THE PRESSURE IS ON

So, in two days we are off to Europe, for a speaking tour that will last almost three weeks. In that time, we will be visiting ten different cities, and so I must update this blog before I fall tragically behind.

When I last signed off we were in the throes of looking for a new flat and in denial about Pesach. In the week before Pesach, we spent the first three days in military formation looking for somewhere to live. In fact, on the first day we found a flat in Florentin that we liked and made our interest known to the landlords, only to discover that we were one of 25 couples who had also later expressed interest. We searched a little more and the decided it was now time to focus on Pesach preparations.

As the days passed, we found ourselves in the middle of a strange reality - where we were making our way through virtual qualification rounds for the flat. By Tuesday night we had made it to the last of three couples and were summoned for a meeting. Despite having a thousand things to do, we made our way to Ramat Aviv (just north of Tel Aviv) to the flat of Yehuda and his wife Aviva (Yehuda and Rikva are the brother and sister landlords) where we endeavoured to charm our way into the flat. The following evening we were down to the last two and it wasn't until Thursday that we were finally informed that we were the successful applicants. It was erev Pesach (the night before Pesach) but Yehuda and Rikva wanted to confirm the deal in writing, so David went off to sign a memorandum of understanding that we were to be the new tenants.

So we entered Pesach with the knowledge that we had a new flat to move to and a flat on a fantastic street - a gorgeous avenue with cafes like bookends at either end of the street. The flat itself is on the second floor of a Bauhaus building, with a balcony looking down on to one of the cafes.

Pesach was quiet. We had a seder for two, which I enjoyed and David found a little sad. But what was really interesting was that we found ourselves fully experiencing the sense of national holiday that comes with Pesach. There was a real festive air everywhere we went. People were relaxed, heading off to the beach - we even ventured down to the beach ourselves (enjoying a kosher l'Pesach icy pop while we were there!). I spent a great deal of time doing nothing, which was glorious...

Pesach was over and the rush was on again. For people who move around a lot, we have an awful lot of possessions - mostly books, admitedly, but a lot of stuff. In amazing Israeli style, we had to pack and move and it took a long time to do. In the end, we managed, we moved , but only after using all our batteries, stress quotas and even expending so physical energy!

There are so many things to ponder on this experience, like the extrsordinary lack of care that both tennants and landlords seem to have for there flats (we took possession of a filthy flat and it took me and a cleaner 5 hours to make it habitable). The list of problematic dealings are significant, but fortunately, the issues have passed and they no longer feel raw enough that I need to purge.

We moved into our flat on the evening of Yom Haatzmaut, celebrating 60 years of Israeli independence. After waiting until 10pm to hand over the keys to our old flat, we wandered down to Kikar Rabin, just in time for the fireworks. We then joined Sharron and his new girlfriend, Michal, and made our way back to Florentin. But apparently everyone else had the same plan in mind as Florentin was the location of the late-night street part celebrations for Yom Haatzmaut. The end of our streets was heaving with thousands of bodies, packed into together in a fervour of beer, dancing and associated activities. But we were too tired for beers, for heaving and for thousands of youthful enthusiasms. Instead we stumbled home and waited for the music to subside (it went off at 4am) before we sank into a stiff but sound sleep.

The following day we journeyed up to Pardes Chana, for our now annual tradition of joining the Shatils for a Yom Haatzmaut celebration. It was lovely event as always, the Shatils being our 'family' in Israel, and a great marker to show just how much my Hebrew has improved in a year.

Now, we are back in the flat, slowly settling in, with some boxes unpacked, and the rest I move around every few days in the hope that eventually the will disappear. David has gone to Jerusalem today to see Mark Pearlman, who, like George Bush, is here for some super-duper conference on the future of the Middle East. Mark is there to interview people of the concept of tikvah (hope). Tomorrow we will be catching up with Felicia Schwartz, who will be our first Perth guest to our new flat. (I moved more boxes in preparation.)

On Thurday we fly to Berlin for Limmud Germany.