a balloontwister’s aliya saga

Well, its been an interesting first week in Baltimore. Not much work but it was nice to get a head start on the new project and get a bit settled in before the real work starts. Baltimore is a very nice community. I have only seen pieces of it but from what I’ve seen it is very nice. The jewish community is pretty spread out. So its not out of the ordinary to see frum people up and about for several miles. In Columbus you wouldnt see a kippa except for a small area.

I drove up friday to spend shabbos in Brooklyn as my brother Yossi made a kiddush for his daugher reeva. I think that means jam or jelly in hebrew. Despite the 3 and change hour drive both ways I was happy to be part of the simcha. I feel bad that Yossi had to have the kiddush without the rest of the family in attendance. Its times like these that I feel regret about aliya. NO two ways about it. Its not all fun and games in Israel. WE do miss the family back in the states and every simcha that takes place in NY we wish we could be there but …. we have to go about our business of living in ISrael. Its work every day. Its a balance everyday between making sure kids are doing their work.. and making sure the kids are getting used to the land. Interestingly enough I came but my sister who lives in NY was not there. She had a Bar Mitzva in Jersey but send 3 of her kids. It was nice to have yaacov, yehuda, and Chavie. I miss what it felt like to have 2 brothers torture their sister. I heard a certain familiar refrain all shabbos.

“sound familiar?” “look familiar?” I missed that.

Saw Yudie and Mrs. Zuller and the kids there as well and shmoozed with them a bit. Gives me chizuk to speak to Yudie. I don’t know anyone who works as hard as him and still gives more of his time and energy to terror victims in Israel than anyone I know.

My folks got a birthday cake for me as my hebrew bday is today. So while I have mine in NY, Tamar is having hers today in her gan. Yoni was the balloon guy in her gan. TOmmorrow is Penina’s Bday and I’ll be missing that too. I’ll be missing YOm hazmaot and Lag Bomer as well. Going to be a weird week. I’m not sure we will be having the same celebration at Johns Hopkins as there will be in Israel. I hear penina will be taking the kids to cousin Eli and ROna in Nof Ayalon. More about that later.

LAst night I attended my first Rabbi Reissman navi shiur in person. I attended several video taped shiurim, but this was my first live one. I was impressed as it was an entertaining shiur and it was good to see that most of the crowd DID stay awake. the shiur was over at 11:15pm and I saw at least 15 people sleeping, Out of several hundred I think that is pretty good. Not sure which group Abe Zlotnick was in. He did seem a bit peppy so he MAY have been awake for the entire shiur.

Kind of taking it easy today before I drive back. trying to get my glutes muscle a bit of rest so I stayed out of the Staten Island game. I’ve been emailing to try and find a softball league in the Baltimore area so if I can rest myself a bit… it can;t hurt.

Well, I’m going to sign off and get ready to head south. Speak to you soon.

Tommorrow is thursday. Last day of the workweek here. 4 days workweek. Im not anywhere close to 40 hours… so I have alot of catching up to do before I head to NY for shabbos. SO far there hasn’t been alot of work as they are bringing in 5 new people next week, so they are having me sit around until next week so they can bring us on board together. Not sure why they insisted on me coming early.

So far things are going well. I’m really impressed on how jewish it is here. The minyanim here are huge. 100 people for a weeknight davening. The area is ok looking. houses and apartments.. streets that need repaving … but its ok. the kosher market here is also very impressive. 7 mile market.

Tomorrow I hope to meet up with my cousin david Lesnoy in downtown baltimore. His wife is bringing me a chair and a can opener I think. Its been japanese style in the apartment here. I figure when food falls on the floor… its not like Im eating off the floor.. I’m just eating off the table. SO I just got an AC and Im getting a microwave… all I need is some soap for the dishes and my clothes and I’ll be all set I think.

Well, speak to you all later.

j

well, I’ve landed… and drove… and here I am.

Baltimore, MD. A new project. A new City. The flight leaving Israel was delayed so I missed the connecting flight to Washington. So I had to rent a car and drive down. Not THAT bad of a drive… 3 hours from Staten Island. I have a small studio apartment which is REALLY unfurnished. In it I have my sisters’ air mattress, suitcases, and a few groceries that I bought. I’m writing this blog on the floor as I don’t have a chair. Hmmm… carpet is fresh smelling..

As I just came back from the Males house for dinner. Micha ws my dormmate in Yeshiva …many years ago. I walked into a quiet house with a pocketful of balloons.. and totally destroyed the quiet there. Sorry bout that. The funny or sad thing is… I say directly behind him in shul 30 minutes before dinner and he didn’t recognize me… well in his defense I didn’t have abeard in yeshiva. Im not sure I was even shaving then. My face that is.

Baltimore is nice from what I’ve seen so far. Jews and Blacks. Kind of like RBS. Well, I’m going to sign off. Long flight and I have to get up early to be at work. Opening day is Tuesday.. Wish me luck.,

whew…. ouch!

Its friday and I just got back from playing softball. Not as much fun when you lose. Lets recap. I go thit in the elbow on a pitch that wass called a strike. Got thrown out trying to steal a base after hitting into a fielders choice. Hit a bases clearing single that went for a triple and hurt my ankle sliding into third and for good measure got hit hard by a pitch in the forearm.

Well, it was playing though. DOn;t remember the last time I played on the same team with my brother… he played third, I was in left.

Its been the calm after the storm, as pessach was really alot of fun. While the seder had mixed reviews, chol hamoed and the rest of the chag was very nice. Tiyulim were great: Haifa, eliyahu’s cave, Jeeping in the golan, Manara Cliffs, Kever of mordechai and esther (maybe), Akko prision where the famous jail break was, Nahal Chziv hike, while was a 3 hour hike down and up the mountain with a wade in a stream in the middle…. whew….

More about the touring later.

The hotel was OK. We had to move to 3 different locations as we were one of the last people to register. THe middle move was to a youth hostel at the hotel / guest house which turned out to be not TOO bad. Except for michal getting mosquito bites around 15 times. There was also 4 burglaries in the place where we vacated, so on the bright side, gam zu ltovah. Food was good, but the seder was very weird. The room wasn’t crowded, but you had to speak loudly to have your voice heard. IN the middle of maggid I felt my voice going, also Tamar was having her moments and you just cant put her in the room, as it was in a different building.

Well, I’m going to sign off as we are taking the kids to the beach, WE meaning Doovid and I. Wives have to prepare for shabbos. It was a bit of a ba’alogon as this is the first week after pessach… so alot of shopping for flour…etc.

Spud, regards from daniel berger and Inker. I met Berger at the hotel we stayed at. We didn’t know anyone coming in, but as it turns out we met several people….more about that another time.

Have a good shabbos,

U.D.

Yesterday was a great day. David’s Citadel. Migdal David. I took Yoni and Moshe as Michal had gymnastics and Tamar had her Gan thingee. It is alot different then it was just a few years ago. New Excavations and new exhibits. Of course the film is exactly the same. It looks like Suleman himself directed it. (very old). What made it great is that Yoni just came from the Bar Kochba Caves and there was an exhibit that had a mention and a painting and coin from the Bar Kochba uprising, so this sparked his interest. We climbed and walked around the entire courtyard and had a great time. Its kedai to go back if you’re in town even though you may have been there. It looks totally different than it did. OR maybe I just didn;t see all of it when I was there last time. SOmeone nearby couldn’t wait for the bathroom so he… well…

I guess if suleman and saladin can GO there, why not that dude…?

After we walked to the kotel for mincha and again…. alot of changes. The wall is still facing west but the inside part of the kotel has been totally redone. A new floor and the balcony from the “bar mitzva” section is now overlooking and is connected to the main part. There are also plastic plates on the floor where you can look down and see how the wall goes down another 20 or 30 feet…maybe more. A few hours earlier I remarked to the boys how you always meet SOMEONE in Jersualem. Well, we saw a neighbor from our area and we saw the wife of a rabbi from COlumbus, Oh.

We went to see the cohens in ramat eshkol and then picked up KFC sold the chometz. In Israel, or at least in Ramat Beit Shemesh it works a bit different. THe Va’ad of Beit Shemesh sells the chometz to the goy and the money that people give goes to maos chittim. So Rav Chaim is the shaliach appointed by the va’ad, as opposed to he himself selling it.

I think any day that has davening at the kotel and eating KFC chicken is going to be a great day.

This morning we have a few guests from the old country. Abe Newman my former neighbor is here for the chag and Avi Waldman is here as well. Penina took the kids to the airport to get him so its nice any quiet here. Trying to do some work.

We also have a Mazel tov. My neighbor Issac Montal’s daughter became a kalla. Its been a rough few months with 2 deaths in his family so we are really happy for him as the family gets a much needed simcha.

Well, I think that just about covers a busy erev, erev, pesach. Have a good day!

u.d.

well, it was the ladies turn to fly.

Penina dragged Sara Baila to Tel aviv. She HAD to get out.. shopping or something. They took the train at 1:47 and came back at around 10. Not sure why Penina had to get out. I was the one that was working. All she had to do was take care of 4 kids, prepare meals, clean, deal with the arab workers, shop, cook for shabbos, deal with tutors, teachers, chuggim, get the car cleaned, take the kids to doctors, do laundry by herself. She is practically on vacation here. Well, she had a nice time with Sara B, no visible tatoos or piercings so I guess things went ok. Yesterday Yoni had a tiyul to the Bar Cochba caves sponsored by Nefesh b’nefesh and had some hot dogs by a bonfire. I took moshe, michal, and Tamar to the coffee shop and let them play in the playground while I went shopping in office depot for a printer / fax machine. I have NO idea what the salesguy was talking about. I broke our printer… another casualty to the 110 / 220 volt conversion I think and the fax didn’t work properly. So 800 shekel later (170 dollars) we have a brother multi office center thingee. 220 volts. This is actually an aliya process. The US appliances that you came with start falling apart. Its a huge hassle dealing with convertors, adapters…etc. Also, it costs more to fix these things than it is to buy. The only problem is when we receive faxes in english.. it gets transalated into hebrew. SO we have to have one of the neighbors read it to us.

Speaking about Hebrew, I ran into Yoni’s rav this morning at davening. He is really suprised with Yoni’s hebrew. Poratz. he said. Like a shock. All of a sudden. I see it too. When we learned mishna brurah on shabbos, he knew some words that I’m SURE I didn’t know at ten.. or 20. Although this morning when we tried to tell the repair guys about the constant wet spots in the kitchen ceiling (listening, ba’al habayis?, lol. ) We asked yoni what wet in hebrew is… he didn’t know. Oh well.

Last night was haircut night. A father of someone is Moshe’s class came over to give them. He does this as a side job. Well, Our kids got, I got, Mendy and his son got, another neighbor. Then he went to doovid… every shekel helps. THe only problem is I look horrible (nothing different right? Thanks). I have the side and back at number 1 and the top at number 2. The top of my head will need to be cut 2 months before my sides. Also my beard got a number 1. So I look like my boss in COlumbus. (the guy who bought my a bath and body works gift card… if you catch my drift. Well, In any event, it was nice to help someone out and give him a shtickle parnassa. Penina was the one to hire him and get the neighbors to use him. Speaking about helping, there is a constant knocking at the door for tzedakah. I don’t carry alot of money, and penina doesn’t trust me with the checks so I don’t have alot to give, but its sad to have SO many people that are in need for pesach. In staten Island you get a few. Here I think we had 7 or 8 and that was just in half a day.

LAst night, the boys and I watched a few innings of the Mets game on the computer. It was an early game, so we saw it live. Mets pulled it out in the 9th.

Its very important for kids at this age. Alot of magazines talk about kids at risk. Without a positive influence. Kids are suseptible. Many turn to the dark side and become Yankees fans.

Well, I have to sign off and do some work before I take the boys to Jerusalem. Michal has a gymnastics chug today and Tamar is at gan chayot with the other little animals.

Have a good day,

u.d.

Whew… back home.

Well, due to the 2 hour delay leaving NY we landed in Israel about 2 hours later than planned… but…. we DID make it. The flight was uneventful… thank g-d. The movies? Well, when you come on the plane after a glass of wine and then you have an absolute and grapefruit, then a lunesta… it doesnt really matter what the movies are… you’re not going to see them. I was out most of the flight.. maybe 7 of the 10 hours. The family greeted me at the gate and made it back home with 2 hours to spare. We had a VERY busy shabbos. Including the 6 from our family we had 14 people friday night, 16 people shabbos lunch, and around 10 for suedat shlishit. Aunt Rozzie and cousin Estie bryk were over for the entire shabbos and I think were a bit overwhelmed by the huge tumult. Non stop action. Kids back and forth. In and out. Tamar with the toilet training….etc. After shabbos the moment havdala was over, they were packed and ready to walk to jerusalem if need be. It was nice having them over. The byrk’s will be in Israel for pesach so before the boys and joel came. Estie and Roz came to us. After havdalah we turned on Friday’s Mets game. Using MLB.TV on the computer moshe, yoni, and I watch a few innings of the Mets game. Mets are in first. Yankees are in last. I’m not going to say anything more bec. last year when the mets were in the race and the yankees were in last… I brought a newspaper clipping to shul and showed the fellas. That sparked the Yankees to turn things around… and make the playoffs so this year I’ll hold it in until the season is over.

There is definately something in the air as pessach rolls around. Kitchens Turning over. Chometz being sold. People planning trips for the kids. WE have alot of stuff already mapped out as we are heading to a hotel for pessach. Not a fancy one, but one that would give the family (especially Penina) a little piece of mind. Being away its been difficult on her so …we’re off to Nes Ammim. I have no idea where that is.. other than “North”.

Tommorrow Yoni has a trip with Nefesh B’nefesh for boys ages 10-13 I think. Its designed to give mothers time to prepare for pessach and let fathers do some work. Sunday is a work day here. I have a project to finish so the few hours will hopefully get the house a bit quieter so I can get some work done.

Well, I’m going to wrap things and get some work.

U.D.

Well, I’m in NY…. just for a few hours…

My 7:55 PM plane is delayed until 8:50…. and its only 4:40….. the good part is that I met my neighbor Issac Montal who is a king david lounge member.. so I’m on the internet.. surrounded by plush chairs, free food and drinks…. Where have they been hiding this place? Today I put in a half day… getting some files together… saying my goodbyes. It feels good and bad. Good that I can be home for three weeks and that I put in a few months of work and left on a high note (good night, I’m out of here). People were actually sad to see me go. They made a goodbye party for me last night. My contractor bought my an Ipod shuffle. My manager from the limited bought me a 25 dollar gift card for bad and body works. Guess which one was the gay one?

Buzz.

Wrong.

They BOTH are. It made the goodbye hug a bit weird ….butt… I mean …but…Nice guys and a nice company to work for. It made the past few months go by a bit easier knowing the people you work for and with are really nice.

I’m going to give Penina the ipod. Please don’t tell her I got it as a gift. Of course I’m going to keep the gift card.

Yesterday I went to the Football hall of Fame in Canton, Oh. A guy from my shul wanted a t shirt and I thought I may never get this opportunity so.. why not…. I did some work and then made my way north…not THAT far away closer to Cleveland if you know Ohio. If you are a football fan you would really love this place. Busts from all the hall of famers. History from the NFL and previous leagues, movies, films… Madden NFL video games…etc. I’m not the biggest Football fan… but I could probably watch NFL highlights all day. Think about it. There is great plays. great hits in every NFL game. You can’t say that about any other sport. Baseball has a great play maybe once a week. Hockey. Basketball has some slam dunks… gets boring…but football….is different. You could watch hours of just running backs.. sayers, brown, payton, mcneil (added that on purpose)….. needless to say I had a really nice time. I also came to notice another very important thing. The Jets REALLY are insignificant. If it wasn’t for Namath. I don’t think the Jets would be allowed in the league. Did you know in 45 years the Jets have been over .500 around 10 or 11 times? Every team has a small exhibit that shows important details of that teams history. The Jets exhibit is the size of your suitcase. Sad. Very sad. There was a film of a few plays from different teams. THe Jets Wayne Chrebet made it into the film. Dropping a ball and getting his head slammed to the ground. Nice.

just got off the phone with Penina. Looks like Efram schneider got bumped and will hopefully be landing in Israel at 4:30… good thing the clock was changed. Or it would be shabbos in Lod.

Well, I’m going to sign off. They just brought the Soup out.

True… unless..

you spend the day at work watching the mets opening day. Yup, had the best day at work ever. I finished my project and while I was waiting for my next one.. I watched the Mets win. Without a TV in Israel (or at work) I signed up for the MLB.TV package… where all games can be watched over the internet. So I had my headphones on…and watched the Mets win their home opener. First place undefeated! I think this is the year the Mets go unbeaten. I had to write this in the blog… they may lose tonight.

well yesterday the guys from my consulting company took me out to a bagels place. I’ve only been here for 2 1/2 months but the people at work have really been nice to me. THe people in the shuls have also really been nice to me. Maybe its the midwest or maybe bec. I have a NY mentality. In any event, the people I’ve met have made it a bit easier to be far away from home.

well, I’m going to pack up. I had an even better day today…. more about that tommorrow,

J

DO you see which guy in the picture was talking about aliya but actually was WORKING in Columbus of all place?

BAck to columbus… for the last time. I’m at Teterboro heading back as I said my goodbyes to the In Laws… I won’t see them for a while.

At least a month. I’m home for a month until my next gig. Shabbos was busy. Ate by Yanky and Elaine and Litchy and Mrs. Litchy and kenny and Mrs. Kenneth. Hate to say this… but I should have had at least one meal at the in laws. Why? Not because they were offended. But last night I found some leftovers from shabbos and it was american roast. Whoa. It was really good. I don’t think it was Tammy Braverman Garlic in the meat good… but it was REALLY good. The food was great at the kasisrererseres…..and the Pecan pie was great at the Litchfields…. but the roast was REALLY solid. Oh, almost forgot the Tuna at the kenigs was the best I’ve had in over a week. The highlight was the KAzans. I think it should be a reality TV show. DD and the Kazans. Fridays on CBS. I went friday as I HAD to see what the big deal was with the new Addition. I was not dissapointed. After seeing the huge stamp that is on the invitation which is a picture of Chaim I got to see DD. This little dude has the biggest cast I’ve ever seen. Its bigger than the any of its legs. I think with an eyepatch it could have passed for a pirate. The dog was hobbling around with it which was a very uncomfortable sight to see. Not as uncomfortable as seeing the dog pee on the floor. well, kids and pets learn from what they see. Its documented. Thankfully, Jeff waited until I left before he did his business on the floor.

After shabbos I went to the father son melave malka. I went alone as my father was going to a shiur and my sons were sleeping. I hope less kids get sick from the hot dogs and burgers than from the chinese food at last years event. I hear around 10 kids got sick last year. At the MM Kimmel’s son won around 5 prizes and Spud’s shay won the electric football game…circa 1975. I think spud spent sunday coloring all the Jets players BLue. I wouldn’ be suprised if you did a search on EBAy and you’d see it being auctioned off. Well, I’m going to sign off. I board in around 5 minutes.

J