Previous installments: Part I
Once I had decided to make Aliyah, I had to fill in my Nefesh B’Nefesh Application. With Nefesh B’Nefesh, you can enjoy the many perks of being a new oleh/olah, essentially Israel’s welcome package to you. The application isn’t that complicated, it should take no more than thirty minutes not including the personal statement. I decided to take the whimsical approach and submit it as a freewrite, as we do with writing prompts in my Master’s program. When I reread it, I was pleasantly surprised with what I saw, so I submitted it. It is as follows, if anyone wants any inspiration:
I am making aliyah in May or June because I have no choice.
Through my seven years of Jewish Day School and eight years of Israel advocacy, through learning about the history of my people and our ties to the Jewish homeland, after years of being given misleading information from my country’s media and academia that strove to unfairly demonize it, I realized that I have no choice.
In the 2015 Canadian elections, I felt forced to vote for a leader whose domestic policies I couldn’t stand because he was good for Israel, and although I am not American, I would probably do the same in the 2016 election if I were.
I soon realized that the more involved I became in Israel advocacy, the more I followed Israeli politics, and the less I followed the politics of my own country. The more I cared about the welfare of Israel, the less I cared about the welfare of my own country. I felt that staying in Canada or the U.S. would do me a disservice, because my heart was always in Israel, it always beat for the Israeli people, my people. I felt I should live in a country where I could vote for a politician based on their domestic policies and not where they stand on Israel. I had become Israeli.
On August 19, 2014, I was near-fatally injured when I slipped down a flight of stairs outside the Singapore Mass Rapid Transit (subway/skytrain) and had my leg run over by a bus. My femur was crushed to smithereens and I lost so much blood that it’s a miracle I’m still here. I had double lung multi-drug-resistant pneumonia, two collapsed lungs, and bilateral pleural effusion (water in the lungs). I was on a respirator for a day and in the ICU on other breathing contraptions for another five days. I wasn’t supposed to survive. I was told the reason I survived was because I was a classically trained singer with excellent lung capacity and strong, versatile lungs. I now have a metal prosthesis in my femur, and took about nine months of rehab to be able to walk normally.
During my hospital stay, I thought about all the soldiers who were wounded in Operation Protective Edge, which was going on around the same time. I felt a kinship with them, in similar situations, also in hospital beds halfway around the world. I felt, that if I had to get injured, I should have gotten injured protecting my country. I realized how short life is, and how I wanted to live a life I could be proud of, a life where I served my people, the people of Israel. I devoted my time in rehab to Israel advocacy, and had accrued quite a following. My Israellycool blog, Lex, went viral, and I began attending advocacy conferences with my boss, who is also a staunch Zionist. I went to Israel in July 2015, and knew that this was where I needed to be. The people there were so warm, caring, and everyone treated me like family. I knew then and there that I belonged in Israel and could no longer live anywhere else. I had a much easier time making friends in Israel than I had in America, because my personality is more Israeli, as many have told me. I decided to come back in the winter to be sure, and my suspicions were affirmed. I always hated the weather in Canada, and loved it in Israel. Israel is also the most beautiful country I’ve ever seen, and I’ve been to forty countries. I want to live a life surrounded by such beauty, both in the land and in the people. I realized that life was too short to live in a climate you hate, as a marginalized minority.
I was a marginalized minority. I had pennies thrown at me in the high school cafeteria, and watched one of my best friends get beaten to a pulp in the student lounge after admitting he was Jewish. I realized the importance of raising your kids in a Jewish environment, and how blessed we are to have a Jewish State we could go to, for the first time in millennia, where we wouldn’t have to worry about that. I want to raise kids in an environment where being Jewish is the norm, where they are taught their history and culture in public school, where they will one day serve with pride in the IDF rather than look at the IDF as monsters as they are viewed by most people where I come from, including many Jews.
I know it’s not going to be easy. Although I would rate my Hebrew at around fourth grade level, I still have a way to go. I have many close friends in Israel already, so I’m not worried about lacking a support network. I am worried about finding a job. But I am young, fresh out of graduate school, with no commitments and nothing tying me down. This is the time to chase my dreams before it is too late. If I never try, I will never know, and I will likely regret it for the rest of my life. Living in Israel doesn’t have to just be a dream – as the cliché Herzl quote goes, “If you will it, it’s not a dream.”
I realized that publishing blogs and attending conferences isn’t the ultimate way of showing my love for Israel. Serving in the army, contributing to the economy, contributing my skills to help the Israeli people, are what feel right to me. They are the ultimate way of showing my love and devotion for Israel. Israel, I am ready to take our relationship to the next level.
I simply don’t have a choice.
And you, you my dear readers, will be brought along for the ride, every step of the way.
Am Israel Chai!
