenchman, and an Italian girl. The Europeans were extremely nice, with the Italian talking in a very friendly and animated way as one would expect from an Italian. The French guy was a little more reserved, but laughed and smiled and was all-around pleasant. He was also extremely hot though, so I don’t know if that influenced my opinion or anything, hehe. The New Yorker….hahahahah, oh my goodness. Well, I’m sure I’ve written about this on my blog before, but in case you didn’t get the memo: I hate New York. I hate New Yorkers. I want to strangle people who wear “I Heart New York” shirts.
She talks like a thesis paper. Nothing is ever light or funny, everything is analytical analysis. For example, a crowd of English-speakers had gathered around the communal TV and were watching Fox News as it reported on the flight that crashed. A couple of us were saying that we were very thankful that no one died, and we were all having a laugh that birds actually downed a flight—something I thought was an urban legend, not something that could actually happen. And then out of the blue she said something about how she “doesn’t care for” TV news because it’s become overly sensationalized, to the point where it’s like a cinematic experience rather than actual journalism. Or some shit like that.
I would have forgiven it if it were a sort of angry, neurotic rant (like I do all the time), but she said it so calmly and with such a detached air that I wanted to strangle her. Don’t say you “don’t care for” something, say you hate it. Say it makes your life unbearable. FEEL something, people, FEEL it whether it’s hate or love. I used to hate those parents I knew growing up who wouldn’t let their kids say the word “hate.” Why? Because it breed boring people. I’m not saying you should hate people of different races or people of different religions, but you ARE entitled to hate things that annoy you. Now we have walking robots, like this girl. She’s not a human being giving an opinion to a group of peers, she’s a professor lecturing students.
Then at lunch she turned to the Frenchman and in a very academic way asked him about anti-Semitism in France. In her “introduction paragraph” she was sure to include examples that she had read in the newspapers. The conversation then turned into a sort of analysis of anti-semitism in the U.S. versus in Europe. I argued that there is plenty of anti-semitism in the U.S. it just isn’t (thank goodness!) as obvious as it is in Europe. And the New Yorker responded in a completely matter-of-fact way:
“Oh, well, there’s no anti-semitism in New York.”
REALLY??? REALLY??? All those millions of people, and not one of them has ever done ANYTHING against Jews? REALLY? I then said something like, “Well, I don’t know about in New York, but it can’t be too different from LA or Chicago, and we’ve had plenty of incidents there, including some wacko shooting up a Jewish center in LA.”
Her calm response?
“No, there can’t possibly be anti-semitism in LA because half of Hollywood is Jewish.”
I didn’t even know how to respond to that. Does she not know that the other half of Hollywood (as well as a huge chunk of LA’s liberal voters—which is like EVERYBODY minus my family) hates Israel and frequently by association hates the Jews? Does she also know that a lot of people resent Jews who have power? Does she also know that the Jew-run movie industry is only part of LA? This is why I hate people who talk like they know LA, because they never do. Dear East Coast People Who Have Never Even Been To LA, don’t talk to me about “Hollywood” or whatever. Why don’t you call it home for 20 years and THEN tell me about it.
Instead of getting into a nasty argument, which is really easy for me, I decided to take in a deep breath, look at the table of assembled Jews from all over the world, and say, “Ah well, that’s all behind us now anyway. We’re in Israel now!” And everyone smiled and said, “YES!”
Also, I have to tell you something about the enlistment center. So I was sitting at a soldier’s desk and he was trying to figure out for me if I were obligated to do service for two years, or if I were exempt because I didn’t make aliyah until I was 20 (even though I entered Israel as a tourist at 19). So he called some office, and meanwhile many of the other soldiers in the room had been watching our conversation take place, because apparently they had nothing better to do. Then the soldier gave me the answer in Hebrew: “You are obligated to do two years of service.” I thrust my hands into the air as if I had just won the Super Bowl and let out a “YES!!!!!” and every single soldier in the room that had been listening to the conversation started laughing, including the soldier who was helping me…. Hahaha…. I turned bright red and the soldier said to me in English, through his laughter, “Don’t be embarrassed, but normally people beg for exemptions and try everything to receive an exemption…you’re very refreshing though, that’s why we are laughing.”
Two years of free bus rides? HELL YES! Two years of integration into Israeli society that many immigrants do not get to experience? HELL YES! Two years of free Hebrew immersion? HELL YES! Two years of guaranteed employment? HELL YES!
Just a HELL YES to everything!
My roommate is French. I haven’t talked to her very much since she’s been gone for most of the day, but she speaks very little English. This is GREAT! I’m gonna improve my Hebrew and my French! She also seems like she’s very messy, so this is also going to be awesome for me.
I’m slightly concerned though cos last night at about 6 pm she said she was going to go shopping…a few minutes later both of us went our separate ways. At like 10 pm or so I came back, and she wasn’t there. She did not end up sleeping in our room, and as of 2 pm today she still has (at least to all appearances) not returned. I’m slightly concerned because it doesn’t look like she took any of her stuff, so I don’t think it was a planned sleepover somewhere like for Shabbat. At the same time though, maybe she had an impromptu one night stand or something (maybe I just say this cos she’s French?), so I don’t want to embarrass her by raising the alarm on her whereabouts. When do you think would be an appropriate time to speak up to someone about her disappearance? Maybe it seems paranoid to be concerned about someone’s less than 24 hour disappearance, but she DID just say that she was stepping out to do some shopping, and I feel like she would have said if she were planning to be going out and doing something, and she would have brought stuff with her….hmm…..
On a different note: Oh man. I think I’m going to love this place. I just had lunch with a girl from New York, a Frenchman, and an Italian girl. The Europeans were extremely nice, with the Italian talking in a very friendly and animated way as one would expect from an Italian. The French guy was a little more reserved, but laughed and smiled and was all-around pleasant. He was also extremely hot though, so I don’t know if that influenced my opinion or anything, hehe. The New Yorker….hahahahah, oh my goodness. Well, I’m sure I’ve written about this on my blog before, but in case you didn’t get the memo: I hate New York. I hate New Yorkers. I want to strangle people who wear “I Heart New York” shirts.
She talks like a thesis paper. Nothing is ever light or funny, everything is analytical analysis. For example, a crowd of English-speakers had gathered around the communal TV and were watching Fox News as it reported on the flight that crashed. A couple of us were saying that we were very thankful that no one died, and we were all having a laugh that birds actually downed a flight—something I thought was an urban legend, not something that could actually happen. And then out of the blue she said something about how she “doesn’t care for” TV news because it’s become overly sensationalized, to the point where it’s like a cinematic experience rather than actual journalism. Or some shit like that.
I would have forgiven it if it were a sort of angry, neurotic rant (like I do all the time), but she said it so calmly and with such a detached air that I wanted to strangle her. Don’t say you “don’t care for” something, say you hate it. Say it makes your life unbearable. FEEL something, people, FEEL it whether it’s hate or love. I used to hate those parents I knew growing up who wouldn’t let their kids say the word “hate.” Why? Because it breed boring people. I’m not saying you should hate people of different races or people of different religions, but you ARE entitled to hate things that annoy you. Now we have walking robots, like this girl. She’s not a human being giving an opinion to a group of peers, she’s a professor lecturing students.
Then at lunch she turned to the Frenchman and in a very academic way asked him about anti-Semitism in France. In her “introduction paragraph” she was sure to include examples that she had read in the newspapers. The conversation then turned into a sort of analysis of anti-semitism in the U.S. versus in Europe. I argued that there is plenty of anti-semitism in the U.S. it just isn’t (thank goodness!) as obvious as it is in Europe. And the New Yorker responded in a completely matter-of-fact way:
“Oh, well, there’s no anti-semitism in New York.”
REALLY??? REALLY??? All those millions of people, and not one of them has ever done ANYTHING against Jews? REALLY? I then said something like, “Well, I don’t know about in New York, but it can’t be too different from LA or Chicago, and we’ve had plenty of incidents there, including some wacko shooting up a Jewish center in LA.”
Her calm response?
“No, there can’t possibly be anti-semitism in LA because half of Hollywood is Jewish.”
I didn’t even know how to respond to that. Does she not know that the other half of Hollywood (as well as a huge chunk of LA’s liberal voters—which is like EVERYBODY minus my family) hates Israel and frequently by association hates the Jews? Does she also know that a lot of people resent Jews who have power? Does she also know that the Jew-run movie industry is only part of LA? This is why I hate people who talk like they know LA, because they never do. Dear East Coast People Who Have Never Even Been To LA, don’t talk to me about “Hollywood” or whatever. Why don’t you call it home for 20 years and THEN tell me about it.
Instead of getting into a nasty argument, which is really easy for me, I decided to take in a deep breath, look at the table of assembled Jews from all over the world, and say, “Ah well, that’s all behind us now anyway. We’re in Israel now!” And everyone smiled and said, “YES!”
Um.....so I went to the lishkat hagiyus yesterday, immediately after getting my ID card. Turns out I'm obligated to do two years of service. hahahaha.....oh man. I have an eye test in February, and after that I should get an enlistment date.
Also, i helped a 17 year old Israeli girl get to the lishkat hagiyus, and boy did I feel like such an Israel-expert!
Also, i helped a 17 year old Israeli girl get to the lishkat hagiyus, and boy did I feel like such an Israel-expert!
Thursday, January 15, 2009
Wednesday, January 14, 2009
Haggle, bitch!
As of writing this, it’s almost 5 in the morning. I can sort of hear a Muslim call to prayer not too far in the distance, so I opened the window to hear better…..man, that dude sounds REALLY tired.
So yesterday morning I tried to open a bank account, or at least change my tourist account to a regular account. A small crowd of people had gathered outside as we waited for the bank to open, and it became apparent that we needed to make appointments using the machine outside. Actually, it wasn’t all THAT apparent to me what the machine was for—when I opened my account back in April, I used the machine inside to make an appointment so I was slightly confused as to the purpose of this machine, and I thought maybe it was like a fancy ATM or something, since it was right next to the regular ATM and looked just like it. A girl around my age was standing next to me in line, making occasional remarks of small talk to me in Hebrew, to which I would either nod my head in agreement or smile and laugh at if they were amusing. Finally I was second in line and the Russian woman in front of me turned around and asked if I could help her with the machine, and I explained in Hebrew that I didn’t really understand what the machine was.
Wow.
It really was startling just how American I sounded. Like, normally I’m fully aware that I in no way sound like a native Israeli, but THIS time even I was shocked that my tongue and mouth somehow decided that this horrific combination of nasally vowels and flat R’s was the best approximation of native Israeli Hebrew that they could come up with.
The girl who had been making small talk comments gave me a brief surprised look, but rushed to help the Russian woman. Finally it came my turn and as I got closer to the machine, the girl was chuckling a bit and said to me in English, “Ah, so you ehhhhh did not understand me before?” So I turned bright red and tried to convince her that I actually do understand a bit of Hebrew, but trying to convince her was totally a lost cause at that point because my horrific accent gave it away….
So she explained in English what the machine was for (making an appointment), and then hit the English language option for me. At that point she stepped back to leave me alone, but stayed close enough that she could step in and help if need be. Meanwhile though, the security guard had noticed that I had been a bit confused, so he left his post to come help me (even though the screen was now in ENGLISH and I could very easily get what I wanted done!), leaving a line people waiting to enter now standing outside in the Jerusalem winter. The security guard starts navigating the screen for me as if I cannot do it myself (again, the screen is ALL IN ENGLISH!), but then the girl decides that she doesn’t want to be left out of the helping so she comes in and also starts trying to help. A couple seconds later several people from the line wandered over to see what the crowd of people around the ATM (or appointment machine, I guess) were doing….and then they all started trying to help me navigate the screen—which, as I’ve said before, WAS IN ENGLISH! Finally my appointment slip printed, and I feel like there were 7 hands reaching for it to hand to me.
While it was slightly frustrating and embarrassing to have all these people navigating an appointment machine for me in a language that is native to me but foreign to them, it did make me love Israelis for being so eager to help……. Aw, what sweeties!
Finally I got inside and got called over to the desk of the guy who I actually sat with to open my original account! Oh man, I kind of swooned a bit, because this guy is one of those random people in Israel that I have a crush on. Other random people in Israel I have a crush on? The guy who works at the McDonalds in the Harel Mall, and many others.
You know what’s wonderful about being an olah hadasha? Seriously like every 5 minutes you get a mazel tov from somebody. At the bank I got a mazel tov from the teller, and even the lady in the cubicle next to him leaned over and smiled, saying, “Mazal tov!” After I went to the bank, I went to get some fresh orange juice at some random stand, and the guy working there heard my accent and asked where I was from and what I was doing in Israel. I said I was from the US and that I made aliyah yesterday, and his face lit up. He clapped his hands together like a fat German boy who’d just been given cake, and then started gushing, “Mazal Tov, Mazal Tov, welcome! Welcome!!!!” We then talked in Hebrew about how cold it was, and he started talking about peeling carrots and even brought me around to the side of his cart so that I could see the barrel full of peeled carrots, and he explained that he was cold from peeling carrots. I’m not entirely sure how the hell peeling carrots makes you cold (maybe cos you can’t wear gloves?), but I did feel special that I can now actually have a friendly conversation with people in Hebrew. I’m really glad I came to Israel for a while before making aliyah, because last time I had so many moments of being totally clueless—which pisses off Israelis VERY quickly I noticed--or not understanding what people are saying….but this time I’m a little bit more aware of what to expect and a little bit better in Hebrew, so silly little conversations like this have happened more in the past day than they happened during the entire 4 ½ months I was here last time.
Also, I feel like I need to address the notion of haggling. So my understanding is that haggling (in the pure sense) isn’t as common in Israel as most people are led to believe. This is probably a marvelous thing for me, because I’m totally crap at haggling, and I’d probably accidentally end up paying more than the original price I was offered. Because of this, I tend to avoid marketplaces where haggling might be expected or at least tolerated or whatever. But in taxis, I always feel like I’m getting ripped off, and if I knew how I would totally try to haggle. Unfortunately, I don’t know how. So today when I got into the cab to come to my new home, the cab driver said I would have to pay 50 shekels.
Well, that seemed a bit high to me since we weren’t going very far at all, and even though I don’t know how haggling works, I figured now was as good a time as any to try a method even if it doesn’t work. For a second I thought maybe I’d just let it go, but I decided that if I’m going to live in this country I should learn how not to be ripped off. So I chose the method of repeating the exact price that the cab driver offered, but this time in a tone of voice that suggested that somehow what the cab driver said had violated my family’s honor. “FIFTY SHEKELS???” I repeated, as if the cab driver had just raped my son and sold my daughter into slavery. There was a slight pause during which the little voice in my head kept repeating, “Psssssst! Make a lower offer! Make a lower offer!” But suddenly the American in me became extremely ashamed of myself, and I ended up paying what the cab driver asked even though I knew I was paying too much (it was only SLIGHTLY less than what I used to pay to get from Jerusalem to the kibbutz, which was muuuuuch farther away).
Oh well. One of these days I’m going to learn how to sound like an Israeli when I talk and one of these days I’m going to learn how to haggle properly. But today is not one of these days.
So yesterday morning I tried to open a bank account, or at least change my tourist account to a regular account. A small crowd of people had gathered outside as we waited for the bank to open, and it became apparent that we needed to make appointments using the machine outside. Actually, it wasn’t all THAT apparent to me what the machine was for—when I opened my account back in April, I used the machine inside to make an appointment so I was slightly confused as to the purpose of this machine, and I thought maybe it was like a fancy ATM or something, since it was right next to the regular ATM and looked just like it. A girl around my age was standing next to me in line, making occasional remarks of small talk to me in Hebrew, to which I would either nod my head in agreement or smile and laugh at if they were amusing. Finally I was second in line and the Russian woman in front of me turned around and asked if I could help her with the machine, and I explained in Hebrew that I didn’t really understand what the machine was.
Wow.
It really was startling just how American I sounded. Like, normally I’m fully aware that I in no way sound like a native Israeli, but THIS time even I was shocked that my tongue and mouth somehow decided that this horrific combination of nasally vowels and flat R’s was the best approximation of native Israeli Hebrew that they could come up with.
The girl who had been making small talk comments gave me a brief surprised look, but rushed to help the Russian woman. Finally it came my turn and as I got closer to the machine, the girl was chuckling a bit and said to me in English, “Ah, so you ehhhhh did not understand me before?” So I turned bright red and tried to convince her that I actually do understand a bit of Hebrew, but trying to convince her was totally a lost cause at that point because my horrific accent gave it away….
So she explained in English what the machine was for (making an appointment), and then hit the English language option for me. At that point she stepped back to leave me alone, but stayed close enough that she could step in and help if need be. Meanwhile though, the security guard had noticed that I had been a bit confused, so he left his post to come help me (even though the screen was now in ENGLISH and I could very easily get what I wanted done!), leaving a line people waiting to enter now standing outside in the Jerusalem winter. The security guard starts navigating the screen for me as if I cannot do it myself (again, the screen is ALL IN ENGLISH!), but then the girl decides that she doesn’t want to be left out of the helping so she comes in and also starts trying to help. A couple seconds later several people from the line wandered over to see what the crowd of people around the ATM (or appointment machine, I guess) were doing….and then they all started trying to help me navigate the screen—which, as I’ve said before, WAS IN ENGLISH! Finally my appointment slip printed, and I feel like there were 7 hands reaching for it to hand to me.
While it was slightly frustrating and embarrassing to have all these people navigating an appointment machine for me in a language that is native to me but foreign to them, it did make me love Israelis for being so eager to help……. Aw, what sweeties!
Finally I got inside and got called over to the desk of the guy who I actually sat with to open my original account! Oh man, I kind of swooned a bit, because this guy is one of those random people in Israel that I have a crush on. Other random people in Israel I have a crush on? The guy who works at the McDonalds in the Harel Mall, and many others.
You know what’s wonderful about being an olah hadasha? Seriously like every 5 minutes you get a mazel tov from somebody. At the bank I got a mazel tov from the teller, and even the lady in the cubicle next to him leaned over and smiled, saying, “Mazal tov!” After I went to the bank, I went to get some fresh orange juice at some random stand, and the guy working there heard my accent and asked where I was from and what I was doing in Israel. I said I was from the US and that I made aliyah yesterday, and his face lit up. He clapped his hands together like a fat German boy who’d just been given cake, and then started gushing, “Mazal Tov, Mazal Tov, welcome! Welcome!!!!” We then talked in Hebrew about how cold it was, and he started talking about peeling carrots and even brought me around to the side of his cart so that I could see the barrel full of peeled carrots, and he explained that he was cold from peeling carrots. I’m not entirely sure how the hell peeling carrots makes you cold (maybe cos you can’t wear gloves?), but I did feel special that I can now actually have a friendly conversation with people in Hebrew. I’m really glad I came to Israel for a while before making aliyah, because last time I had so many moments of being totally clueless—which pisses off Israelis VERY quickly I noticed--or not understanding what people are saying….but this time I’m a little bit more aware of what to expect and a little bit better in Hebrew, so silly little conversations like this have happened more in the past day than they happened during the entire 4 ½ months I was here last time.
Also, I feel like I need to address the notion of haggling. So my understanding is that haggling (in the pure sense) isn’t as common in Israel as most people are led to believe. This is probably a marvelous thing for me, because I’m totally crap at haggling, and I’d probably accidentally end up paying more than the original price I was offered. Because of this, I tend to avoid marketplaces where haggling might be expected or at least tolerated or whatever. But in taxis, I always feel like I’m getting ripped off, and if I knew how I would totally try to haggle. Unfortunately, I don’t know how. So today when I got into the cab to come to my new home, the cab driver said I would have to pay 50 shekels.
Well, that seemed a bit high to me since we weren’t going very far at all, and even though I don’t know how haggling works, I figured now was as good a time as any to try a method even if it doesn’t work. For a second I thought maybe I’d just let it go, but I decided that if I’m going to live in this country I should learn how not to be ripped off. So I chose the method of repeating the exact price that the cab driver offered, but this time in a tone of voice that suggested that somehow what the cab driver said had violated my family’s honor. “FIFTY SHEKELS???” I repeated, as if the cab driver had just raped my son and sold my daughter into slavery. There was a slight pause during which the little voice in my head kept repeating, “Psssssst! Make a lower offer! Make a lower offer!” But suddenly the American in me became extremely ashamed of myself, and I ended up paying what the cab driver asked even though I knew I was paying too much (it was only SLIGHTLY less than what I used to pay to get from Jerusalem to the kibbutz, which was muuuuuch farther away).
Oh well. One of these days I’m going to learn how to sound like an Israeli when I talk and one of these days I’m going to learn how to haggle properly. But today is not one of these days.
Tuesday, January 13, 2009
Monday, January 12, 2009
aliyah.
I'M HERE!
Great things?
Being asked by El Al security to explain the meaning of my last name (which could be thought of as an Israeli last name), when in reality it's of French origin.
Being asked maybe five million times by the Birthright group on my flight if I was part of their group. Their staff was asking me why I wasn't wearing my nametag, the participants were introducing themselves and asking my name as if we were about to embark on an adventure together, and several times they tried to call me over to join their little huddle of rule explanations. They even tried to give me a fucking count-off number. I AM NOT ON FUCKING BIRTHRIGHT!
Getting into a huge argument with taxi driver. He had no idea where the street in Jerusalem I was trying to get to was, but he refused to consult my map. I told him that I found the exact [fucking] location on the map and would he please look at it? And he totally refused. And we got into a yelling match in Hebrew over it. In the end, he never did look at my map and we ended up driving around Jerusalem for like an extra 20 or 30 minutes asking random Haredi men (we were in Mea Shearim) if they knew how to get to the proper street, and they would sometimes be helpful but usually ended their directions with a stern look.
But before that, we managed to somehow get well into the West Bank--like, not the part of the West Bank that the road from Tel Aviv to Jerusalem clips. I mean, with checkpoints everywhere and enormous fortress-like walls.....I'm not gonna lie, it was a little bit exciting, especially when I saw a sign for Ramallah
Finally getting to the hostel and finding out that I had to carry my three heavy suitcases, the ones with all of my life's worth crammed in, and my heavy backpack up three flights of stairs. And when I finally got to the top, I took a moment to catch my breath....and accidentally knocked over my 70-pound bag. It fell down one flight of stairs, and I thought that would be it. Oh no. Then it bounced off the wall and fell down a second flight of stairs. And I thought THEN it would be over, but my suitcase bounced off another wall and fell down a third and final flight of stairs. It was one of the most tragic things I've ever witnessed.
Oh, by the way, I'm not sure why they make such a big deal about the whole getting processed as an immigrant at Ben Gurion thing. It was actually really quick, and I'm kind of sad about that because it meant I didn't have time to have a pee....which was really upsetting, because (like dogs) I really enjoy peeing in different places.
Also, my teudat oleh picture? I am as sweaty as fuck. I didn't have too much space left in my suitcase so I was wearing a lot of layers.....and oh my christ I could not stop sweating. I'm so glad that every single time I flash my teudat oleh from now until my immigrant rights expire (which is many years from now), everyone can stop and take a moment to remember how goddamn sweaty I was.
Well team....that's all. Tonight I took a walk down to the Old City and strolled down (or up?) Ben Yehuda, watching a small group of Nachman guys dancing.......Ahhhh....thank G-d I'm back.
EDIT: So at the ministry of absorption at the airport, they give you basically a bag of thick pamphlets geared towards helping olim. Most of them are pretty relevant, like information on how to register for health care, or where to go for employment help, or how to register for an ulpan. Except for ONE pamphlet, entitled, "Safety Recommendatons for Swimming in the Sea." So, thank you Misrad HaKlita for watching my back, even when I'm swimming in the ocean and it has nothing to do with being an immigrant
Great things?
Being asked by El Al security to explain the meaning of my last name (which could be thought of as an Israeli last name), when in reality it's of French origin.
Being asked maybe five million times by the Birthright group on my flight if I was part of their group. Their staff was asking me why I wasn't wearing my nametag, the participants were introducing themselves and asking my name as if we were about to embark on an adventure together, and several times they tried to call me over to join their little huddle of rule explanations. They even tried to give me a fucking count-off number. I AM NOT ON FUCKING BIRTHRIGHT!
Getting into a huge argument with taxi driver. He had no idea where the street in Jerusalem I was trying to get to was, but he refused to consult my map. I told him that I found the exact [fucking] location on the map and would he please look at it? And he totally refused. And we got into a yelling match in Hebrew over it. In the end, he never did look at my map and we ended up driving around Jerusalem for like an extra 20 or 30 minutes asking random Haredi men (we were in Mea Shearim) if they knew how to get to the proper street, and they would sometimes be helpful but usually ended their directions with a stern look.
But before that, we managed to somehow get well into the West Bank--like, not the part of the West Bank that the road from Tel Aviv to Jerusalem clips. I mean, with checkpoints everywhere and enormous fortress-like walls.....I'm not gonna lie, it was a little bit exciting, especially when I saw a sign for Ramallah
Finally getting to the hostel and finding out that I had to carry my three heavy suitcases, the ones with all of my life's worth crammed in, and my heavy backpack up three flights of stairs. And when I finally got to the top, I took a moment to catch my breath....and accidentally knocked over my 70-pound bag. It fell down one flight of stairs, and I thought that would be it. Oh no. Then it bounced off the wall and fell down a second flight of stairs. And I thought THEN it would be over, but my suitcase bounced off another wall and fell down a third and final flight of stairs. It was one of the most tragic things I've ever witnessed.
Oh, by the way, I'm not sure why they make such a big deal about the whole getting processed as an immigrant at Ben Gurion thing. It was actually really quick, and I'm kind of sad about that because it meant I didn't have time to have a pee....which was really upsetting, because (like dogs) I really enjoy peeing in different places.
Also, my teudat oleh picture? I am as sweaty as fuck. I didn't have too much space left in my suitcase so I was wearing a lot of layers.....and oh my christ I could not stop sweating. I'm so glad that every single time I flash my teudat oleh from now until my immigrant rights expire (which is many years from now), everyone can stop and take a moment to remember how goddamn sweaty I was.
Well team....that's all. Tonight I took a walk down to the Old City and strolled down (or up?) Ben Yehuda, watching a small group of Nachman guys dancing.......Ahhhh....thank G-d I'm back.
EDIT: So at the ministry of absorption at the airport, they give you basically a bag of thick pamphlets geared towards helping olim. Most of them are pretty relevant, like information on how to register for health care, or where to go for employment help, or how to register for an ulpan. Except for ONE pamphlet, entitled, "Safety Recommendatons for Swimming in the Sea." So, thank you Misrad HaKlita for watching my back, even when I'm swimming in the ocean and it has nothing to do with being an immigrant
Sunday, January 11, 2009
Leaving....
Well, folks. In about 45 minutes I'm leaving for the airport, so it looks like this is probably my last post from the U.S. for a while. In the words of the man outside of the Sunset Strip House of Blues a few years ago, as he drunkenly staggered to his car that had been brought around by the valet, and as he flipped off the entire crowd of people standing in the valet line:
"I'm leaving...y'all gotta wait in line....fuck y'all!"
"I'm leaving...y'all gotta wait in line....fuck y'all!"
Spanglish
I'm really afraid I'm going to show up at the airport tomorrow and they're gonna be like, "Sorry, we don't have a reservation under your name. Or "Sorry, Israel actually decided it doesn't want any more olim." Or "whatever.
I'm about 99% done packing (and I made sure to pack underwear!)
For the past week I've been shopping up a storm. Basically my parents said they will pay for anything and everything I want (within reason....but it's not like I have expensive taste anyway) as long as I'm in the United States, but the second I get on the plane for Israel I'm on my own financially. Basically they were trying to seduce me into staying in the U.S. using financial stability and the promise of "luxury" items as a bribe. (I put "luxury" in quotes because I don't exactly have the classiest taste--I much prefer Target to Bloomingdales). Instead what happened was that I stocked up like some kind of rodent preparing for winter. I'm so tempted to just stuff every pair of shoe I own into my suitcases, because I'm afraid that when the time comes in Israel for me to replace my shoes I won't have any money. So I need extras. Oh shit son, you don't even understand how scared I am--I'm stocked up on medicines, on underwear (concern over underwear seems to be a common theme for the past few days), and whatever else. Basically I'm trying to fit everything I own into the suitcases, no matter how ugly or old or whatever. Some weird things I've packed? An American flag, because I was concerned that if I ever needed one in Israel I wouldn't be able to afford it or even find one. A prayer book which I've opened maybe once, which I'm bringing because I'm afraid of the inavailability of religious texts with vowels and English translations (which I enjoy reading) in the extremely unlikely event that I decide I want to pray.
Oh man am I getting worked up over all of this.
Also, when I was at the mall today I bumped into my childhood housekeeper. The word "housekeeper" doesn't do her justice, cos basically she was my mother until I was 14. I hadn't seen her in ages, so it was really nice. I told her I was going to Israel tomorrow, and she freaked out and started scolding me in Spanish, and then she asked me why. I said, "Cos it seems like fun." Her response? "No. Magic Mountain is fun. Blowing up every day is not fun. Go to Magic Mountain. I'll take you to Magic Mountain right now, you want to go?" Hahahaha.....oh man......
When I went in to buy shoes, the guy working there was clearly an immigrant from a Spanish-speaking country, and was having quite a bit of trouble understanding things people were saying to him. I tried to be very patient because I imagine this is how I'm going to be starting tomorrow, but this middle-aged West LA lady was having none of this. She was trying to figure out where the other worker in the store was, but the first worker was having a little bit of trouble understanding what she was asking. So the lady says very loudly in what she thinks is Spanish:
"Dundee ist el other man????"
Which, if you ask me, confused the poor man even more. Oh gosh....this is what's going to happen to me. People are going to yell at me in what they think is English but which is actually bizarre Hebrew
I'm about 99% done packing (and I made sure to pack underwear!)
For the past week I've been shopping up a storm. Basically my parents said they will pay for anything and everything I want (within reason....but it's not like I have expensive taste anyway) as long as I'm in the United States, but the second I get on the plane for Israel I'm on my own financially. Basically they were trying to seduce me into staying in the U.S. using financial stability and the promise of "luxury" items as a bribe. (I put "luxury" in quotes because I don't exactly have the classiest taste--I much prefer Target to Bloomingdales). Instead what happened was that I stocked up like some kind of rodent preparing for winter. I'm so tempted to just stuff every pair of shoe I own into my suitcases, because I'm afraid that when the time comes in Israel for me to replace my shoes I won't have any money. So I need extras. Oh shit son, you don't even understand how scared I am--I'm stocked up on medicines, on underwear (concern over underwear seems to be a common theme for the past few days), and whatever else. Basically I'm trying to fit everything I own into the suitcases, no matter how ugly or old or whatever. Some weird things I've packed? An American flag, because I was concerned that if I ever needed one in Israel I wouldn't be able to afford it or even find one. A prayer book which I've opened maybe once, which I'm bringing because I'm afraid of the inavailability of religious texts with vowels and English translations (which I enjoy reading) in the extremely unlikely event that I decide I want to pray.
Oh man am I getting worked up over all of this.
Also, when I was at the mall today I bumped into my childhood housekeeper. The word "housekeeper" doesn't do her justice, cos basically she was my mother until I was 14. I hadn't seen her in ages, so it was really nice. I told her I was going to Israel tomorrow, and she freaked out and started scolding me in Spanish, and then she asked me why. I said, "Cos it seems like fun." Her response? "No. Magic Mountain is fun. Blowing up every day is not fun. Go to Magic Mountain. I'll take you to Magic Mountain right now, you want to go?" Hahahaha.....oh man......
When I went in to buy shoes, the guy working there was clearly an immigrant from a Spanish-speaking country, and was having quite a bit of trouble understanding things people were saying to him. I tried to be very patient because I imagine this is how I'm going to be starting tomorrow, but this middle-aged West LA lady was having none of this. She was trying to figure out where the other worker in the store was, but the first worker was having a little bit of trouble understanding what she was asking. So the lady says very loudly in what she thinks is Spanish:
"Dundee ist el other man????"
Which, if you ask me, confused the poor man even more. Oh gosh....this is what's going to happen to me. People are going to yell at me in what they think is English but which is actually bizarre Hebrew
Saturday, January 10, 2009
Siege of Gaza? What about the Siege of a West L.A. Mall?
Oh man.....so less than 48 hours left. What's new?
1) I'm sick. Really really sick. Okay, technically I'm not actually sick. Wait, actually that's a lie, I am sick: I have a really bad sinus infection. But it's actually the medicine that I'm taking that is making me FEEL sick. The doctor is afraid I'm going to be in agony on the flight so basically I'm taking like 5 different drugs, ahhaha.
2) WHERE THE HELL IS THE FUCKING U.N WHEN YOU NEED IT??? They keep trying to call Israel's defensive military operation a war crime, when in reality the only war crime Israel is committing is sending out fleets of post-army Israelis to sell hand creams to Americans who DO NOT WANT YOUR FUCKING HAND CREAM! It's especially annoying because I am, in fact, allergic to a lot of creams/laundry detergent/whatever, and sometimes can have really painful skin reactions to it. Today was priceless though, because when some Israeli tried to sell me some of that Ahava shit, I said, "Sorry, I can't, I'm allergic...."
And here is her response, completely un-edited:
"No no no no no, no you are not allergic."
WHAT???
We then had a conversation for the next couple minutes that went something like this:
Me: Yes, I am.
Lady: Can I ask you a question?
Me: Um....okay.
Lady: Let me spoil you. [Not actually a question, lady....]
Me: Uh.....
Lady: I spoil you now (starts trying to put hand lotion on me)
Me: (squirming away) Really, I am.....I....I....I gotta go!
Seriously though, based on our exposure to Israelis, anyone who had never been to Israel would think that everyone in Israel sells hand creams.
1) I'm sick. Really really sick. Okay, technically I'm not actually sick. Wait, actually that's a lie, I am sick: I have a really bad sinus infection. But it's actually the medicine that I'm taking that is making me FEEL sick. The doctor is afraid I'm going to be in agony on the flight so basically I'm taking like 5 different drugs, ahhaha.
2) WHERE THE HELL IS THE FUCKING U.N WHEN YOU NEED IT??? They keep trying to call Israel's defensive military operation a war crime, when in reality the only war crime Israel is committing is sending out fleets of post-army Israelis to sell hand creams to Americans who DO NOT WANT YOUR FUCKING HAND CREAM! It's especially annoying because I am, in fact, allergic to a lot of creams/laundry detergent/whatever, and sometimes can have really painful skin reactions to it. Today was priceless though, because when some Israeli tried to sell me some of that Ahava shit, I said, "Sorry, I can't, I'm allergic...."
And here is her response, completely un-edited:
"No no no no no, no you are not allergic."
WHAT???
We then had a conversation for the next couple minutes that went something like this:
Me: Yes, I am.
Lady: Can I ask you a question?
Me: Um....okay.
Lady: Let me spoil you. [Not actually a question, lady....]
Me: Uh.....
Lady: I spoil you now (starts trying to put hand lotion on me)
Me: (squirming away) Really, I am.....I....I....I gotta go!
Seriously though, based on our exposure to Israelis, anyone who had never been to Israel would think that everyone in Israel sells hand creams.
Friday, January 9, 2009
Gaza in My Pants
Have decided that from this moment until the operation in Gaza ends I'm going to refuse to read the news and instead watch the music video for "Jizz in My Pants" on repeat. For as long as it takes. Because it's more calming than the Nachman mantra....
Thursday, January 8, 2009
Parental Blog and "Fuck-The-Palestinians-ia"
So my parents have asked me to start a blog for when I'm in Israel....which is actually what this blog started out as. But I never actually told my parents about this blog because I figured I'd feel restricted if I knew my parents were reading. Sooooo, I think I'm going to start a second blog. Use this blog as the sort of "Anything Goes" blog, whereas the other one will have appropriate bits from this blog copied.
Also, convo with my pa:
Dad: I've got such a crazy daughter, going to Palestine...
Sam: Dad, it's not Palestine!
Dad: Well, who cares...
Sam: The Romans only called the area Palestine to piss off the Jews by naming their land after their enemies The Philistines.
Dad: Wow....you gotta hand it to the Romans....no one says "Fuck you" quite like the Romans.
Sam: It's kind of like if we took over Gaza and the West Bank and renamed it "Fuck-The-Palestinians-ia."
ALSO, I really like M.I.A. but I can't for the life of me figure out what the fuck she's saying in any of her songs. Does anyone else have this problem?
Also, convo with my pa:
Dad: I've got such a crazy daughter, going to Palestine...
Sam: Dad, it's not Palestine!
Dad: Well, who cares...
Sam: The Romans only called the area Palestine to piss off the Jews by naming their land after their enemies The Philistines.
Dad: Wow....you gotta hand it to the Romans....no one says "Fuck you" quite like the Romans.
Sam: It's kind of like if we took over Gaza and the West Bank and renamed it "Fuck-The-Palestinians-ia."
ALSO, I really like M.I.A. but I can't for the life of me figure out what the fuck she's saying in any of her songs. Does anyone else have this problem?
Tuesday, January 6, 2009
Monday, January 5, 2009
shema
I just heard my brother saying the shema before going to bed....and it dawned on me that it's basically "Taps" for Jews.
Sunday, January 4, 2009
Random
Two nights ago my family and I ate at a kosher sushi joint that played exclusively Enrique Iglesias songs over their speakers. I just thought that was a wonderful jumble of mismatched cultures.
Also, a real exchange between me and a cashier at CVS, 1/3/09
Lady: Would you like to open a CVS card account?
Me: Uhhh....no thanks.... it's not really worth it. Thanks though.
Lady: It's really worth it, you can save so much and you get so many coupons!
Me: No, I meant it's not really worth it cos I'm leaving the country for a while, so I won't have a chance to use the card
Lady: Ooooo! Where are you going, if you don't mind my asking?
Me: Uh....(wondering if I should say Israel....deciding against it) The Middle East.
Lady: Ooooo, are you in the army?
Me: No....
Lady: (totally serious) Well if you're not in the army, why else would you be going to the Middle East? (pausing for a moment to think while I stand there awkwardly) Oh! Were you HIRED by the army? You know, what's the word......
Me: ....contractors?
Lady: Yes!
Me: Um, no, I have nothing to do with the army.
Lady: ......
Also, a real exchange between me and a cashier at CVS, 1/3/09
Lady: Would you like to open a CVS card account?
Me: Uhhh....no thanks.... it's not really worth it. Thanks though.
Lady: It's really worth it, you can save so much and you get so many coupons!
Me: No, I meant it's not really worth it cos I'm leaving the country for a while, so I won't have a chance to use the card
Lady: Ooooo! Where are you going, if you don't mind my asking?
Me: Uh....(wondering if I should say Israel....deciding against it) The Middle East.
Lady: Ooooo, are you in the army?
Me: No....
Lady: (totally serious) Well if you're not in the army, why else would you be going to the Middle East? (pausing for a moment to think while I stand there awkwardly) Oh! Were you HIRED by the army? You know, what's the word......
Me: ....contractors?
Lady: Yes!
Me: Um, no, I have nothing to do with the army.
Lady: ......
Saturday, January 3, 2009
Stop invoking the name of Anne Frank to make a point.
Taking a little bit of a serious turn right now....
I'm getting really sick of all this anti-Israel shit right now. The world doesn't give a shit about violence when Jews are the victims, but the second the Jews try to stop themselves from getting killed, suddenly they're evil people. I read in an online news article that someone at some European anti-Israel protest said that "Anne Frank is turning in her grave," which totally disgusted me.
First off, It disgusted me because the European who made that remark is probably a descendant of a person who helped put Anne Frank in her grave.
Second of all, with all due respect to the memory of Anne Frank, she is not the one and only symbol of the Holocaust or the one and only person who determines what is right and wrong for Jews. Anne Frank was just a teenager who died tragically, and to put her on this high pedestal as moral decider is just weird.
Third of all, there's no fucking way to tell what Anne Frank would have thought, so stop trying to use her for your own purposes. Whether she's for or against what Israel's doing, it's completely irrelevant.
And FOURTHLY:
If Anne Frank would be in favor of allowing such attacks to continue and sitting back and doing nothing in self-defense, as these people attending protests claim, then I'm going to have to disagree with Anne Frank on this one.
I'm getting really sick of all this anti-Israel shit right now. The world doesn't give a shit about violence when Jews are the victims, but the second the Jews try to stop themselves from getting killed, suddenly they're evil people. I read in an online news article that someone at some European anti-Israel protest said that "Anne Frank is turning in her grave," which totally disgusted me.
First off, It disgusted me because the European who made that remark is probably a descendant of a person who helped put Anne Frank in her grave.
Second of all, with all due respect to the memory of Anne Frank, she is not the one and only symbol of the Holocaust or the one and only person who determines what is right and wrong for Jews. Anne Frank was just a teenager who died tragically, and to put her on this high pedestal as moral decider is just weird.
Third of all, there's no fucking way to tell what Anne Frank would have thought, so stop trying to use her for your own purposes. Whether she's for or against what Israel's doing, it's completely irrelevant.
And FOURTHLY:
If Anne Frank would be in favor of allowing such attacks to continue and sitting back and doing nothing in self-defense, as these people attending protests claim, then I'm going to have to disagree with Anne Frank on this one.
Why Quebec totally sucks
So, don't judge me, but I googled Celine Dion. I wanted to see if she was REALLY French-Canadian, because I had a sneaking suspicion that she was a Canadian imposter. Kind of like Keith Urban acting all country and shit in his songs, and it's like, dude, Keith, you're from Australia. You have your own white trash stereotypes there, you don't need to borrow ours. Go be the next Steve Irwin or Crocodile Dundee something, cos we sure as hell don't need another Garth Brooks or (G-d forbid!) Toby Keith.
Anyway, this post isn't about Keith Urban, it's about Celine Dion.
So it turns out that Celine Dion is, in fact, French-Canadian. Well, actually I'm still not convinced, but Wikipedia seemed to think so. Anyway, I clicked on a link to her husband's Wikipedia page, and I soon learned that there is so much more to the creepy old man behind Celine Dion--turns out he was in a pop group in the 60's who were apparently Quebec's answer to The Beatles. Which raises the question: do The Beatles require an answer? Aren't they sort of like the rhetorical question of bands?
And if there is an answer to the question of The Beatles, are these guys the answer?
I believe the evil-looking fat one on the left is Celine Dion's husband.
Obviously I was intrigued and immediately went to do some aural research on itunes. Do yourself a favor: search for "Twist and Shout" by the Isley Brothers. Just listening to a clip of it will make you want to dance. Put on headphones, turn the volume way up, and completely shatter your eardrums. Totally worth it.
Now go search for the Baronets' version of the same song, called "Twiste et Chante." Not only will you want to stab your ears with the nearest sharp instrument, but you will also find yourself pushing for legislation that requires everyone on the planet to learn English, effective immediately.
Anyway, this post isn't about Keith Urban, it's about Celine Dion.
So it turns out that Celine Dion is, in fact, French-Canadian. Well, actually I'm still not convinced, but Wikipedia seemed to think so. Anyway, I clicked on a link to her husband's Wikipedia page, and I soon learned that there is so much more to the creepy old man behind Celine Dion--turns out he was in a pop group in the 60's who were apparently Quebec's answer to The Beatles. Which raises the question: do The Beatles require an answer? Aren't they sort of like the rhetorical question of bands?
And if there is an answer to the question of The Beatles, are these guys the answer?
I believe the evil-looking fat one on the left is Celine Dion's husband.
Obviously I was intrigued and immediately went to do some aural research on itunes. Do yourself a favor: search for "Twist and Shout" by the Isley Brothers. Just listening to a clip of it will make you want to dance. Put on headphones, turn the volume way up, and completely shatter your eardrums. Totally worth it.
Now go search for the Baronets' version of the same song, called "Twiste et Chante." Not only will you want to stab your ears with the nearest sharp instrument, but you will also find yourself pushing for legislation that requires everyone on the planet to learn English, effective immediately.
Friday, January 2, 2009
Poca-Avi
You know what I'm not looking forward to in Israel?
Being schooled.
Do you know what I'm talking about? Like, I'm going to go there with my American beliefs in the way things SHOULD be, and one day an Israeli is going to school me. Except, unfortunately for me, it won't be ONE day. It's a constant process, one of constantly being embarrassed and constantly doing the wrong thing or thinking the wrong way. What I'd REALLY like is for some kind soul to just step in and gently explain to me why I'm wrong. Kind of like Pocahontas. Except the song the Israeli is going to sing to me is going to have nothing to do with being one with nature or whatever. More likely the song is going to be about tickets on a bus, or dual-flush toilets, or matkot, or whatever.
WANTED IN THE JERUSALEM AREA
Being schooled.
Do you know what I'm talking about? Like, I'm going to go there with my American beliefs in the way things SHOULD be, and one day an Israeli is going to school me. Except, unfortunately for me, it won't be ONE day. It's a constant process, one of constantly being embarrassed and constantly doing the wrong thing or thinking the wrong way. What I'd REALLY like is for some kind soul to just step in and gently explain to me why I'm wrong. Kind of like Pocahontas. Except the song the Israeli is going to sing to me is going to have nothing to do with being one with nature or whatever. More likely the song is going to be about tickets on a bus, or dual-flush toilets, or matkot, or whatever.
WANTED IN THE JERUSALEM AREA
Thursday, January 1, 2009
All I can say is, an apocalyptic-style New Year's Eve....like y2k...would have been an improvement.
Things really suck at the moment. had an angry 3 mile march home, followed by "best friend" since 8th grade bailing on me.....so, all in all, things are really depressing around here. combine that with my mom coming into my room every five seconds to try to cheer me up and it's even more embarrassing.
Sigh.....looks like 2009 isn't going to be any better.
Edit: I was looking at facebook statuses.....looks like I'm not the only one who's pissed off or sad! That's strangely comforting...
Things really suck at the moment. had an angry 3 mile march home, followed by "best friend" since 8th grade bailing on me.....so, all in all, things are really depressing around here. combine that with my mom coming into my room every five seconds to try to cheer me up and it's even more embarrassing.
Sigh.....looks like 2009 isn't going to be any better.
Edit: I was looking at facebook statuses.....looks like I'm not the only one who's pissed off or sad! That's strangely comforting...
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