Repatriation (immigration) to Israel began spontaneously, like many other things in our lives. One day I get a visa, and the next day we buy 1000$ ticket from to Tel Aviv, a sandwich on the plane, and eyes full of wonder when I arrived in Israel. What am I doing here? Where do I go? How do I understand these scribbles? Is it just my life jumping around like a drunken frog, or is it normal to be in complete uncertainty and not know what to expect from tomorrow?
I had nowhere to sleep, couldn’t find a decent place to live, slept under a blanket that smelled like dog, ate food from the garbage dump, and lived on social assistance. Clothes and stuff were from the street. An hour’s walk to the store for cheap groceries. Queuing at the social canteen along with the homeless. I moved almost every week. My acquaintances started to write me sympathetic letters, and my viewers called me for dinner to feed me when we met. Social bottom – the reality of the Russian blogger after the monetization cutoff on YouTube.
When a man I had known for a long time wrote to me, sympathized and offered me a job online at his firm… I realized that from the outside my life really looks pretty sad. It wasn’t easy for me either in some places, but not as bad as people from the outside perceived it through my videos. Overall I had fun and it was interesting, a lot of adrenaline and adventures, new journeys every day. In six months I traveled all over Israel and found the best place to live, so I had no time to be discouraged.
What happened in Israel
It’s funny that the first video in the playlist about Israel on my russian speaking channel is from our dacha in Moscow, we were thinking about coming to Israel then, but we were afraid that Israel was too expensive. It turned out that the prices here are really awful. But it was only at first, while you were still converting them into rubles and did not know the local money-saving tips. And another non-obvious plus of living in a rich country – people bring a lot of good things to the trash cans, you can not to buy clothes, pots and pans, and furniture.
My best place to live in Israel is definitely the north! Technically Haifa is also considered north, but I like the nothern north: there are pine forests, Mount Hermon with its snowy peak, lots of greenery and flowers, hills and beautiful views around, various small villages surrounded by agricultural fields. The solitude, the nature, the measured life. If you really feel like it, in a couple of hours you can to get to the big cities and some events and get to the sea.
How am I doing now
Not long ago, I was wandering around Israel, not knowing where I would sleep tomorrow or whether I could buy milk in a new city for breakfast. I rented short-term housing. I was a real vagabond. And today – after six months of absence from the site – I’m writing this post from a cool house in the northern countryside, sitting at my own desk and I don’t seem to need to go anywhere. It’s also a short-term rental – a month, two, three… I don’t know yet. I really like it here!
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=S31CqWOHKGQ
It’s hot in Israel right now… there are protests everywhere against the new government’s judicial reforms (they want to appoint their own judges), and even the airport didn’t work. Our library in the village also closed in protest, and I went there to print out a sheet for 50 agorod (local kopeks) and was confronted with a protest sign. Luckily, the nearby community center was open and they helped me make a piece of paper. So there’s no time to be bored in Israel!
I only took part in one street protest in the Netherlands, just once – I was standing for a bit next to a group of 10 people, who were protesting against the increase in the speed limit on the highway. Everything else I prefer to watch on YouTube at dinner.
After living in Israel for six months, I realized that:
🔹unkosher is on the contrary cool, because the burger has cheese and everything is cheaper;
🔹shabbat and sabbath are the seventh day of the week, which is saturday, but witches still walk on the sabbath;
🔹names are literally translated from Hebrew, for example, I had a dog Daniel – dani (my judge) and el (god).
What are my plans?
I also realized that making plans and executing them are two parallel universes with a lot of randomness and variables.
When I had a predictable (read boring) life, I could easily write a plan for a year or even five, and more or less everything came together. But when you live by a known curse in an era of global change (read – life isn’t boring), then you go to your own website six months later, read the syllabus from the last post and don’t understand at all what kind of girl wrote it – probably the one from a past with at least somewhat stable life.
Making plans is fun! And I will definitely continue to do so. But when things don’t go according to plan, just know this is life.
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