She's back from the recruitment office--and she's got news!

Today I created yet another reason for going on birthright (if you’re an Israeli).


So I went to the Lishkat Giyus today, and they informed me that if (G-d forbid!) a soldier dies in the army, a little bit of money is paid to your family or to some other person of the soldier’s choosing. So they asked me who I wanted my money to go to if (here’s your cue to say “G-d forbid!”) I die in service—yeah, I know I’m probably going to work in an office somewhere, but you can die from papercuts….

So obviously my immediate response is, “My parents, of course!” And she tells me it has to be someone in Israel and asks if I have any other family in Israel—and then she catches herself, because she remembers that earlier in the interview we couldn’t think of anyone that I know in Israel that has been here for at least 7 years, and she suggested that I put down the name of a family member, and I told her that I don’t have any family in Israel or even an old friend, and all of the people I talk to here in Israel regularly are new immigrants. So the soldier who is interviewing is trying really hard to be helpful and suggests that we put down the guy in the Machal office to be both my contact who lives in Israel and the person who would get my money. So we called him, and he freaked out and was not helpful and didn’t understand what was going on and was generally unhelpful. He told me that no one else has ever had this problem before and so he couldn’t figure out what my problem was. (My guess is that most people who do the program do have family/close friends in Israel that they can put down, so that’s why this guy has not heard this problem before….). So we get off the phone with him, and the soldier who is interviewing me is starting to get a little concerned, cos we can’t move on without this information. She suggests putting down the manager of the ulpan. Desperate to just get on with things, I said okay.
(Holy fuck though, if my money went to this fucking ulpan……Jesus Christ, I’d pray for immortality, drink unicorn’s blood….do whatever it takes to prevent that.)
So we called and there was no response.

Well, fuck. So we’re just sitting there, and I'm trying to act all calm but in my head I’m freaking out because I don’t know what I’m going to do. I asked if she could just give away my death money to charity or something, or if she could just give it to a random person on the street—I didn’t really give a fuck, I just wanted out.

Meanwhile a crowd of soldiers gathered around the desk I was at as each tried to offer advice. Other people being recruited who were bored and scared looked over at me, and I just felt so pathetic. It was embarrassing and really drove home the point that I’m alone in this country.

I started nervously fidgeting with my phone, and then I got suddenly got an idea. “Fuck this,” I said in English, and then continued in Hebrew to the soldiers, “I’ll try one more time, wait.”


I called my roomie from Birthright.

I said in Hebrew, “If I die in the army, do you want my money?”
And the ENTIRE room erupted in laughter. Oh my goodness, it was excellent. I think most of the time people are just like, “Give it to my parents,” and here I was just trying desperately to get rid of my money to anybody (if my last attempt didn’t end in success, I was considering just finding a random schmoe off the street), and I end up asking questions in an incredibly blunt way.

Anyway, once that got settled everything was quite nice. During the interview it was really difficult to understand everything the soldier was saying, but I thought I understood pretty decently.


So finally I got released from that room and sent downstairs for my physical. I’m like about to die because I have to pee so badly, and so I go quickly and then head downstairs for a medical exam. And they immediately tell me I need to go pee in a cup. And they tell me that I need to pee in an upstairs bathroom and then carry it downstairs in front of everyone back to the doctor’s office. Which struck me as quite possibly the most disgusting thing I’ve ever heard. What if I bumped into someone (as I do all the time) and I spilled a cup of pee everywhere? Omg, that’s so gross, I’m sorry I just said that to y’all.
So obviously since I just peed I can’t go again so I start chugging water. Like I spent a solid 5 minutes at the water fountain.
Which meant that for the rest of my time in the lishkat giyus, I had to pee every 10 minutes. (Again, sorry I’m telling you all of this, but I mean, you are CHOOSING to read my blog….)

Eventually I end up in the main physical examination room. And this horrible and enormous Russian lady talks to me in English, which is a relief for me after (at this point) experiencing 2 hours of not fully understanding everything), but she’s only doing it because she thinks I don’t understand Hebrew at all.

As she sifts through my papers and says not a single word to me, in Hebrew she starts yelling, ranting, etc. at the soldier in the room about how angry she is that I don’t have a teudat zehut and how that just makes everything soooo difficult for her, and how angry she is that my doctor from home gave me a prescription that she didn’t think I should take for what I have, and what a pain I was and how difficult I am making her day just by sitting in her office. And then to top it off she started ranting about how she hates my doctor and people from England (where she said I came from) because they use pounds and inches, instead of kilograms and meters.

So I sat there quietly through all of this and smiled and pretended that I couldn’t hear or understand. But when she suggested that I was from ENGLAND and that the English use OUR system, I got pissed. So I said to her in Hebrew, “They use kilograms and meters in England too. And anyway, I’m not from England. Oh, and anyway I also understand Hebrew.”

Hahahahahah. Oh it felt so good. She got all red. Then she started arguing with me in English over whether or not England used pounds or not. I told her she was confusing pounds, the unit of measure, with pounds, the unit of currency. I wanted to say, "You're also a fucktard," but I kept it civil.

So finally since I have a blood issue I had to get a little blood test, and so a soldier takes me down the hall. And again no one thinks I understand English. No one told me in English that I was getting a blood test, I just overheard it in Hebrew and I was told to follow a soldier in English. So I’m sitting there and a couple soldiers start whipping out needles and shit like that. And then one of them says to the others in Hebrew, “Do you think maybe we should translate for her what’s going on, because she probably doesn’t understand what’s happening. It might scare her.” Then another said, “No, just surprise her, that will be better.” And I burst out laughing….

After being made to stand in nothing but my skivvies in front of the horrible and enormous Russian lady, I was sent upstairs to take tests.

So first I had to do that horrible shape/sequence shit test. And it was great because all the instructions were translated into English.
Finally I clicked to go onto the personal questionnaire….and everything switched into Hebrew. I thought I was going to vomit. I think the last time my stomach dropped like that was when I went on “Ghostrider.” I raised my hand and a soldier came to my aid. “Yes?”

“Um….it’s in Hebrew.”

“Yes.”

“Um…..I….I….I’m American….I….I can’t….”

“Oh. Well, we only have it in Hebrew, so…..can you read Hebrew at all?”

“Yeah, a bit, but—“

“Well, just try.”


Fuck. So I started off the questionnaire by being totally pissed off. I don’t understand why they wasted their fucking time translating the questions and instructions for the shapes and sequences thing when the instructions were self-explanatory, while the actual verbal questions they left in fucking Hebrew. Like, whose fucking great idea was that?

But then I started working on the questions and I realized that I more or less understood the questions and the answers. At least, I THINK I understood. For all I know, I kept saying, “Yes, whenever we go to Gaza I want to be the first one in.”

A couple questions I had to guess at because I would read it and it would be like, “In your opinion is garble farble in quarkledee foobletan dratten?” And they don’t let you leave questions unanswered so you have to put SOMETHING. So I have a feeling that like 80 percent of my answers are accurate (more or less) representations of me, whereas 20 percent are total wildcards. I can just imagine people somewhere reading my answers:

“Well, from the answers we got we can tell that she’s slightly introverted, likes to read, is excited about her army service, and enjoys raping small children. She also is always on time, enjoys studying, and she also killed a man in Reno.”


Finally I was released. I walked down to Ben Yehuda to get some shwarma, and when I went to pay, the guy says to me IN ENGLISH: “You got chicken? 29 shekels.” And I wanted to be like, “Bitch please, ‘chicken’ and ‘29 shekels’ would have been the easiest thing I’ve heard in Hebrew all day…..”