With love, for Grandpa Chick

Last Friday, my husband Keith’s grandfather passed away in Florida. He was 99.
As I wrote on Facebook yesterday, when I first met Keith, I thought “wow, he sure does talk about his grandparents a lot”.

As I got to know him better I understood that his grandparents were more like his parents. They have been the major adult figures in his life since he was a kid, and when I joined the family, Fran and Chick may as well have been my mother and father in-law, not my grandparents in-law.
For our children, Fran and Chick are just “Grandma & Grandpa”. We lived just around the corner from them for all of the kids’ lives until Israel. They had their first sleepovers at their house when they were still babies, and every Wednesday after school, right up until we moved to Israel, the kids went there and stayed until after dinner. Often Grandma Fran & Grandpa Chick had scavenger hunts waiting for them in the house, they taught them to play all kinds of games (including poker) and so many other things too.

Thankfully, Keith and his sister Heather were able to get to Florida in time to spend a few days with Grandpa Chick, and have some last conversations with him.  At the funeral yesterday they both eulogized him beautifully, and with Grandma Fran’s permission, Keith also read out the following eulogy that I wrote. I wrote it from the heart, I mean every single word, and I decided to share it, because the world today needs more Grandpa Chicks.

<<Grandpa Chick. Just Chick really. From the minute I walked into your life 20 or so years ago, you made me feel welcome. You treated me as if I was already part of the family, even long before Keith figured out that I should be part of the family.

A man of few words, something that drove Fran crazy, a trait you passed on to Keith, that drives me crazy, but you somehow managed to always let us know your opinion, and to let us know how much you love us all.

For Keith you’ve been a father figure, you taught him everything he knows, for better or for worse.

Every time Keith fixes something in the house, I send up a prayer of thanks to you Chick, because I know you taught him how to use tools, and how to try to fix just about anything. Maybe I should blame you for us having what was once a broken pinball machine in our apartment?

For my kids, Noffiya, Elnadav and Shalhevet, you were just Grandpa.

From the moment each of them was born, everyone else took a back seat – those great-grandchildren of yours are your pride and joy.

With each baby you couldn’t wait until they started solid food. You asked frequently “when can we give them Cheerios?” And once we introduced cereal, you would show up to feed them, making faces to get them to open their mouths and eat whatever it was.

For Elnadav you were sandek at his brit, and I was worried that you wouldn’t be able to keep your hands steady. “Don’t worry,” you told me, “these hands won’t move a fraction of an inch” And they didn’t.

Just like you taught Keith so much, you taught the kids so much too.

Wednesday afternoons at your house were the highlight of their week while we still lived in Boca. You loved to help them with homework, even though I told you they should do it on their own. You taught them how to play Rumikub, but you never let them win. You taught them how to play cards too, and all three of them play a mean hand at poker.

You taught them how to hide candy from Grandma Fran, as long as they shared it with you. You taught them that sharing French fries is okay, as long as Grandma doesn’t see you take them.

For a man of so few words, you managed to say so much.

In 2011, at the age of 91, you called me and asked me if I could come over and help you set up Facebook. I asked you how come you wanted to join the world of social media, and you told me all the kids are doing it, and you don’t want to miss out. When Facebook wouldn’t accept your name, Channon, or your date of birth, we had to appeal to them and argue that your given name is really Channon Band, and that you were in fact born in 1920. And so you joined Facebook. And I had to start being careful what I posted, because sometimes I got a phone call from you asking why didn’t I tell you that one of the kids was home sick from school, or how come you found out on Facebook that I wrote another blog post. That was when I showed you how to subscribe to my blog.

While I am sorry that the kids and I didn’t get to see you one last time, I am happy that our memories of you will all be good. When we think of Grandpa Chick, we will think of your always cheerful disposition, your sense of humor, the funny faces you would make every time Grandma Fran chastised you about something, and your seemingly endless patience. You put the “great” into grandpa.

99 and a half years sounds like a long life when you say it out loud, but for us, it seemed you would be here forever. You were a constant in all of our lives, and now you’re not. You didn’t suffer at the end, and for that all of us are grateful. That was the only thing the kids wanted to know, when I explained to them what we knew was going to happen. Does it hurt him, they asked. Is he feeling any pain? And I was pleased that I could tell them no, that you were awake and able to communicate with Keith, Heather and Grandma Fran, almost until the very end. Because they didn’t want Grandpa Chick to feel pain, when he had so often kissed their boo-boos away.

Your physical being may have left this world, but your spirit will always remain here with us, and Noffiya, Elnadav and Shalhevet, have the most wonderful memories of you that they will some day share with their own children, God Willing.

As for me, I want to say thank you. Thank you for the unconditional love. Thank you for the endless patience. Thank you for making me always feel like I am your granddaughter, and not just married to your grandson. And thank you for your grandson  Keith. He is who he is because of you. So for that I thank you the most.

May your memory be always for a blessing. We love you more than you’ll ever know. >>

 

 

Letter to my daughter in Poland

My eldest daughter has spent the past week in Poland with her school. From the time we arrived in Israel and she learned that most schools here make the trip to Poland in 11th or 12th grade, she said she wanted to go. Since last May, when she signed up for the trip, the school has spent days and weeks educating the girls, both historically and psychologically, what to expect. They left before dawn last Monday morning, arriving in a cold, wet Warsaw around 8am, and went immediately to a Jewish cemetery. They have traveled the routes traveled by our own ancestors, visited towns and cities where Judaism once thrived, and seen the horrors of Treblinka, Majdenak, and the woods of Zbylitowska Góra where there are mass graves of Jews, including thousands of children, shot to death by the Nazis. Tomorrow, Sunday, is the final day of the trip, one that is spent at Auschwitz-Birkenau. Parents were asked to send a letter to their daughters for them to read over Shabbat, which they spent in the city of Krakow. Below is an edited version of the letter that I wrote to my daughter. It was originally written 2 weeks ago, but I have modified it slightly to reflect the anti-semitic murderous attack that killed 11 Jews in Pittsburgh just one week ago.

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<<I am writing this on Erev Shabbat Lech Lecha, when Hashem commanded Avram to leave his homeland and his birthplace, and to go the land that Hashem would show him. In the parasha, we see Avram’s blind faith in Hashem, how he was willing to leave behind everything that was familiar to him, to follow Hashem.

For thousands of years, the Jewish people yearned to return to Zion, to the Land of Israel, after the exile and the destruction of the Beit haMikdash. The area that makes up the Promised Land has been controlled by so many different powers during these years of Diaspora, and each of these governing people played some role in making sure there was no official Jewish homeland.

Finally, in 1947, immediately following the genocide committed in Europe by Hitler and the Nazis, the British Mandate came good on the Balfour Declaration of 1917, to give the Jewish people their own state. There are those who believe that the only reason the modern state of Israel exists is due to the guilt felt by the world following the Shoah. These people believe that if it weren’t for the Shoah, we would never have our State of Israel, and we would not have been able to establish a Jewish homeland in the Biblical land that was promised to Avraham our patriarch in Parashat Lech Lecha.  I choose to believe differently. I believe that while the Shoah was a factor in us getting back our homeland, the realization of the dream, the establishment of the state, is nothing short of a miracle. You see, as soon as Israel declared independence, all Arab nations surrounding us declared war on us. We had no proper army. Our army was made up of various underground movements who had resisted British, a haphazard group of people with little military training. We had newly arrived immigrants from Europe, (many of whom had arrived illegally, due to British limitations set on the number of Jews allowed to land in Israel in those post-war years) survivors of horrors worse than anyone could imagine, recovering from years of starvation and illness and mistreatment at the hands of the Nazis, who immediately joined forces to fight for their new homeland. It is only by God’s Hand that Israel won that war. As you know, that was only the first war, many more have followed, and still our enemies try to wipe us from the face of the Earth.

When I asked if you were anxious about your trip to Poland, you answered that you were not. You said that you hoped to get some clarity from it, some more understanding of what happened, and to find some connection to your past, to our past.

I have never been to Poland, nor do I have any desire to go. From what I understand from others who have made the trip, the last day is the hardest day.  Auschwitz-Birkenau is always described as devastating – people who didn’t know they could feel such deep emotion, describe how it is impossible not to feel the souls of all those murdered there. Just the sheer size of the place, makes it impossible to digest how many were murdered there.

Yours is the second generation to grow up with the State of Israel as fact and reality, rather than a dream and a prayer. It is difficult to communicate to you and to your siblings and friends, the true meaning of Zionism and why it is so important. Your great-grandparents, and even your grandparents, remember the declaration of the State of Israel in 1948. They remember the 1967 Six Day War, which resulted in a unified, free Jerusalem, giving us access to the Old City and the remnants of the Beit haMikdash. It is easy to take this for granted today – that you can hop on a bus and then the light rail in Jerusalem, and show up at the Kotel whenever you feel like it. But we must never take any of it for granted. We must always remember the days when we didn’t have a country of our own, and when we had a country of our own, but no access to the holiest of places for the Jewish people.

Today’s fight is different. We have to continue to fight the BDS movement which does its best to put Israel in a negative light all around the world. When we hear people saying that Israel is an apartheid country it is up to us to show the world that this is not the case.  The Palestinians do not want a 2 state solution – their vision is a single state that is devoid of all Jews. As a Jew, and as an Israeli, it is your job and your duty to educate others, to make sure that they see the truth, the real Israel.

As we learned last Saturday night, anti-semitism is alive and well. Exactly one week ago, eleven Jews, praying in their synagogue on Shabbat morning, just as we do every single week, were murdered, in an act not unlike those carried out by Nazis nearly 80 years ago. It can happen in Pittsburgh. It can happen anywhere. Where there are Jews, there are anti-semites.

I have no doubt that you will return from this trip changed. How can anyone visit Poland, and see what was lost, and not come back feeling changed? When we meet up at the Kotel on Monday morning, look at it with new eyes. Don’t take it for granted. Don’t see an ancient wall. Look again, and see all that is left of the Beit HaMikdash. Look again, and see the miracle that enabled us to reunite Jerusalem in 1967. Look again, and see how God is a part of everything that happens in Eretz Yisrael and Medinat  Yisrael. Look again, and see how the existence of the State of Israel is not a direct result of the Shoah, but the realization of a promise, and of a dream of thousands of years.

I can’t wait to see you on Monday morning. I am sure tomorrow will be a tough day, but hopefully you will return empowered, and believing that God exists, even though we may not understand how He works, and why He makes things happen the way that they do.  I pray that this trip has been all that you expected it to be, and that you return feeling proud to be Jewish and proud to be Israeli.>>

 

Friends Make My World Good

I’ve learned a lot about friendship in my 44 years.

I’ve learned that you have to work harder to maintain some friendships.

You have to decide which ones are worth the effort.

I’ve learned that some friendships will last the geographical distance, whereas others will simply fizzle out.

You have to decide whether or not this hurts you or makes you stronger.

I’ve learned that your best friends are not necessarily the friends with whom you agree with on everything, sometimes they are the ones with whom you frequently disagree. But because they are your friends, you can agree to disagree over and over and over again.

I’ve learned that my closest friends are the ones who are there for me, day in, day out, through thick and thin.

They may be the friends I have known for decades, or they may be the friends I’ve known for 6 months.

But they are there when I need them, and I want to be there for them when they need me.

I’ve learned that friendship is when I feel heartbroken along with a friend who is going through a difficult situation, and it is when I feel elated along with a friend who is celebrating something wonderful.

True friendship is being able to show up at a friend’s house unannounced, and that friend doesn’t care that she is in her pyjamas and hasn’t showered, or washed off last night’s makeup, and her house is messy, because she knows if you just showed up, you need to be with a friend right then.

True friendship is dropping everything, without a second thought, to rush to help your friend in need, no matter what the reason, no matter what your plans were.

Nothing has happened that prompted me to write this.

I just feel blessed that I am surrounded by true friends.

I feel lucky to have friends to whom I can turn when I need to.

I am grateful that with my friends, I do not have to hold my tongue and refrain from saying what I really think – even if I know that not a single one of my friends agrees with my opinion.

That’s okay, our friendship will survive our conflicting views.

To all my real friends reading this, you know who you are. I love each and every one of you, even when I think  you’re being a crazy paranoid hypochondriac (not necessarily all at once)

Memories of INS at Miami Airport

In August of 2001 I entered the United States as a legal alien with a conditional, two year green card. I came exactly 2 weeks before the September 11 terrorist attacks. I arrived with my American  husband of 21 months – less than two years, hence the condition attached to my green card.

With all the talk about the latest immigration policies and current upheaval in the US surrounding immigration from certain countries, I started thinking about my own immigration to America story. Leaving aside refugees, my thoughts are mainly about those people who hold valid green cards, and who have been living in the United States for a period of time, or who have recently received their green cards and wish to move to the US within the time frame they have been given. Once you receive your green card, you have a limited amount of time within which you must physically arrive in the country.

I applied for my green card before September 2001. Even so, it took a year and a half for the process. At the time we were living in London. In order to simply file the application we had to provide an incredible amount of paperwork, including police reports from all countries in which I had lived for more than 6 months after the age of 16. For me that was 3 countries – Ireland, Israel and the UK. This was proof that I have no criminal background. In addition, we had to provide multiple copies of birth certificates, marriage certificate, proof of current employment in London etc. My husband had to provide proof that he could afford to support me in the United States financially – green card holders had to sign a waiver that they would not claim any benefits (medical or otherwise) for 10 years after moving to the US – even though green card holders pay taxes the same as citizens. Once the paperwork was processed and approved the next step was medical. I was subjected to a multitude of tests and vaccinations. I was tested for HIV and drug use. I was x-rayed to show that I don’t have TB. I obtained from my childhood doctor a letter stating that I had measles and mumps as a child, or I would have been forced to be vaccinated. I had to get a tetanus and a rubella booster, because I had no proof of the most recent ones I had received. All this was paid for by me, the applicant and required a full day of  vacation from work.

As one of the lucky ones, my green card was approved relatively easily. My husband and I were called for our interview at the US Embassy in London where we were asked to show all the paperwork again, and we had to answer some questions about our relationship and our plans once we arrived in Florida. Another day off work. But I got my green card.

One would think that once you have the card, entry into the United States is simple. Not so. While having a green card allows you to enter through the US Passport line (or it did,  until now), the first time you arrive in the country with that green card, you are taken to that room. You know, that room you pass after passport control, with the big letters “Department of Homeland Security” – or back in the pre-9/11 days “Immigration and Nationalization Services”. That room is where people who are denied entry into the US are sent. That room was eye opening. That room was frightening. That room was possibly the most humiliating part of the whole green card process. While I knew that my documents were in order, and that it was a matter of protocol and fingerprints, while I waited my turn I watched families get torn apart. I saw a mother get told she could not enter the country with her husband and children. I saw an old man get escorted to a closed room for an extensive interview. Those images have stayed in my memory for more than 15 years. When my turn arrived and I was called for fingerprinting I was shaking so hard the INS officer had to hold my hand steady. I remember him saying something like “Relax, you’re almost done! Welcome to the United States” and that he was smiling, while all around him people’s lives were being destroyed.

If the process for me to get a green card took 18 months, pre-9/11, pre -“Homeland Security”, an Irish citizen married to an American, living in London, I can only imagine how much more difficult the process has become, especially for anyone living in war torn countries. And it should be difficult,because the country has every right to deny entry to people who may be dangerous. The process is there for a reason, and once a person has been approved for residency s/he should be allowed to enter the US with US citizens through the same passport control booth. End of story.

 

A wise woman once said

to a friend “the day they come to pack up your house for an overseas move is the hardest day of the entire experience”

That was me, giving advice to my friend who is also moving to Israel, on the same flight as us.
I was speaking from memory of my experience when I moved from Israel to London, and from London to the US. But I didn’t really remember.

Our lift was due to be packed next Wednesday. So yesterday I said to myself “I have a week to pack the things I want to pack myself”. I’d already packed many boxes of books and photos, and other easy things, mostly just to save time on the day. At 5pm yesterday we had a call from the shipping company, asking if it was okay to send a couple of guys “tomorrow, just to pack the fragile stuff like china”. So Keith and I said “sure” – we’re not eating any shabbat meals in our house, we’re not using our china again on this side, makes perfect sense.
So this morning, 3 guys in a very large truck showed up at 10am, raring to go. Within an hour they had packed most of our breakables – china, crystal, stuff. But they wanted to do more. Now it’s almost 4pm. They’re still here, and the only rooms still intact are my bedroom and the girls’ bedroom. The dining and living rooms are wrapped in cardboard. The paintings are off the walls.

I guess it’s good they got so much done today. It means less time spent next week packing, and getting the container out of here earlier in the day. And tomorrow Keith & I are going on a date. R&R time just the two of us.

As for poor Guinness the dog, well, she is sleeping on the couch as usual…

I dreamed a dream…

I love Les Miserables. Not just the musical, I’ve actually read the entire Victor Hugo book in the original French, and in English, just in case I missed something in the French. I love how in spite of all the misery and hardships, there is a relatively happy ending. Not the happy ever after ending of a fairy tale, but a content, life can go on kind of ending.

Life is not a bed of roses. Bad things happen to good people. Different folk deal with that in different ways. Some use bad things as proof that there is no God. Others use tragedy to say all religion is bad. Still others tell us that disaster strikes because we don’t put enough faith in God.

I believe in God. I’ve had times in my life when that belief has been tested, but ultimately I believe in God. I believe in the Torah, and I believe in Judaism. I don’t always agree with the interpretations, but the beauty of Judaism is that there is always more than one answer to a question.

When times are tough, I try hard to tell myself that it’s a test, and that God only gives you as much as you can handle. It’s what I told myself when I battled post-partum depression, when my husband was out of work for a long time, and at other stages in my life. I don’t know if I believe it completely, but it does help me get through, and it drives me to pray harder, to do extra mitzvot, and to give more tzedakah – there is always someone worse off than you!

The past 6 weeks my faith has been tested to the limits. As time flew by since our interview with the Jewish Agency in Miami, we heard nothing about our application to make aliyah as a family. Others who interviewed weeks after us were approved, their flight confirmed. We approached from as many angles as we could, trying to get some information – was there a document missing, did our file get lost, anything? Eventually we discovered, as I had expected, that it was related to my aliyah some 20+ years ago. Our application had to go through a special committee. You cannot make aliyah twice – this I know. All I wanted though, was for our family to arrive in Israel together on a Nefesh B’Nefesh flight. I never had a free flight, as I made aliyah from within the country, and my husband & kids are entitled to a free flight per the laws of making aliyah. It was so important to me that we were on a Nefesh B’Nefesh flight. I want my children to arrive in their new homeland to an enormous welcome. To singing and dancing. To be welcomed by the leaders of the country. To understand from the minute they arrive that this is HOME, this is where we need to be. And if we weren’t approved for the Nefesh B’Nefesh flight, well, it just wouldn’t be the same.

Baruch Hashem, we finally heard this morning. I give so much thanks to both Rabbi Fass at Nefesh B’Nefesh, and to Iris at the Jewish Agency in Miami, for their patience in dealing with my incessant emails and phone calls, and for their investigating for us. Thanks to Keith, my ever-patient spouse for ignoring my insistence that if we weren’t on that flight I wasn’t going. Thank you to my Mahjongg girlies for allowing me to have an evening playing Mahj, without a single mention of the move – you guys have NO idea how serious I was – I would have just left Tuesday night if anyone had mentioned it.

And now the real work begins. The dream is being realized, but we’ve a way to go. I’m not expecting a fairy tale outcome, but I cannot wait to live in Medinat Yisrael, Reishit Tzmichat Geulateinu. The State of Israel, the beginning of our redemption, the only place the Jewish people can truly call “Home”.

I’m not really a liberal

I write this with tears pouring down my face. I can barely breathe, and I keep checking my Facebook feed in case I am mistaken.

The bodies of three Israeli teenagers (one, a dual citizen of the US and Israel) who were abducted 18 days ago while on their way home from school, have just been found.

Eyal Yifrach. Gil-ad Shaar. Naftali Fraenkel.

Aged 16 and 19 years old. Children. Sons, grandsons, brothers, nephews. Kids.

The boys were kidnapped by Hamas terrorists, as they waited to hitch a ride home for Shabbat. I’m not going to write about hitchiking and its dangers here, because in truth, when it comes to hitching in Israel (called “tremping”) it’s not something you can understand unless you have lived there.

My friends in the US think of me as a liberal, because I believe in equality for all US citizens, regardless of race, gender or sexual orientation. This has resulted in me having the label “LIBERAL” stuck on me.

But I’ve always said that when it comes to Israel everything changes.

Right now, right at this moment, all I can think is “Hashem Yinkom D’mam” – “God will avenge their blood”. And by that I mean, Tzahal, the IDF, with God’s help, of course. Because Hamas are terrorists. Because the majority of Palestinians do not want a two state solution, or any other kind of peace with Israel. The majority of Palestinians are not a “peace loving people”. They want to annihilate the Jewish state of Israel, and all the Jews within. In all likelihood, within the next hour or two, we will start to hear stories coming out of Gaza and Ramallah, and other areas controlled by the Palestinian Authority of celebrations. What are they celebrating? The deaths of 3 children. 3 children abducted and brutally murdered on their way home from school. For no reason other than being Jews living in the land of Israel.

Let Israel hold back nothing when chasing down the animals responsible for this. And they will find them. Enough deals. Enough “peace talks” – there cannot be peace with a people who rule with terrorism.

Baruch Dayan HaEmet. May the memories of Eyal, Gil-ad and Naftali be for a blessing, and may their families, somehow, find comfort as they become a part of the ever growing “Mishpachot sh’kulot” – bereaved families – in Israel.

Well meaning people?

I wasn’t sure what to name this post. I’m being optimistic when I title it “Well meaning people” because I’m not always convinced that these people are actually well meaning, or if they want to sabotage things.

Recently – as in, the last few months – some people (not just one, but a few) have told me that my children are worried and scared. I’ve been informed that my kids are upset, unhappy and anxious. When I ask these people to elaborate I am told that it’s because I (never “you plural”, always just aimed at me) am taking them away from life as they know it, and that it isn’t fair to move to Israel when the children are so against it. My response to those people is usually something along the lines of “We, my husband & I as a team, are doing what we believe is best for our children’s future. We understand that right now they are unhappy about it, but we believe that they will one day thank us for it”. And I move right along, because frankly, if I attempt to have a more in depth conversation around the subject with the people concerned it may end badly.

These individuals are not the only ones, however. So called friends, adults, have asked my kids how they feel about our move, and when the answer leans to the negative, they follow up with “why?” My kids aren’t able to fully articulate why they don’t want to move to Israel, but suffice to say, they have never set foot in the country, have no idea what to expect, and they’re worried.  I’d be more concerned about them if they were really gung-ho and raring to go. Some people are smart enough to give a sympathetic smile and leave it at that. Others, sadly, are not so savvy.

I’ve had people ask my son directly “are you scared about going into the army?” and when he answers that he sometimes is, they go on to either tell him that it’s nothing to be scared about (hello! Do not diminish his very real fear!) or that he should be proud that he will be serving in the IDF (Really? You’re going to make him feel bad for being scared?).

Listen up people, making a big move with our family is not a decision we take lightly. We did not just wake up one day and say “ok, let’s move to Israel”. It’s been years in the making. 15 years to be exact. It’s normal that my children should be concerned and scared and worried and sad. And don’t for one moment think that we are not taking their emotions seriously. Of course we are. Just because I brush off their feelings in front of you, don’t think that we don’t discuss their very legitimate fears when we are together as a family. Don’t be so naive to think that we’re ignoring the challenges that they will have as a result of this move.  And please, for the love of all that is holy, don’t undermine my kids’ feelings to them, or to me.

This is a classic example of “you have no idea what goes on behind closed doors”, but rest assured, all is well, and we are helping our children cope with their feelings in the privacy and comfort of our own home.

To those of you who are truly looking out for us, thank you – I know you do mean well, but think twice when you get answers you’re not expecting from a child.

To the rest of you, know that it’s working against you. All the kids have complained individually about things you’ve said, and they simply no longer want to spend much time with you. Keep that in mind, as our time here grows limited – don’t spoil what we still have here.

Shabbat Shalom

3 strikes and you’re… what, exactly?

I am at my most productive when I make lists. I find nothing else gives me a sense of accomplishment like checking things off a long to-do list. So, in an effort to get things done, rather than just stressing myself out from thinking about all the things that need to get done, this morning I wrote a list. There were only 5 things on the list. I quickly crossed off one of them, and began working on a second.

Then I tried to accomplish the third. I called the Israeli Consulate in Miami. I listened to the recorded message, and chose what I thought was the correct department, and pushed the button. I got voicemail in Hebrew. So I left a message in Hebrew, asking for someone to call me back. Surprisingly, I did get a call back, right while I was in the middle of crossing item number four off my list – getting passport photos taken. The nice man told me I had the wrong department, and also informed me that the consular department, which I need, is on strike.

Yup. On strike, he said, chuckling. No, really, he chuckled and said “you know, it’s Israel here, they strike, we strike, but don’t worry, call them anyway.”

So I called the consular department, and after a few buttons, a man answered ” ‘allo? Ken?” I began explaining in Hebrew how I’m an Israeli citizen, and I want to register my children as citizens, but quickly got confused, and asked if he spoke English. “English, Spanish, Hebrew, Portuguese, whichever you like”, was the reply.

In English, I asked what I need to do to register the kids as Israeli, and he gave me very straightforward instructions. “But,” he said, “we are on strike now, so you can’t come down here to do it all”

Ah, yes, I responded, do you have any idea how long the strike might last?

“Check our website at the end of the week, it might be over” he replied.

You know, I said, interestingly enough, it is because of a strike that I made aliya all those years ago. The professors were all on strike for months, and I was bored and wanted to get a job, so I made aliya in order to get a job…

“You see!” he laughed, “strikes are a good thing!”

Oh Lord, give me strength, and let this adventure be smooth…

And the downside is…

You put your kids back in school and on day 1 of week 2, someone has to stay home sick.

My kids are really healthy in general, but once in a while there are things beyond our control. Number 3 woke up yesterday with a bright red rash on her face. Classic test case of fifth disease, or “slapped cheek” disease. According to my medical research (i.e the interwebz), once the rash has appeared, it’s no longer contagious. But this morning the rash had spread beyond her face, to her torso, and I could not send her to school without a doctor’s note, or I imagine I’d have received a call within minutes of her arriving to pick her up.
So, she stayed home, we visited our favorite pediatrician, who concurred with Doctor Mom, and gave us a note so she can return to school tomorrow.

So here we are. Luckily she’s cute and fun to hang out with, but she does not stop talking at all!!!

Look at those red cheeks – classic “slapped cheeks” disease. Perfectly happy otherwise, just covered in a rash, poor child!