A beginning of a retrospective that's already been forgotten a little

Since my arrival here in this bizarre yet awesome country nearly two weeks ago, I feel like I’ve experienced much, accomplished nearly nothing, and eaten a metric ton of hummus. But it’s all good. Please read on as I relate the joys and sorrows of life as an unemployed, somewhat language-impaired American in Israel...

Annie and I arrived in Israel on the morning of Friday the 16th. Her cousins picked us up from Ben Gurion airport and shuttled us to their home in Netanya (the 4th largest city in Israel, but you’d never suspect that this is true). These are somewhat distant cousins of Annie's, but her mom studied with one of them at Hebrew U 25 years ago, so the bond is stronger than the actual relation might imply. My memory of our two days in Netanya is a little foggy (jetlag), but I am certain that hummus consumption began almost immediately and some serious napping took place within a few hours of our arrival. Our first Shabbat began that night and was decidedly un-Shabbatish, with Kiddush (NJN: blessing over the wine) at dinner being the only real difference from the norm.

On Saturday, Annie and I went to the beach. The water was bathtub-warm, and the sand was frat-party-packed. The beach at Netanya reminded me of a beach I visited in LA, with a large cliff separating the town from the beach, and with long and winding staircases providing the only access from one to the other. This might have been one of the best beaches I’ve ever visited. And I hate the beach.

A fun exercise: When spoken in an Israeli accent, the word “beach” sounds a whole lot like “bitch.” Reread the last paragraph and substitute appropriately.

On Saturday night, Annie’s friend Hannah (See link to: Hannah Rocks Jaffa) came to Netanya and we went to dinner. Hannah and Annie were roommates at Brown, and Hannah is in Israel on the same fellowship as Annie. We went to some Moroccan place and I had my first experience struggling with a menu written entirely in Hebrew. It was at about that time that it began to dawn on me that I’ve forgotten roughly 87% of the Hebrew I’ve learned in my life. Which is something of a problem, I guess, when you live in a Hebrew-speaking country.

On Sunday we took some of our stuff and caught the express bus from Tel Aviv to Jerusalem to begin a quest to find a place to live. We had gotten advice that a real estate agent could show us around and we figured that he could show us a number of places in rapid succession, which would in turn lead to a swift, decisive, and satisfying conclusion to our apartment hunt. Unfortunately, the agent that we visited only had two places to show us and they were both total crap. So we moved in with friends on a temporary basis, certain that the search for an apartment would come to a rapid end. I guess a week is a fairly brief search, and there are certainly those among us who would have been more than satisfied with said time frame, but for me it felt like a very long time...