The Diary

Day One

8 am – Get out of bed easily today because I know we have exciting errands and it’s the end of the week. My husband, B. is already on the shuttle on the way to school and I head to work which is around a 6 minute drive away.

12:30 pm – It’s just me and one of my teammates in the office today (we are a team of 5), and I am ready for lunch because I know I need to head out soon. I have a doctors appointment in Jerusalem at 5:30 p.m., so I will be leaving work early today to get there. Thankfully, my boss is so flexible with things like that, and I am working some overtime nights in the coming weeks, so I don’t feel too bad. I eat my lunch from home – leftovers from last night of lentil burgers and green goddess sauce (which is just techina, honey, and lots of parsley, dill, and garlic).

1:30 pm – B. lets me know he’s almost at the Tachana Merkazit (Central Bus Station) of Be’er Sheva, so I head over to get him and we are on our way. B.’s bus from school to Be’er Sheva was ₪13.
₪13

3:00 pm -We arrive at my parents place in Jerusalem, drop our things off and eat something while catching up with any of my siblings who are home. (I made Aliyah years ago by myself, then slowly my siblings followed and eventually my parents made Aliyah as well).

4:30 pm – B. runs out with my mom to pick up a ring of mine which we had left at the store to be adjusted when we were last in Jerusalem, and my dad drops me off at the hospital so I won’t be late to my appointment.

5:30 pm – B. comes in right on time after paying for parking (₪20).Since the next specialist appointment I needed was only in like 2 months, and I needed one now, I decided to pay for a semi-private doctor. The Shara”p (private services) are such a more pleasant experience- instead of hoards of people in the halls and waiting around for hours, we waited in a clean and quiet and relatively new part of the hospital. It made going to the doctor so much more pleasant and calm, and well worth the ₪200.

The doctor walked me to the test he wanted me to do, I did it right on the spot, and he went over the results with me and clearly explained everything to me. Thankfully, it’s not anything dangerous, but I really appreciated his clarity and patience, especially after seeing a doctor in Be’er Sheva in emergency services who barely even noticed me, much less explained anything. ₪220

7:00 pm – We head back to my parents, eat a yum dinner with everyone (Salmon! Such a treat because it is soo expensive here)  and watch a movie with the rest of my siblings who have come home by now.

Daily Total: ₪233

DAY TWO

9 am – Wake up and hit the road because Shabbat is starting so early today! The supermarkets in Jerusalem are a mob scene on a regular day – Friday is only worse. One thing we are loving about life in Be’er Sheva is the cheap supermarkets, the plethora of parking, and most of all the short and speedy lines even at the major stores. We generally do all of our shabbat shopping at 12 PM on a Friday and are in and out and home within 40 minutes.

12:35 pm – Check out of Supersol Deal after having stocked up for Shabbat and the upcoming week- chicken, vegetables, chummus, some frozen veggies, oil, barley, flour, and other basics.We are planning on making a kugel, chicken soup, cholent, and some chicken, salad, and grilled vegetables. Heimish theme this Shabbat I guess?
₪300

4:20 pm – Shabbat is starting and we head to our small minyan across the street. We live in a neighborhood of young couples and families and everyone comes to daven in a school across the street from us. Shabbat Shalom!

Daily Total: ₪300

DAY THREE

9 am – B. wakes up for davening and I stay in bed until 10:30 a.m.

10:45 am – I get up and take the food out of the fridge and set the table and daven. B. comes home and we have kiddush, read a little and nap. We have the best most relaxing Shabbat and are so sad when it ends!

5:00 pm – Shabbat is out and we are deciding what to do tonight. Be’er Sheva has a lot going on, and plenty of places to go and eat or do on Saturday night but we decide to stay home, heat up some leftovers from Shabbat, watch a movie, and get to bed early.

Daily Total: ₪0

DAY FOUR:

9:30 am – The new week is off to a productive start. My whole team brainstorms together how to get more customers out of a certain product we rolled out and we have an effective standing meeting that already shows great results by the next morning. I feel a bit useless because I don’t interact with customers directly so I couldn’t call on specific customers like my teammates could. My Director validates my contributions after that though, so all in all it was a great meeting.

12:00 pm – Leftovers really make for the best lunches. I had some leftover green beans, chicken and rice and it was yum. In the beginning I was buying lunch every day (there is a clean and yummy and relatively cheap lunch place right next door, where you can get a main and 2 sides and it tastes almost home made and they often have salmon- all for 35 shek) but now that we are a bit more set up and have the things we need I haven’t bought lunch once and I am very proud of that!

3:45 pm – Some of the team leaves to continue working from home for the day and I head over to the gym for a 4 p.m. class. I joined a gym right next door to my work building and have learned that I need less than 15 minutes to get over there and change. The place is ₪200 LESS than what I would pay per month when I was living in the merkaz (Central Israel), and there I had to wait in line for the showers and it was a feat to get an empty treadmill. Here, I am one of less than 10 people in the class, and there is almost no one in the women’s locker room when I am there. I can’t get over this amazing set up, I love it.

4:45 pm – I leave the class because I feel like I am dying and 45 minutes is enough exercise for today. It feels so good to be back in that routine though. I know the rest of the week will be hard to get to the gym so I’m glad I got that in now. I shower and head back to work for a course I have a tonight.

7:30 pm – My teammate who also stayed for the course says I can leave because she will oversee the rest of the night. I feel a little bad but also remind myself she is honest and would only tell me to go if she really meant it. And we certainly don’t both need to stay.

I head home and soon B. is also on his way home. He volunteers for a program where you can serve as a big brother to local kids who come from broken homes and less than ideal living and family situations. This is his first time at his kid’s house (parking was ₪9.50), and I’m excited to catch up on how it was. On his way home, B. stops at the Makolet by our place and picks up eggs (₪11.50). Eggs is one of those things that has a controlled price so it’s not more expensive just because it’s from the corner store.
₪21

9:00 pm – After some more leftover dinner (grilled veggies, the still delicious potato kugel, and chicken) we do some of our adulting banking things, watch an episode of The Crown, and go to bed.

Daily Total: ₪21

DAY FIVE

9:00 am – I am feeling particularly not in the mood for work today, and a little blah about work in general. I get myself to work and bring my gym clothes in case that will make me feel better. I snack on a banana muffin from home with my coffee.

12:00 pm – I have been snacking on gross things in the office so I am not even hungry for lunch but I have some anyway. I brought an avocado, some homemade flax crackers, and a can of tuna. Our office has a great kitchen so I squeeze some fresh lemon juice and S&P my avocado. Delish.

3:00 pm – I head to a few stores to pick up some things for an upcoming event we have at work with a teammate of mine. A guy cuts me off on the main road and I get annoyed at him. I am anyway feeling annoyed about things down here- been blah at work for 2 days in a row, and just generally feeling out of my comfort zone since I don’t yet have many friends here and am not involved in my usual things in my free time. That guy who cut me off was just adding on to my annoyance about this place. Most days I am so inspired by Be’er Sheva- the area I live in and work in are so beautiful and my normal routine has all these exciting perks and is such an enjoyable environment. But sometimes going out of my routine brings me to places I would rather not be especially since it is all still so unfamiliar to me. I think that even though I have been here for a few years already, this must be what making Aliyah feels like – feeling totally out of place and unfamiliar in a place you want to call home. Here we go again I guess.

6:00 pm – I go to an Itzuv (body sculpting) class at the gym. It feels good to make my muscles work hard again. The class is full of Israeli students who look like me, some Asian looking women, and even someone who may be Arab? I am re-inspired about living in the south and love the eclectic group of put-together looking people. That was a fast change of heart.

7:00 pm – I head home and jump in the shower. B. came home after class on the public bus instead of waiting for the shuttle today (₪13), so he was waiting for me when I got home. I made some spicy chicken for dinner, and heated up more leftover veggies and kugel from Shabbat. We catch up on our days and talk a lot about the poor people in Beer Sheva and what its like to be exposed to another part of society we don’t normally see (even though they are there) in Jerusalem. We go through and chose some more pictures for our wedding album, watch another episode of The Crown, and headed to bed.

Daily Total: ₪13

DAY SIX

7:50 am – I head downstairs to be picked up for work. My team is spending the day outside of our office, and my teammate and I coordinate carpool pick up. I grab a coffee in a to-go cup (realize I need to get myself a reusable coffee cup that I like) and a banana muffin from the freezer. She asks me to drive, so I get in and we are on our way.

9:30 am – The day is busy with meetings, and we get to it right away. These meetings really help clarify some of our teams goals and operation methods.

12:00 pm – I am exhausted from talking to everyone about so many different things- good, bad, and everything in between. It’s great to be in a place where everyone makes you think so much about who you are and who you want to be. Work orders us lunch and I barely got to eat it because I was so caught up in conversations! But managed to snag some before it was gone.

4:00 pm – I’m happy to get back home at a decent hour! In the car we had a great, reflective catchup about the day and the last little while in general in the company.

6:45 pm – By the time we get back I’m exhausted and so happy to be home. I stopped by the office to drop off some things, and to check up on a project going on there tonight.

7:00 pm – So happy to be home. B. and I have so much to catch up on our days and it takes us forever to get through everything that is on our minds. We make pizza because we are both too tired to do anything else with too much prep tonight. We finish off the rest of the challah from Shabbat and have a yummy dinner.

9:00 pm – We hang out some more, talking more about our day, read a bit on the couch and decide to make a quick trip to the pharmacy. We pick up some random items we need- a hair scissors (I usually trim my own hair), a pack of gum (it helps B. concentrate when studying) and some batteries (for the clock that’s been hanging on our wall but doesn’t work yet).
₪55

Daily Total: ₪55

DAY SEVEN

9:00 am – I am feeling so much better about going to work this morning. We have a big event coming up tomorrow so I know this will be a busy day for me. Only three of us in the office today so I get some things out of the way and am feeling productive and good about work.

11:30 am – B. lets me know that he was in touch with the electrician who can be at our place within the hour, and wants to know if I can meet him there. I head over to our apartment (just a 7 minute drive away) and get back online from home while I wait. We only have a washing machine and are planning on getting a dryer, but since we have been having some electricity issues we wanted to get it checked out before we buying, and make sure the line we have is adequate to add on a dryer to it.

The electrician was highly recommended and seems to really know what he was talking about. He added an outlet on the existing line and told me we wouldn’t be able to run more than two machines out of the three at once (dryer, washer, and oven). I chatted with my mom on the way back to work about this and we agreed it may not be worth it to even get a dryer since it will be so much money to install a shelf to put it on top of the washer (no more room to put it anywhere else that makes sense).

We will get a drying rack so we can hang dry our clothes and towels and sheets and things that need to be put through the dryer we can bring to my parents when we visit. We’ll see. If this doesn’t work for us we will look into a dryer. It just sounds like too much money for an apartment we won’t be in for more than a year (probably). In the meantime though, the electrician for that second outlet and a minor fix for our stovetop cost ₪400.

While I was home I cut up the remainders of the spicy chicken from the other night and put that with chummus and some tomatoes and avocado in a wrap for lunch.
₪400

1:30 pm – I head back to work and have a productive rest of the day. I snack on some granola and another muffin and a coffee to get me through the afternoon.

4:30 pm – I am ready to get home and finish up our day. I meet B. right by our apartment and he takes the car over to his “little brother”.

5:30 pm – I decide to make a noodle spinach casserole for dinner and do some work before I head out to my night activity. B. has the car with him so I plan on walking the 10 minutes over to the start up center.

6:00 pm – I head out to a graphic design workshop for beginners. In our neighborhood there is a “start up center” (clever name) funded by the municipality to help equip people- students, transients, and locals, with real world skills to help them succeed. I was very impressed with the presenter who looked as put together and sounded as professional as someone at a tech meetup in Tel Aviv (if not more). The place was packed! I knew a lot of the things he taught but still learned some cool tricks and saw some cool things going on around me. It felt good to get out of the house and do something interesting that I care about.  ₪20

7:30 pm – B. is home already by the time I get there. We are excited for the almost weekend and have lots to talk about. We enjoy our yum casserole and catch up (again) on our days. B is going to Miluim (army reserves) tomorrow so he packs a bag and I have a brit in Ra’anana in the morning so I wrap the present and write a card. I include 120 NIS in the gift because even though we are a young couple, and I don’t think that is expected, B. and I agree it is the nice thing to do and we are happy to gift our good friends as they begin this chapter of their journey. I jump in the shower and we watch another (amaazing!) episode of the crown.  ₪120

9:00 PM – We are finishing up the night with watching The Crown. We need to go to sleep because we both have early mornings tomorrow and long days.

Daily Total: ₪540