It’s hard to believe, but it’s been exactly two years since we arrived in Israel!  I have such clear memories of that day – being met at the airport by a couple we knew from Baltimore (bless them for caring enough to make the effort!), loading all of our thirty boxes into two huge vans that we rented, the long drive on a blistering hot summer day with less than a liter of water for us all to share, arriving in Karmiel and thinking what a pretty street it was when we drove in.  Then standing outside our apartment building in the hot sun waiting for the real estate agent to come with the key so we could get into our new home, the neighbor across the street who saw us and hurried out to greet us and offer us water, and the agent who arrived with the key and told  me before I even entered the house that I needed to go to some government offices with her to transfer the utilities into our name (I told her I wanted to run in and take a quick look around before going out with her, so I had a thirty second glimpse of our new home before rushing out).  I wouldn’t agree to something like that again; thinking back it seems insane but I was going with what was asked of me.

We arrived on a Thursday afternoon to a home with no furniture, no appliances and no one to welcome us.   The water in the house had been turned off and it took some time until we figured out how to get it on again.  (Did I mention we were parched and desperate for a drink?  The new neighbor’s offer of water was a lifesaver.   When the water was finally on, we discovered the tenants had taken the kitchen faucet with them when they left, and when a new faucet was finally installed two weeks later we discovered the pipes were stopped up with hardened plaster that the tenants had apparently washed off their utensils after plastering a wall, not considering what would happen when the water was turned off and it was left to dry in the pipes.

The first thing that hit me when I got there was how filthy everything was, and the older girls went out to buy cleaning supplies – that’s their memory of their first time in our home!  Without a fridge or stove, our food was very simple- we bought bread, butter, yogurts and fresh vegetable twice a day for the first couple of weeks.

We decided to take the kids for a walk to Park Hamishpacha, a beautiful park a five minute walk from our new home that is free to residents of Karmiel.  When we got there, we were denied admission unless we paid since we didn’t have identity cards that showed us having a Karmiel address.  Our explanation that we had just made aliyah several hours before didn’t help, so we continued on our way and found a free park where we could go.  We met a lovely family there who was excited about our aliyah and invited us to spend a Shabbos at their home in Jerusalem.  The father picked a fruit from a prickly pear cactus and shared it with our kids, and ds5 (then almost 4) was so enthusiastic he tried to pick some himself.  🙁  That resulted in his hand being filled with tiny hairlike prickles and us exiting the park.

We managed to keep the kids up and outdoors until 8 pm with the hope that we could minimize jet lag.  Everyone was exhausted, and after bedding everyone down into the sleeping bags we brought with us (we used clothing in place of pillows) I stayed up to unpack and organize our boxes.

It was strange coming to a place where it seemed no one cared if we were here or not, even though they knew we were coming.  I’m so happy for those moving to Karmiel that their experience is so different than ours and I don’t think anyone else has had the lack of welcome that we had.  But we were so happy to be here, and we put the challenges to the side as we focused on our gratitude to have been able to move to Israel in what five months before, when we first made the decision to move, had seemed to be an impossible and unrealistic idea.

Over the last two years there have been a lot of challenges.  Looking back, it’s pretty clear that our biggest challenges wouldn’t have happened if we hadn’t moved here, some wouldn’t have reached the critical situations they did if we were in the US.  Having said that, we don’t know what difficulties we would have faced if we had stayed in the US and it’s unrealistic to assume that life would have been trouble-free if we hadn’t moved.   Despite all the bumps and challenges, we are all really glad we made the move.

On the anniversary of our second anniversary in Israel, my feeling is that we’re at a transitional point in our lives.  We feel settled in our home here, have made friends, dealt with and overcome medical challenges, have work and are continually growing in our feeling of community.  Our kids have friends and are used to life here, and all either speak or at least understand Hebrew well.  As we begin this year with a return to homeschooling, we have a feeling of hopefulness that we’re leaving behind the intense traumas and difficulties of the past two years and entering a new period of stability, health and abundance in all areas of life!

Avivah