Don't say it, Mr. Trump!

My working ordeals have been somewhat well documented in this space, but things took a turn for the strange this week. To review: I got a job at a couple of places, decided to take one place over the other because I was going to work in the kitchen, trained there, was suspended from work pending acquisition of a work visa, and resumed working there after three weeks. Since resuming work, however, my place of work had relatively few customers and I was receiving relatively few shifts. In addition, there was a new manager, rendering all of my previous training invalid, but I was never exactly retrained. So I go into work this week, and I’m told, in Hebrew, that in the time that it took me to get my work visa, they hired other people, and they didn’t really need so many people, so it would be best if I didn’t work there anymore. Actually, the guy could have told me that I was a bad person and a terrible worker, but since I got fired in Hebrew, I’m relating things as I understood them. Let’s say I’m about 70% confident in my first explanation. This was actually okay with me, because I was dreading every shift at this place, and was kind of planning on quitting anyway. I guess this just made the decision that much easier.

So now what?

Well, since my shifts were so few in number the past couple of weeks, I’d already been considering the possibility of additional time on my hands. For the past couple of weeks, I’ve been volunteering a couple of mornings a week for an organization called Livnot Ulehibanot. They send their volunteers to a soup kitchen, or to paint/repair the homes of the needy. So that’s been a good time, and I’ve met some very nice people doing it. Plus, I learned the Hebrew word for spackle. It’s “spatchtell.” Don’t you just want to say it over and over? “Spatchtell.” And, as in English, it’s both the verb and the noun. “Say, would you mind passing the spatchtell?” or “Just spatchtell right there, where you see that gaping hole in the wall,” or, less correctly, “That was a fine example of professional spatchtelling, until you came in and f’ed it up” Really, learning that word is probably one of the top five things that’s happened to me since I’ve gotten here. Which I guess says a lot, but not necessarily anything good.

I’ve also begun looking for other work, but in an entirely non-desperate way. Through Janglo (the Yahoo group where English-speaking Jerusalemites post anything from garage sale announcements to advice requests about infants with severe gas), I’ve found several part-time professional leads that could be financially if not spiritually rewarding. If I really wanted to ruin my time here, I’d work with IDT. IDT is a call center about thirty minutes from where I live that has all sorts of jobs for native English speakers, with hours either from four in the afternoon til midnight or from midnight til seven in the morning. I like sleep. So I don’t think I’ll be doing that.

Finally, I’ve talked to a couple of organizations about being a counselor for a short-term Israel trip. I don’t know why I didn’t think to apply for something like this sooner, since the vast majority of these trips are taking place in the next month and a half. But I’ve found some quality leads, and I’m confident something will come of this.

By the way, Merry Christmas. Classic “I live in Israel” moment, courtesy of Joel Seltzer. Earlier this week, for Fantasy Football purposes, he was looking at the NFL schedule, and saw that almost all of the games were being played on Saturday. He couldn’t figure out why. It took him half a day before he realized that today, Sunday, was Hag HaChristmas. And honestly, you can’t blame the guy. Unless you watch non-Israeli TV stations (recommended, actually), or decide to take a quick jaunt to Bethlehem, you’d have no idea that it was Christmas. In the States, y’all are being bombarded by the “Holiday” spirit, while fighting in the trenches of the War of Christmas, while here in Israel, I was at the mall last night and the only indication of the holiday was a drunk guy walking around in a Santa hat and beard.

We have so many guests coming here in the next couple of weeks, I can’t even keep track of everyone. And that’s not counting the dozen or so people who I know who are here, but I don’t know that they’re here. So if you’re here, and I don’t know you’re here and you want to split a sufgania or something, let me know.

And one more thing: Sufganiot. The traditional Hanukkah jelly-filled donut that brings cheer to all the boys and girls in Israel. Is. Totally. Gross. I’ve probably tried a dozen of these things, and I’ve been unable to finish a single one. There is never enough jelly. There is always immediate heartburn. I keep trying them because people gush about them, and I’m trying to figure out whether it’s a national practical joke on me, or whether people are just ignorant of the superiority of a Krispy Kreme jelly donut, or even (and this is hard for me to type) a Dunkin Donuts jelly donut. Or do Israelis just have digestive tracts of steel? Are you supposed to pop a dozen Tums first? Can someone explain this to me?

And to all of my Jewish readers, a very happy Chanukkah / Hanukkah / Channukkah / Hanuka / Chanuka / Hannukka / etc / etc / etc.

How quiet things are...

I've been wanting to post for awhile, but there's been so little going on. I've been working at the Cafe, but shifts have been infrequent and the patrons have been few in number. I tried to get a different job in a fancy hotel, only to be thwarted by the Israeli Bureaucracy. I've still got some other options, but I'm wondering whether gainful employment is ever going to be possible for me here. Sigh.

Annie's family is here, which has been very nice. Yesterday, we went to Ariel, one of the largest settlements in the West Bank. We got a tour from the mayor. It's a nice town, but the mayor's an insane person. The politics involved with settlements are a whole other blog post that I just don't have the strength to pen right now. After Ariel, we went to dinner in Yafo, and the power went out as the food was arriving. Good times.

Last weekend, we rented a car and travelled to Machtesh Rimon, a huge crater in the south of Israel with inspiring views and awesome desert hikes. We climbed a mountain, then we climbed down the mountain. On the way to Machtesh Rimon, we stopped in Abu Ghosh, an Arab village just west of Jerusalem, famous for its hummus. You know how you buy hummus in the store, and some flavors are Hummus Abu Ghosh, and the hummus has this red stuff in the middle that tastes kind of spicy, but you otherwise can't place the taste? Yeah, that stuff comes from Abu Ghosh. And let me tell you, they know from hummus there too. Just awesome. The restaurant we ate at was owned by a man who had moved to Illinois, and then won the lottery, came home with his $30 million, and opened up a restaurant. There are newspaper clippings of him all over the place. Good reading material while stuffing one's face with hummus.

But enough about the hummus.

Okay, just one more thing. I want to learn to make hummus before I leave. And I'm not talking about filching a recipe from the Internet and mucking around. I want to watch the pros do it. Then come back to America as the hummus king.

This post was only marginally better than the lame Thanksgiving post. I promise, the next time something exciting / hilarious takes place, I'll be sure to make fun of it. And maybe one day I'll write about politics, but that will be a low day indeed for not just myself, but for the entire Jewish people.

Bah, I'm not even going to edit.

The Israeli Bureaucracy: Not so bad after all?

I know that the minute I post this, I'll get some phone call invalidating the title of this post, but what the hell, I'm feeling lucky after my experience today.

For those not carefully following along, last week a kind soul named Yuchi granted me an appointment at Misrad Hapnim to get a work visa, without which I've been unable to work. My appointment was set for 12:45 this afternoon; forty-five minutes after the office closed. Now, in any other country, this might have sent up a red flag, but in Israel, for whatever reason, I didn’t even think to question the logic. Just to be on the safe side, though, I arrived a full hour early. When I entered Misrad Hapnim, I mused to myself "this is exactly what it's like in hell," somehow appreciating this fact in a way that I hadn't in my previous visit. I walked into the door, and made it about a step and a half before I was nearly decked by a tall black-hatted man rushing in one direction while almost having my legs taken out by a three-year-old looking boy going in the opposite direction. I waited on a "line," which was more a clump than anything else, with people consistently pushing to the front and harassing the lone woman at the front desk. I decided that this woman probably has the worst job in Israel, which might explain why she only has to work four hours a day. By the time I'd “gently elbowed” my way to the front of the clump, the poor woman was as much as the end of her rope as she was at the end of her shift. She was very nice to me though, telling me that I shouldn’t have waited on this “line” at all, and that I needed to take a seat in the next room. As I walked through the clump to get to the corridor to the next room, it smelled like poopie pants.

Finally able to move and breathe freely, I made my way to the visa waiting room, which was packed with mostly Anglo English speakers from workers from the Philippines. I found a place to sit and opened up my book, expecting to be called at some point in the approaching two to four hours. You can imagine my surprise when I heard my name called at 12:46, a mere minute after my appointed time. I sat down with Dalia, who was exceptionally friendly and helpful, but never smiled at any point during our twenty minutes of interaction. Apparently, I had all of my documents in order, and surprisingly, the requirement to bring two pack mules as tribute to the Israeli Bureaucracy is no longer binding for people seeking work visas. So if anyone needs a couple of pack mules, just let me know (By the way, I'm pretty proud of myself for resisting the overwhelming urge to make an ass joke there. You know you were just waiting for it, and there's a part of you that still wishes it had been there, but there's a larger part of you that appreciates my shunning of predictability there). Dalia asked me to fill out a green form, typed some stuff into a computer, had to get her supervisor to sign off on my visa (I was surprised that she only needed one additional person to approve my visa), and before I knew it, I was walking out of the office with an official Israeli work visa. I'm still kind of in shock.

There is still the matter of seeing whether the cafe that wanted to employ me a couple of weeks ago has given away my job, but for the moment I'm just content to bask in the glow of my work visa. I don't even think I would care if they found someone else. Plus, with legal permission to work, my options are wide open now. So thank you Israeli Bureaucracy, for (can't believe I'm thinking this, let along committing it to print) making my life easier and better, in a not terribly bureaucratic or obnoxious way. Okay, now I'll be struck by lightning or spontaneously combust or something like that, so if you don't see any more posts, you’ll know what happened.

In other news, I've decided that I haven't given up on the Eagles' season yet (officially confirming either incredible stupidity or brutal masochistic tendencies), and I'll be waking up at 4am on Tuesday morning to watch them come incredibly close to upsetting the Seahawks, only to fall "Kevin Dyson in Super Bowl XXXIV" short. So there that is.

In other other news, lots of people are coming here soon. We're excited.

And finally, I've written this entire posting on my porch. It's December 4th, and it had to be like 80 degrees out today. This is great news for people who live here, and all but guarantees that the weather will be atrocious for every minute that we have visitors. Sorry in advance.