Aliyah Blog 39: Prove Yourself and Plumbing

Aliyah Blog Entries – Read Them All Here

Aliyah Diary

Arrival
01. Aug 19, 2024: Preparation In America
02. Aug 25, 2024: First Few Days
03. Aug 29, 2024: Moving In

Cultural Adjustment
04. Sept 4, 2024: First Day of School
05. Sept 8, 2024: Two Weeks In . . .
06. Sept 16, 2024: Getting Comfortable
07. Sept 22, 2024: Ready for Yom Tov
09. Sept 30, 2024: Nasrallahed on the Floor
15. Nov 10, 2024: Safety Fourth
18. Nov 24, 2024: Language – l’at, ‘lat
29. Jan 31, 2025: My Son Still in America
31. Feb 3, 2025: Internet Filtering for Kids
34. Feb 17, 2025: Finding Obscure Things
37. Mar 3, 2025: Technical Difficulties
39. Mar 12, 2025: Prove Yourself

The Roads
24. Jan 5, 2025: Supermarkets & Highways
25. Jan 12, 2025: Not Cutting Me Off
36. Feb 25, 2025: Road Rules of Israel

Government and Bureaucracy
10. Oct 8, 2024: Driver’s License
11. Oct 13, 2024: Packages. (חבילות.)
13. Oct 30, 2024: Bureaucracies and Stories
19. Nov 28, 2024: Taxation for Americans
22. Dec 23, 2024: Doctors & “Choleh Chadash”
27. Jan 23, 2025: Healthcare in Israel
32. Feb 5, 2025: How To Hire the Wrong Person
33. Feb 10, 2025: Quest to Pay My Taxes

Politics & Thought
12. Oct 25, 2024: October Sun and the Jew
16. Nov 17, 2024: Where People Look Like Me
17. Nov 19, 2024: Jewish Identity and Outlook
21. Dec 11, 2024: Let Freedom Ring
38. Mar 6, 2025: Talking in Quiet Peace

Travel and Trips
08. Sept 25, 2024: Jerusalem Concert
14. Nov 2, 2024: The Kindness of Strangers
20. Dec 5, 2024: Tel Aviv Art Museum
23. Dec 29, 2024: The West Bank. (Shomron)
26. Jan 18, 2025: Dead Sea Beer and Ice Cream
28. Jan 26, 2025: Yarkon River Judaism, Tel Aviv
30. Jan 31, 2025: My Son Visits and we Travel
35. Feb 20, 2025: Mitzpe Ramon Stars, Ein Avdat

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Prove You’re American

The best way to let Israelis know that you are American is to open your mouth and start speaking. The second-best way is to walk into an electronics store and ask to buy a Chromebook.

“You mean Qualcomm?” said an Israeli in an accent that sounded kind of like, “Chromebook”. (Are you trying to mouth it now?)

Okay, so maybe this store, which was really just a long counter something like a small train station ticket booth, is run by newbs.

I was in Jerusalem where I had purchased a Linux-based Dell laptop previously – NofTech. It seemed they knew what they were doing. (Another installation choice is FreeDOS?!? – that’s the open-source version of an operating system last widely used before the turn of the last century)

In clear Hebrew I asked for a Chromebook. In clear English he said Americans come in regularly and ask for them. There are no Chromebooks sold in Israel!

My operating system of choice is PopOs … and said family member wanted a certain size, a touchscreen, etc, … so it was cheaper to buy a Chromebook from Amazon and pay shipping and VAT than a comparable ‘regular’ laptop with those features. (I’d love to meet another actual person who runs PopOs – if you have no idea what I’m talking about, that’s okay too. Chromebooks are great for everyday use.)

Most laptops won’t even ship to Israel from Amazon … NewEgg has a website for Israel though their prices didn’t seem right to me.

Prove You’re Ashkenazi

There’s an Isaac Asimov short story in I Robot about detecting a robot which has emotions that otherwise is identical to the other robots. This robot doesn’t want to get caught so it blends in. Through some mental trickery they get this robot to outthink itself and move forward when other robots stay put. The robot reveals itself to its embarrassment.

Sefardim are the real thing over here … not the Americanized ones. They don’t stand when someone recites kaddish. I, on the other hand, start standing … then sit back down and hope I wasn’t noticed. The thing about Israel though is that no one cares what you do.

Sliach Tzibor Like an American

For the normal people who didn’t decide to find G_d and religion in college, a “shliach tzibor” literally means “someone who sends for the congregation” … the person who leads the prayers. I did that for the first time not too long ago during the morning and got to bircas kohanim, which is the prayer given by the Kohain’s for the congregation. Outside Israel, the kohanim only get up in front of the congregation on holidays, put a tallis over themselves, make a Spock-hand gesture, and bless us to live long and prosper (though not in those words). The Vilna Goan wanted it instituted everywhere and while not successful in doing so in Lithuania, his followers were successful in establishing the process in Israel.

In Israel, it’s everyday so it’s not quite the “ooo, get the kids in here! Get them under tatti’s Talis!” sort of thing. Durkheim or some sociologist said the obvious … when something is more rare, we make a bigger deal out of it.

So here I am in Israel, leading the morning prayers for the first time and … someone yells, “Kohanaim!” signaling for the kohanim to say the brocha (blessing). Then there’s silence.

More silence – why aren’t the kohanim saying anything? I’m not a kohein.

Oh – shoot. I say the words first. Ugh. I feel like I just asked for a Chromebook.

. . . then at the end they add some other stuff that Sefardim say … even if you’re Ashkenazi in Israel. There are those that learn from books and those that learn from experience.

There’s also those that pay more attention in synagogue. Also, there’s a big sign that says the time for Shachris and Minchah (morning and afternoon prayers) at the gas station. Lest you think that sound strange – the gas station is really clean … it looks almost like a Planet Fitness with the reflective metal panel walls.

English Words Without Meaning

I have weeds. I wanted to buy weed killer. I have tiles and no grass – yet, I still have weeds. Thought I was past that. At least I don’t have to rake leaves.

“Weed killer” is just not something I know how to say in Hebrew. The guy in the hardware store jokingly says he thinks it’s marijuana. I chuckled a bit on the inside because he has no idea why pot is called “weed” and what it means.

Monopoly is the same way … in Hebrew it’s “monopol” and they have no idea that it comes from “mono” (one) and “poly” (many) … one person who controls many things. To be fair, sixth graders had no idea what monopoly was either – I taught them the origin on page 30.

Going into “me-nouse” (negative balance in your bank)

Most Israelis, I’m told, have a negative balance in their bank account … they say, “me-nouse” which is Israeli for “minus”. I can see why. It’s too easy.

Comparison:

United States bank – “OH MY GAWWWDDDD!!!!! NEGATIVE BALANCE?!?!?! HOW DARE YOU!!! NOTICE IN THE MAIL FOR YOU!!! ONLINE ACCOUNT SHOWS RED AND BANK FEE FOR STEALING OUR MONEY!”

Israel bank – “Welcome back. Nothing new here. Have a nice day.”

… and so many things automatically come out of your account such as mortgage payment, taxes, copays for doctor visits, school payments, and whatever else. Stores will ask you, “do you want to pay everything or spread it out over 12 payments?” There’s no such thing as missing a credit card bill. They just take it from your account, and you go into “me-nouse” and no one cares.

I really have to stay on top of it and make sure to transfer enough money into my account from the United States. Ain’t no one gonna tell me when I need to do that and it’s very easy to forgot to do what we don’t want to do or think about. I’m very type-A … most of the world isn’t.

When the Internet Goes Out

Verizon almost never went out. It’s more reliable than a husband fixing something in the house six months to a year after his wife asks him to do it. Bezeq … it’s gone out a few times and usually comes back soon after.

Each time you disconnect/connect you get a new internet address – suppose that varies by company though it makes it easier to hide yourself from the world which I guess is the point. This last time it was a few hours so I called Bezeq, the former monopoly phone company in Israel (monopol company?) – I reached a human in about 5 minutes. I selected English in the menus and received English prompts and an English speaking technician. She texted me a link to share my camera with her and I showed her my setup. I suppose this could be done in America … it just isn’t (as far as I know). With tech, Israel is usually a lot more advanced. The support was 1000x better than anything I received from Verizon or Cablevision. (Turned out I needed to reboot my own Tp-Link Deco routers … which is how we extend the internet through a concrete house.)

Common Language with the Chinese

Arab workers from across the green line are no longer a thing. It’s a stupid shame because there are those that are normal – and those in Israel proper have a lot more job opportunities so there are less “day laborers” available from that pool. Israel is now importing workers instead … two Chinese guys were working on my bathroom, cutting tiles with a table saw and no ear protection. I couldn’t take it, so I bought them some.

When they wanted water, the international signal worked … hold your yarmulke with one hand, cup your other hand in front of your mouth, and move your head and mouth together, looking towards the sky. He wasn’t wearing a yarmulke yet he was holding his head with his hand the same way. Guess he thinks it’s the way to do it here.

For more complex things such as, “are you deaf yet?” he couldn’t understand me (or hear me?) so I tried, “is your tinnitus worse than mine?”

Then I realized he didn’t speak English, and I don’t speak Mandarin. He communicated in his broken Hebrew and me, in mine. Nice fellow. If you can’t hear, you can’t hear in any language so the way I see it, I saved his Mandarin.

About Those Tiles …

When I hear “B’Nai Brak” I think – Ponevitch yeshiva, full time Torah leanring, Pesach haggadah … I don’t think, “that’s where the tile places are.” They are. Lots of them. In the lobby of this mall-like place with tiles was a great eatery as well with a great hechsur.

Unlike America, as is almost everything around here, there’s a lot more variety. You don’t walk into different stores and see carbon copies (well, color equivalent thereof) of everything. There are some places whether everything is white or grey – drab. There are other places with, well, tile like the above. Large tiles are in these days – less grout and probably less work to install.

We needed more. The store we bought from ran out. To get them now, I must drive (well, my wife says I must drive – and refused to wait the requisite 6 months to a year for me to do it) to a store 45 minutes away. I park illegally with everyone else – you have to know where it’s okay to park illegally – and I bring my full-page receipt to the clerkess (I’m liking this masculine/feminine word thing in Hebrew, sometimes – it tells you more information in less space). She’s deadpan serious and staying in Hebrew. The document I have isn’t right for some reason. Need an order number. I show her. My wife talks to her by phone. The contractor talks to her. We finally get it right. Still deadpan – no smile.

Then I thank her for not trying to speak English to me so I could really practice Hebrew. She smiles – finally. Then she answers me in English. No! Quit that! Go back to deadpan and speak Hebrew!

Then I waited 20 minutes and when I stood up she said, “you’re still here?” (in Hebrew) and got me the tile right away. Then I drove it back home and found out we didn’t need the extra tile after all.

At least I got to practice Hebrew and see more of the country. I mean that.

I think I understand women easier than men when they speak Hebrew. Women tend to speak slower and don’t mumble. The pitch of their voices is within normal human hearing range whereas some men around here not only mumble, their guttural letters can be in such a low pitch that the surroundings resonatedly rumble, further making it hard to hear them. Except Benjamin Netanyahu – he speaks slowly and clearly. It’s easy to understand him on the radio.

My days are like vacations – nice warm weather, plenty of unique shops, and I can do whatever I feel like. My shoes are sandals. The shoe store has American sizes on the boxes.

Then I work at night from 4pm to midnight and … I’m tired. When do I get a vacation? Ah, tomorrow.

Plumbing in this Country

One of our bathrooms was bad enough that we gutted the whole thing. Someone had glued the laparoscopically-accessed tank to the inside cavity … crooked. The flusher would keep leaking / breaking and it was unfixable without opening up the wall. The floors had some nice pools of water under the tiles with … who knows what.

Gutted. Re-tiled. Work performed by Chinese people. Real ones … the ones who have lived their whole lives in China.

We had some other fun things like … failure to put silicone around a pipe entering the basement and drains below porch tiles. Below. The Arab contractor from before I bought the house said it would prevent buildup of water – below the tile. ?!?! The drains are now cut into the tiles and … drain water.

In Modiin I heard there was a row of apartment buildings where the pipes rusted after about a year. They all had to be replaced … at the owner’s expense.

Hot Water

We have an “instahot” in addition to a “dud“. The “instahot” works fine … it runs on propane and you know when the propane tank needs to be replaced. However, it’s not so hot when the dishwasher is also running and there’s another person in a second shower. I’m sure there’s higher capacity instahots.

The “dud” … the hot water heater on the roof that’s heated with electric coils (that Israelis only turn on before taking a shower) … that thing is hot. I put the shower control thing barely towards “hot” and that’s a nice shower. It’s hotter than a McDonalds hot coffee lawsuit. No one sues each other for their own stupidity here.

Happy People

They smile a lot – they’re friendly – they seem to be genuinely happy. Life has meaning. We’re part of something bigger here. You don’t need JFK to say “ask what you can do for your country”. YEah, America is like that – there’s a bill of “rights” and no bill of “responsibility” (I got this concept from Rabbi Johnathan Sacks). Israel has rights and responsibilities.

Government buildings, private offices … people take the time to help you when something isn’t going right, such as with the bureaucracy. Israelis care about their country and take pride in it. The streets are clean and people actually care about one another. I thanked a girl who cleans the gym for keeping it clean (after she took my towel thinking it was ownerless) and she responded, “azeh kef” … it’s a common response … something like, “with pleasure” though it literally means, “what fun”.

You don’t have to hold your kids hand tight and really close to use when you walk down the street and you don’t have to watch your back. It feels so much safer. Once you’re living here and no longer a tourist in your own country, you can really see the beauty of the land and people.

Southwest Elevation Satellite Map of Israel

Found this map on Reddit. This is why no condemnations from the United Nations will ever result in Israel giving up Judea and Samaria (the “West Bank” … west of the Jordan river). Israel also recently took the entirety of Mount Hermon from Syria, all the way in the North. It’s the highest point around and overlooks Damascus and Beirut. While Israel is at it, they’re allowing Druze from Syria to work in Israel and giving them tons of money to build up their society in Syria. Azeh kef.