“U is for…..”

Ok….don’t be mad. I haven’t updated in a while. My first reason is for the first couple of days preceding my last update I really didn’t do anything aside from update the website and prepare for the weeks to come, because Gene and I decided that work would start on the 21^st. (that would be yesterday). However, right after I made the conscious decision not to update a lot of things started to go on.  Then, it wasn’t a matter of I have nothing to write about, but instead just the opposite; I have too much to write!  So, the daunting task of relaying the excursion of my last few days can be put off no longer, because….well…you deserve to know, and I want to tell you J.

Last Friday was the beginning of Shabbat, which is the equivalent of a worship day. It starts Friday night and goes until sundown on Saturday night.  On this day it is nearly impossible to find anything open (grocery stores, restaurants, and even gas stations) Because Israel is a non-secular society, the whole country adheres to rabbinic law. (Basically what God says….goes!)  So, Friday night I went to my first Shabbat service with Gene’s congregation.  Everyone there was so nice and I was invited to many to two סֵדֶר‎ seders (ritual feast) for פֶּסַח Pesach (Passover).  Seder literally translates to “arrangement” or “order” because everything from the food to the order at which things are served or said has a specific place and a specific meaning. This is also why you will find seders all around the world to be relatively the same regardless of demographic cultures.

Among being invited to two seders, I was asked that Friday night to give a speech in front of Gene’s congregation.  Now, speeches are not my, how you say….forté, but I actually did fairly well. I think the fact that I had no clue who anyone was helped a little. Also an interesting aspect of the service was it was in Hebrew and had a Russian translator, for the English speakers (which was me and two other people) we had special ear pieces which translated the service into English for us….very UN-like. Once the service was over, I said goodbye, dosvidanya, and gave kisses to all the babushkas who now are determined to fatten my up like a Thanksgiving turkey.  Then I proceeded to turn my little flashlight on and guide myself home, while informing all the vipers to stay away from me……I MEAN IT!!!

Saturday was a big day.  Every Saturday is feeding day in the park by the Recovery Center.  This is where a small group of us prepare food in a kitchen close to the park and at 1800 or so we distribute the food to the drug addicts and prostitutes.  I arrived to the kitchen and Lena, Gene’s wife was running that kitchen like a 5-star Michelin restaurant…..I’m sure the French Laundry has nothing on her. (What out Thomas Keller!!)  Although it was a tiny kitchen, everyone had their place and it moved rather smoothly.  Upstairs there was an Ethiopian service taking place. Tel Aviv is riddled with Ethiopians. And I believe this particular congregation was of the charismatic persuasion because occasionally form the bellows of the kitchen I heard the occasion national geographic “war cry”.  I’m not trying to be prejudice at all, just a simple observation and trying affiliate it with something everyone can recognize and understand.  Actually, I went up to observe the service and it was quite beautiful. The music scale is very similar to carnatic style (monophonic songs).  Once the food was prepared, we brought it to the park.  Unfortunately, there were not a lot of people and the distribution took longer because there were Israeli police on scene as crowd control.  Early that day the community had planned a demonstration to show the Israeli government their displeasure in the deportation of its refugees.  Many Ethiopian refugees as well as Russian refugees reside in this community, which is just mere block from downtown Tel Aviv.  The town itself I would equate to Harlem in New York City (yup…that’s where I’m working.)

Afterwards, Gene took me to a street, once again close to where I work, which is Tel Aviv’s “Red Light District”, and yes, there actually is a “hous wit da red door” (for all of you Taken fans)  This street is about your average Chicago city block in length and it has many portals of entrance to this huge compound, which Gene tells me is actually interconnected on the inside; like one big brothel.  Each entrance is guarded by a man, whose primary job is to, what else, we’ll say gather patrons.

I’ve come to learn that many women are promised a job, free passage, clothes, money, virtually anything to get them to into trafficking.  The women leave with these delusions of grandeur, thinking that this is their ticket of our poverty and oppression, but in reality it is their ticket into a far greater circle of hell.  Often sold by the men who have befriended them for the moment, or in some circumstances, their boyfriends, these women are indebted to their owners for every cost they’ve occurred (plane ticket, purchase price).  The lifestyle becomes all the bad parts of Memoirs of a Geisha, but without the glamorizing shadow of Hollywood and status.  It is my hope and my dream to someday offer these women a chance to have a Recovery Center, much like the men.

 (Boris and Dima fixing the van....Boris is working so hard....
  Dima is under the van)

As for the men, Sunday was my first day teaching.  Nerves were the least of my worries.   I was worried none of them would understand me, or care to learn. I had taught myself in Russian everything that I was going to teach them in English. So we began with the letters of the alphabet and the difference between the Russian and English alphabet. (which I don’t know if you ever have seen Russian letter, but they look almost nothing like ours……so this process took quite a bit of time;-)  However, from the very instant I began teaching I knew my expectations of all

the men were far too low. Everyone, and I mean  EVERYONE, were taking notes and asking questions, and reciting, and practicing with each other. As Gene would say, “they have shocked me” (meaning amazed). From then on I knew this would be a life changing experience for them, as well as for me. 

So as we continued on with the alphabet we finally got down to the letter “u”. But, because “u” is a vowel it makes two sounds “uh” and “you”, so they wanted and example of both sounds in English words. The “uh” sound was easy, I used the word “up” and “utter”; however, the only word I could think of for the “you” sound is “uniche”…..aaaahhhh!!!. So, after a great moment of pause I finally got up the….well ya know…..and said it. Igor, my faithful translator and also one of the men in the center looked at me and said “oh but there must be another word, there must be”.  And me, with my mind in the gutter, feeling like a total jerk, finally stumbled upon a word, so I quickly shouted out “unique, unique”.  Ah, saved…..who ever knew the letter “u”’ would bring about so many emotions and levels of shame.  These are the kind of thing I’m glad they didn’t teach our kids on Sesame Street.  I blame my mother for teaching me that word, or the Egyptians who loved to have the empress guarded by many uniches…..ya know….I blame history for that word.  (ok, all the shame is off me….hahahaha).

As for the men, they are all extremely nice. On my website www.tikvaforisrael.com I have posted pictures of them with little descriptions of their personality.  I desire for all of you to know them and identify with them.  They struggle for lack of control the same way we struggle. My goal for the men is more than just teaching them English, it’s providing another form of self-expression and self-respect. I want them to not only have confidence in themselves, but confidence in God that he has control over their lives.  I believe it is a struggle for all of us to relinquish what amount of control we think we have, say to ourselves “I am not in control, but God is” and the most important aspect is trust what we are telling ourselves.  It is one thing to say it, but a completely different challenge to believe what we say.  The men have showed me a life of not regaining control, but giving control back to the rightful owner.

The Guys!!! (Back row left to right: Geana, Shasha, Zaur, Vitale; Front row left to right: Dimitry, Pasha, Anton, (Gene), Igor, Sasha, Boris)