Clean Clothes (Article #19) 09/07/2006

Happiness is having working laundry machines.

As we get more and more settled, we reach more and more mini milestones. We had brought new laundry appliances on our lift, and with its arrival the week before – we were ready to have them installed.

One of the first things you learn when planning Aliyah is that Israeli and European appliances have much smaller capacities than American appliances. So, partly to take advantage of the import tax benefits awarded to olim, but also partly to make sure that we have the largest machines available, we brought in some Maytag laundry machines.

Since we bought the machines for the purpose of exporting them to Israel, we bought 220 voltage machines and got professional installation and 1 year’s service included in the price. When the lift was unloaded, we left the equipment in their boxes, since we knew we would need professional installation and we had so much other unpacking to do anyway.

On Sunday I made arrangements with the Israeli installation company for them to come to the house on Thursday to install the equipment. They told me to make sure that everything was out of the box and in the laundry room.

The Yeshiva’s new group of Talmidim arrived on Monday on their group flights. We had spent the prior few weeks working shorthanded to get the Yeshiva ready. With several of our people in the reserves in the war and many vendors (especially the contractors) shorthanded from the war – not only in manpower but sometimes in supplies as well due to the uncertainties in the ports, I was amazed that it all came together.

This group of talmidim will probably always be special to me – since this is my first year in the Yeshiva as well. Every time we go on a tiyul – it will be my first time on that tiyul as well as theirs. Part of the joy of this experience is the fact that my job allows me to experience the country and the people in the same way as these young men will.

They arrived in the Yeshiva mid-morning, tired but still excited to be here. After getting assigned to their rooms and having lunch, they enjoyed some brief welcoming shiurim and we went on the “opening day” tiyul to the Kotel.

We started the tiyul at the “Tayelet”, a park that overlooks a great deal of the city of Jerusalem, including the old city. While there, the Shana Aleph boys had the opportunity to tear Kriah upon seeing the destruction of the Beit Hamikdosh.

They then went straight to the old city, where they deliberately entered from Sha’ar Tzion in order to reflect upon their first visit to the Kotel. The tiyul was moving and it was a treat to do it with the boys and see how they reacted to the Kotel and the tiyul as the “kickoff” of their year.

On Tuesday I was preparing to leave the Yeshiva after a day of orientation for the guys. They were about to embark on a walking tour of the neighborhood, a basic review of where everything is, when I got a phone call from one of the Rebbiem telling me that there was a major security alert issued for the Jerusalem area.

Apparently there was hard information about a serious credible threat for an impending attack in the area and the security services were literally searching each and every vehicle entering Jerusalem that afternoon. Although we did not feel threatened, we followed our procedure to cancel any off campus activities and used the opportunity to review our emergency contact and action plans.

I had arranged to take the day off on Wednesday, since I had really only had a couple of days to unpack since the arrival of the lift. There was a whole list of things that needed to get organized. Goldie prioritized which rooms she wanted cleared out so that she could feel a little more at home, including putting the washer and dryer into the laundry room.

Goldie was thrilled that I would be home, since she had spent the week either staying home for various contractors/repairmen or chasing kids all over the place. She took the opportunity to get out of the house and take the kids for a ride and out for lunch.

About an hour after our lift had been delivered, our dining room table came apart. Apparently, the runners had been unscrewed and then screwed back in by the movers in the US, weakening the holes and resulting in the whole thing collapsing.

Thankfully, we were insured for the move and the furniture repair guy came to the house to install a new set of runners and put the table back together. We also got our telephones installed by the phone company at the same time. So by the time everyone got home, I felt that we had made significant progress toward getting everything in order.

Wednesday night, I unpacked the laundry machines. When I went to put them into the laundry room, we were horrified to realize that they wouldn’t make it through the door. No matter how hard I tried to angle them or turn them sideways, I just couldn’t make it work.

Goldie came to take a look at the machines, and while she was upset that it didn’t seem like there was any way to get them into the laundry room, she was thrilled to discover that they have more capacity than our prior machines back in the US. In a family with six kids, having a large washer and dryer are really very important.

When I took a look at the wall that was in the way, I realized that it was actually a sheetrock frame that was behind a bathroom sink and that there was actually a wide gap between the wall and the tile around the sink.

Knowing that the installers were coming the next day and that there would be no other way to get the machines through the door, I did what anyone would do – I removed about a foot of the wall (with a hammer – shhhhh don’t tell the landlord). I will have a repairman fix it, but I got the machines in and the next tenants will have access as well. (And I did tell the landlord)

I cannot describe how happy Goldie was to not have to shlep stuff to a neighbor to get clean clothes. Some simple things can make a major difference in your life. She happily did laundry for days.

On Thursday we had a technician come to the house to look at one of the A/C units (covering the master bedroom) that has not worked since we moved in. According to Goldie, it was probably the repairman’s first day on the job.

He had no clue where the compressor was, and kept referring to the installation manual to figure out what was what. When he realized that the compressor is on the roof of the house, he refused to climb on to the roof to take a look at it.

His excuse, “I cannot go out on the roof – I have no life insurance.” No matter what Goldie said to him, he would not agree to go to the roof and check the unit. When she asked him to look at one of the dampers on a different unit to see why it was blowing very weakly, he said, “I cannot do anything – at least it is blowing!”

Truthfully, stories like this are not common. While they do happen here, I would say that the majority of the people we have dealt with have been pretty competent, or at least compassionate. Most people are so nice to us, especially if they find out we are new olim.

By Friday, Goldie had reached the end of her rope with the kids. They were so bored with nothing to do, and were driving her up a wall. She spent the day prepping knapsacks with schoolbooks and school supplies; the first day of school was Sunday and she wanted to make sure that the kids were prepared.In Israel, even second graders have departmental classes, so a 7 year old might have 5 or more teachers on any given day. Additionally, books are shlepped back and forth, so there is a big focus on preparing all the books needed in the knapsack for the next day’s learning.

With the exception of Mordechai, who is terrified of going to a Hebrew speaking pre1a and is concerned that he won’t understand the Morah or the kids, our kids are excited to begin school. One positive with Mordechai is that just last week the city government approved a new pre1a for religious people. This program opened up in a building at the end of our block – so this could be huge for the Katz’s.

The chessed committee in our neighborhood is terrific. They made sure we got called prior to Shabbat to find out if we needed meals or anything else. We have made a special effort to stay in shul after davening to shmooze with people in order to get to know them, and it was nice to see that the people in the community have the same thoughts.

We were invited to a Kiddush hosted by Gershon and Tzippi Tokayer in memory of the Yahrtzeits of both of their fathers (Tzippi also runs the hospitality coordination for the chessed committee). This was another great way to meet people and try to make friends not just for the kids, but for ourselves as well.

We enjoyed a terrific Shabbat lunch with an English couple (the Grosses) who have both been here for many years (their six children were all born here) who were really very gracious in opening up their home to our family of 8.

Chaim walked a half hour uphill in the brutal sun to visit his classmates who all live in Ramat Beit Shemesh. If that wasn’t enough, he invited them all to join him for a walk back and they stayed by us through the end of Shabbat.

For the most part the kids have assimilated pretty well. I am sure the real stress will come when we try to deal with the first day of school which will have passed by the time you read this article. There is just no way to prepare for the onslaught of information that the kids will have to process, in adjusting to a new classroom, new friends and a new language. Hopefully it will all go smoothly.

Last week I wrote about a BBQ at my sister’s home where our kids got a chance to meet each other for the first time. This week I got an email asking why it took us eight weeks to get the kids together if they had never met before.

As it happens, this was a great question, since it allowed me to reflect upon a very basic difference between Israeli and American lifestyles. You see, there is no “Sunday” in Israel like there is in America. In Israel, Sunday is a regular day for work, camp, school or whatever.

Since our kids were all enrolled in various summer programs, they were occupied from Sun-Thurs; our lack of a car made getting together at night very difficult to arrange, especially when considering that our little kids needed to get to sleep at a normal hour.

So we really had to wait until the programs all ended and the kids were to be home all day in order to work things out (having a car then didn’t hurt either) and get them together. After all, since they had never actually met it wasn’t like they knew that they were missing something.

An interesting side benefit of the no Sunday issue is that many people have off on Fridays instead. This summer, the Friday off day gave me a chance to help Goldie and/or do stuff with the kids. However, during the winter all of our kids have school six days a week, so they will all be in school on Fridays, leaving Goldie and I alone for the day. Without kids. Ahhhhhhhhhhhhh.

Mazal Tov to Michael and Jennifer Stern and their family upon their Aliyah this week with Nefesh B’nefesh!! May your Klitta be Neimah (May your absorption be pleasant)!