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I've been delaying sending this report for such a long time that I forgot most of the things that happened in the last three months. I feel that my life is so boring and there is nothing to write about, and I say "I'll write after ... (insert some event here) ... since then I'll have something to write about", but I've been doing it too long, and actually many things happened.
Starting with technicalities: My e-mail account has some problems, and I lost a lot of mail, so if you sent me anything lately there is a good chance that I didn't receive it. Try again!
Still, the most exciting thing is Sequoia, our amazingly smart and cute baby. She talks all the time now in three languages (her favourite words lately are "No thanks" and "I don't know"), sings and dances. Especially at night. We've decided to stop fighting with her about sleeping, and just tune into her schedule, that is, going to bed after midnight and waking up at 10. She's much happier now, and therefore I and Ela too. We also stopped forcing her to wear a diaper, and (surprise!) she doesn't need it! She sleeps all the night through without wetting once!
She had her 2nd birthday party two weeks ago, with all family and friends. We should put photos, but we didn't yet, so there you are. The party was big fun, but I don't know if it was worth the stress of doing it. It wasn't much stress though (we went to the park, bought drinks, and asked everyone to bring a plate of food - as easy as it gets). However, I get stressed about everything. Now I'm stressed about: We go to rainbow gatheing in Turkey and we don't have a tent nor sufficient bedding; The computer wouldn't show DVD movies; There is a leak in the kitchen sink, and a few more.
The big event of last month was Ela's parents' visit. They came for a week which was very exciting, busy, stressful and tiring. We tried to show them as much of Israel as I could, and it was Ela's first visit to Jerusalem and to Jaffa and to Haifa and to Masada. She's still angry that she had to wait for her parents to come so I'd take her places. But going for one week all over Israel made her very tired. I had an excuse (I go to work).
Then her grandfather came, which was even more stressful, though we didn't go around the country with him. He and Ela don't get along so well.
While all this happened, we got to arrange Ela's papers in Israel. We managed to prove that she is of a Jewish family, and so she got an instant Israeli citizenship! And only 5 months after we put the application. It could have lasted one week, but the office was SO slow, annoying, rude (they wouldn't speak English to Ela!), and very unhelpful. Only because my cousin works in the ministry of internal affairs we managed to get all the information needed to complete the application. Since Ela is now a new immigrant, she is entitled to support from the government (free medical insurance, Hebrew course, etc), but we still don't manage to get it because (yet again) the people in the office in charge of new immigrants dont speak English! The only way she could get anything from them was in Spanish. Really.
The craziest thing was that since I've been traveling for a long time I am entitled to the same government support, and as a new immigrating family, we will receive about 30,000 Shekel (about $7000) from the government! cool. So far it just costs us money. E.g. Since Ela is now Israeli, she can't use her Australian driving license, and needs to do an Israeli licence. It already cost us $300 in permits, fees, medical check, and eye glasses.
So life is pretty routine. Not much excitement, only stress. I worry a lot about the future. Ela and I want so different things out of life - Ela wants to live in a big forest, grow vegetables and be a shamanic midwife. I want to live in Israel, in a city, and work in high-tech. However, since she took my side for this year, than we decide to try australia next year. So the plan is to spend next xhristmas with Ela's family, and then join a community in north NSW, and Ela will study to be a midwife. See what happens...
Love, Moddy.
Today is a good day to wake up late.
The gathering in Turkey was amazing.
We arrived there after a short flight with a cheap airline, which included (for free) the most inedible cheese sandwich I ever tried. But the security was easy, and Sequoia wasn't too difficult. She even used the airplane's toilet. Antalia turned to be a culinary disappointment, since Vic and I couldn't find any vegetarian food. Ela had a big bellyache, and Sequoia was so excited she forgot her potty training, which meant changing her clothes once an hour, so we decided to take it easy, ignoring the instructions who said that if we take the afternoon bus, we won't make it to the camp in the same day.
We arrived at the bus station at lunch time, and were totally lost. No-one speaks English, no-one understands what we want, and sending us back and forth to different bus companies. When I finally found the right bus, another bus driver came and said "Eynif? Camping? " And we realised it was the right one. So we took it. Three hours drive in beautiful landscape (Similar to northern Israel, but with higher mountains, bigger trees, and everything more green). Since the instructions said the last bus from Ibradi to Bashlar is at 3:30, and that there is no place to stay in Ibradi, and it was already late, we wanted to get off in Akseki. The driver, however, wouldn't let us take our bags off the bus, so we had to stay. We also tried to get off in Ibradi, but the driver promised us that there in no hotel in Ibradi, but there is one in Ormana, and we should go there. (remind you again: It is all happening in Turkish, in which neither of us know even one word).
So we landed in Ormana an hour before sunset. So far all of the instructions were wrong, so we had no idea where to spend the night. There was no hotel. Our bus driver disappeared. Someone offered us a lift back to Ibradi to the hotel there. We were confused. Ela found an old man who spoke some German, but it didn't help much. Some old guy with a funny beard offered us tea and biscuits, and we watched our offered ride leaving. Then a miracle in the form of a 12 year old kid arrived. He learnt English in school, and managed to inform us of a possible ride all the way to welcome centre, for 25Ytl. We happily said yes, and just then a Russian woman with 2.5 yrs old girl arrived. So we all went to the beautiful valley of Eynif. It was getting dark when we reached the welcome centre, and though the driver insisted that we should go further, we spent the night there, under beautiful trees by a small stream. The next day we walked two kms through a small forest to the gathering. I went without a shirt and got burned. Silly me.
The site was beautiful. One of the best sites I've been to, second only to Patagonia. It was very green flat land; Flowers everywhere; mountains and hills pine trees which made wood collection and fire starting too easy; Main circle could hold 10,000 people easily; Nice weather, though a little cold at night; Horses, cows, sheep and goats were roaming the fields; A spring of fresh water to drink and cook; and swimming holes about 20 minutes away. The main drawback was that site was too big for the amount of people there, and therefore the energy was scattered.
There were about 100 people when we arrived, most of them camped on one hill, and only four kids. Kids' Kitchen wasn't set yet, so we chose a place for it, put our tent, and started building � pitching a tarp, building an oven, digging a shit-pit. There was an air of seed-camp, not yet gathering, which I didn't like at first, but in two days we felt settled.
Our third day was very special. There was a little cloud cover which made things not as hot, and at morning circle we saw a rainbow around the sun. Workshops started being offered, and at the end of the circle, a truck drove directly into main circle. At first we thought they were local villagers and were upset that they drive into the circle, but as they jumped of the car, they turned out to be Iranians! twenty two of them! The first Iranians to come to rainbow. I felt so hilariously happy. It was the fulfilment of the vision of middle-east gathering, were Israelis and Muslims can meet.
It took Sequoia a few more days to get used to it. In the beginning she pissed a lot on her clothes, didn't sleep well, and made us very tired. She especially refused to wear clothes, which made her snotty and sunburned, but of course when she got happy again she became the queen of the gathering. She loved food circle, and usually ate with some random people. She ate too much sugar (she was given sugar cubes, and after the first one started screaming "Sugar!", hitting Ela and whomever tried to intervene). She somehow learnt a few words in Turkish and said them to the Turks. She didn't really like the locals, who had a tendency to grab her and kiss her though she protested loudly. Everybody knew her, and it became a token of great honour of Sequoia knew your name. One day she saw a sister sitting with a pack of chips, so she went to sit in her lap, smiling her most charming smile and stroking the girl's shirt, saying "Nice shirt! Nice dress! Chips?". She really knows how to get what she wants!
The gathering was very relaxed. People woke up and instead of going to the kitchen, sat in their tents and made breakfast for themselves. After that, someone went to the kitchen and cooked. Therefore, breakfast was served in the afternoon, sometimes as late as 5pm, so we called it lunch. Supper was at night, sometimes too late for us to stay up. Sequoia got to a pattern of falling asleep at sunset, which I liked a lot. One day the Italians made the best Gnocci I ever had. They cooked all day but supper was served at midnight� ever since then, midnight became a common time for food circle.
Besides, there was cigarette butts everywhere, mainly from the local shepherds (who sold us fresh goat milk everyday). There was a car parking in the middle of the gathering, and the local taxi was chauffeuring people into main circle itself. The big difference was that here nobody freaked out "How dare you do this in the rainbow".
Personally, I started the gathering with a determination to be happy. The last gatherings I've been to I had felt that instead of having fun I was over cautious about not leaving Ela and Sequoia alone, feeling guilty if I do, and therefore missing the whole action. After a few days (and at Ela's birthday) we had a big fight and broke up, though we kept on sleeping in the same tent, looknig after sequoia together, eating together in the circle... so basically nothing changed, except that I felt more open to actually falling in love with her again. Seeing how Sequoia was happy there made me realise how awful it is for her to live in Tel Aviv, and that moving to a community in Australia could be great.
Ela, however, became more and more tired. She was cold at night; Sequoia nursed; and though in the daytime Sequoia usually went with other people Ela couldn't rest. I had my knee problems again, and Jan gave me acupuncture treatment, which made my pain disappear only to be replaced with a worse one. (I still have it. I have difficulties walking). Therefore I couldn't go out dancing which was a big part of my big plan. But I did meet some interesting people, and walked about in a red girl's shirt which made everybody say I'm sexy. It was good.
After a while Ela's situation became critical. I tried to get her to sleep more but I wouldn't take Sequoia to sleep in another tent since she still pissed in her bed sometimes. One afternoon we had a big ugly public fight in main circle, after I sent her to sleep and she wouldn't go. So we knew this can't go on. We had a long talk and chose to stay together but work hard on this relationship, so that's what we are doing. We found a book that helps us see our patterns and we read it together. We talk a lot. We try to be more aware.
The last days of the gathering were raining and boring. The energy was low, and we left to Antalya in the first opportunity, not going travelling. What we did change was that Ela bought a gorgeous white(!) dress, and I started to eat meat. And we went back to Israel!
Back to work, to humid hot Tel-Aviv, to the crazy political things that go on, to being tired... but we are trying to make things better. We go out more (together and by ourselves) and preparing my immigration papers to Australia. (more difficult than it sounds).
Love, Moddy.
Today is a good day to have a banana milkshake.
We came back from Turkey, and nothing much changed in our lives. Then Ela and Sequoia went for three weeks to Germany for the European Gathering. It was good to rest for a while, and get some things done, though I didn't do as much as I wanted. When they are here, it's hard to go out with my friends since I always rush home from work to help Ela with the ever-difficult task of raising a kid.
One thing I had arranged was for Ela to go to Hebrew school; something she is entitled to as a new immigrant, but took us almost a year to actually do. Stupid of us not to do it earlier. The challenge is that she goes every day from 8am to 1pm, and I look after Sequoia, so I go to work late and come back at 10pm, tired and stressed, to my tired and stressed family. On the other hand, Ela likes school, made friends with other non-Israelis who share her criticism of this land, country and people, and started to speak more confidently; and I got to spend more time with Sequoia.
August was hot, humid and unbearable. I rode our bike to work and got very sweaty, or Ela rode the bike to school and got sweaty. Anyway, we needed another bicycle. Then came my birthday. My mum told me she wants to buy me bike, but I felt it was too big a present. One day I wanted to go to work but saw that Ela took my bike! I had enough. I walked to the shop, bought a bike and went on. I called Ela happily to tell her what I bought, and she wasn't too happy. Turns out that the day before she went to the same shop and bought a bike for me, for my birthday, she just hadn't picked it yet...
So Ela got stressed about what to buy me. She wanted to buy me a kitchen timer (I burn rice), but the following day my mum visited us and gave us a kitchen timer for the holiday. Then Ela wanted to bake a Babke cake for me, and called my mum for the recipe. My mum said "But I'm making a Babke". It began to be scary - does my mum spy on us, knowing what we want and buys it first? We realized it happened too often. We get Sequoia underpants, and on the weekend my mum gives her underpants. Sequoia plays with a friend's toy, and we say we'll buy her one... and my mum presents her with the same toy.
By the way, due to the confusion, no-one baked a Babke cake for me! Ela made me a very simple cake, since she thought I like it - what I really like about it is that I can make it myself and yet it tastes good, but made she wonderful cakes for her friends' birthdays.
Meanwhile, I had other things to stress about. My aching knee got worse in Turkey. I started physiotherapy, which helped a little, but didn't really solve the problem. The orthopaedist says that western medicine has nothing more to do for me short of a surgery, and that non-western medicine is a hoax. I started acupuncture last week.
Going to Australia is also a big stress. We had a plan to be there on Christmas, which means to put the immigration papers in three months before, which means preparing everything even before that� I was rushed to do things I'm reluctant to do, and eventually got an anxiety attack and spent a whole afternoon in hospital. They found nothing, of course. After that we decided not to worry about Christmas, but still try to do it as fast as possible. We still miss one important document � a testimony of an Australian citizen that we are genuinely a couple for more than a year. We have one. We need two. We felt that Ela feels better in Israel; I feel good at work, and we are not in a hurry.
So far so good. However, a few things happened lately that make us wish to leave soon. The first was that Ela's school teacher got crazy. She's rude to people in class; she talks about her own life instead of teaching, and she teaches badly. Ela doesn't enjoy school much anymore. I began to feel a little stuck at work, and that I don't manage to do anything in my life but survive. We decided to take a tour in Jordan for the holiday. Big mistake.
I don't know what came over us when took an organized tour. I guess we felt it would be too tiring to take buses with Sequoia, but when my mum offered to look after her for the whole three days, saying it wouldn't be a real holiday if we take her with us, we didn't change the plan. A three-days organized tour to Jordan.
The word 'organized' was too big for this tour. It included three people in a Taxi - Ela, myself, and a Mexican woman who spoke no English and Ela has to translate everything for her. The Jordanian agency had no idea what tour we took, which hotels to take us to, etc. The agent said we don't need to take any money with us since everything is paid for. Apparently, he lied. A had to pay entrance to sites that were supposed to be included, and so on. On the positive side, Petra is amazing. See photos at http://photos.yahoo.com/elamajikfaerie in the Jordan album.
The other thing that makes us want to leave is that Ela took a Palestinian tour of the West Bank, and after seeing the wall and other horrible things the Israelis are doing there, she hates Israel, and doesn't want to be an Israeli anymore.
So we plan on leaving. When?? We'll see about that.
Love, Moddy.
Today is a good day to drink ginger tea.
It's Ela again, writing Moddy's group mail for him. Why on earth would I do that? Isn't that a bit like writing his diary for him? Yep, it is, but since I'm legally his wife, which means I'm more or less own him, and all his thoughts, then there's really no reason why not. Just kidding.
Actually, Moddy is very stressed (for a change) and since our regular baby-sitter selfishly went on holiday, Moddy is spending all his mornings with Sequoia while I go to school, he gets to work around 1:30 or 2pm, and works until around 10pm. So he doesn't really have a life anymore, nor time to write his group mail, and he's always complaining that he needs to do it but doesn't have the time. So I thought I'd do it for him as a surprise. Aren't I nice!
So anyway, what's new with us?
At the start of November we went to the Israeli rainbow, it was in a
really nice place (as far as Israel goes), a kind of little forest
planted in the desert. It was freezing cold and raining a lot, but I
was very happy to be there. Moddy came with us for the weekend, and
we made a nice camp (even without our lovely green tarp that I
foolishly gave to my sister when I left Germany).
We had a minor disaster � on Saturday at food circle, Sequoia was happily munching on her salad, and suddenly, while still chewing on a piece of raw cauliflower, she decided to nurse a bit. We learned that chewing and nursing at the same time does NOT work � she bit a small piece off my right nipple! I screamed, Sequoia cried, and Moddy comforted her while I bled. So okay, Sequoia was very understanding that I wasn't too much into letting her nurse that afternoon, and that she could only drink from the left side.
That night Moddy hitched a ride back to Tel Aviv so he could go to work, and I stayed with Sequoia at the gathering. Sunday morning was fine, we had fun, though it was a little too cold to really do anything, at least the sun came out, and Sequoia made some friends with the other children there.
But then, at food circle, almost exactly 24 hours after Sequoia bit
me, we were lying on my sheepskin and she was nursing, when I was
stung by a massive wasp! It was about 3cm long, and it stung me� yes,
on my left nipple! An inch from Sequoia's mouth!
It hurt like nothing I'd even imagined and I screamed, lots of people
came over to help me, sequoia went to sleep.
I had a terrible night, and by the next day my whole breast was
swollen to twice the size, it was purple and infected. Yuck!
So I packed up some stuff, leaving most of the camp as it was, and
drove back to Tel Aviv.
That was the end of breastfeeding for us, after 2 years and 7 months,
for sure I couldn't nurse at all, and Sequoia completely understood.
I explained to her that both of my breasts were "broken" and she
couldn't drink my milk anymore, and amazingly, she never asked to
nurse again. We were expecting her to make a huge fuss, to have
sleepless nights, and fight, but she was totally ready to stop nursing.
So that was a blessing in disguise.
We went back to the rainbow the following weekend, with no further
mishaps.
The day we cam back from the rainbow, Moddy had organised for a
renovator to come and fix up the apartment a bit � to raise the
ceiling in the big balcony, knock out the wall between the kitchen and
the little balcony, and to put in big sliding windows instead of
shutters, so its warmer for the winter.
It was supposed to be a 2 � 3 day job, but then the renovator got very sick, he took a few days off, was still sick, eventually he was diagnosed with Crohn's disease, a kind of nasty chronic digestive disorder. Now more than a month has gone by and he still hasn't finished the job, and it doesn't look like he ever will. All our furniture is piled up under plastic and the house is full of dust and we can't use one room at all! The renovator is really, really sick, and every time I call him up to see what's going on, he promises that he will finish the job tomorrow, but he never manages to work more than a half hour before he collapses. Lately I tried to fire him, I called him and said that I was going to get someone else to finish it, but he insisted that I don't have to worry about it, and he would come the next day and finish. As usual, he came, started working, but after half an hour was too sick to continue. So now I'm looking for someone else to come and finish the work but its not too easy. If anyone knows a good shiputznik in Tel Aviv, let us know!
Why did we let this whole thing go on for so long? Because I was sick too! The second day of the work I suddenly got a very bad pain in my stomach, and a headache so bad I had to go home early from school, only I couldn't lie down and relax because the house was full of workmen and dust and loud banging. At least we weren't having any work done in the bedroom!
By the end of the day I had a high fever, around 38 � 39 degrees. Moddy took the day off to look after me, and the next day too. My fever rose, and my headache got worse, I even tried taking painkillers, but nothing helped. We went to the doctor, she thought I should see a gynaecologist. He said he could find nothing wrong with me and that was it.
On the same day, Sequoia got interested in my thermometer, an old-fashioned mercury one. She tried to measure her own fever, bit off its end, and seemed to have swollen bits of glass or mercury or both. Moddy rushed her to hospital, where she was x-rayed and was found healthy. Turns out that, contrary to common belief, thermometer`s mercury isn't very poisonous. But the stress. Oh the stress.
The third day I was sick, we bailed out and went to Moddy's parent's
house, since Moddy wasn't able to take care of me as well as sequoia,
let alone go to work. I stayed sick, my fever rose up to 41 degrees,
I couldn't eat, I vomited if I did, I felt like dying. On the 5th day
my fever went down and after 5 more days of being weak and dizzy and
eating Moddy's mum's chicken soup, I felt better and we went home. I
still had a headache that didn't go away, but I went back to school.
After 3 days, I woke up with the worst headache I've ever imagined
possible, in so much pain I couldn't open my eyes, and the fever came
back.
This time we went straight to Moddy's family, and his mum took
me to a doctor, who sent me to the hospital and they admitted me.
I was in the hospital for 8 days, they did every possible kind of test
on me, the facilities were really good, but only if you're used to
third world standard hospitals.
The ward I was in had place for 4 beds, with a balcony, but they had put a place for another bed in the balcony and somehow managed to fit 7 beds into the ward. Almost none of the doctors or nurses spoke English, the hygiene standards were a bit lacking (I clean the floors at home more thoroughly than they did in the hospital, and I don't clean much!), when the nurses came to check my blood pressure (about 5 times a day as it was dangerously low), they often came without anything to write on � once the nurse tore the edge of my napkin and once another nurse wrote my blood pressure down on her hand!!! The night before I was discharged I was so annoyed by the I.V. line that I buzzed the nurse to get them to take it out, but after about 15 minutes and several buzzings, no one came to me, so I took it out myself. No one ever even noticed that I'd done it!
In the end they didn't find out what was wrong with me, but decided that it's a virus. I stayed at home for another week, still weak and very dizzy and headachey, slowly getting better.
Since then, I seem to have healed amazingly, I feel emotionally, mentally and spiritually healthy for maybe the first time in my life. So having a high fever can be good for you, I guess! Anyway, that's about it for now.
Ela xxx
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So, since Ela had written everything, I have nothing much more to say. It's good to have Ela healthy again, and hopefully we'll have the apartment fixed, and life will be beautiful again. The sun shines after a long storm in cold Israel.
Love, Moddy.
Today is a good day to play outside with all the kids.
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