Virtual walking tour of our apartment

Here is a virtual guided walking tour of our apartment. The porch scene didn't quite come out, it's more of a blinding light

A new chavrusa

A little bit ago I requested a chavrusa, and someone hooked me up with one..who doesn't speak English.

Today was our first day, we are learning Gemara Shabbat..Here is an example of how our language barrier has effected us so far. We were supposed to meet at 2:15 at the beit mdrash, I have never met this person, just given his name and number. I arrived a few minutes early, peeked into the beit midrash to see if there was anyone who looked like he was waiting to meet with someone. There were a couple guys learning by themselves, none looked up when the new guy walked in, so I called. I told him I was at the beit midrash, and I continued to wait.

After a few mninutes of just standing outside, I ventured back inside, sat down open a sefer and waited for him to come. At 2:30 I decided that I was going to call him - because I had to leave at 3:00. I called him, and I was pretty sure he said that he was just around the corner, to the right of the beit midrash, I went in to wait.This time, someone looked uo from their sefer, and waved me over..their sitting to teh right of the entrace was my chavrusa, he had been sitting there the whole..I told himn that I had been sitting one table over for the last 15 minutes waiting..we had a nice laugh, and then started learning.

I think I understood most of what he said in regarding the learning so that was good

Omega Shipping

I don't get this company it's as if they are trained that the customer is an annoyance, rather than a customer. For those who don't know Omega Shipping is the horrible company that we used for our lift to Israel. For more background go to Nat's blog and read about their uselessness.

Here is my latest issue.
Some stuff on the lift came broken, so we filled out teh insurance forms, but I needed some additional information. I sent the following E-mail to Liat Yosef, Export coordinator

Hi,

In order to fill out the insurance sheet I need the following information
Departure date of Shipment
Arrival Date
policy number
endt number
Plus where do I send the form, to your or to Atlas Insurance? if its to Atlas how do I send it to them

Thank you
Shauli Zacks

She sent me this reply

Dear Shauli Zacks,

You have the information on the policy.
Please send it directly to atlas you also have their tell # and info on the policy.
Thank you

Liat Yosef
Export Coordinator
Omega Shipping Co, Inc

Obviously, I don't have the information, or I wouldn't have asked her for it. And let's say it is in my policy, which I don't see. Would it have killed her to put in the information. Even if she wants to tell me that I have it and I'm an idiot for not looking hard enough, but here is what you want. Instead she basically says, don't bother me with your problems.

So I called her and she again told me that I have it, I calmly told her that I don't see it anywhere, and if she has it on file can she give it to me. She really didn't want. She insisted I have it in some policy, which I don't have. I asked if I could at least have the phone number for the insurance company so I can submit my claim, and she says, its right there on the policy its a 1-800 and they have a fax. I again,. repeated that I DIDNT HAVE THIS INFORMATION, CAN SHE GIVE ME THE REST OF THE PHONE NUMBER. Perhaps she thought if I dialed 1-800 and wanted to call the insurance the phone would somehow know.

Finally she said she would look at my file and e-mail the information., I'm pretty sure she just wanted to get me off the phone because it's been about 4 hours and I haven't heard from her.

Cute Sammy Video

Here is a cute video of Sammy

Cookie Experiement

Last week I started making cookies again, and it isb't the same. I was told by mom and Golda that the margarine here is bad. Last week I took Mom and Golda's advice and I melted the margarine and then poured it in with the other ingredients. The batter looked weird and the cookies didn't come out like they used to in my previous life/.

This week Nat suggested using something like "I can't believe it's not butter" the Mazola brand here. The batter was very sweet, but very gooey. The cookies came out really sweet, good, but not how I want them.

Next week I will try using oil and seeing how that comes out.

The strangest thing is that in both cases the batter has made about 15 cookies less than before.

Jonah the philosopher

On Shabbat Nat took the boys to our nice view spot, which overlooks an arab village. Then it was prayer time, and they started making noise, so Jonah wanted to know why they had a shul if they aren't Jewish, then he asked, if they arent jewish, why do they live in Israel, they should live in Detroit, and finally, why does hashem make non jewish people