Second Week Summary

This week was mainly characterized by work, studies and things to-do. Monday was the first day in which I started to feel like a routine is coming, with me working on the lectures to be given later in the week, listening to last.fm and generally "working". Routine is usually an underestimated concept. People find themselves trying to escape routine, go on vacations, travel to distant parts of the world, and, sometimes, even leave to another country to seek a new life. And what is this "new life" if not yet another "routine"? On the other hand, when your life gets into turmoil as ours have been in the last few months, routine is just the medicine the doctor prescribes. However, this week proved to be as far from routine as possible.

On Tuesday the remnants of the blessed routine were still here. However, on Wednesday school started, and both of us found ourselves trying to keep up with the pace of things. Bear in mind that we had to move to our new apartment, which, aside from the kitchen, was completely empty. We spent most of the evenings this week shopping for the new apartment in (vain) attempt of transforming it from an apartment to a home. We went to Kroger on Tuesday evening, spent most of Thursday evening in Wal-Mart, and around 4 hours at IKEA on Saturday. We also visited our first ever garage sale and purchased a used chest of drawers for $25. Totally we spent around $1000, most of them on IKEA products, and, as you know, IKEA products require assembly. So, we spent most of what was left of Saturday building the things we brought home (up to 25Kgs a piece), and most of Sunday morning building the things we requested delivery for (two pieces at around 40Kgs each). Now at least we have a cupboard in the walk-in closet instead of the two shelves and hangers' rack it came equipped with.

Another notable thing is service in America. We, Israelis, tend to think of America as a place where good service is defined. This is true, but also, surprisingly, untrue, at the same time. We met a few examples of good service, mainly at the bank, the post, and the Original Mattress Factory from which we purchased our bed. All of them promised and delivered on time, and if they made a mistake, they corrected it without giving us any problem, and free of charge. However, service people here are so s-l-o-w. To say that they are slow is even to picture them as being quick to respond and resourceful. They are neither. I already told you about the power outages last week. Here are two examples for their lack of ability: they haven't even registered me into the university systems, and the Roadrunner / Warner Brothers cable company have not installed our cable yet, more than a week after we registered for their service. By the way, these things are not just frustrating; the former also means that I don't have a key to my office, a login for the systems, and most probably I will not be paid at the beginning of next month.

Road Runner service people, in addition, demonstrated the most unbelievable amount of inaptitude: first, they scheduled our installation to Saturday. Then, they called on Wednesday to tell us that they will be coming, "as planned" (so was the message they left in the voicemail), on Thursday. Then, they called on Thursday, after the time slot for their arrival had already started, to say that they are not allowed to dispatch a technician for the installation, because there are still internet outages in the area as a result of the storm and power outages from the week before. They rescheduled to next Saturday! This may mean (I'm not sure as I am not certain that I fully follow their obscure logic) that they are still working on the outages until that time. Therefore, there are probably people who are stuck without internet connection for over two weeks (first the power outage and now the cable outage).

We met another bizarre thing at IKEA. It appears that Americans are unable to say negative things. For example, if they have sold out a product, they will not say: "sorry, we currently don't have this product in stock". The product tag reads: "Sorry, this product is oversold". Meaning, we're selling this product so well that temporarily we have oversold it. We're so good at selling it, that it's not our fault that you – customers – are buying more than we can replenish.

Work was a bit of a rollercoaster as well last week. As I mentioned earlier, this was the first week of school. As a result I lectured my two classes twice this week. The outcome of the four lectures I gave is not as satisfactory as I want it to be. I feel that I have too many problems with my oral English skills. I stutter too much, I use the incorrect terms or tenses, and generally I do not deliver the material as well as I expect myself to. It brings me down. And it stresses me out, which means that by the next time I will make even more mistakes. I can't seem to find a way of breaking this magic circle. If it doesn't get better really soon I'll have to reconsider this job arrangement here. On another note I finally had my talk with Kelly. It seems that he expects me to be his right-hand in founding a new laboratory and raising new projects. If it wasn't clear enough he even mentioned that I should become the lab's "system engineer", and this is exactly what Eli told me would happen. Kudos, Eli. On one hand, this is something that I know; on the other, did I come here to repeat what I have done back home? If so, I think I prefer doing it while working with my friends and having my family nearby. And that's another blue note: I have basically no one to talk to and absolutely no friends here and I can't see how this may improve in the near future. As someone who is a "faculty", but not a doctor, and a Ph.D. student with no time for classes, I have absolutely no peers. None. Zilch. Therefore the chances of transforming a peer into a friend are not slim to none. They are ZERO.

And by the way, for those of you who survived so far, SHANA TOVA!!!

Summary:

· 1 week.

· 3 shops.

· Dozens of products.

· Circa $1000 less.

· 1 apartment yet to become a home.

· 6 days to a new internet connection (until further notice).

· American service people are stupid.

· IKEA cannot admit a failure.

· 4 lectures down, too many to go.

· Self assessment of my performance so far: 50%.

· New friends: 0.

· Chances of making a new friend: 0.0%.

· Gloom-o-meter (AKA mood-o-meter, but with high score when gloomy): 75%.

Signs of routine?

The last months were a crazed rat-race to achieve everything. The pressure was so high that even the transients in our move to the States could not add anything to it. In the past couple of days I can see, though in the very distant horizon, the signs of blessed routine. You know, just going to the office and back, perhaps relaxing at home when not working. Will it be so? I don't know yet. It's too far to tell.

Settling in Cincinnati

It's been 10 days since we left Israel for the coming few years and 7 days since we arrived in Cincinnati. It's hard to describe how we feel at the moment. Perhaps the best term will be: overwhelmed. So many things are so different than what we were accustomed to in Israel that we still need to adapt to a lot of things. I'll try to summarize some of the highlights of the week in this email although life, of course, is much more complex.

The first thing we did when we arrived was to check in with the International Students Services Office. Basically it means that the US government can verify that we have arrived according to the visas they had given us, and that we haven't gone missing, which might render us a potential threat to the Greatest Democracy. Unfortunately, they were all booked up for the day, so they suggested to take our passports and return them on Monday after the next check-in. We had better things to do with the passports so we decided we wanted to keep them with us for the weekend. This was a good idea as we got the chance to sign up for a cellular phone (#513-444-7800 in case you missed my previous advertisements) and a bank account. However, we should have understood that this is an omen, that things will not go as quickly and smoothly as we are used to in Israel.

On Sunday came the remnants of Hurricane Ike, which passed by for a couple of hours and left the city and the entire area quite devastated, and without power. Trees fell on the power lines and approximately 1.3 million customers were without power. We got the power back at the hotel we're staying at 52 hours after it went out. Some customers are still without power, but the Duke Energy company says that they will restore power to everyone by the end of tomorrow (that's more than a week since the original breakdown). As I said, people are quite calm about things here, and it seemed perfectly alright for them to be left without power for several days. I wonder what would Israelis do if Hevrat Hahashmal left them without power for an entire week.

Since the power was out, schools were closed, and many people did not show up to work on Monday. We, on the other hand, went to the university, which by chance (or purpose; we have a suspicion that Duke Energy prioritized UC because it is the largest employer in the city) had power. We couldn't do much at the university, but at least we were able to enjoy electricity and wireless connectivity. That was much more than we had back at the hotel, so we hung at the university doing practically nothing. This was where frustration took place. We had so many things to do before the start of the year (next Wednesday) like renting an apartment, registering for classes, orientations, and so on. On Monday nothing progressed. On Tuesday we managed a small fraction of the things we had intended for Monday. By Wednesday we got to do the things we intended to do on Monday. This was also the first day that Kelly (my patron here) decided to show up at the university. Try to imagine how you would feel if your only familiar face at the new job is not showing up for almost your entire first week.

The rest of the week was basically dedicated to working hard in order to make up for the missing time. We finally signed a lease on an apartment on Friday morning. I have my first lecture ready for the next week, and I know on what days and what hours I'm supposed to teach. I'm teaching 6 hours a week, two lectures in each Monday, Wednesday, and Friday. Preparing a lecture takes a lot of time, and luckily I have the lectures of the previous instructor (Kelly) in one of the courses. I don't know if I'll have time to study any course during this term. Perhaps after we settle a bit more it will be easier for me. For example, we have NO furniture at the place we rented and we'll have to buy the basics in the coming week.

Dana has been working very hard as well. She had an orientation meeting everyday of the last week, with a course today (Saturday!). She also has her birthday today, which makes her pretty sad for missing her family and friends, who called while she was in class. We went to a nice Indian restaurant and to the Oktoberfest downtown. The latter seems to be the largest Oktoberfest outside of Germany, and is the contribution of the large German community here. We didn't stop to ask them what their grandparents had done 60-70 years ago.

Summary:
2 days lost due to power outage,
5 days of hard work,
1 apartment (not occupied yet),
4 days to start of school (and teaching),
1 lecture done, 20+ to go,
2 beers at the Oktoberfest,
only a quarter of the things needed to be done are already done.
Mood-o-meter: 55% (passing but MUST get better soon).
Homesickness: strong (Dana), mild (Elad).

Frustration

The power was still out when we left the hotel this morning. It is claimed to be the worst power outage in the history of Cincinnati and the area. This, however, brings little comfort to our lives. Since most of Cincinnati is out of power, the schools are out, and many people stayed at home with their children. My department secretariat is closed for the day, so I still can't do anything. There is no one answering the phone at the real estate agency, so we still cannot go and do anything about renting a place. D's check in appointment was rescheduled to later this week or even the beginning of the next, so she is REALLY frustrated. Everything is just on a consistent Wait-Wait-Wait loop. URGHHHHHHH

First Weekend

It's Sunday afternoon and we're staying at the hotel, stranded by the strong winds (and future heavy rain) of tropical depression (formerly known as Hurricane) Ike. The strong winds blew down the power circuit and we are left with no power. This leads me to consider how dependent we have become, as a species, on the ubiquity of power. We're just so used to being able to generate everything with a turn of a switch: light, heat, food, entertainment, and so on. Now that electricity is gone we cannot heat water for coffee, we need flashlights to go to the bathroom, we're disconnected from the internet, and once the sun sets we'll have no light. Hopefully the power circuit will be fixed by then.

The day started much better. We went to the Levee on Newport, Kentucky to see the views. The weather was hot, humid, but relatively mild, and we had a good time strolling along the waterfront and watching the Cincinnati Downtown skyline over the Ohio River. I had a nice phone call from the department head, asking if she can help with anything. It's nice having someone looking after you, especially when you're new in town, and have so many things to do. I also head a talk over Skype with my former boss. It's funny to be able to talk for free with people and stay in touch with them when you're half a world apart. I think that I begin to miss my friends and family. I talked to my dad yesterday and he doesn't sound well. He sounds depressed, and I wish I could help him. It's hard to hear a man, who for all my life I have looked up to and considered to be as stable as a rock, becomes so weak. I fear for his health both mentally and physically. Skype is not useful in such situations. Perhaps we need a way of communicating physical gestures just as we're able to communicate sound and vision over the internet.

I also miss life in Israel. The main reason is that it was so much easier for me there, having a nice job, good pay, financial security, credit history (and no need to prove one), and my friends to help me. Now we are starting all over again, like being reborn, but without the parents support. Some small examples: we know that we are able financially to lease (or buy in credit) a car, but we don't have the credit history to do it. We have the money to pay for D's first term tuition in our bank accounts, but we cannot access it readily, nor do we have the means to pay for it electronically, nor will the "domestic partnership" thing be settled soon enough to avoid the need to pay for the tuition at all. Life here seems like a magic circle that we need to penetrate, but we still haven't figured out how. You need a positive credit history to be able to receive credit. It's the perfect Catch 22.

I wish we were two months from now. Hopefully things will be better than and we'll have our lives sorted out.

Cincinnati

We traveled from Newark to Cincinnati in two days and two hours. The trip was efficient both in time and fuel, as we had a hybrid Toyota Prius. We fueled only twice during the 1000+ Kilometers drive from Newark to Cincinnati, roughly a 20 Km/liter fuel consumption. If the Prius was not so expensive to buy perhaps it would be a good idea to buy one. However, it costs $22000+ as a new one, and even more for preowned cars.

The only perks we allowed ourselves to have during the drive is buying D a new laptop and getting a new GPS navigation device for us. D is enjoying her laptop pretty much so far, and the GPS device has been most helpful in the city. We decided to postpone purchasing a laptop to me until we have the money for that.

We arrived in Cincinnati yesterday. Currently we stay at an extended stay motel just outside the city. So far, we haven't achieved much from our to-do list. The only two things we managed so far are getting a cellular phone number and opening a bank account. The coming week is going to be extremely busy, with both urgent tasks and preparing for school. D is having an orientation meeting every day of the coming week, which leaves too little time to do all the stuff we need to accomplish. Undoubtedly, we will have to extend our stay at the motel and our car rental in order to be able to survive past this week.

After the cellular phone and bank account I finally started to feel that this is not a trip. This is the real deal. It is said that "all beginnings are difficult". Hopefully, after the transient period it will be easier for us.

Incompetence

It is unbelievable how hard it is to get a decent service in Israel. It is even inconceivably harder to get a service person to rid you from a current engagement. As D mentioned, we are faced with numerous setbacks and problems that various service personnel raise in our way. Today, however, I faced the other side of the same problem: people who are way too overzealous about doing their jobs. So overzealous that the two of them even complete their jobs before the schedule. What can I say? Let's give them a prize for being so diligent. Oh, I just forgot to mention, one of them disconnected me from my aDSL line three days before the requested disconnection, and the other one simply put my ISP account in a "frozen" state. So, if you're looking for hard-working and zealous communications providers, jost follow the links above.

6 Days To Go

We're less than a week from the flight. Today my visa was approved, and now I wait for the passport to return. We gave D's cat to a lady, who kindly agreed to take it in, and now D is sad for parting with the cat :-(.

Yesterday we signed the lease for my apartment with none of the candidates I mentioned in the previous post. The tenant is a brother of D's friend. These three achievements: the visa, the cat, and the apartment, are the three show-stoppers that could have prevented our flight. Getting them done clears the way for our trip.