Update # 7 Out of Debt

Hi Everyone,

I am happy to report that I got the job at Citibank and have left the world of Debt Collection behind. I have completed my first week of work and overall things are going well. About a week and half after I sent the last update, they scheduled a meeting to make me an offer, which I happily accepted. The position is a management position, and I actually manage directly 4 other officers, who all supervise smaller staffs. It is exciting to be working again, and especially exciting to be working in Tel Aviv surrounded by Israelis speaking Hebrew. The job is essentially in English, which is a requirement, but I told my staff that I wanted to speak to them in Hebrew and have them correct me, which they were happy to do in the staff meeting. My direct boss, was there on my first day, but then away for the rest of the week, so that made it a little easier. I hear she is very demanding, but being a veteran at Citi, I'm not too worried about that.
I had a lot of meetings this week with other department heads, and was very warmly received. There are about 130 people working for Citi here, on 4 floors in two different buildings that are side by side. I am on the 13th floor in my building, and actually have a real office, with walls and everything. Having said that, a closed door means nothing to Israelis so they barge in whenever they feel like it, which I have already gotten used to. Also, everyone always answers their cell phone, regardless of what else is going on. But the really cool thing is that it is a corner office, not that it is huge, but I have two different view points of Tel Aviv, one to the Southwest, where I can see the Mediterranean, and one to the Southeast, which overlooks Tel-Aviv. The other cool thing is that there is an unlimited supply of Coca Cola, which I found out after I brought a bottle in and after half a day it was gone. Another perk to the job.
Speaking of perks, the position does come with a car, which is on order and we should get in about a month. In the meantime, they have rented me a car, a Volvo, which is really nice, although a little to small to fit our family, even though it is a pretty big car. My office is about 7 minutes and 24 seconds (if I make the light) from the train station, and since I prefer the train (you can see DBF has influenced me), I am happy to leave the car in Beit Shemesh, so Caryn's life can be a little easier. Of course since I am out of the house from about 6:51 AM until about 7:12 PM, that makes Caryn's life more difficult, but we both knew that sooner or later that would happen. The really hard part for me is that Eitan wakes up after I leave and goes to bed before I get home, so I don't see him at all. That would mean on a normal week, I would go from Saturday night until Friday morning without seeing him.
A few things we may do to rectify that is to move his bedtime back a little, which is more difficult to Caryn. That could be a short term solution. In the long term, Caryn and I have started looking for a new place closer to Tel Aviv. At this point, our most likely place is Modiin, which is a relatively new City in Israel, and only 30 minutes from Tel Aviv by train. It is also only about 23 minutes by car to Beit Shemesh, so we would still be relatively close to our extended family. We drove through Modiin this past Friday, and even looked at a house (although it was way too small). While Modiin looks really nice, and is a planned City (which is unusual for Israel, as Israelis don't seem to understand the planning concept), it is somewhat pricey so we still need to see if it is doable. If it is feasible, we would probably try to move during the summer, before the next school year.
Speaking of the train, the train rides to and from work, are uniquely Israeli). In the morning, morning services are held in the last car, so I am able to daven(pray) with a minyan(prayer quorum), without going anywhere. It was strange at first, but I am getting used to it now, plus it is quite a time saver, since I don't have to daven before I leave for work, and we are never short of a minyan. On the way home, midway through the train ride, in the same car, we daven Maariv (evening Services). That is really cool too, and I am enjoying that aspect, although it is way too crowded. For Mincha, they daven in the bomb shelter of my building at 2PM, but it is done in the Sephardic (I don't have enough energy to explain that right now) way, so it takes twice as long. I had to miss that half the time this week, not that I missed it. The times that I missed it, I davened in my office and locked the door. The funny thing was that after I finished, I instinctively went to take my Kippa off, and had to stop myself realizing a was no longer working in a non-Jewish environment.
Most of the people in the office, and all of my staff, are not ritually observant, so when I showed up, all the observant people got very excited. On the one hand, I can understand that, but part of that really bothered me, as I don't want to be stereotyped into a specific group and separate myself from everyone else. I will have to work on that, not just in the office, but the whole country.
Clearly I am rambling, so I will wrap up now. Caryn has instituted a points system for good behavior, which the kids to varying degrees respond to. Obviously, this will be difficult on everyone in the beginning. On the plus side, Passover is in a little more than two weeks, so I will have some time off, plus my parents, and both my brothers and their families from the states are coming, so that should be really great.
I wish everyone Chag Kasher V'Sameach and just remember. If Passover seems too long, make Aliyah and you can shorten it by a day.

Kol Tuv,
Zumi