04 September 2006

Last evening I went to one of the mega-supermarkets in Jerusalem, part of a chain appropriately called "Mega." Among the many tasks on my list were to buy sheets and pillows. It still sounds weird to buy one's sheets and pillows in the supermarket, but that's what one does here, even if the sheets look more and more like upholstery for a nondescript European airliner and the pillow deflate after one use. There is better bedding to be had in this country, but for now my Air France a la 1972 sheets are just fine
Like all other supermarkets, Mega carries a Russian black beer that if you walk by its Cyrillic label fast enough, it reads "KRAC." Too many self-evident jokes in that one.

Today I decided to sleep late, still recovering from the weekend in Tel Aviv and the state of my friend's apartment. I didn't have much to do, so I bought some necessary fixtures and spent time arranging things in the apartment. After putting clothes away and hanging up others, I decided to go back to the bank to finally get my card. Getting ignored by one of the workers, ironically sitting at the "New Accounts" desk, I decided to get my health care settled. I picked the Clalit healthcare company since they're literally next door to me – the employees there were happy to see me, the receptionist told me all about her trips to the USA, and in no time I was signed up with the General Healthcare for the Workers in the Land of Israel (the original name of the company), a reference to the Histadrut, the labor trade federation that can paralyze the entire country with a general strike.
I decided to try the bank again, not letting the surliness of one teller get to me. Within no time I was sitting in front of a woman who not only gave me my card and numerical code, but once figuring out that I'm a new immigrant from America, complimented me on my non-existent accent. Quintuple points for Bank Leumi!

You know it's the beginning of the academic year here, not just because you see parents taking their little kids to their first days of school or because every news broadcast announces it here (granted it's a small country, but this country's attention to its students makes the USA look like a third-world hovel); no, the way one knows it's time for school in Jerusalem is by seeing the hordes of girls with long hair, jean skirts and/or skirts over sweatpants, long sleeves with cuffs tightly wound around their knuckles, charm necklaces and/or bracelets, and an endless stream of English being spoken. The accents, the disregard for others in the same proximity (much like Israelis), the half-hearted attempts to speak Hebrew, and the general immaturity that unfortunately defines a good percentage of post-high school American Jews who wind up here in a yeshiva or seminary.