Living the Dream, Two Years In

Every so often, I get a feeling that I'm dreaming. Am I really living in Israel? It's been almost two years and it still doesn't feel real. Twice I've been back to NY and twice it's been a round trip ticket, because- that's just not my home anymore.

Because of having work on Sunday mornings and my general exhaustion, I've barely left Jerusalem in months. I started a new job a few weeks ago that works primarily with the US and so there's no work on Sundays. Before I started there, I called up a friend in Ramat Gam (near Tel Aviv) I hadn't seen for a while and told her I was coming for Shabbat the first week of my new job. I asked her if she had work on Friday or Sunday and we made plans to go to the beach. 

Heading to Tel Aviv on Friday, I, of course, had my phone out and was tweeting, playing my newest game, checking Facebook, etc. when I realized that it's been too long since I simply looked out the window while commuting. I've almost forgotten the pure pleasure of seeing Israel's landscapes as I ride through it. I'm not even talking about the beautiful ride heading up to the Golan or down past the Dead Sea, just passing smaller cities or towns, crops and fields. I closed Twitter and looked out the window. 

Then I decided that I should really be listening to Israeli music rather than the RHCP, and there was a specific song I wanted to hear, which for some reason wasn't on my phone. I found it on YouTube, put it on and looked back out the window.

And started tearing up.

I really live here? This is really my home? Yeah, I struggle to pay rent every month, yeah, there was one really embarrassing incident when the electric was shut off because I know nothing about paying bills (don't worry, it's worked out), and yeah, there are definitely some things about this country that I can't stand, but, much like an annoying sibling, you can only complain if it's yours, and this country is MINE.

I miss my parents and friends, but no matter, I've never even entertained thoughts of leaving. I know that there are lots of people who feel differently, lots of people who, for their own reasons, are unable or choose not to stay in Israel, and they have my respect for trying, but for me...

This is my home. 

A Toast: To Attempting to Figure Out WTF to Do

I hung out with my cousin on Monday. She just got back from traveling in Asia and also had to visit some government offices to straighten things out. At the end of the day, we visited a little bar in the shuk (marketplace) we'd gone to together in October. It's called the 5th of May, a closet sized store with a couple of small tables inside and out and a nice cherry beer that I can actually stand to drink. I decided to go with a proper Israeli drink: Arak (or Ouzo or Anis or whatever it's called in your place of residence). I asked for it in a "chaser"- shotglass, idk why it's called a chaser, but ok- lifted my glass, toasted "to the Israeli bureaucracy", and tossed it back. I didn't do it, but I was in a mood to get smashed.

Allow me to start at the beginning -only of the day, don't worry:

I unexpectedly slept over at a friend's apartment Sunday night and needed to leave early Monday morning together with her roommates so that we wouldn't need to worry about keys. Fine. So I get into town around 8:00am and head to Sam's Bagels on Ben Yehuda, my place to go if I want more than coffee and pastries for breakfast, to wait for my cousin. Well, she got stuck in traffic on her way into Jerusalem and I can linger over my coffee for only so long, so I went to develop some photos I'll be making into cards. She arrived and we headed to the office of Bituach Leumi-the National Insurance Institute, basically the Israeli Social Security office.

Now, for those of you who don't know, if you need to go to a bank or government office, if you show up after 12noon, you won't be able to get in 9 times out of 10. That's just how it is over here.

So we get to Bituach Leumi at about 9am and they're closed. WTF. Turns out they have afternoon hours on Mondays. From 3pm-5pm. Fine. So we decide to wander around and run some errands we needed/wanted to do. Among those things was going to the bank. We went to my bank, I took a number and then a seat, waited my turn- inasmuch as one waits for a turn in Israel- and sat down with a personal banking rep. Four things I needed to do, I even wrote them down:

*change my bank branch to a more accessible location,

*make sure that my account is no longer locked (I had it in a 6 month locked account, like a certificate of deposit),

*change my address in the system (I don't need important bank info going to NY if I'm not there!), and

*order a new bank card.

Great. I start to tell the woman what I need to do. "No problem" she tells me. Beware of this phrase! When an Israeli tells you "no problem"- expect problems!! Branch transfer- really was no problem: click click, ok your account information is being transferred, it should only take about 2 days. Locked account? no, no I can see it's ok, you have X shekels. Scrreeech!! Hard brakes! How much???? the number she told me was 1/3 of how much I knew I had in the bank! Well, ehhhh, until your account is fully transferred, I can only see so much... Ok. Fine. I'll verify the amount when it finishes transferring, address change? "Don't worry" (that's another one to watch out for, so now I'm more than a little anxious) we'll do it after this is your branch, no problem. New card? same thing. Well, hell.

Walked around, walked around, walked around... got some craft supplies I needed, got some

earrings, walked around some more... met two of my cousins' wives for a light lunch at a great place on the corner of King George and Hillel- that's apparently been there forever and used to be a salon style place for politicians, then headed to Bituach Leumi.

Again, I took a number and then a seat, and waited for my turn. When it finally came, I go to the lady, I say I'm an Ezrachit Olah (a citizen born abroad who moved to Israel) and that I came because they told me I needed to register before I could sign up for the health plan of my choice. Ok, here's a form you need to fill out. But this says it's for a Toshav Chozer (returning resident), that's not my status... Same thing. Um, ok, do you have one in English? No. Um... ok... So I start filling the form out- address, identity number, etc. I turn the page (4 pages in all) and the questions seem to be asking about my business and if I sold all my property... I'm not sure I understand what it's saying so I ask my cousin to help me. She doesn't think it's the right form either and we stand up to tell the lady. So she finishes with the man she's speaking to- I hesitate to say "helping"- at the moment and looked me up in the computer.

According to the computer system at Bituach Leumi, I lived in Israel from 1992-2006.

Allow me to assure you, faithful-ish reader, I was most definitely in America during my formative years. I mean, just ask me how many pairs of shoes I own, I think that's a pretty strong indicator.

So I took the papers and my shocked self out of there, ranting and raving like the proper Israeli I'm becoming and we set off to find somewhere I could get a strong drink.

So raise your glass of arak and toast the runaround, headache, angst, and all the other "good" stuff that comes with making aliyah.

New Directions (and no, I don't mean Glee!)

I did it. I moved to Israel.

That was the easy part.

The hard part was packing- which of course I didn't actually do until the day/night/morning before my flight. Which ended up being delayed a ridiculous amount of time lol. I didn't mind, I actually got to know some of the other olim (people moving to Israel), we played cards, we chatted, I got distracted n wandered off, bought some chocolate, came back n shared-- nothing new in any of those things lol-- and finally after about 2 hours waiting in the gate, we finally boarded. I sat (aisle seat thank G-d!!) next to a girl I'd met in the airport and a guy I hadn't.

So the flight went well, we met Natan Sharansky in Newark after check-in--- aside: all 3 of my bags were overweight, 1 was even >20lbs over, which is supposed to be like $100 fine or something, but the lady only charged me $25 each, but I just checked my bank statement and it looks like I was only charge $25 total!!! :D --- we took pictures, blah blah blah...

My mother didn't cry, for which I am grateful, my father didn't make it to the airport, for which I was disappointed, but I saw him during the 2 hours extra I had at home and he'll be in Israel on Tuesday. Oy. To see my grandfather who's in a rehab center after having had a stroke a month or so back :( We went to see him Thursday night. It's scary to see your grandparents getting older, my other grandfather is home now from a similar place, and walking, thank G-d, but in pain all the time.

Ok, back to the flight day: umm... yeah, so good

flight, I got to watch I am Number 4 and Country Strong, two movies that I've been wanting to see, I would have watched more, but a total of 10 hours of sleep over 4 or so days does not encourage staying awake on an 11 hour flight. Food was good, had some wine- even better, had some coffee-- big mistake! DO NOT DRINK AIRPLANE COFFEE!! I knew this and I still did it. I must have forgotten...

So we get to Israel, met by Nefesh B'Nefesh people (the organization that helps people make aliyah), some of whom I recognized cuz I've only been in their office like 3 times trying to get help (the non-white coat type), went through passport control, went to the old terminal- which I didn't know how much I missed! It reminds me of my childhood :) -to the Ministry of Absorption

office where we got documents and money- yay ;) - then back to get our luggage lmao 3 huge bags and lil ol' me? it was a sight to see, and then out! into the hot humid air of Tel Aviv! but

before that, MY COUSIN CAME TO MEET ME!! a cousin I hadn't seen in like 2 or 3 years, whose husband I'd never met, with whom I am not in general contact with other that her status updates in my Facebook newsfeed! (which is how she knew I would be arriving that day!) I was

so surprised and so so so happy!

The three of us packed ourselves and my bags into a monit sherut (shared taxi van thingie... hard to translate) with an older French couple and set off to Jerusalem, where I would be (/am) staying with my brother.

Ok. That's enough for now, stay tuned for the next update of

-dum dum dum- Vered's Aliya.

it's been a while...

Okay. So here's an update on the last few months... not that I expect anyone to care, but hey, why not?

As you may have been able to tell from my last post, I hated my job. With a passion. However, you may notice that I used the past tense in that sentence- why? you may ask. Well, now I love it! No, that's a lie, really I quit!! yeyah! Unfortunately, I couldn't squeeze more money out of them when I resigned... not that I'm sure they would have offered it, but my reason was that I'm moving to Israel. Which I am, please G-d, in a few months time. Well, now it's closer to two months. Ask me if I'm ready... nope! not at all! Except for having been accepted into the Ulpan (intensive Hebrew classes) of my choice (woot woot!), and that includes room and board for 5 months, so that's awesome. But there's so much more I need to do before I'm ready to go. Sooo much more! Like go through 24 years worth of crap and figure out what to keep, what to donate, what to throw out...

Right. um... also, my brother got married!!! In Israel. Another reason I decided that my aliyah (move to Israel) has to happen now. G-d willing, they will be starting a family when the time is right and I'd really, really like to be there to be the bestest aunt ever. So I went to Israel for the wedding, which was beautiful, thanks for asking :) and I stayed for an additional month. I didn't get everything done that I wanted to, especially cuz I kept getting sick :( but I was able to talk to some people, get some advice, sorta look for a job... Then I came back to the States. I've been home now 3 weeks and I've been really proactive in doing nothing. Really, I think I deserve like an award or something, I am so accomplished at getting nothing done. No, not quite true, I have been keeping up with my Twitter and Facebook. That counts for something, right?

I was looking for a temp job for the next few months but couldn't really find anything. What I did find was a commission-only sales job. It's with Israelis and if it works out, I can continue in Israel, but... I really need money now not in a month... well, I'll just have to be really aggressive, eh, and get the cash flow starting sooner rather than later.

I'm also trying to get people to buy personalized gifts from me, so, hey, if someone you know had/is having a baby or a birthday, or really any occasion, and you don't have time to get them a gift or you want something really special, call me, alright? cuz I'm really good at making gifts and they're nice and reasonably priced. So please take a look at the collage I've included with this post

And that's about all for now...

office therapist?

Although I did study psychology, I have decided that it's no longer what I want to do with my life. It seems as though my coworkers haven't accepted my decision in this matter even though I don't work in the mental health field, I work... slave... pass the time... in the home health field.
Anyway, so I don't know why it is, but I always seem to be the one that people vent to, share office secrets with, etc. Not that I mind, I'm glad that people are comfortable telling me things they wouldn't share with others... that sounds kind of weird, but that's how I've been for a while, it's one of the reasons I wanted to go into clinical psych in the first place, I'm happy to be the person you can talk to when you're frustrated out of your mind with the daily grind... but I don't always have a response for them. And I can't always say what I'm thinking, you know? Like if coworker A says to me that she has so much to do that she can't get the payroll entered (which affects my ability to do my job) and make phone calls and do such-and-such, I can't say to her, "well, if you actually could multitask, you'd be able to!" or "really? because when it was my job, I got it all done..."
sigh.
I also can't stand it when some of the office staff are really nasty to this one woman who works with us. Thing about this lady is that she's a straight shooter, if you mess up, she'll call you out on it, if she messes up, she'll admit it right away. But in her department, no, the whole company, if someone messes up the patients could be at risk, so if a mistake is made, it needs to be constructively criticized so that it won't happen again, but people just don't like the way she talks. Now, being the office therapist and all, I happen to know how crappy her job is, the lack of support she receives (which I can totally empathize with O_o), not to mention some health and relationship issues she's dealing with. So when people call her a bitch and talk about her like there's no reason not to, it bothers me. I'm not going to say anything about what she told me, but sometimes I want to tell them to shut up and leave her alone, how would they act if they were going through what she is.
But of course I won't, everything told to me is in strict confidence, that's part of my job as office therapist.

netflix

I love my Netflix. Most of the time. The problem is that I like to share with people, like my mom and my dad, etc. Now, that in itself wouldn't be a problem except that my mom keeps rating the movies she watches on my account.
Now, those of you who are familiar with Netflix know that when you rate a movie, the algorithms built into the program will select other, similar movies to suggest to you. Wait, no, you don't even have to rate the movie, you only need to watch it. So my mom, who's rating the films she watches, and I use the word "film" rather than "movie" because most of what she watches is from the 40s, 50s, whatever, you know, those black and white dramas, comedies, etc, films that were actually rather well done-- but not what I want recommended! My dad, on the other hand, has a 2-yr-old. Need I say more?
Not to worry, I do appreciate well done films, but I've taken too many film classes to just sit back and relax watching an old movie, I'm always admiring filming technique, witty dialogue, etc. Not what I need when I'm looking for a quick, fun, recent, rom com at the end of a long day.

As much as I like sharing, I think I may need to change my password.

starter

hi all. so this is my first blog ever, and i'm hoping y'all (whoever's reading this) will bear with me as i learn as i go.
a bit about myself... i studied psychology but i no longer want to go into clinical so i have an unused 4-year degree, i'm working at a job i am "dissatisfied" with, making sure that over 100 field employees are paid for the home healthcare services they provide.
anyway, so i'm trying to break into the advertising or marketing fields, but specifically in creative design. for this, i understand that i need to build a portfolio. unfortunately, in order to do this, one needs to actually know how to use the programs that one uses to build such portfolios... which i don't :/
um... what else...? i'm an orthodox Jewish young woman who's trying, at the same time as the above, to move to israel. asap.
yeah, i think that's all for now. hope to be back soon.
A bientot :)