I'm Up to Good

Weird title, yah? But it mostly fits... you'll understand in a minute.

See, the question we get asked most from folks we don't see or speak to very often is, "So, nu, what are you up to?"

And I remember when I was a kid, and some people still use the phrase, my grandma would say something about being "up to no good."

Since it's been a while since I actually mentioned anything here about what's going on in my own life, I figured I'd better update ya'll on what I'm up to... and the fact of it is, thank G-d, I'm up to good.

Four weeks ago today was my last day at IDT. It had been completely unexpected until just a few days beforehand. We knew the company was struggling, but we had no idea what kinds of cutbacks they were planning to make.

They slashed something like 150 positions... maybe more at this point, I'm not sure... and when a company is something like 750-800 people, that's obviously a huge percentage of the workforce.

Seeing as how I was planning on starting to look for something else anyway, and if I got "fired," I could get my full severance package, I volunteered to be one of the ones cut.

And while it's a bit scary being without income, I do not regret my decision.

See, for just a couple of weeks before that, I had been praying (okay, so like, I pray all the time, but this is something specific...) that I would have an opportunity to spend more time learning from Jewish sources. I wanted to attend classes, instead of just trying to catch one once in a while. I wanted to have time to read the books that had been sitting on my shelves asking to be read.

And I asked G-d that if it would be His/Her will that I should do that, G-d would make it possible.

Of course, I had no idea that meant I would lose my job... but hey, if Hashem's gonna make it so clear and obvious to me that I should take time to learn, who am I to argue?

It just happens (of course, nothing "just happens," as everything happens for a reason...) that I had just finally started attending a couple of night classes at a co-ed yeshiva that I love. So when my schedule suddenly opened up, I spoke to the rabbi who runs the yeshiva and asked what kind of arrangements I could make in terms of tuition reduction.

He said they usually ask for a certain amount for classes, but if someone cannot afford to pay that, the person should pay whatever he or she can... and if he or she cannot pay anything, that is absolutely no reason not to attend classes. He made it very clear, abundantly clear, that a lack of tuition was no reason or excuse not to come learn if someone wanted to come learn.

So that's what I've been doing. I've been taking classes about different kinds of Jewish philosophy, as well as Jewish law and learning how to read and analyze the written Torah.

Plus, I've been blessed with the opportunity to go to the Kotel, the Western Wall, as often as I'd like. That, in itself, is an amazing experience. I don't always feel a huge spiritual pull there, but the opportunity to be in the holiest spot on the planet is incredible. It's beautiful (if sometimes also annoying) to see the people coming there from all over the world.

And it gets even better... as a "religious" (blah, I hate that term) Jew, I try to pray at least twice a day, plus a set of short prayers before I go to bed. Usually, that means trying to squeeze in around 30-35 minutes of speed davening (praying) before work for the morning prayers, and taking a 10-minute break at some point during work for the afternoon prayers. It usually means skipping the non-vital parts and only hitting the highlights.

For the past few weeks, I have been able to take as much time as I want (or, as my ADD mind will allow) to daven and actually pay attention. The order of the prayers was put together by brilliant Jewish scholars, and there's a whole system to it. When one only hits the highlights, he or she doesn't get to experience the whole journey. I've been blessed with the opportunity to take the whole journey many times over the course of the last few weeks.

AND, though I haven't been showing much evidence of it here, I've been taking a lot of time to write. Many times, I've wanted to write, but I just didn't have the energy after a full day of work, etc. Now I've been writing pretty much every day. Mostly journal-like stuff, but also a bit of other stuff that might turn into something one day, G-d willing.

So what am I up to? I'm up to good.

But now it's time to really start looking for a job again. There are bills that need to be paid, and as much as I love what I'm doing now, it doesn't cover the rent checks. And it doesn't cover the cost of a plane ticket to America, where I am apparently going in September for my sibling's wedding. And it doesn't cover the cost of the crown I have to have put on my tooth. So I gotta get a job.

Meanwhile, I gotta get my act together and go apply for unemployment. I haven't done it yet, because I'm afraid of the bureacracy... but it has to be done. So that's on the agenda in addition to the actual job hunting.

Anyway, that's my entry for now. It's not deep. It's not insightful. It's not me ranting about the situation in Israel. It's just me... :)

My Crazy Country

It just gets crazier and crazier.

The Prime Minister is going to be indicted any day for only some of the many crimes I am sure he's committed. It would be more respectful to the country if he would just resign, but he's got too much ego. And not that I know who'll replace him, but sheesh, please G-d, don't let him or her be any worse!

***

Meanwhile, Israel's talking to Syria? Why? Some say that it means Israel's willing to give up the Golan, and Syria's willing to break its ties with Iran, Hamas and Hizbullah.

Is this some sort of an alternate reality? Were there drugs passed around, and I wasn't part of the in-crowd?

'Cause that's the only way I can imagine either one of those things happening -- Less than two years ago, we were AT WAR in the north! Lebanon's being run by Hizbullah, which is getting its weapons and support from... Syria! Suddenly we're going to give up one of our most strategically-needed pieces of land, and Syria's going to make nice? There MUST be drugs involved.

***

And now, because of the Hamas terrorists who keep attacking the Erez Crossing between Gaza and Israel, Israel has decided to pull back non-combat troops from the Erez Crossing.

So let's think about this for a minute:

Do we want soldiers to die? NO!

Do we want civilians to die? NO!

Is turning tail and running away from the problem going to solve it? NO!

Because we are apparently not capable of doing what needs to be done in order to stop being attacked by rockets and bombs, we'll just run away from rocket range.

What happens as they develop longer-range rockets and missiles? I guess first, we'll evacuate Sderot and Ashkelon... then we'll evacuate Be'er Sheva and Tel Aviv... Eventually, we'll evacuate Jerusalem and Israel? G-d forbid!

I just don't, really, I don't understand this.

I am amazed that I was originally "pro-disengagement." I was one of the naive who thought that by giving them a piece of land, they might actually put some effort into becoming self-sufficient instead of relying on aid from the UN and EU. I was one of the naive who thought they might do better if they weren't constantly being reminded of their impotence by having armed Israeli soldiers around every corner.

I was one of the naive, period.

By the time the actual disengagement came around, I had already flipped to the other side. I knew it was being handled in the stupidest way possible, the most immoral manner conceivable. We ripped pioneers out of their homes, and gave a piece of Eretz Yisrael to the enemy. And we received nothing for it... not only did we not get piece, but the rocket attacks have never stopped -- and have only gotten worse.

***

A couple of weeks ago, I was involved in a debate with someone who is young, passionate, and naive. He reminded me quite a lot of what I was like seven years ago. I wasn't a citizen of the country. I didn't know anyone who'd died in a terrorist attack or a war. I came from a left-wing idealism in America, wherein I still believed that what people really, really want more than anything else is the ability to raise their families with food, housing, and peace.

I didn't understand people who said, "No, they don't want peace. The peace they want would only come about if we (Jews) were not here anymore."

How could that be? How could there really be people who care more about hating us than they do about raising their families in peace?

Yet it's true; there are people like that.

In this debate, I was trying to open this young man's mind -- even if only by a crack -- to the Truth. The Truth is that it isn't black and white. The Truth is that as much as we'd love to put our cultural beliefs onto others, the others have different ideas.

People have different cultures and different idealisms. They have different views of G-d and religion.

To the most extreme, there have been cultures in the past (and maybe the present -- I dunno) that believe in cannabilism. It's a fact.

There are also cultures that believe in peace -- even to the detriment of themselves.

So if there are those two extremes, what's to say there aren't a million other extremes? Including a group of people who believe that the only way to live is to be a particular religion, and if you're not part of that religion, you should die?

The young man is still idealistic and naive. Good for him. I gave him a bracha that he should have the same amount of passion in discovering the Truth, and I invited him to make aliyah and fight the system from within. At least for now, he declined.

***

It's easy being an armchair politician when you're not living on the front lines. I'm blessed with living in Jerusalem, and still we live on the front line of terrorist attacks. I cannot even begin to imagine what it's like to live in Sderot, where the rocket attacks are daily, sometimes tens of times a day.

And that's why I don't get it... if my stupid government keeps pulling back from strategic military bases, and negotiating with terrorists, the front lines are going to multiply exponentially.

What a crazy country...

Ever Hear of Burkina Faso?

Yeah, me neither, until today.

I was at the Kotel this morning, and as I was leaving, I noticed that police officers had entered the women's section -- male police officers. So instead of simply leaving, I hung around for a bit, just to try and figure out what was going on.

After a few minutes, I gave up. Nothing exciting seemed to be happening, so I started to make my way out of the Kotel Plaza.

But on the way, I saw a limousine and some cars that definitely came from a caravan/procession/whatever, so I looped around to take another look.

I saw placards in the front windows with the Israeli flag and a flag that I didn't recognize. The top half was red, the bottom half green, and there was a small yellow five-pointed star in the middle. I had half-wondered if Dubya was going to make a surprise visit to the Kotel, though I knew that realistically it couldn't happen... and that if that had been the case, the security would have been way, way tighter.

After finding a seat so I could check out the sitch, I got to play a game I hadn't played in a long time: Observe Israeli Security Procedures.

See, I love watching the way Israelis handle security. The process definitely has its visible presence -- the Israeli version of the Secret Service security detail that protects the President and such -- but it also has its invisible presence, and its presence that's somewhere in between.

That is, there are people we see, and we know they're security, but they don't make a big deal of it... we don't see their weapons, and they don't look vicious. They do, however, look determined.

At the same time, things come off appearing disorganized. The limo's moved into place and the door opened for whomever, but lots of people milling around so that when the Important Person gets into the limo, it still can't actually leave... etc.

Anyway, the whole thing only took maybe five or 10 minutes. I saw that there was an entourage consisting of Israeli security and what I assumed was security from some African country. There were a few people (not security, I assume) wearing what appeared to be a form of traditional dress from an African country, and since the guards were almost ebony-skinned, it was my deduction that they weren't from Norway or some such.

I saw some guy in a suit get into the limo on one side, and someone who looked vaguely familiar from Israeli politics on the other... and a couple of minutes later, the whole procession left the plaza.

It was sort of cool, though. I tried taking a picture with my phone, but since I rarely use the camera, I couldn't remember how to actually click the picture... so I have a picture of what might be the top of the President of Burkina Faso's head.

I came home and looked up the flag, and that's how I found out it was from Burkina Faso.

After doing some Googling, I found that the president (whose picture looked a bit familiar when I found it) was indeed in Israel as of yesterday for some Presidents Conference.

So, like, I was 15 feet or so from the President of a country... cool, huh? Just wish I'd have known it ahead of time, so the picture would have been neater :)