Blog/November 2008/Nov 21st

November 14th (See this week's devar torah)
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Hi again!

The election season is now behind us. The municipal elections in Israel were heatedly contested, and thankfully the assault of election literature and phone canvassers is over. I have a 100% accuracy record: no-one I voted for (neither in the US nor in Israel) won. Perhaps I should hire myself out as a prognosticator?

I'm doing better in the personal realm: my company (well, the company I work for) is in the news. This is the project I'm managing, and which is giving me enormous headaches. The main problem is that though we all speak English, we don't all seem to mean the same thing when we use the words. For example, I send an email to my Indian counterparts and ask later, "did you read the specification?" -- to which they answer, "yes, we did" (imagine an Indian accent there). Later on, when discussing requirements I find that not only did they not read the specification, but they didn't even open the document. GRRR!

In preparation for the local elections, the Jerusalem Post sponsored a "meet the candidates" forum (in English) here in Maaleh Adummim, which ended up being more entertaining and informative than I would ever have imagined. Of the seven "lists", four sent representatives and a fifth sent a person for only five minutes. We got to hear the lists' representatives answer questions of interest to locals, and we also got to hear the opposition candidate for mayor (the incumbent didn't show: despite the fact he "dissed" us, he got 75% of the vote. I guess we really weren't an important demographic for him). As the night wore on, we were witness to escalating rhetorical violence, which b"h didn't manifest itself in a physical manner. Who knew politics could be so exciting?

As we came into the room and took seats, a friend of mine sat next to me, and a friend of his next to him. I introduced myself to his friend, "Hi, I'm Ron Aaron". He said, "I'm Mr. Rogers". I thought he was being a smart-ass, so I asked him, "Oh, do you want to be my neighbor?". My poor wife, overhearing me, whispers to me, "No, his name is really Mr. Rogers". But I didn't get a chance to talk to him again after that -- maybe he won't talk to me now. Anyway, who says "I'm Mr. so-and-so" these days? Particularly in Israel!

One thing we weren't prepared for was the decidedly "low tech" election system. Votes are cast by placing a pre-printed slip of paper in an envelope, and placing that envelope inside a flimsy cardboard box (like one of the boxes you might get at Office Depot to store documents in). We both thought it couldn't be too hard to commit election fraud and get away with it.

Esther is volunteering at an ulpan for young kids who are new immigrants. She says she envies them their ease with acquiring Israeli accents (even if they don't know many words). Sarah is volunteering (as part of her schoolwork) with young kids in a different school, who are also recent immigrants. Both my ladies are finding it a much more challenging task than they had thought it would be.

We asked a gardener to give us a bid on how much it would be to clean up our "yard". There are climbing vines on the outside of the house which we want to remove, the trees need professional pruning and the ground needs to be cleaned up and prepared. There is more to be done, but we just wanted a quote for that. I expected it wouldn't be cheap, but I didn't expect 3500 NIS (about $1000)... not including tax (16%) or the dumpster. So I think I'll invest in some good quality gardening tools and for much less, take care of the mess myself. The only problem is one of time -- by the time I get home it's dark; but to save that much money I am willing to do the work myself.

Until next week,
Shabbat shalom!

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