Climbing El Cap'

The day after our wedding, the phonecalls stopped. No more hectic caterers, confused florists, irate wedding planners, sobbing relatives, or lost guests. Just the two of us in marital bliss. After weeks of sleeping past noon, we got on a normal schedule and began sorting through the heaps of wedding presents, plus all her stuff, plus all my stuff. Trying to cram it all into our tiny rental apartment has forced me to purge my wardrobe of all articles of clothing over seven years of age, begin selling some of my five computer systems, and haul out bag after bag of miscellaneous junk to the trash. It’s hard to believe I landed in this country three years ago with just two suitcases.

Leaving America with all my belongings.

Purging my possessions has caused me to try to organize myself mentally as well. What are my new life goals now that the big one, marriage, is squared away? Rambam (the 11^th century Jewish sage Maimonades) lists the proper order of one’s life goals as: Parnassah (income,) Bayit (home,) Ishah (wife.) In plainer talk, get yourself a job and a roof over your head before you think about getting married. In my 31 years on this planet, I have never actually owned my Bayit, always rented. In Israel, I have been homeless several times, living off the hide-a-beds and eating out of the fridges of friends and relatives for a month or more until I could find a new apartment. While vagrancy is tolerable for a rough-and-ready single, it would be a nightmare to drag my family through that. I need to own an apartment.

A compensating factor for the diminished personal wealth of life here is the feeling of total ownership. In Israel, even the sky is Jewish. I don’t need a castle with a five acre lawn because all the hills, streets, and trees around me are already mine. Still, I would like to have four walls and a roof of my own, to have my life beyond the whims of my landlord.

Personal finance in Israel, at least for most people, involves finding some way to scrape by. It is possible to pay the rent and bills, but it’s unusual to be able to get ahead. The cost of living for basic items (milk, eggs, busfare, etc.) is approximately the same as in the United States. Any luxury items, such as quality shoes, deodorant, a computer, or my car (which I have now sold,) are typically double to triple their cost in the United States. Meanwhile, my salary here is half to a third of what it was in the United States. A low-cost apartment in the settlements goes for at least $200,000, and a place in the outskirts of Jerusalem goes for a minimum of $300,000, and since down payments are typically 30%-40%, my down payment would be from $66,000 to $100,000. Based on a simple calculation of our earning potential versus expenses, it would take us anywhere from twelve to sixteen years to save up this amount, ignoring the effects of inflation. And that doesn’t include times like now, when I’m unemployed watching my savings bleed away. Also, while as a new couple it is possible to save up money, as time goes on and there are, God willing, more and more mouths to feed, saving anything in this country becomes impossible.

Our original plan was to give it a year and try to find something that paid better than my job at the solar power startup company. Then, five months ago, I was laid off. I’ve been to a couple of job interviews that looked really hopeful, to the point that one manager told me, “You are the ideal candidate. I’m flying to Austin next week to sign a contract, and when I come back, I’ll have an offer for you.” Having not heard from him in some time, I asked around. Turned out the company didn’t get the contract and was in a nose dive, shedding employees. I’ve reaped similar sour grapes from my other job interviews. It seems that, at least as far as I’m seeing, Israel is just too small a market for large, stable engineering firms. If they exist, they sure aren’t hiring. I’m sure that if I continue to apply myself, I can eventually land another six-month gig at another green-tech startup till it flops or is sold.

The question of leaving Israel temporarily to work and save is an option I’ve considered for some time and my feelings are mixed. Nobody comes to Israel to get rich, they come to satisfy a spiritual and ideological impulse, and to live with family. On religious terms, there is simply no comparison to the potential for spiritual growth in an environment with endless options for Torah study, the highest levels of kashrut, and a culture rooted in Jewish life. While I could sacrifice a few years of this growth on a personal level, there is a national aspect to living here as well. Living in Israel isn’t just another lifestyle choice, like dropping into Paris or London for a few years. I still haven’t lost the inspiration of participating in the restoration of the Jewish homeland and repatriation of its exiled natives after thousands of years of wandering. If every Jew were to base his or her decision to stay or leave on financial grounds alone, this country would be abandoned and revert to the deserted ruins it was under Muslim rule. Then again, if working abroad for a while helps me anchor myself here more permanently, then it could be a worthy sacrifice.

There is a reasonable case to be made for either sticking it out or going back into the diaspora for a while, and so I asked Hashem to affect my ratzon, my will, to push me in the right direction. In the end, my ratzon is pushing me to jump through this window of opportunity.

In Yosemite, I remember once speaking with a mountain climber who had scaled El Capitan, at over 3,500 feet, the tallest shear cliff in the world. At certain points on his ascent, he could anchor his equipment into the granite face and lower himself down by pulley, and then hoist himself back up to the same spot the next day. Walking into a bar in the evenings, his friends asking him what he was up to, he would answer, to their bemusement, "Right now, I'm climbin' El Cap'."

El Capitan

And so am I. Aliyah, literally "Ascent" is a process. When I landed here three years ago, I never thought I would have to leave again, but I'm not giving up on my Aliyah by a long shot. I have my family, friends, and connections, and I have some idea of how life works in this country. It may be a few months or a few years before I'm back permanently, but I can pick up life where I left off, I view this as part of the process.

So, on November 2^nd, wifey and I are going on a voyage. We will land on the East Coast, spend some time with my wife's family and purchase a used car. After visiting cities in the east, we will begin driving cross-country. We will stop in various communities across the United States and Canada getting to know one another’s family, seeing the sights, visiting those who could not attend our wedding, and hunting down job leads, until we reach my family in the Pacific Northwest. I’m confident we can find something, but even if we don’t, at least we’ll know we didn't let the opportunity pass by. And I won’t forget to write.

More on Student Loans and Defaults

I've been having a conversation with Zapporah over my previous post on the Student Loan Scam.

I think it deserves its own post here, since this is an important issue which affects people for their entire lives.

Zapporah said...
Please answer me this... I just graduated college and I am moving to Israel in just a few months. Can I escape these high loan amounts in Israel? What will happen to my credit rating in Israel? Is it the same as in Canada with the new social number? What will the repercussions be for me in Israel?Thank you so much for this article.
8:49 PM

Evan said...
Hi Zapporah,There is no such thing as a credit history in Israel. At this time, lenders do not persue delinquent debtors outside of the United States. Also, there is no debtors' prison or anything like that, so you can fly back and visit as desired. Please note, however, that as of the writing of this comment, there is still no bankruptcy or statute of limitations on student loans. Therefore, if you default, and then you return to the U.S. after 20 years, your debt collectors will be waiting for you. Also, over the next 20 years, there could be a change in finance laws which makes it easier to persue debtors abroad. Nobody really knows which direction this will go. But for now, you will be safe from the loan collectors.

Zapporah said...
Evan, thanks. I signed up for as many classes as possible to get out of school in 18 months so I didn't have to pay more money. I knew my end date would be in June, but it kept coming up for Sept and no one could answer me why. I ended up being charged $3,000 more for the 3 months they added on because they didn't put me in more classes to get out of school by June which I signed up for. I was fully prepared to pay the $15,000+ amount but after reading this and getting $3k+ tacked onto my bill, no way am I going to start repayment. I will try for one more month to get the school to wipe the $3k off and if they don't, I'm out. Thanks a lot.


And Evan Says:

So basically, your college ripped you off. This is actually somewhat unsurprizing. Many colleges are now run more like businesses than educational institutions, and with a profit motive involved, inevitably there will be crooks and thieves in the mix.

However, please bear in mind one thing. If the college goes forward with charging you $3,000, then they will probably just take the money straight from the lender, unless you can find some way to convince the lender not to send the money to the university. Basically, if you default, the odds are that the university will get the money regardless.

If you do default, keep in mind that this debt will balloon with late fees and astronomical interest rates. They will not be able to come after your income as long as you are here in Israel. However, they will be able to sieze your tax returns (you still have to file tax returns from Israel to the United States every year, even if you are abroad.) That means that things like the stimulus checks or any other sort of money you would ordinarily receive on your tax returns would be lost.

More importantly, if say in ten or twenty years, should you decide to return to the United States, even if just to work for a few years, the creditors will come after you and attempt to garnish your earnings.

My own opinion is that people who are trapped in this hellish mess of massive and unrepayable debt should flee the United States as a last resort. However, this has dire personal consequences and probably shouldn't be undertaken unless the debt is so crushing that it is impossible to repay.

It's just a good idea to think about the ramifications of a decision which will affect the rest of one's life.

Our Wedding

Well, it's been a few days, and wifey and I are now recovering from the holy ceremony / wild party that was our wedding. I've posted some preliminary pictures taken by friends. We still don't have the official photos from the photographer or the video guy, but this should give you some idea as to how it went down!

City of Light, Part II

Continued from Yesterday...




Multi-colored buckets hanging from the retaining wall of the Temple Mount.
Lights on trees. It looked sort of wintry to me.
Back in the downtown area, spinning "movies" projected onto the Iriyah (City Hall.)
In the central plaza of the Iriyah, a 3-dimensional projection of an image. The symbols of all of the 12 tribes, in this case Reuvein, were projected holographically.Meanwhile, back in the Christian quarter of the old city. A fountain in the main plaza was covered with a giant plastic bubble. Fans spun feathers and bubbles around inside the giant plastic bubble, to make it look like it had its own weather system.

Making juice next to the giant plastic bubble fountain.

City of Light, Part I

A couple of weeks ago, the Jerusalem municipality put on the "city of light" display, where artists displayed their light-based sculptures, also projecting colors and images on the ancient walls and buildings of the old city.

Click on the images below for larger versions.

Walking toward the Jaffa Gate, the streets are lined with hanging colored lanterns. some sort of glowing translucent plastic tanks which constantly change color.

Welcome sign projected on Jaffa Gate.

People dressed in light.
Outside the walls of the citadel, some sort of whale-shaped figurine with a kinetic flying bicycle attached.

The kinetic flying bicycle.

In the Cardo, vendors selling lamps.
Multi-colored, ever-changing lights projected onto strings.
One of the benefits of the City of Light display was that all of the archaeological gardens, parks, etc., were open to the public free of charge. We went into the archaeological gardens to view some of the sculptures on display there.
Images projected on giant 20-foot tall spinning vases.

Light tubes, with a little Magen David (Star of David) in the middle.
Looking at the light tubes from the bottom.








To be continued...

The Vort / Lechayim / Engagement Party

Wife2B and I had our Vort (Yiddish) / Lechayim (Hebrew) / Engagement Party (English) (choose appropriate language) last week. I've posted some photos here:

Yours truly spinning in the circle with Tel Aviv Moshe. That's Adam playing guitar in the background.


Peeking through the Mechitzah.

More guys dancing.

Rabbi Shurin from Wife2B's seminary came to give a speech.

Wife2B with friends and roomies.

Wife2B

Women dancing.

And, of course, more dancing on the men's side:

Yours truly with Wife2B!

Mighty Moish of Modi'in (soon Tzfat)

Yours truly, living it up

Fwd: Obama Vs. Israel

After years of blissful uneventfullness since the end of the Second Intifada, punctuated by a few weeks of intense warfare here and there, I've suddenly started paying attention to the news again.  It started with a call from one of my rabbis, who is now living in a small community on a windswept hilltop in Samaria (the northern West Bank.)  These communities are often called "Settler Outposts," but the term is a bit misleading, as it implies some sort of military fortress bristling with antennae, thermal imaging cameras, and all the toys from a spy thriller.  In reality, these Outposts are composed of small ramshackle temporary shelters and leaky trailers built, like their wealthier Arab neighbors, without the benefit of legal permits. 

 

"I know you like to keep up with the news, so you're aware of what's going on?" he asked me.

"Yeah"

The new, nominally conservative Netanyahu administration, had slated twenty six such outposts for demolition.

"We need lots of tefillah (prayers) and help."
"Let me know what I can do, just say where and when."

 

These demolitions, which are now in progress, are the first such since 2005.  They apparently did nothing to ingratiate Netanyahu with the new Obama administration.  It was expected that the new administration would be markedly cooler toward Israel, but a sudden series of edicts emanating from the White House caught everyone off-guard for their naked hostility, including:

 

1.       Israel must sign the nuclear non-proliferation treaty, which would require Israel to disarm.

2.       Israel is to take no military action to prevent Iran from obtaining nuclear weapons.

3.       The U.S. understands Iran's, "energy concerns" (i.e. nuclear ambitions.)  The United States will not make efforts to prevent Iran from obtaining weapons of mass destruction until Israel makes sufficient progress on destroying settlements.  Meaning, America will do nothing about Iran.

4.       In violation of previous commitments and signed treaties, Obama is now demanding Israel freeze all settlement activity everywhere, including in large cities abutting the 1949 armistice line which everyone agrees will become part of Israel.

5.       In his meeting with Palestinian Authority President (and financier of the 1976 Munich Olympics Massacre) Mahmoud Abbas, President Obama indicated that the U.S. will no longer hold the Palestinian Authority responsible for upholding their commitments in previous signed agreements.  These commitments include turning over known terrorists to Israel for trial, prevention terrorist attacks, and cessation of funding for acts of violence against Israeli civilians.  The White House is only demanding a vague, unverifiable, "Commitment to end incitement."

6.       The U.S. is beginning to enact restrictions on which weapons Israel will be allowed to purchase, holding up sales of weapons which might be used to thwart Iran's nuclear program.

 

While no consequences for non-compliance with American demands have yet been issued, the unspoken threats for refusal include:

 

1.       Removal of American loan guarantees.  Israel would have to borrow money for its national budget at a much higher rate of interest during a time of economic crisis.

2.       Removal of American support in the United Nations.  One in three United Nations resolutions is a condemnation of Israel for all sorts of outlandish accusations.  These condemnations are typically authored by Arab states, embraced by the third world, sheepishly ratified by Europe, and finally vetoed by the United States.  Removal of the American veto could result in a gradual erosion of Israel's diplomatic position and, in a worst-case scenario, the eventual imposition of sanctions.

3.       Elimination of military aid.

 

Since all of these measures were enacted without discussion, or even a warning through diplomatic channels, it seems pretty clear that the Obama administration, for its own purposes, is actively trying to pick a fight with the Israeli government.  Taken in context of his visible cooling of relations with other American allies like Britain and India, and his warming of relations with traditional adversaries like Syria, this seems to be part of a general American trend in the world of turning away from free democratic states and toward third-world dictatorships and Islamic Apartheid regimes.

 

This isn't the first time Israel has come into conflict with an American administration.  In fact, Netanyahu's previous term in office in 1996 was marked by conflict with the Clinton administration.  Clinton, perceived by Israelis as a great friend, partnered with the Israeli left and managed to have Netanyahu replaced with the more pliant Ehud Barak.

 

Obama has made similar overtures to the same Ehud Barak, today Defense Minister, bypassing protocol and just "popping in" to a meeting between Barak and white house officials yesterday.  It was a clear signal to Israelis that there are more pliant leaders with whom he was willing to work after Netanyahu is overthrown.  But Obama is not Clinton.  Clinton took four years to prove his pro-Israel credentials before involving himself in the intricacies and intrigue of Israeli domestic politics.  Barack Obama jumped right in and began issuing demands, and already has a reputation on the street as an Israel-hater.

 

Also, the Israel of 2009 is not the Israel of 1996.  At that time, Israel still held Gaza, the "West Bank," and Southern Lebanon.  The Palestinian Authority still claimed, at least in English, to have no ambitions beyond a state of its own.  But after withdrawing from Lebanon and Gaza, both became launching grounds for kidnapping raids, terrorist atrocities, and rocket bombardments of Israeli civilians.  As distasteful as Ehud Barak may find the settlers, it's blindingly obvious that, should Israel withdraw from the "West Bank," his own supporters' homes in Tel Aviv, just four or five kilometers to the east, will come under rocket attack.  Israeli leaders may still mouth the words "West Bank Withdrawal," but most seem to understand on some level the lethal threat a State of Palestine would cause for Israel.

 

The real threat is one of Arab perception.  Since the Arab conquest and colonization of the holy land in the year 639 CE (AD), the Jews were always a docile minority accepting of second-class status.  The Arab street of today views Jewish haughtiness at demanding freedom from their rule as a direct result of American military and diplomatic support.  If they view this sudden rift in the American-Israeli relationship as serious, they may smell a moment of weakness and be tempted to attack.

 

In the long run, Obama will probably be forced to reduce his expectations.  Every American administration takes office with a surge of energy, convinced that the previous guy had it all wrong.  Reagan came in with a similar list of demands, although not nearly as threatening.  Within a few years, after gaining real-life experience seeing American diplomats tortured and servicemen killed by Arafat and the like, he realized with whom he was dealing and scaled back his expectations.

 

A temporary reduction in Israel-American ties is no need for fear.  It may, in fact, be beneficial to break Israel's psychological dependence on American support in an increasingly multi-polar world.  India and China, both rising powers, have higher public approval ratings of Israel than the United States.  Most of Israel's great accomplishments, from the building of a state, to Independence, to repulsion of repeated Arab invasions, to the immigration of millions of refugees, all happened before the American-Israeli alliance was cemented under Nixon, and often with vehement American opposition.  Still, it's a shame to see the world's greatest democracy, and Israel's greatest friend for the last thirty years and more, turn a cold shoulder to its former friends.

 

At least the news is now more interesting than the sitcoms.