Gilo Apr-July '88

April 9, 1988

Dear Family,

A somewhat relaxed greeting to you on the close of the Passover holiday from Jerusalem. We are more or less fully and happily ensconced in our domicile in Gilo and gearing up to returning to a normal life. While everyone is well and happy, we all miss our beautiful family in Milwaukee.

Life here is beginning to take on a normalcy. This past week my brother and his family were in from Haifa and we got to see lots of them. My nieces Noa and Liat really fawned over our kids and Nadav is the same age as Yehiel so everyone had a good time. The Gilo park - humongous playground is for kids of all ages, so we are having lots of good times there. The Hebrew Univ. botanical gardens
have come a long way in the last 16 months and this Passover were a cacophony of color and lush and varied flora. We expect to see the Haifa crowd again for a picnic on Independence Day and possibly go up there for a Shabbat even sooner, but with Lisa's pregnancy entering its final stage, we probably will not be seeing too much of them after that, until mid-June. They would certainly welcome our relocating to Haifa.

Jerusalem is in full blossom. Tulips are blooming all over the place. Two new strolling promenades, one in Gilo and one in East Talpiot attest to the vibrancy and care or the city's planning. While E. T.'s has the more spectacular view and formal construction, ours has the play area for the kids. The city also has its share of familiar faces as we randomly encounter acquaintances and friends of years past. A new structure near us is the completed gas station across the street from our apt. complex. While we are warned by everyone to not travel into the territories, we are otherwise removed from any of the rioting-uprising

My sister and her husband Ehud and 1 ½ yr old daughter Hagar are set to leave for Phila on April 25. They are all set (except for packing) for a year's + stay, though she is due to give birth in December, which I expect will complicate their plans somewhat.

My parents are in good health and spirits. They do not currently have the extremely rigorous physical and social lives of the recent past, but they are busy and free of any pain. My mother's Hebrew continues to improve slowly while my father remains adamant about his ignorance.

Leslie was a real help our first few days and during most of Passover she went touring to Tel Aviv and parts north with her car-endowed friend Jill. She looks good and seems happy about what's happening professionally. We expect to enroll Yehiel in her pre-school class next week.

I have had my resume translated into Hebrew and have begun answering job ads. I will also soon try a scattershot application to public accounting firms. So far the process is proceeding as planned…Our only institutional hitch is that it will take a few weeks for us to get back into the national insurance system so we will probably arrange private insurance until then. My full citizenship has been applied for and I should be getting it within a month (and army duty within
a year). Our apt. and car are in good shape... In fact, Gilo being a relatively quiet and safe neighborhood (i.e. no major Arab population between us and the city) suburb, apt. prices here have appreciated dramatically since we left, in dollar terms. We expect to rent this out when we move, but maybe not and in any event, we will probably not live in this apt. again, as we have had enough of fourth floor life over a relatively crowded courtyard. .

Prices of just about every basic commodity excepting maybe bread $0.38 loaf) and gasoline ($3.20 per gallon) are higher on a real basis since we left. Milk is now $2.20 per gallon and hard cheese $3 per pound. While I the economist appreciate the beneficial effect that the subsidy removal has had on allowing the budget to be tamed and inflation brought under control, I the consumer am grieving.

Daily high temperatures have been up to 75 degrees F and we are all into sandals, sand toys and sandboxes...Not much is happening back at my old employer, the Israel Economist, and it seems that operations there will wind up within the year.

Be well

P.S. We plugged in our microwave oven soon after arrival and it has been working for us at least daily since.

P.P.S. Orly had a first bowel movement on the potty today! Hurray!


April 23-24, 1988

Dear Family,

Greetings from Jerusalem. We are all well and in good spirits and trust you are likewise. Other than the weather, everything has been going well since I last wrote. It has been cold and. damp these past two weeks so we've been bundling up both day and night. We have no promises that summer will be here any time soon.

The good news is that the institutional acceptance of us continues apace and with little difficulty. We are into a fairly comprehensive HMO at a cost of one-third what we paid in the US (replete with 90% prescription reimbursement). Though it does not have all our favorite doctors among its choices, enough familiar names are on the list...Just as important, Yehiel is into Aunt Leslie's gan -(day-care nursery school). While she has been mildly disparaging that he has not won universal acceptance among his peers, he enjoys going to class and so we are satisfied. The gan is English speaking, but of the talking children, many are bilingual, so we are hoping his Hebrew will benefit. He is picking up the language slowly.

We spent the last 3 ½ days in Haifa visiting my brother's family and a good time was had by all, right up to the end. They rent a not-large ground floor flat, with surrounding shrubbery and growth, enough of a diversion for our kids. Nadav and Yehiel got along reasonably well, considering they are both quite "indulged" little boys. Their wrestling matches are quite even with Nadav's weight advantage giving way to Yehiel's aggressiveness. We celebrated Independence Day with a group of their friends over a barbecue at a nearby park, and the night before in the commercial center of their neighborhood. The kids are much more civilized and less obnoxious there than in downtown J' m (and both are legions above the drunken crowds in Trafalgar Square and Times Square on New Year's Eve). My sister-in-law Ellen is agonizing over leaving her well-paying social work job and the effects it will have on their income but it seems that it will be only a matter of time. While it seems that we will be moving to Tel Aviv in July, we could certainly enjoy Haifa.

My job search is going well and I have what I hope will be my second and. final interview with the CPA firm of Reuveni, Har Tuv, and. Tepper in two day's time. They have a need and use for my English -language skills and are likely to offer a salary and responsibilities that I could get enthused about. The 30-person office is computerized and located in downtown Tel Aviv, a 7 minute walk from the central bus station. A bus. stops in front of our apt. bldg at 6:49 AM and gets to the TA bus station at 8 AM, a convenient and tolerable commute until we move after the baby's birth. Even if this job does not materialize, I expect similar-type offers. I already have an offer from a Jerusalem CPA, but the city's lack of industry limits both starting salaries and advancement opportunities...I also interviewed (possibly successfully) in Beer Sheva and the most exciting part was passing the Dehaishe refugee camp where troops were in action tear gassing somebody and the bus got stoned by resident youths.

Lisa's pregnancy is progressing well with moderate discomfort. She feels physically pressured now in many body locations much of the time, with 6+ weeks to go. It is at this time that her enthusiasm for a large family is most taxed. She is registered at the hospital of her choice, Misgav L'dach and we have been getting glowing reports from everyone who has given birth at this new facility. We are to tour the facility this week. Lisa is already planning on what is going into the bag she is taking with her.

The family is still on a somewhat late sleeping pattern. Yehiel is still napping in the afternoon and so far it is working out that the three of them nap at the same time...Orly does not yet seem bored around the house...I expect we shall purchase a new small bicycle with training wheels for Yehiel next week.

Our friends Pinhas and Judy Landau had us over for a hospitable evening of tea, cakes and conversation and we hope to entertain my friend Mark Weiss and his fiancée this week, as well as Leslie...My sister leaves for Phila tomorrow night and she will be the carrier of this letter...I met my successor at the Israel Economist and I may work out a continuing writing relationship with him though the firm's financial straits are even more dire now than when I tried to hire freelancers.

Be well.


May 4, 1988

Dear Family,

Greetings from Gilo, ablaze in bonfires. This evening begins the I.ag B' Omer holiday whose celebration includes pyres to which today's youth are only too happy to contribute. From our living room window we see at least five of them. Anyway, we are in good health and spirits and trust you are likewise.

The big news is that I am gainfully employed as a CPA trainee at RHT (see last letter). They are part of the European region of the Fannell Kerr Forster worldwide accounting group. PKF is the 14th largest US CPA firm with revenues of some $100 million annually and a renowned expertise in the hotel and travel industries. Big eight accounting firms shy away from formal Israeli associations, so we have quite a unique affiliation. My job is principally to facilitate and foster that potential. The managing partner, Shlomo Tepper sees this international effort as still a "hobby" but he believes it will ultimately payoff and that is why I am on board. I also manage his English-language correspondence of a few letters per day. My first week has been a slow orientation so I have taken the time to write some articles which will help hype the firm's expertise in personal income taxes, investments and the hotel industry. I replaced a South African who had more extensive auditing experience than I but whose Hebrew and promotion abilities were inferior. He is headed back to Johannesburg on his own volition. In the room in which my desk is situated, two other desks are there as well. The staff is friendly and competent and the newest secretary has been there over a year. The office doesn't have a microwave, but free soda and coffee are offered and enough IBM PCs are around for ready access. The commute is longer than I had initially supposed, though, so I am presently gone from the house almost 11 ½ hours and am at the office only 8 of those. Our 8-4 winter hours drop to 8-3 in the June through Sept. period. I expect to be excused from the alternate Fri. 8-1 duty until we move.

We are now engaged in an active search for Tel Aviv area housing, but it may prove to be short-lived as we will be looking at a 4-bedroom flat in Rehovot on Friday that should be affordable and available August 1. The woman of the house of it present occupants is a family friend from Cleveland and they are expecting to vacate at end-July to move into a new house they are building. It is located some 12 miles from the office and it should be a manageable 40-minute door-to-door commute. Staying here any longer than absolutely necessary has its problems, notably the commute and the 54 stairs, but not having to engage in a tedious search process and getting this flat at a good price may clinch the deal.

The kids are just dandy, as usual. Orly's command of English is precocious and she is up to full sentences and almost a dialog capacity. Yehiel continues to acclimate himself to Leslie's gan and he (and mother and sister) even went to their first birthday party since he started, yesterday. We will probably hold off on buying him his first two-wheeler till we get settled in the flatlands around TA. We are in good shape clothes-, and toy-wise for the new baby but I expect we will buy a new carriage that can comfortably seat two.. .Today we got our first box of books that we shipped - all children’s books, welcome and needed in our library.

I painted the apartment - at least almost all the necessary touch up spots. We have begun advertising it for sale, hoping in our wildest imagination to double our money ($) in the four years we have owned it. We may yet just rent it out. I have lost a few more pounds and hope to stay under 140. I am reading Jane Brody's Good Food Book and it gives me insight and renewed determination to stick with my complex carbohydrate diet. So far the dearth of red meat hasn't been felt. Breakfast is usually my hot bean paste-cheese sandwich or cold or hot cereal and then I bring a sandwich on whole wheat bread and that keeps me till dinner with fruit snacks or an occasional home-microwaved potato.

We are having some problems with Yehiel's nap as it seems that no time is exactly right for it. I guess he will give it up altogether by September.

Tonight we are taking out the Landaus for dinner in honor of my job. Next weekend is my mother's birthday and we are expecting to entertain them then. I speak with my brother at least three times per week. Ellen is leaving her social work job out of frustration and anger and they will miss her income but they'll get by...as will we.

Be well.


June 10, 1988

Dear Family,

Greetings again from the four of us in Gilo. As of this moment I cannot unfortunately report on any big news. Lisa is a few days late, but as the calculations were not exact, there is nothing yet to get worried about. Otherwise, we are all in good health and spirits, and trust you are likewise.

We do have big exciting news, namely that we sold our apartment. We are very pleased with the $76,000 that we will net for it, a profit of some 65% ($30,000) in four and one-half years. Of course, when we want to buy a new one in a few years, I am sure we will have to pay much more for this same apartment in an area we would like. Upon our return, we have relearned the importance of neighborhood. While I won't depress or scandalize you with the inconsiderateness and mindless vandalism of our adolescent neighbors and their families, we now accept the Ashkenazi pseudo-racist concerns of living in predominantly poor- lower middle class neighborhoods, and we are now ready to pay more to insure our neighbors are more like us. The price did not include the bedroom closets, which we will have disassembled and reassembled in our rented apt. in Rehovot. We have ordered a mover and our departure is set for August 4. (Incidentally, the buyer of our apartment is Maier Ben Claikha. He works for the phone company and his wife for the Health Ministry. They are Sfardi. They are soft-spoken and respectful.)

Anway, we are moving to the apt. I have described in previous letters, at an acceptable price of $450 (plus city property tax and central water heating) per month. Everyone who has been there speaks highly of the town (though one friend did call it "too JAPPY") except for the weather. Next week I will sign the lease and register Yehiel for pre-kindergarten nursery school. As of now we expect he will be in a religious gan three blocks away, rather than the secular one across the street, because of comments by people who have sent kids to them.

Our kids are happy and healthy. I expect that we will be working on the optimal nap strategy until they leave home but at least generally, the hours between 9 PM and 6 :30 AM are free of their disturbance. Lisa has invited a few kids from his gan over to play hoping their mothers' will reciprocate when she is indisposed with the new baby. He has certainly gained acceptance and even a little popularity at gan. Last week was his turn at being "Shabbat Abba" and. we joined in as appropriate. I expect we will purchase him a two-wheeler with training wheels soon. We are also contemplating a carriage for two in honor of the new baby. We have been buying assorted furniture to clutter up our new place, like a couch bed, children's table and chairs and baby dresser (all second hand)... Orly is certainly over her teething and she can now eat peanuts. She is charming, earnest and occasionally obnoxious

Work is going OK. Shlomo is now away for two weeks and. I expect I will be doing mostly auditing. Even at clients, I get called upon to draft english-language letters, where they are then transmitted by fax to our office, typed, and then transmitted by fax to their overseas destination. To date, I have been working at the Israel Standards Institute, a Government Corporation. At my level of work and comprehension it is not demanding, but the Ramat Aviv location adds another 70++ minutes unto my 4 hour commute. So despite my official workday end at 3 (till Oct.), I am not getting home much before 5:30. I am getting a lot of reading done and after breezing through Zeev Chafetz's Inside the New Israel, I am into Home by Witold Rybczynski. I squeeze in newspapers and periodicals as I get them.

The rest of my family is well. Richard and Ellen are also expecting to sell their Jerusalem apt. this month, hoping to fetch $115,900 for their four bedroom ground level flat with porch. My parents are busy with lots of intellectual activities. My sister and family seem to be adjusting well to Phila and Ehud is working, as hoped, in carpentry.

I have jogged recently and hope to make it more than a weekly affair upon moving. Breakfast is almost always bean paste-cheese vegetable open-faced sandwich and lunch is two microwave cooked. potatoes. I also have granola (home-made) at breakfast and apples and other sweets at lunch.




June 16, 1988

Dear Family,

Heartfelt salutations. The occasion has finally arisen in which I can greet you with fundamental news. We are now five in number. At 9:10 A.M. on June 15, our second daughter, Ma’ayan (meaning spring in translation) was born. The delivery was awesome and human. Lisa, per usual, demonstrated her true mettle and I rendered my ineffectual assistance and tears.

The countdown to our second daughter was as follows: By the night before birth, the cumulative effect of Lisa's Braxton-Hicks pre-labor contractions (which were identified because she went to be monitored as she was a week late) left her with one-quarter of the necessary cervix dilation. We got an OK night’s sleep, though Yehiel was up several times in the opening throes of stepped throat. Before 6 AM Lisa told me to get moving, but I started on my leisurely pace of a shower and labored breakfast sandwich. Finally 1 got the message and at 6:30 called my parents and told them to be here by 7. We got to the hospital, Misgav L'Dach shortly after 7 and Lisa was 5 cm (halfway) dilated. Anyway, Ma’ayan emerged unscathed and Lisa was fine. No drugs except for assistance in eradicating the persisting varicose veins.

The hospital grounds are compact but filled with aromatic and visually spectacular roses and other flowers. While full scale, it is mostly a birthing hospital and many English-speaking immigrants are drawn to it for its holistic-midwife oriented philosophy. Lots of religious types. Lisa's two roommates were as colorful as the rest.

Anyway, three hours after the birth, 1 left Lisa' s side and went off running errands. I stopped in at our lawyer's office to fax documents to my Tel Aviv office (a letter I had composed) and got my chest X-ray at another hospital, the last step in my initial army interview. I still expect to perform only up to 60 days initial service but 1 may not be called upon for up to a year.

It is now June 17 (Fri) and Lisa and Ma'ayan ( Maya for short) are happily ensconced here, safe and warm too hot;. As much as possible, everything is back to normal. We hope next Fri afternoon to host a reception for our newborn and I have been informing people...Fortunately I am presently at work on a J'm client and will be able to help with getting Yehiel to gan and my parents will have to help with only a one-way shuttle assistance.

June 25, 1988

Well, here it is 9 days later; so let me add a few words about Maya's first week. She is close to being the perfect baby. Just like in the book, she is sleeping almost 20 hours per day. So far she has manifested only a gentle lazy disposition. She nurses well, burps easily and doesn't spit up much. She has been taken out on a few walks already, sometimes in the snuggly and sometimes in the new carriage.

Fortuitously, I worked on a client in Jerusalem all this week and basically finished the audit. Starting tomorrow I return to the office and with my bosses return there will be lots of English-language correspondence.

Yesterday we hosted a simchat bat - birthday celebration for Maayan and some two dozen friends and relatives showed up. We all had a good time and now we will have leftovers for the next few days.

July 2, 1988

Dear Family,

Happy national birthday! We are actually going to the Assoc of Amer. and Canadians in Israel July 4 picnic on Monday and hope to have a good time. We trust your long weekend was pleasant and enjoyable. Alas, Monday is a regular workday for me. And of course every day is a workday for Lisa.

We are typically in good health and spirits and trust you are likewise. Actually Yehiel and Orly are only now fully emerging from undiagnosed colds and congestion that made the last week less than unmitigated fun. At least they have been sleeping reasonably well. Ma'ayan (meaning spring of water) is down to maybe 18 ½ hours of sleep per day but still little trouble. Burping her is still a fairly mild endeavor, though growing increasingly labored and more chancy. Her persistent diaper rash is quite significant, unlike the token affliction of her brother and sister. We thought Yehiel might have graduated from a diaper at night, but to our disappointment were proven wrong (twice in one night!!). We continue to enjoy watching the two elder ones develop personalities. We do not let Yehiel admonish us to "be quiet", but he is permitted to and does tell us to "calm down" and "don't get hysterical”, to phrases which we are undoubtedly trying to convey to him at the time he says them. Orly is a great mimic in both English and Hebrew. She is precociously cute in pigtail and ponytails.

As we close in on our August 4 departure from Jerusalem, it becomes increasingly clear that there are aspects of Jerusalem that we will greatly miss. Principal among these are the variety and quality of parks and public spaces for us to take our kids to. This morning we frequented a satisfying. rose garden-playground and in the afternoon, after hosting my parents for lunch, we ran around the Hebrew Univ grounds. Another aspect is the city as tourist and convention center. Yesterday we received hand-delivered packages from Milwaukee and ate some rich, creamy and satisfying cheese cake downtown. (Of course the morning was also upset by a Denver-boot big-city $30 parking ticket.)

Yehiel is into summer camp at the same location as his gan and sister-in-law Leslie is again the teacher. The structure and hours are similar though his class is down from 16-18 to 11 and Leslie's Finnish colleague has been replaced by a non-Hebrew speaking non-Jewish Samoan. My parents have been helpfully picking him up regularly as needed and occasionally babysitting.

Work goes OK. I finally got wise why I am billed out at the same $35 per hour rate as I was in the US but I gross only two-thirds of what I did there. The difference is in employer payroll taxes which were some 8% of gross there but are 35+% here. Last Thursday I spent some working hours at -18°C in a refrigeration house counting barrels of frozen citrus concentrate at client Yaf'o Mor in Ashdod.
On the return, I stopped in Rehovot and finalized details (ie signed the lease) on our Rehovot flat.

As we realize proceeds from our apt. sale in Israeli New Shekels, we have been buying US$. We are allowed to purchase as many $ as we have on previous occasion transferred into shekels, which in our case is about $47,000. As we expect to buy another apt. in about two years, we are sending the $ to the US and will be purchasing corporate bonds expiring about the time we expect to want the cash. My cousin Harry Weiss is a bond broker and expediting the transaction, which he expects will yield (on a AA2 or AA- rated company) about 8.15%, annually. Our concern at this time is understandably capital preservation and security.

My brother has sold his apt and bought one in Haifa, for about the same price. It is a 3-bedroom ground floor with a sunken living room and semi-private entrance and garden. They will move from their rented quarters in April.

My parents remain busy with their various and assorted intellectual endeavors. This year they will be vacationing separately in the US, with my father going for some 2 months beginning mid July (coinciding with his brother’s youngest daughter's wedding in Buffalo over labor Day) and my mother in December for up to 3 months, to coincide with my sister Judy's birth of her second child.

Lisa is well and sends her regards. Three kids keep her from much free time to serenely compose correspondence. She can already get into most of her old clothes and of course turns my head whenever she enters the room. By this time. she has of course turned household management into a mere administrative discipline and I hope that I am at least a cog in the wheel of progress.

Be well.


July 15, 1988

Dear Family,

A penultimate (?) greeting from Gilo. Another phase in our lives is drawing to a close.

No regrets, only hopes and prayers for continued health and happiness. The experience has been rewarding in its own way. Leaving familial support is never easy, but someone has to pioneer the heathen-devil metropolis Tel Aviv and I guess we have been chosen to be the first Levinson Israeli city-slickers...For those of you not in the know, though, our Destination of Rehovot belies this argument as it is almost as close as one could come in Israel to a university town, despite it being a TA exurb.

Anyway, we are reasonably well and trust you are likewise. Our latest family visit to the pediatrician have centered around heat-diaper rash of our eldest. The prescription: the same Miconazole Nitrate - Hydrocotisone cream that our youngest got. We are truly suffering from the earth's "greenhouse effect." It has been a hot summer. And while no one in this household seems to be in mortal danger from dermatological problems (confirming what I expect would be low dermatological MD malpractice premiums), it has certainly been discomforting.

Ma'ayan continues to sleep less and demand more, but she is still at the upper end of possession of desirable baby attributes. She is not always beautiful, but has an increasingly cute -face. She still has a very amenable personality, sleeps a lot and doesn't demand much. Today I gave her a first bottle of infant formula as Lisa was out for a few hours. She took it well. Of course, she has not yet been inscribed or blessed with a personality, unlike her siblings. Orly has taken to warding off Yehiel' s big-brother. aggressive advances with a chin-touching-shoulder shrug and an "I'm not feeling well.” Yehiel is also subject to hypochondriacal impulses and suggestions and will almost always agree that it hurts him in the location we ask. He is also in a less-than-ingratiating stage where he continues to ask "why" until we are beyond exasperation. Alas their Hebrew language facility will evidently wait until they are mainstreamed into Israeli society, which for Yehiel should come around September 1.

Today, as we did a week ago, we enjoyed amplified jazz and rock on the East Talpiot esplanade, with a view of the old city rivaling our wedding site. We missed this week's James Taylor concert, which got good reviews. My jogging has unfortunately been unsystematic. We are at the height of the watermelon season and regular seeded varieties are available in our parking lot for under 15¢_ per lb. Plums and peaches are also at bargain prices.

Work is going OK. I stay busy with client and English-language work. Everything is still reasonably interesting and challenging and if I could only motivate myself to a better level of concentration I would have absolutely no anxieties. I certainly have a healthy professional respect for my colleagues and superiors... I am slowly progressing toward my US and Israeli CPA certifications. At a minimum it will take at least another 7 months.

Our apt. sale proceed collection is progressing spottily. We are into Citibank 8.3% 6-1-1990 bonds as planned but we may be forced to give our buyer a loan on part of the balance. Ah well, no one said life here would be hassle-free.

We will be lunching at my parents again tomorrow as we did last Shabbat. I shared some Scotch with my father this week in celebration of Ma'ayan's arrival at a local world-rated bar. Their travel plans to the US are now up in the air as my sister and family will probably be returning from Phila in early Nov. My father will probably be gone from mid-August to mid-October or something like that. He has begun receiving again his New York Times Book Review subscription and I am happy to be again back in touch with this critical source.

Of course all the philosophical and critical verbiage in the world does not transcend the worrying headlines here of increasingly sophisticated ground-to-ground missiles in the hands of the Arab despots and their increasingly flagrant brandishment of their chemical warfare capacity... My army file continues to wind its way slowly through the system as I receive periodic calls about various unclarified aspects of my personal history. I still expect to receive a first initial call-up of up to 61 days sometime within the coming year. My contemporaries do a lot more of only annual reserve duty!!



30 July 1988

Dear Family,

A final greetings from Jerusalem. I trust my right hand won't lose its cunning and my tongue cleave to the roof my mouth. As our departure date nears, we are getting pangs of remorse. Oh well, in between the clutter of an apartment full of packed boxes, we are experiencing a little excitement of the move. On the mundane level, we are in reasonably good health and trust you are likewise. Orly had a 1 ½ day cold and Ma'ayan had six hours of congestion. Yehiel has a persistent heat diaper rash.

At least everyone has a healthy appetite. As a family entity we consume relatively large amounts of corn flakes, peanut butter, apple juice from concentrate and other items on a less systematic basis. Yehiel has an adventurous and varied palate. Alas Lisa and I are not immune from body mass growth. In our defense, apart from lack of time to exercise, our only time to peacefully ingest our food is after the kids go to sleep. Hopefully Rehovot's relatively flatter and less densely populated terrain will help motivate me to run more and opportunities for organized aerobics will present themselves to Lisa.

Our weather has remained unseasonably warm. At least Jerusalem is dry and cools off in the evenings, something we are soon to miss. The season has also brought out plagues of mosquitoes and ants which we are coping with with varying degrees of temporal success. I at least escape daily to an air-conditioned office. So far it also seems that the power outages that plagued Tel Aviv in June are over for the time being.

Work goes OK. I still have a long way to go before I am certifiably competent in public accounting and I may never really get there but hopefully I am not hurting anyone on the way. Last week I worked on the fixed asset schedule of our largest client, whose half-year report is due tomorrow. Currently most of my time is on a non-billable project of translating English PKF audit internal questionnaire programs into Hebrew. Managing Partner Shlomo Tepper is in Yugoslavia on vacation for the next three weeks... So far my progress towards an Israeli CPA is progressing and as expected my apprenticeship time for both will run concurrently over the next half year and I'll need only three exams. Shlomo offered to help finance the whole Israeli tax, law, auditing preparation cost.

As the elections in both the US and Israel approach, a certain resignation sets in. Here it looks increasingly like a dead heat but I expect the Likud /right to eke out a victory. As a libertarian who would like to vote his pocketbook I am in a quandary as everybody is ultimately nationalist-statist. I am loathe to commit myself and will probably be a 'floater" until election day. As for the Bushakis choice, I am more sanguine. George is a MOSSAD-certified friend of Israel and of course the Duke is a married MOT ('member of the tribe). I of course lean to the Ron-like clone for his albeit-murky
economic philosophy.

Our own economic affairs are more-or-less in order and our buyer has one final $17,000 payment to make when we hand over the keys in four days time. Hopefully his final mortgage will come through and we'll have no problems. We have now given ourselves two years to find an affordable home in the Tel Aviv area. We are expecting to stay in Rehovot but we will see what we can afford when the time comes.

The extended family is in good health and spirits. My brother has been working long hours getting Elscint's next generation CAT scanner prototype ready for installation in Haifa's Rambam hospital. Ellen, his wife, is enjoying her parents visit this summer and fortunately the jelly fish which plagued the country's beaches have moved on. My parents remain busy with their volunteer, social, cultural activities. My mother has been serving us tasty shabbat lunches this past month.

Well, I am at a lull in titillating (let alone scintillating) news and views from this corner of the world. stay tuned for your next edition, from the lovely little town of Rehovot. . . We do think of our American family often and wish you could all be here with us. Please let us know what's happening with you.