Ulpan: To do or not to do

(yeah, yeah, it's been a long time.)

Someone on LinkedIn posted this question, I felt like answering it, and then realized it would make a good blog post. So here ya go!

Question: When first making Aliyah should you work or study Hebrew full time be fluent? Some say yes, and some say no! what is the best ideal answer?

Answer: My own opinion (and it is my own :) ) is it's best to do Ulpan first. It won't make you fluent, but it will give you a good foundation. More importantly, ulpan is where you will make lifelong friends. Your ulpan classmates will be your social environment for the first few months (assuming you don't already have an existing one, of course. Some people do when they make aliyah) and, since nearly everyone - if you're taking Ulpan Aleph (the first level) - will have recently made aliyah, it will give you moral support. You'll have people who will truly understand you when you are frustrated with the bank, when you keep buying tomato paste at the supermarket when you really want tomato sauce, when you are unbelievably thrilled with yourself the first time you manage to order pizza to be delivered ALL IN HEBREW and your pizza showed up exactly how you ordered it!

This will also be the only time you really get to freely travel around the country and explore. Once you start working, if you're lucky, you will have Friday off, which is a crazy day for most people preparing for Shabbat and hard to do tourist-y stuff. Some ulpans arrange day trips for their students, as well.

Fluency with Hebrew will come when you start working (unless you're in an all-Anglo environment) and making Hebrew-speaking friends and forcing yourself to speak Hebrew when you're out. Don't be afraid to say you're an oleh and that you really want to speak Hebrew; nearly everyone will accommodate you - to a certain extent. :)

On the other hand, if you get offered a great job that seems stable that you really want and will be happy in for a long time - how do you say no to that? You can take a night ulpan class (be prepared to be exhausted!), you can get private tutoring, you can throw yourself headlong into Hebrew seminars, lectures, movies, etc and try to learn that way.

So you see, there is no best ideal answer. You have to decide what works for you, based on your situation and your needs. B'hatzlacha!! May you be successful in your aliyah!

A Day in the Life of a non-Hebrew Speaker

You ever have one of those days when all the little individual items add up to make one bad thing that much worse?

Yeah, that was my day.

It started with the rain. Maimo wouldn't, er, do his business this morning, so I brought him along with me when I took Morey to the train, figuring we'd stop at the park on the way home, since by that time the rain had let up a bit.

We drop Morey off and head home. Two minutes later, I hear a 'thunk' that sounds like something hit the side of the car. Based on where we were (there is SO much construction in this city, I was neither worried nor surprised), I decided to continue around the corner where I was turning, and park.

Except.

The car died just as I made the turn. In the middle of the road. Next to two blocks of red & white striped "no parking" zones. He just would not start, and the sudden, overwhelming smell of oil convinced me that it probably wouldn't do much good to try. I did, a couple of times (what? You've never touched a freshly painted wall, despite the "Wet Paint" sign?), but my first instinct was right. I was able to roll a little out of the way of traffic, and up against the curb. I was hoping to roll back out of the turn, and roll down the main street a few feet to a legal parking spot.

Best laid plans and all that, blah blah. The curb was angled, and since the car was turned off, I had very little steering control, so the rear tire bumped up against the curb, and there she stayed. And of course, there is no one around, and none of the cars flying by me slowed down enough for me to even hope to get their attention to maybe help push me. I sat there staring at the perfectly legal and empty parking spots maybe 50 feet ahead of me. If this had happened only 10 seconds earlier, I could have coasted into a perfectly legal and empty spot on the main road. If it happened on 10 seconds later, I could have pulled into one of those spots right in front of me.

What to do? Call Morey, of course! He was on the train, so he made a few calls. The call to our mechanic went to voicemail, and when he tried our insurance company (we get one free tow), he was hurled into a Hebrew phone menu that went by so fast he couldn't even be sure he called the right company. He had to wait until he got to work, to enlist the aid of an Israeli co-worker.

Which would have happened faster if his train hadn't been delayed by 15 minutes.

I've now been sitting in the car - with the dog - for over an hour. I, too, have to get to Tel Aviv for a recording session. But since I was just planning on dropping Morey at the train, then heading back home, I am not dressed for Tel Aviv, I have no cash on me, nor do I have my bankcard. I also have no water, which by now both Maimo and I are regretting.

In the meantime, I take Maimo out for a quick stroll near the car; he does his thing, so we at least got one item on the to-do (to-doo?) list checked.

After another half-hour passes, I cancel my gig for today, and call a friend to ask for a ride home. Of course, she has a kid home sick today. But she's a great friend, and willing to drag her poor, sick kid out of his sickbed to come get me and the dog. Morey finally calls; while trying to figure out the best place to tow the car to, our mechanic had called and explained that one free tow is a tow to anywhere. It's good to know that had we been in Eilat, we could have gotten a tow home. I'd feel really bad for the tow guy who then had to drive a tow truck 5 hours back home, but hey.

So after Morey's co-worker gave a sob story about how the car was blocking traffic (well, it had been) and "his wife" was in the car, the tow company said they'd send someone right away. This, of course, was the Israeli "right away," but it wasn't too bad, especially given that I was starting to need to use the human facilities, and you. just. know. if I left the car to go to the shopping centre around the corner, that would be when the police finally showed up - to give me a parking ticket. Plus, I had the dog and that's... just... weird.

The tow truck shows up, and it figures - I can speak enough Hebrew to do just fine in a restaurant, or a supermarket, yet everyone always wants to speak English with me. I know not a single word relating to mechanic, tow, car repair, etc., (the best I can do is "my car is not working"), and I get the one guy who doesn't know a single word of English. He left, it started raining as Maimo and I waited outside, and stopped just before Kate came and picked me up. Her sick little kid got lots of doggy kisses, and less than 3 hours after the start of our ordeal, Maimo and I got home. We're still waiting to hear if Frenchie is dead in the water, given up the ghost, returned to his Peugeot maker or if there is a small modicum of hope. Sadly, I am not optimistic.

What I am optimistic about, however:

• It was raining today!
• I have a friend who was available to pick me up. And if she wasn't, I had backups.
• I was able to move the car out of the flow of traffic, and not block the road.
• We can get a tow to anywhere! Please God, may we never have to use it again.
• Today's gig was with a long-term client, who has me doing a big project, so re-scheduling is not too much of a big deal. If it had been a one-off client, that would have been very very bad.
• This happened while I was in Modi'in. It could have just as easily happened at 110 km/hr on the highway on my way to Tel Aviv.
• Maimo is a rockstar. He could have been a right royal little pain in the tuchus, being stuck in a car, with no water, toys or food for so long, but he eventually curled up (with his head on my lap - aww) and sacked out.
• Morey is an awesome rockstar. While I normally can handle stressful situations, there were too many factors that threw me - being in a no-parking zone, having the dog, having to get to a job, not having the language skills, not being sure what our policy covered... Morey handled it all with aplomb. I should hire him out.

Yes, this is what it takes to get me blogging again. Expect some "I hate Connex" posts in the near future.

How to look like an idiot without even trying

The conversation went something like this:

Me: (in Hebrew) I want to make an appointment with Dr. X
Guy on phone: Im Dr. X b'Modi'in? (with Dr. X in Modi'in?)
Me: Ken. (yes)
GOP: Mi holech l'rofe? (who is going to the doctor?)
Me: [Brain fart]

I didn't understand the question. Who is going to the doctor? I don't know - his patients? Is there a party at his office? Do I need to bring a date? It's a contextual thing; I've never been asked this before when making a doctor's appointment. I'm going to the doctor. Who else would it be? (Remember, I do not have children, so I am not used to making appointments for other people. Plus, I've never been asked this before.)

Finally, I get it and I say:

Me: ani. Aliza Ahltmahn (me. Alissa Altman)
GOP: b'ivrit (in Hebrew)
Me: Ma? (What?)

Then the brain really shut down. "In Hebrew"? I answered him in Hebrew. I don't understand. He asked me if I'd prefer English, I said yes, he said something really quickly that I think was he'd get me an English operator, wished me a good day and then hung up.

So.... does that mean someone's going to call me back? Did he accidently disconnect when he meant to put me on hold? Is he banging his head against his desk, sighing, "Anglos"? Did he go on his lunch break thinking, another day, another dumbutt?

:sigh:

Making a doctor's appointment is not difficult Hebrew. I know all the words necessary to make an appointment. Yet, I failed. I know what to say, I just can't understand what people say to me, especially if it's out of context or unexpected. And once I'm thrown, I can't get myself back on track.

This is true for a number of situations. I can get along okay in simple Hebrew, as long as I keep the sentences short and no one ever answers me. Just let me talk, and if you need to tell me something, use hand gestures.

We'll manage just fine. Who needs actual conversations, anyway?

Okay. Okay? Okay!

Another important lesson learned in the grand education of living in a country where the national language is not your native tongue.

When scheduling recording sessions with your client and the studio engineer, and the dialogue goes something like this:

SE: Sunday at 11am
Me: I'm available
Client: No, I have a problem.
SE: (Something in Hebrew.)
Client: Wait, let me call my office.

(SE & Me discuss other schedule possibilities for the following week while waiting)

Client (hanging up phone): Ze b'seder ("it's okay").
SE: B'seder?
Client: Ken, ken ("yes, yes").

make sure that the "b'seder" that has just been spoken refers to the appointment, and not to the "something in Hebrew" so that you don't shlep all the way to Tel Aviv for nothing.

Well, not for nothing. I gave tzedekah (charity) and bought an iced coffee, and got to watch half the IDF try to cram themselves onto a train for Be'er Sheva. Lama? Ein li musag.*

*Why? I have no idea.

This is a but a very small portion of the number of soldiers jamming the platform.
It looked like Black Friday at the IDF WalMart.