‘Greece’ is the Word (Article #14) 8/3/2006

Our third Shabbos (Shabbat? even I get confused) passed uneventfully. After our Friday night seudah at home, we enjoyed a terrific meal with our buddy family the Schneiders for lunch. We had a really nice time there and since Amy bakes professionally out of her home, a really awesome dessert!

Our kids have really acclimated well to the community. They have had sleepovers and playdates and have really become a part of the children’s “scene” in our part of Ramat Beit Shemesh. Each Shabbat they disappear for hours and it is a pleasure to experience.

On Sunday we had a major meeting at work about the scheduled tiyul to Gilboa the next day. With all the hostilities going on and the rockets falling, we decided that it was not prudent to send the boys up north and replaced the tiyul with a trip to Ir David and the Kotel excavations.

Since we needed to send someone from the administration on the trip and it has been 24 years since I last visited Ir David and Chizkiyahu’s tunnels, I volunteered to go on the tiyul. It would give me a chance to get to know the South African and Australian students (who will be with us through December) and experience some of Yerushalayim.

Aliza (age 10) had no camp that week until Wednesday, so we decided to have her join me on the tiyul. Chaya (13) also wanted to go, but she had to go sit for a high school placement exam instead. She will have to join me at another time.

Thankfully we got a ride Monday morning to Yerushalayim. Transportation has become a major issue for us. We have been getting around locally by foot or taxi. We cannot buy a new tax exempt car until we get Israeli drivers licenses. Renting a car can cost $1,000 or more a month. So we are trying to get a used car that we can keep for a year or two and then buy a new car.

However, with 8 people in the family our choices are limited to 3 types of minivans. Unfortunately these minivans are not only expensive, they are also in limited supply and it is hard to find one. Even worse is the fact that they are incredibly expensive. One car dealer offered me a 14 year old minivan for the low low price of $15,000.

So we are looking around to try and find something a little cheaper and in the meantime are resorting to taxis. At least for local trips.

Getting to work in the morning is a different story. While the train lets me off a ten minute bus ride from the office, it is a $7 taxi ride to get to the train each way. Since this can really add up, I have started to take the bus into Yerushalayim (which leaves 3 blocks from our house), and connect from there to a bus to my office. The trip ends up taking about 15 minutes more, but it is more direct with only one transfer involved.

I wouldn’t care normally, but I simply hate the bus. The train is so comfortable and spacious while the bus is always crowded and with all the curves and turns I am always slightly queasy by the time I get off.

When we get a car, Goldie will be able to not only do all her shopping and errands conveniently; she can also drop me off at the train which is a short 10 minute ride away.

Luckily, that morning we were able to catch a ride to the Yerushalayim end of the train trip and catch a bus to the Yeshiva to go on the tiyul.

What can I say about Ir David? It was amazing! Our first stop was a park in Talpiyot where we had a bird’s eye view of most of Yerushalayim and the Old City. Our guide Yaron Levy was very informative about showing us different areas and how they are represented in Tanach.

We then hopped back on our bus for a short ride to the Ir David excavations in East Jerusalem. Ir David is the site where archeologists believe that David Hamelech set up his castle. It is downhill from Har Habayit and currently right in the middle of an Arab area.

We saw the excavations and the location where they have found several sealing stamps with names on them that were people mentioned in Tanach. We also had a great view of Har Hazaisim and talked about the coronation of Shlomo Hamelech with specific views of exactly where the events most likely occurred.

The highlight of the day though, was the trip through the water tunnel. This tunnel had been dug originally as a water source for the original residents of Yerushalayim from the springs which were the main water source for the area. This spring was located outside the walls of the city, and the tunnel diverted some of its water to a pool within the city walls.

However, Chizkiyahu expanded the tunnel and sealed the spring so that the Syrian army would not be able to have a water source upon its return to Yerushalayim. Originally discovered many years ago, it was not until the late 90’s that new excavations discovered totally unknown areas of the water tunnel and surrounding city, dramatically expanding our understanding of city life in Biblical times.

With the exception of the blinding light provided by camera flashes and very rare flashes of light from Yaron’s mini flashlight, we walked the entire tunnel in total dark. For those who have not walked the tunnel, the water continues to flow through it, and at times it gets very narrow and short (at one point I was totally bent over as I walked and felt the ceiling of the cave scratch my back).

The footing is all uneven and totally underwater, and since the walls are not always even, we had to walk through very carefully. After a while the boys began to sing different songs as we made our way and it was a lot of fun. When we finished we discussed what a marvel of engineering it must have been to dig the tunnel totally underground.

Although the tunnel was cool and wet inside, by the time we got out we were totally exhausted and walking up the hill to the old city was grueling. After a break for lunch we made our own minyan for mincha at the Kotel and headed to the last part of our tiyul, a tour through the southern corner of the Kotel.

Seeing the destruction of the Beit Hamikdosh is especially meaningful during the 3 weeks. However, seeing visible signs of damage in the excavations was an especially poignant moment.

I had no idea that the protrusions from the Kotel at its’ southern end were the remnants of a bridge entrance into the Har Habayis. In the excavations we were able to see where the weight of the falling bridge stones literally broke the street below and where the stones from the upper levels of the wall were thrown.

Standing among the ruins of the Beit Hamikdosh during the 3 weeks somehow brings the meaning of what we are missing a little more home. I hope that it somehow makes my davening a little more meaningful with a greater understanding of what we have lost.

We cut the tiyul short because it was a really hot day and we were all exhausted from walking.

Thankfully, the next few days were uneventful for us. Chaya had a recurrence of Strep Throat (the Doctor told us that if she is prone to strep it will happen more in Israel than America) and the kids all went to camp and had a great time. By Thursday it was clearly time for something to happen to liven things up.

That morning started off on the wrong foot when Goldie took a taxi to the center of town to go shopping at one of the supermarkets only to discover that the market doesn’t open until 11:00. Apparently, most of the shoppers for that market are the husbands who shop late at night after work/kollel, so the hours are skewed for their benefit.

Later that day I took a half hour walk to the offices of our shipping agent to drop off some documents that had not come through clearly in a fax. I was greeted at the door with the words, “your container is now in Greece”.

Apparently, the ship with our container makes several stops in its roundabout journeys. It therefore always has numerous containers on board, each destined for different places. So the amount of containers on board actually being delivered to Israel may only be ten to fifteen percent of the total cargo.

With the start of hostilities in the North and the subsequent bombing of Haifa and Northern Israel, the port of Haifa has been closed with all shipments being made to Ashdod, a much smaller port. Furthermore, the insurance companies have been charging the shipping lines a surcharge for each container on board the ship that enters Israeli waters, regardless of the container’s final destination.

Since the shipping lines a) don’t want to pay an insurance surcharge for the containers onboard NOT destined for Israel and b) don’t want a full boat to be waiting up to two weeks to be unloaded in Ashdod, they chose to drop our container in Greece instead. They are within their rights to do so, since they have only undertaken to get our container as close to Israel as they can.

With this drop in Greece we get added fees. Fees for unloading the container into Greece and fees for loading it back onto a vessel to Israel. Plus storage fees. Since we do not know how long our stuff will be in Greece, we have no idea how much this is costing us.

Of course there is also the fact that we have none of our things and need to move into a different house in less than 3 weeks. Without beds, linens, pots, pans, anything that we packed in the lift. School starts in a month and we have no school clothes. The list of inconveniences this causes is endless.

At the current time, we have no idea how long this will last, and can only hope that everything works out quickly.

Of course, when I told Goldie about it she was beside herself. Anger and tears mixed together as she realized that all our planning to be settled in and ready for school early were not going to come through and that there was no way to “fix” it.

While it helps to know that most of the current crop of Olim face similar issues, it doesn’t make it any easier on us. We are frustrated and concerned that we will face problems when school starts because the kids will not be prepared. We are also worried about dealing with unpacking when all the kids are in school and cannot help.

Then there is the endless supply of people who say to us, “well it could be worse, after all the people in the North are being shelled every day.” While I admit that we definitely have it much better than them, it is really no comfort because it is hard to internalize. Or at least it was until that night.

I have written about the war and how we do not really feel the effect of it here in central Israel. Thursday night, we went to a meeting about a Gan Chova for Mordechai being held in a Ramat Beit Shemesh school. When we got to the building we walked in to discover that over 100 people had been living in the building since the start of hostilities.

Apparently, throughout the entire Beit Shemesh community, evacuees from the north numbering 500 or more are living in classroom and gymnasiums, with all their food, clothing, beds, formula, and whatever else they may need being provided to them by the local Gemillas Chessed committee.

I got an email from a Five Town friend telling about how families are printing ads in the paper and offering their phone number through the radio offering to welcome complete strangers and their families into their homes.

Seeing these people and realizing that they had to leave their homes because of such strong threats to their safety finally brought home how significantly Israel has been affected by the war. We have faith that our army (if allowed to) can truly wipe out the terror threat, and allow these people to return to their homes and join the many thousands who either chose to stay behind or had nowhere to go.

These people are truly paying the hardest price of all of us. Their neighbors have died in rocket attacks, their homes destroyed and their security endangered while we wage this war. We can only pray that the danger to them is quickly eradicated and that they can return to a normal life.

On Friday, my boss returned to Israel from a two week trip to America. I was looking forward to his being back in the office, since I have only been on the job for three weeks and I need his guidance on a lot of issues. I called him Friday morning to welcome him back to the country and his response was to tell me that he had been called up to the reserves and would be reporting for duty within 2 days.

He is a member of the paratroopers and if anything serious is going to happen, he will be right in the thick of things. While it will be hard for us in Yeshiva (considering that we are in the midst of a major building renovation – making room for the 60% student growth we will have this coming year), I feel terrible for his wife and family.

He spent 2 weeks traveling away from home and they had no vacation/family time since the Yeshiva had been in session. These next few weeks were I am sure a time that they had planned to spend time together as a family. Now they are a time that they will spend worrying about their husband and father.

In all, 3 members of our staff were called to duty last week. We also have a neighbor who was called as well. Hopefully they will not have to see action and if they do, we hope and pray that Hashem keep them and all our Chayalim safe.

Goldie’s nephew who is here in Mach Hach Baaretz came to us for Shabbos. This was our first completely at home Shabbos and we were looking forward to it. Although some of the Mach Hach busses had been evacuated from Northern Israel, the program continued to run and the kids have been having a great time.

This is in contrast to several programs that either curtailed their sessions and sent kids home or cancelled their program altogether. While I can understand the concern for the kids safety, with the exception of Northern Israel, we really live in a safe and secure environment.

If there ever was a time that tourism and your visits to Israel was important, it is now! Our economy is taking a double hit, both by the unforecasted military expenses, but also by the lost tourism revenue, a major source of income for the country.

Every tourist that cancels a trip, every child that doesn’t attend a summer program or postpones their Yeshiva study in Israel and every parent that doesn’t come to visit that child causes a direct loss to the Israeli economy, at a time when we can least afford it.

Please continue to come. You are still safe in Yerushalayim, still safe in Tel Aviv, you can still visit Chevron and Masada. We need you to do so, and we need you to encourage others to do so. Now is the time when we need your presence and your support so that together we can ensure the viability and continuity of our country.