chapter
two
When you study Hebrew as a new immigrant and the State
of Israel pays for it, you’re supposed to go to class in the morning, study at
home in the afternoon, have a good night’s sleep and come back to
class the following day, 5 days per week, shining bright and full of
verbs. Maybe some did, but the rest gathered in coffee shops, went
to movies and free concerts and rarely formed study groups. That’s
how it was in the late 80s and you weren’t allowed to undertake paid work in the
afternoons. For being a good girl I received four hundred shekels
per month. If you’re using dollars, divide by four.
It wasn’t easy.
After 25 years here I suppose I could confess:
I worked in the afternoons. I edited, I wrote, I signed up
with Manpower and a couple of other agencies and since my English is good and I
type really fast, I got jobs. I worked for the Jewish Agency; the
Freud Institute, the National Insurance Institute—the all-powerful health and
social agency—translating letters from French into English and answering
them. Heart breakers, every one of them. ‘I was in
Auschwitz and I lived in Israel from ____ to ____ and I wondered if I could
obtain a pension based on my work record’. I was told to reply,
“Non, nous regretons que c’est impossible.’ Edith Piaf was
wrong.
Eventually I ended my jolly career as a student and got
a real job. No more Iranians desperate to learn Hebrew and return
to their previous professions—accountants, pharmacists, cosmeticians—and no more
Russians. In one class I protested Svetlana’s interrupting the
teacher who was trying valiantly to get us to understand the Israeli system of
government, tough stuff. Svetlana wanted to inform us all about
the Russian system and I called out We didn’t come here to learn about the
Russians! BIG mistake. Came the break, sitting
outside in the Spring air, I suddenly realized that all about me were
disappearing, melting as it were into the shrubbery. Svetlana came
steaming out, fists up. I am not a courageous person and as there
was nowhere left to hide, I asked Svetlana how her old mother was faring since
her recent eye operation. Fortunately I possessed enough vocabulary to cover the
question and her temper cooled instantly. How kind of you to ask,
she said. Bloody right.
When the subject of chequebooks and bank accounts came
up, I was excused from class. Apparently the Russian
immigrants—who had never handled their own money in such a way before—were
convinced that as long as there were cheques left, there was money in their bank
accounts.
One evening my daughter rang to ask if I had the
Jerusalem POST, page 24, ‘there’s an advert that lacks only your name’.
And so it did.
If you think being employed in Israel is
easy, think again. The boss’s PA loved me, but they’d employed
someone recently who turned out to be so inefficient that after they fired her,
they’d decided that the next candidate would have to take psychological tests
before being hired—the same ones I gave in North America when I worked for the
psychiatrists. I said nothing, took the tests, was called back to
see a big #1 on my file.
The boss was a philosophy professor; he’d written a book
to be published in the USA. He wanted an English editor for the
final draft and someone who could arrange a book tour of America for him. When
he mentioned wanting to visit a certain university, I floored him with my
knowledge of the president, having met him in quite another context some years
before. Complete snobbery knows no borders.
Dealing with Princeton Press was easy. My
opposite number was a young man called Mervin with vocal evidence of a Jewish
community in his youth. We got on well, sympathizing with each
other after every conference call during which the Professor blew up at one of
us—never both. When at last the day came for departure ceremonies,
I asked one favour: When you come back, let me know what Mervin
is like in real life. What do you think? he asked.
Oh, middle-aged man from a well known Jewish community in New York or New
Jersey, tall, bald, married.
Mervin, it turned out, was brought up in New Orleans. He
was young, single, short, with a full head of hair, and Black.
אלינור
cross posted Israel Thrives
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