In the Tel Aviv safari, up close & personal

Best first-day-of-work ever

I just had the most wonderful day. The timing of my new job couldn't have been more perfect -- the management had planned for today a staff-wide retreat to the north in honor of Tu B'Shvat, and I was invited to come along and get to know everyone before my first day at the office next week. The Tel Aviv office crammed into one car and we trekked north to meet the Kiryat Shmona office at a tree-planting site organized by Keren Kayemet Yisrael. There were 17 of us in total (I the only American) and it was my first time meeting everyone. It was a little nerve-racking at first with the language challenge, but I quickly realized that all my fellow co-workers were genuinely friendly, down-to-earth people who truly made an effort to make me feel part of the team. And it felt great to dig my fingers into the earth, smelling the familiar smell of moist dirt, planting a plant for the first time in I can't even remember how long. We split into two teams and participated in various challenges throughout the day. After the tree-planting we drove up to a magnificent view of northern Israel, above the border village of Metula. I had never been to Metula before and was shocked at how it literally sat along the border with Lebanon. From our high look-out point, the landscape at first appeared as a seamless expanse of beautiful green hills and majestic mountains. I assumed Lebanon was off in the distance. But as my eyes focused, I realized that everything I was looking at WAS Lebanon - the border was a mere fence right beneath me kissing the backs of the houses of Metula, and everything beyond was 'another land'. From our vantage point the fence was hardly visible and it was hard to cement mentally that concept of division from the aesthetically harmonious landscape. The most breathtaking part of the view was the Hermon - the tallest mountain in Israel, 3% of which is Israeli and 97% of which is Lebanese - which was whitewashed with snow. The snow looked so thick and creamy it was almost like you could imagine taking a teaspoon and dipping the cream off the top of the mountain. What was so incredible about it was that the whole view before us was lavishly green - green hills, green trees, green everywhere - and as you followed the green with your eyes up the mountain, at a certain point it just stops and turns to snow. The snowy cap literally looks out over kilometers of palm trees. It's such a beautiful paradoxical image. I had never before been that close to the Hermon, and none of us could stop staring at it. We learned a lot of interesting history about the area. For example, I never knew that when Israel pulled out of Lebanon in 2000, there were many Lebanese who had previously cooperated with Israel and worked doing various jobs in Metula, and when the surprise pullout took place and Israel locked down the gates, these Lebanese workers were desperate to cross the fence and return to their families before Hezbollah would shoot them down for having cooperated with the Israelis. Like my boss said, Israel is full of many sad and happy stories. From there we traveled to Nahal Ayun - a nature hike famous for its grand waterfalls. The hike took about 2 hours and along the way we stopped for a few team challenges, like skipping stones and racing each other and getting as close as we dared into the spray of the largest waterfall. Some of the most rare Israeli flowers were pointed out to me along the way. The hike concluded with turkish coffee brewed out of a backpack one of my co-workers carried along the way. From Nahal Ayun we traveled to Kiryat Shmona to the company's north office, which is really situated inside a small house on a moshav. It also moonlights as a tzimmur (an Israeli version of a b&b). Being one of the new people, I partook in the tradition of a walk along the river that runs behind the office. To get there my boss and the other new girl and I crunched our way through the deep underbrush of dark dried leaves alongside an orange orchard. The oranges were vibrant and lush and plenty. I'm sure we would have taken some from the ground if it were not for the modest fence attempting to protect them. As we descended upon the river the ground below us took the feeling of damp muddy sand, and we squatted to sway our fingers in the cool rushing water. Because of the recent rains the stream was very swift. We returned to the house/office, where everyone had a task in preparing our "al ha'aish" or barbecue. Unlike all my previous jobs where any office meal was either catered or ordered, this was my first home-made office meal. Everyone had a part. The men managed the chicken and meat on the grill while the women took care of the salads and vegetables and dips and drinks. We equally shared the clean-up, swept the floor, shook out the heavy weight of accumulated leaves from the netting looming over our cars, and headed on to Rosh Pinna. We drove straight up the steep hill of Rosh Pinna and parked on the cobblestone of the old moshav. (In fact, Rosh Pinna was the very first moshav of Israel, just weeks before Petach Tikva was founded - one of the many interesting facts I learned today). We made our way to the famous chocolaterie and our cozy reserved tables in a corner among low pillowed couches. The waiters brought us hot chocolate in cups decorated with chocolate and trays filled with a cornucopia of chocolate cake, pies, cookies and chocolate-covered fruit. They topped off our meal with chocolate shots in cups we could actually eat - true to Willy Wonka style. Our last challenge of the day was a trivia challenge about northern Israel. I knew none of the answers, but on the plus side I learned a lot. And it made me excited and motivated to learn more about Israel. After the chocolate shots the winner of the day's competition was announced, and it was my team! We all received mini-medals and posed in a picture together. We were exhausted, in fact it was more exhausting than a day's work, but it was a day good for everyone's soul. It must be the air of the north. Or the humbling feeling of gazing up at the majestic Hermon. Or the rushing rhythm of the roaring waterfalls. Whatever it was, the day was the perfect recipe for peacefulness.
And on top of everything, it was a maximum day of Hebrew practice. There was no way I was going to impose upon 16 Israeli adults to spend the day speaking English or translating for me, and besides I've already been here for 9 months; so immersion it was. I certainly didn't understand everything, and at times the language barrier made me feel like an outsider, but I've come to realize it's ok. You can't swallow Hebrew the way you can swallow a glass of water. It's like bending over sand at the beach, opening your palm, and one by one placing grains of sand into your palm. It's that tedious and exhausting and frustrating. But even though you're standing on a sand-covered beach, at the end of the effort you have a palm full of sand. So although I don't understand every sentence, with hard work I am gaining the gist of the conversation. And with more work, and more work, and more work, I'll eventually be walking freely in that conversation. I hope.
But I've had my Hebrew quota for the day. Now, to the bath. Layla tov.

p.s. unbelievable pictures VERY soon to come

Becoming a real Israeli

So I have some exciting news to share... I got a job!!!
I'm starting Feb 1 as the Marketing Operations Manager for a Tel Aviv start-up company. I'm really excited, it should be a great start for me here. And the best part is I'll have a regular salary coming in which will relieve my financial stress. I'm finally going to be a real Israeli!
Although I'm sad to leave the girl I've been babysitting for the past 6 months... we've become close and I'm going to miss her. I realized the other day that even though she's only 9 years old, she has played a significant role in my aliyah adjustment. She's taught me about Israeli TV shows, Israeli music, Israeli celebrities... and what the realities are for children in Israeli schools. It was really a special and unique relationship. Well I promised her that I will always be in her life and I intend to remain committed to that! (As my mom said, who knows, maybe she could work as a babysitter for me one day! Wouldn't that be funny.)

My new company is taking the whole staff on a retreat next week to the north in honor of Tu B'Shvat. We'll plant trees, go on a hike, and bond as an office. I'm the only American in the company, so even though all the work is in English, the office conversation is generally in Hebrew. I'm looking forward to that challenge. I've now been out of ulpan for about a month and a half and I've noticed how dramatically my Hebrew learning has slowed. I'm still practicing daily and learning new words, but compared to the pace in the ulpan, I'm feeling the lag. I want to get back into a part-time ulpan class as soon as my schedule allows it.

Last week I celebrated my 27th birthday. My first birthday as an Israeli. It was really nice. I went for dinner at one of my favorite Tel Aviv restaurants (Zepra - I highly recommend it) with my close friends and Tzahi. We drank wine and had a fabulous time.
Over the weekend Tzahi took me to see "Avatar" and I absolutely LOVED it. It's an ultra-modern twist (futuristic if you will) on the classic imperialism story. It's amazing how they have you rooting for the blue aliens over fellow human beings. What I loved about the story was how they emphasize how everything in nature - and therefore in the world - is one big interconnected network of energy. I've learned this myself through yoga but it's so easy to forget or dismiss. But it's undeniably true. The movie inspires you to want to get back in touch with nature, the earth, life. Our world is just as amazing as Pandora (the planet in Avatar) we have just taken it for granted.

And then there's Haiti. I was discussing with my employer why it is that it seems every major natural disaster (tsunami, earthquake, tornado, etc) seems to be happening in the poorest parts of the world. My employer argued that its the other way around -- that these countries are poor BECAUSE of the fact that they experience so many natural disasters. But then I pointed out an example like California, who suffers many extreme earthquakes, but seems to recover from them much more efficiently. It's easy to blame imperialism for all the problems of the world -- but I can't help but wonder if it has something to do with this as well.

So there are lots of changes... but good changes. I'm excited to enter this next phase of my life in Israel - a real working woman. It's always hard for me when I make a change to leave those things behind. It's like the little anxiety that accompanies every birthday - questioning whether I'm "ready" to take on the next age, the next step. But I always seem to find that after I surpass the change, I'm even happier.

Struggling to keep up with genderized speech

Of all the things that amaze me about fluent Hebrew speakers, I think what amazes me the most is how people always automatically know the gender of the object of their sentences. When speaking Hebrew, you have to be constantly conscious of gender. Everything has a gender - nouns, verbs, adjectives, pronouns, even words like "it" and "this" and "will be". everything. so when I speak, unless I want to sound like an idiot who only speaks in the singular masculine present (which I don't), I am always forced to slow down and think for a second - ok the object of my sentence is future female plural - and convert all the other elements of my sentence appropriately. but it just amazes me how Israelis just do it so naturally, automatically, they just KNOW the gender of whatever they're talking about, always. But when you're learning Hebrew they tell you, there's no way to know the gender of anything except for just learning it - memorizing. there's no trick. sure there are certain letters that make a noun more likely to be male or female (such as words ending in "mem" are more likely to be male and words ending in "nun" are more likely to be female) but a lot of the time, you just have to memorize. Like what makes a door feminine and a window masculine? Or what makes the word for "breasts" masculine and the word for "war" feminine? It's not logic. You just gotta memorize. So it's quite impressive to me when I hear little children around me babbling away, converting all their adjectives and such according to the proper gender, I'm just like -- how do you KNOW?!! amazing. simply, amazing.

A little clip of Ehud Banai - performing about 3 feet away from us at an intimate dinner club/performance bar in Ramat Hachayal, Tel Aviv