Blog/February 2018/Feb 9th

Feb 9th

ברוך שהחיינו וקיימנו והגיענו לזמן הזה!
Blessed is He who gave us life, sustained us, and made us reach this moment!

Mom and I left Newark on Sunday, for a 10 hour flight to Israel. We landed early Monday morning Israel time, and I was expecting all kinds of hassles. To my delight, we had absolutely none.

Not only that, but the staff at Ben-Gurion Airport were incredibly nice and helpful; I began to wonder whether we had landed by mistake somewhere else! But no, we were in the right place.

The El Al staff told us to wait a few minutes while they arranged a special bus to pick up all those who needed physical assistance (there were more than a few). We were whisked off to the passport-control area, where we went through a special line with nobody in it. Then a representative from the Ministry of Immigrant Absorption came, and wheeled my mom up to their offices, where he immediately registered her and took care of her papers. We then went one office over to the Ministry of the Interior and got mom her Israeli ID document.

We were done with all the bureaucratic business in less than an hour. Record time! Now mom is an Israeli citizen, and she’s starting to adopt Israeli attitudes…

After the paperwork was done, we collected our seven pieces of luggage, and piled them into and onto our small car. I’m quite adept at spatial puzzles, it seems.

Esther drove us home, where we dragged our luggage into the house and tried to stay awake until evening. It was a challenge!

During the week, we took care of all kinds of things; opening a bank account, getting set up with the medical system, making some necessary purchases, and most importantly: setting up the TV! The latter is a work-in-progress, with varying levels of success and much frustration on all parties’ parts. But we’ll work it out in the end, or it will be my end.

Other than that, I slowly got back into my normal schedule, to the extent I was able. Esther worked a bit. Sarah met us at the airport, and also came with her boyfriend to visit us the next day. We are blessed with loving family!

For mom’s first shabbat in the Land, we plan on doing absolutely nothing. Well, I do plan on going to shul; but other than that, eating, and sleeping — nothing but peace and quiet. OK, that’s pretty much the plan every shabbat…

This shabbat we’re back home, B”H! We’ve got some guests, and Esther is preparing:
homemade ḥalla, baked chicken, beef-barley soup, saluna: salmon and vegetables in a sweet-and-sour sauce, various salatim, veggie cholent, and date-pecan cake.

Until next time,
shabbat shalom!

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