Category: Fatherhood

A State in Crisis: Our Year in the Holy Land

Me

I haven’t been able to write in months – despite my desire to do so, having plenty to say, and an array of new notebooks I continue to buy, mostly when we travel. Partially it’s the logistical challenge of finding a spare moment between two young, active kids and a full-time full-on job. But mostly, if I’m being honest, I’ve become somewhat frozen. In time, in action, in reflection, in a state of micro and macro overwhelmedness. A mental state of lowkey survival mode is probably how I’d best label it. Getting through the days and onto the next.

One of Dalia’s friends recently wrote to me to say how much she enjoyed following our family’s adventures in Italy on my blog and how “it was a completely different energy than now.” Forcing my head over the sightline, I couldn’t but agree with this crystalline assessment. What energy, do I have any, who even am I now, will I be like that Italian guy again?! I’ve ebbed so much since Tivoli, Orvieto & Santa Marinella that I’m not always sure. (I won’t tell you that I tear up almost every time someone mentions our life in Italy to me). So I won’t mention it now either.

All of this to say, in writing, for the first time in months, I’m still here.

We have lived in Tel Aviv, Israel, since late August, 2023, and if all goes well, in another handful of weeks, we’ll be leaving – if not forever, then at least for my own good.

Us

Baby Elia was born in Rome in late July. It was always going to be a heroic endeavour to change countries so soon after that, but we managed. Five weeks after his birth, we took the four hour flight down the Mediterranean: had a cappuccino in our Roman neighbourhood in the morning, and hummus in Tel Aviv the same evening. The transition was a bit jarring but we slowly started to settle in.

On Thanksgiving weekend, a little over a month later, we decided to meet with Dalia’s brother and family in Cyprus, less than an hour from Israel. We woke up in our hotel room on October 7th, taking in the beautiful balcony sunrise, with only a vague appreciation of the chaos engulfing our new home country. We proceeded with our all-inclusive day, following headlines and work messages with an emotional and physical distance of people who have never known war or organized mass violence, and also recently lived a fairytale existence in Italy.

Unfortunately, inevitably, our protective bubble imploded almost completely when it was time to fly back on Monday, October 9th. We arrived well early for our short scheduled flight, as one does flying into a country newly at war. Although on a low-grade stress percolation, seeing our flight on-time on the departures board brought a certain amount of relief. What followed was likely the most surreal experience of my life and easily the most challenging day I’ve had as a father and husband.

As time ticked away and our check-in counter remained closed, I sought some assistance from somebody, anybody. As you might be able to imagine, a standard issue Canadian was no match for dozens of Israelis trying (actively) to understand what was happening with our flight. I was too patient, too polite, completely ignored. When I finally found someone from the airport who managed to look me in the eye, he said: “You’re flying into a war, no one knows what’s happening,” shrugged, glanced momentarily into my soul and let it be known that I was the crazy one for even inquiring given the circumstances.

Then I truly had a first in my 44 well-travelled years on this planet: our flight disappeared, without a trace. Approaching 45 minutes to scheduled take-off and with still no sign of life at the now police-cordoned check-in counter, our flight vanished from the board. No delay, no cancellation, no notification by email, no message over a loudspeaker, just the sudden non-existence of the flight we were paid and confirmed to fly home on.

I had no pre-programmed response or strategy for this situation, as our flight time came and went, while Dalia, our toddler and newborn circled the pile of luggage in the wide open hall of the Larnaca Airport. Hence began an approximate 12 hour meltdown of the nuclear reactor of my spirit that I’m pretty sure now, almost eight months later, still hasn’t fully been resolved.

With no cavalry on the horizon, I ran around the airport looking for an operational flight to Tel Aviv and like in a movie I never hoped to star in, threw down my credit card, in a soupy emotional mix of despair, anxiety, fear, adrenaline, utter disbelief and pure unadulterated stress. In any case, a new flight was found and booked and now the wait for whether and when it might take off was on. With four new boarding passes in hand, we crept through security and towards the gates.

From here, I’ll spare most of the trauma-inducing details but over the course of the next ten hours, amongst dozens of messages from people suggesting we try to leave Tel Aviv asap, we waited and waited and waited, saw the worst of more than one of our fellow passengers and at least in my case, questioned not only my judgement, but my sanity as a human person in a way I simply never have before in my life.

At approximately 4am, with a gorgeous zombie wife, adorable strung-out three year old and gratefully unknowing 2.5 month old, we boarded our flight, that was not shot down while flying into Israel almost exactly 72 hours after Hamas attacked. We landed as the sun rose, just less than a full day since we headed out for our 45 minute flight and about 22 hours since I had last slept. Emotional, physical, psychological survival state. Hanging on by a hair.

The main thing I remember about the next day and even the next full week is something I won’t ever unremember. In the afternoon, just as the boys went down for their nap, a missile siren sounded. We all went into the bomb shelter room in our apartment (that are, tellingly, a building requirement in Israeli homes). This was the surreal cherry at the heart of the surreal cake, staring at my wife with wild eyes, while she held Aleksander sleeping and I tiny baby Elia, considering what were the very unlikely chances that a missile would rip into the room putting us all into a final good night. ‘At least the boys won’t know what happened,’ I thought.

Approximately ten weeks removed from the gelato, prosecco, joy and general dolce vita of Italy, here we were, deep into something altogether different.

By the end of that same week, after a steady stream of missile sirens, including during a visit by Canada’s foreign minister, young families, including mine, were evacuated from the country. We were thankful and torn completely apart at the same time. Even as I write this, my stomach knots.

I don’t need to describe the abyss my life became after that because I’ve documented it in this very blog. And I will never fully know the challenge my recently post-partum wife went through for three months with a newborn and toddler in Canada, but I glean it still and don’t know how to forgive myself for not being there with them. Gratefully, the grandmas chipped in, the cousins took Aleksander out for his first halloween, and Elia started to crawl on the floors of our own childhood homes. I returned for Christmas and New Year’s and began to make up for lost time.

We stopped in Warsaw for a couple nights on our way back, met serendipitously with an old friend, absorbed all the charm of the old European style Christmas markets, and, of course, ate all my Polish favourites. I also did something that I’ve found myself doing on every trip out of Israel since: pretended that I lived in the other place – bought books and notebooks, made emotional investments in the alternative reality, imagined, meta-physically, that the relatively safe and uncomplicated place I find myself in is my forever home. Prayed, in a real way, that fate would intervene and the flight back would again disappear, maybe for good this time. Alas, pipe dreams, all for not.

We returned to our apartment in early January. I went back to work and Aleksander picked up at school. Dalia has since entered a motherly flow state that she is extremely fond of: hanging around with Elia in the morning before walking on leafy Rothschild Blvd with a coffee in hand, meeting Aleksander at the gate of his school and taking him to a nearby park or beach with his pals. I’ve been doing the needful at work, obsessing about secondary and tertiary fronts in the so-called war, trying to make the most of the extraordinary weather, and otherwise biding my time. The boys have been growing, expanding, bonding. We miss our connection with family, worsened by the difficulty and uncertainty of travelling here for visits.

I have to say that Tel Aviv is an extremely pleasant place to live with kids. It’s a human-scale, walkable, green city with a fabulous five kilometre city beachfront. The cost of daily living is breathtakingly high (Geneva high, an Egyptian diplomat said to me), people can be a bit prickly and now, maybe always, there’s lowkey existential tension in the air. But, in a vacuum, plenty of cities in the world would benefit from some of its features.

In the non-geo-political vacuum of the current moment, the most troubling thing for me about living here, in quite a bit of comfort, is that 75kms away, 40 or so minutes on a Canadian or Israeli highway, is Gaza.

Undergoing one of the worst documented experiences of human suffering of this century. My challenges here, however personally notable, would probably not even register for a Gazan person who is still somehow surviving to this day.

All the Rest of It

We arrived in Israel as neophytes. Neither of us having any personal connection to the place but intrigued to learn more and swayed by a number of positive recommendations about its lifestyle. Before leaving Italy, upon telling a colleague he should come visit, he responded, instinctively, sternly, that he would never step foot in the country. I suppose that was a pretty clear omen of what we were getting ourselves into.

As a shameless non-expert, I won’t bother any grand analyses on the current situation, even though I spend much of my waking life forming and reforming my own takes. All I can really do is offer some anecdotes from life within Israel for a non-Israeli in one of the darkest and most difficult chapters for the Middle East of this generation (if not beyond).

As I was pushing through my own issues in the autumn, Tel Aviv was quiet, solemn and on edge. Posters for the kidnapped, yellow ribbons, handcuffed teddy bears came to dominate the public space. Many Israelis carried rifles, in line for cheeseburgers, at parks with their kids, on the boardwalk in their swim shorts. All in all, it was far from the young, carefree, beach vibey city of September. I’ve previously shared how odd it felt for me doing ‘normal’ things as bombs rained down on Gaza.

As time went on, and particularly after the brief ceasefire in November, the city and its people regained their pace. To the point now, where an alien visiting the city for the first time wouldn’t notice too much out of place. Not too long ago, an Israeli colleague, in the kitchen over coffee, said: it might feel normal but everyone here is broken. I have to say, that as a newcomer, that brokenness isn’t altogether obvious to me from the outside. Israelis are resilient, tough and for better or worse, normalized to tragedy. From what I can see, they’ve largely reclaimed their lives, grieved and continue to grieve their losses, passionately protest for their political views, and hope, along with me, for peaceful lives, from the mundane everyday level, all the way to the international sphere.

In the lobby of my work building, there’s a poster of some 100 or so of the hostages taken on October 7th. Initially by happenstance and now intentionally, I try to really look at one of them each time I pass. Look at their age, their names, appreciate their smiles and the joy they usually show in the photos, try for a second or two to construct their personalities, what they were doing in life, how they had lived, how they hoped to continue to live. 35 year old scruffy overweight male, 84 year old grandma, 57 year old divorcee, 19 year old idealist. The young women hit me the hardest because it’s not too hard to imagine the suffering that they might be enduring. It’s easy to mentally expand from the kidnapped to their families, neighbours, former classmates. Israeli society feels like one big high school where everyone is connected by at most two degrees of separation. It becomes obvious quickly that it’s not hyperbole to say that everyone in this country has personal connections to the atrocities of October 7th and its aftermath.

In my best reading of the people here, I surmise that they haven’t been able to detach their gaze for a moment from the eyes and outcomes of their hostages. And in that singularity of focus haven’t opened their view to the scale and depth of tragedy that has been brought to bear on the Gazan people, also men, grandmas, families, doctors, humanitarians, children.

There’s a real duality between how the world largely views, with horror, the brutality of the campagin in Gaza, and how living here, within commuting distance, there is no outward evidence of it. And this isn’t Russia or China where real information is hard to come by or trust. Maybe they don’t want to know. But it feels like they really should. Israelis seem genuinely baffled at how the world has moved on (or forgotten) October 7th so quickly as it still has their rapt attention. They can’t quite incorporate that the world has ‘moved on’ mainly because the violence following October 7th has come to overshadow the violence of October 7th.

The videos of gleeful, gloating, dare I say arrogant, Israeli soldiers destroying lives, homes, mosques, schools, stores, hotels, memories, pretty much anything they seem to feel like, leaves any conscientious person aghast. The incomprehensible number of dead, injured, displaced, traumatized. The scale of absolute destruction. The children under the rubble, in body bags, in pieces, covered in burns, amputated, orphaned at 7 years old, taking care of baby siblings, eating grass, crying, shattered, silent, frozen, disappeared.

Times 15,000.

Take that in.

And then take it in some more.

Then don’t drop your gaze from it.

I’m the opposite of the person who relishes in squeamish videos and yet I watch what the children of Gaza are going through. I break a little every single time and yet I do it again and again. Because it is my responsibility to bear witness at the absolute very least.

And so this is what it’s like, living in an eminently livable place, an hour away from the world’s freshest mass graveyard. Conflicting, difficult, morally contradictory, like nothing I’ve ever done before and will hopefully never do again.

For this reason, as well as the ongoing possibility of further conflict, I asked to leave here and my employer agreed. We’ll be moving to Shanghai this summer and I couldn’t possibly be more excited. It’ll be a big change but hopefully it’ll be stable and we can just be a family in a normal way for the next three years. I cynically joke that knowing my recent luck, China will begin an invasion of Taiwan five weeks after we arrive. Hopefully it doesn’t go down that way but if it does, God forbid, I’ll have some more clearly defined red lines about putting family before all else.

Jerusalem Postscript: A sign of hope, a sign of the times

One of the only places I feel entirely comfortable and at ease in Israel is in the Old City of Jerusalem. In many ways, I feel like the only reason we ended up here at all is to experience this ancient, historical and singular city. We’ve been four times already and are planning another visit next weekend. Last time having spent the night to wake up early within its magical walls. Having kissed the tomb of the Risen Christ on both Catholic and Orthodox Easters.

Jerusalem is the best of what the ‘Holy Land’ could be. Different religious and cultural communities living side by side, sharing paths, passing each other’s children, for generations, for centuries, for millennia. Even coming from Rome, Jerusalem represents something from even another level of the highest possibilities of humanity, of humanness. It’s humbling to just be there. For us, that’s obvious as Christians, but no less obvious for Jews and Muslims. Sacred.

Yet even in this miraculous place, reality intrudes. Israeli police presence is visible and significant. Young Israelis, dressed like robo-cops, shaking down even younger (mostly Muslim) men, dressed in t-shirts and shorts, in often demeaning ways (from my lived experience). Settler homes in non-Jewish quarters with kids jumping on rooftop trampolines surrounded by barbed wire fences and oversized Israeli flags.

Even in this holiest of holy places, it’s impossible to escape entirely what this place has become: a paradise on Earth for the powerful and integrated, and something of the inverse for the rest.

I don’t know if I’ll ever come back here again, and I’m still not as far gone as my colleague in Italy, although I now better understand where he was coming from. I certainly can’t envision a return at this point. I don’t want to be too intimately reminded of the personal struggle I endured here and can’t see myself returning until Palestinians live on the land with an equal expectation for justice and personal (familial, communal) security as Israelis. I think that’s possible in my lifetime and then maybe I will return. Spend a few nights in Jerusalem, safely see Bethlehem and Nazareth in the same day, take a surf lesson in Tel Aviv, and watch the sunset from a reconstructed Gaza beach front.

Sadly, I’m not holding my breath.

Shalom Israel.

Good morning Shanghai!

Ten Days of Interlude

I returned to Tel Aviv, alone, having shed several layers of emotional skin but still leaving my heart and soul with my family back in Toronto. They, and Canada more generally, let one month of acutely accumulated stress, fear, indecision, discomfort, doubt and guilt, fall right off. In fact, a certain weight and tension just wasn’t there as soon as I crossed the outbound border. And thankfully, partially due to exhaustion, but mostly thanks to my tank being replenished, I opened the door to our apartment renewed and in good spirits.

I went out for a cheeseburger (Tel Aviv’s unofficial second street food after shawarma) and noticed that the vibe in the neighbourhood resembled more what it felt like when we first arrived rather than when I had just left. Largely due to the temporary ceasefire that had happened in my absence and also the increasing squeeze on Gaza that, relatedly, left Tel Aviv less affected by rocket fire.

I decided, with salt on my fries, that if things felt ‘fine,’ I would pretend that they are fine. That I could be fine here. That it’s a regular, normal place.

I went back to work, fought off my jet lag and tried to keep the connection with my family, so live and profound days ago, aglow. I found that I could read. I could hear and feel music and not just listen. I was buoyed by the loving reality of my family, shared moments, experiences, the knowledge that this will hopefully be our final separation for some time, if not ever.

I walked to the beach boardwalk on my first Saturday back and noticed how many more people there were than before, how relaxed and at ease everyone seemed. I looked out at an incredibly beautiful dimming sun set over the windy waves. And wondered what it looked like from Gaza. I squinted down the coast in an effort to actually see the place, beyond the bends. My stomach knotted. I decided not to return to the beach because it didn’t seem fair.

Later that week it rained quite heavily and I imagined how it felt in the tents of Khan Younis and Rafah. Day by day, I started to lose the recently shared connection with Dalia and the boys, because of the time difference, and work, and distance, and simply being apart. I again got choked up thinking about missing moments, walking into Aleksander’s empty room, watching videos of Elia starting to crawl. I would look for them in my dreams, try to find ways to pull tomorrow closer, pretend that I was fine and everything was fine.

The reality of what’s happening in Gaza weighs down my spirit like a leaden vest. Even when I try not to look, it sneaks into my heart. Tears and pain and anguish beyond all comprehension.

I want to invite all the spirits of the Gazan children into my home, to share a moment while I search for my kids and they search for their parents. Show them love and that the world can be a good place. Take them to a bustling beach with a beautiful dimming sunset and tell them that everything is fine, that they live in a regular, normal place, that they can take a walk, go to sleep, share a laugh.

Relaxed and at ease.

Twenty Days of Plenitude

It’s hard to overstate how much being in Canada these past few weeks have meant to me. The country, the people, the peace, positivity, politeness, even the ugliest of late November weather. I’ve been able to cobble myself back together, (to a point).

I’m drinking montepulciano with a side of chocolate torte as a Newark airport wine bar plays very good jazz. Having just said goodbye to my family again. Teary eyed.

I stormed back into Canada and frolicked in an early season snowstorm like a child. I smiled at everyone and they almost all smiled back. I saw joy and reflexive kindness and easy interactions everywhere.

I walked my Ottawa neighbourhoods and met old friends. Korean bbq with an owner from Jeonju, where I lived in 2004. Korean chatter with an Ottawan from Morocco, who I last saw in Jeonju in 2004. Christian from Sri Lanka in 2001, over coconut sambal and a conversation with the Mauritian server about Sierre Leone. And Anita who saw us in Rome three times and played the piano at Tiburtina train station for Aleksander. Freshly pulled northern Chinese noodles with Tom from Rome. An Etobian from Pretoria. A Mississaugan from Lima. Christiana from Abu Dhabi then Ankara.

I felt Home. Gleefully so.

Then I went to my family, and nothing else on the planet mattered, finally.

I dove headlong, spritually, metaphysically, into my family’s arms and didn’t let go for any single moment. I absorbed our love. I kissed Elia, hugged Aleksander, embraced Dalia. Saw my mom, brother, cousin, in-laws, high school friends. It was a poem, a movie, the fullest type of living. I visited my dad’s tombstone for the first time since it went up. Strolled with my family along Toronto’s lakefront, my old University campus and through the city’s museum for the first time in decades. Dalia and I went to the Cathedral where we were married, prayed with the priest who presided, got a bubble tea and spiderman balloon at the shopping plaza we used to visit after pre-wedding classes. We passed through almost fifty years of layers of personal history in the place, creating anew every step. It felt like a magical therapeutic immersive video game from the future. Queen’s Quay, Spadina, Bloor, The Junction, Scarlett, Islington, Burnhamthorpe, Mill Rd, Pebble Valley Lane. Seasons of life, and lives from all the seasons. Sprinkles of grey in my friends’ beards, twinkles of gold in my childrens’ eyes. Snow, dinosaurs, aquariums, hot chocolate, matching pj’s. I wrapped up Aleksander in a big warm towel after his swimming lesson, heard Elia fill the hall with giggles in the home we moved to in 1993, during the March Break of grade 9. Reminisced with Ryan about our long ago week in Banff, hugged my neighbours and agreed we should never have left Rome, laughed then cried with Eddie about how life can be so funny and so hard, sometimes at the same time. Dalia and I aimed to watch a movie but never actually managed. We ate pizza and kebabs and roast duck and homemade dinners. We talked about Sudan and Montreal and Vienna. And occasionally the future. Looked forward, hopefully, cautiously, with lingering uncertainty. Always rooted firmly in the present, in our unity, in the calm unassuming greatness of Canada and modern Canadianism.

My old friend Dave, over a pint and some wings, said that he hasn’t had time to follow the situation in the Middle East closely as a working father of three young children. I was up and down with envy at his statement. Maybe at another time I would have judged non-engagement with a global situation more harshly but this is exactly why I wanted to come to Canada myself, to have the possibility to momentarily not care. Not read daily reports, see emerging images, breathe in the tension of a state at war. Canada is not perfect and we heard our fair share of complaints, from education to healthcare to traffic to housing. But I didn’t shy away from reminding people: at least there are no missiles flying overhead. Which, without fail, struck them as entirely other-worldly and mostly alarmist – exactly as it should be.

Stay normal Canada. Please always just be normal.

Three Magical Years of a Beautiful Little Life

Aleksander turns three today.

It’s unfortunately a little bittersweet as today also marks the longest time I’ve been away from him. Mommy, Aleksander and baby brother Elia left Israel, where I now sit writing, exactly two weeks ago and their return date remains uncertain.

As though I needed any reminder of how much I miss and love him, the absence of his little steps, kicks, smiles, snuggles, kisses, hugs, laughs, looks and general amazingness really crystallizes my absolute devotion to him, and joy and gratefulness of being his dad in all the moments, big and small.

I’m not sure when exactly it happened but we have a fully fledged toddler on our hands. Kind, decisive, occasionally difficult, exploring, enthusiastic, aware, alight, loving, warm, thoughtful, energetic, clever, fun, funny, polite, dynamic, eager, precise.

It still remains an absolute pleasure and privilege to witness Aleksander’s growth and development up close. Seeing baby steps turn into toddler phrases over a million little increments, all along his path to becoming who he’ll be.

This year Aleksander graciously welcomed his little brother Elia into our family and onto the planet. Since the very first moment, he’s been nothing but caring and considerate as a big bro. Gentle, inclusive, excited. He has inhabited his new role naturally, not needing too many pep talks or guidelines about how to love, support, hold, help and cuddle our sweet newborn. Aleksander has always had a generous and compassionate heart and it’s deeply rewarding to see his character in action as our family has expanded.

If the first year of his life was about newness and adaptation; the second movement; this past year has been about communication. He’s gone from a handful of words to fairly coherent sentences between his second and third birthdays. It’s allowed us to get to know him even better, understand his needs and perspective, delight in his creativity and worldly wordiness. He chats and chats, jokes and explains, dances and jumps, directs and distracts. I love his sweet little voice, so sincere, so true.

I’m swooning a bit aren’t I?!

It’s hard not to. Dalia always says that, as a family, we’re meant to be together. And as challenging as parenting can be, especially now with two, there is not a single thing on Earth I can think of wanting to do more, in any given moment, than spending time with my’s Aleksander. Doing something or doing nothing, it doesn’t matter, because it’s actually doing everything.

Aleksander, my big boy, I love you beyond words and beyond anything. I love you will all my heart and forever will.

Tel Aviv, Tel Avivians and Us – One Month In

We arrived in Tel Aviv from Rome exactly one month ago today, on an all too easy 3.5 hour flight down the Mediterranean. In hindsight, the straightforward nature of the travel logistics did not align in any way with the otherwise almost complete life overhaul between these two relatively close cities and countries (if not necessarily cultures).

All that to say, waking up in our apartment in Rome, with newborn and toddler one day, and falling asleep in a new home in Tel Aviv the same evening made for some serious sensory whiplash.

Alas, all is going well – or somehow better than I had honestly anticipated given those circumstances. Aleksander has started French school and mostly integrated without a hitch (on espère); Elia continues to grow, sleep, nurse, and has even begun to smile and coo; Dalia is making the most of her second go-round of maternity leave, walking the boys on the boulevards with iced coffee in hand and making activity dates with school moms; and I’ve begun my new job (same job, different place) and have found lunch, coffee and grocery spots as needed. The basics seem to be mostly covered.

Tel Aviv is a bit hard to describe. In parts, completely dilapidated, hipsterly-so, and in others, modern skyscrapers and construction cranes, à la Dubai. Kensington Market one moment and Bay Street the next. Plus, add a beach.

I’ve never had the pleasure of living in a proper beach town and I used to joke that I never trusted people who did because ending your day in flip flops and a sandy wavey sunset just doesn’t feel real enough real life.

In any case, the beach is about a 25 min walk from our home and we may have already caught a few sublime sunsets while buskers sing radiohead tunes, people do agressive calisthenics or play beach volleyball (strangely enough, just as often with their feet), and Aleksander climbs world class play structures while getting covered in dust-fine sand. Like I said, not really real life stuff; pretend temporary life indulgences.

Otherwise, the city is not very readily classifiable. Tel Avivians like to compare it to Miami but I’d say they’re overshooting on that one. There’s definitely more American street culture here than any other subset: burgers, beaches, lattes, longboards, athletic wear, etc. But, of course, this is not the U.S. I can’t say that we feel it’s particularly European either, somehow too casual for that, and certainly on an entirely different wavelength than Rome: smaller, younger, beachier. So, Tel Aviv is Tel Aviv, maybe at best it’s the Mediterranean lovechild of Montreal and Barcelona, that was then immediately estranged from its parents.

Tel Avivians appear to be the type of people drawn to such a place: keen to live in a (mostly) Jewish beach paradise.

There are lots of 20 somethings (and older wannabes), patios and tattoo shops. There are also loads of families (or maybe that’s mostly who we notice in the AI inspired playgrounds). And then others: Orthodox Jews zipping by on e-bikes; Russian grocery store clerks; Eritrean line cooks; Filipino nannies; almost middle-aged tech looking bros; aspiring cross-fit champions on every square metre of the kilometres-long beach boardwalk; 19 year old Israelis in their military training camo, at the coffee shop, automatic weapon in one hand, current love interest in the other; grannies on quiet park benches.

Regardless of all that, we’re pretty occupied just doing us, surviving, settling, adapting, starting to look ahead from a novel perspective. Life with two kids under three is full. So far we’re thankfully approaching it with some serenity: soaking in as much of Elia’s newborn vibes as we can, smelling his little baby head and kissing his squishy cheeks a million times a day.

School dropoffs aren’t proving to be as romantic and laid back as in Rome. The price of absolutely everything is so astonishingly high as to almost be physically painful. And, of course, we’ve gone from two plus years of actively integrating into Roman life – the language, gestures, food, rhythms, piazzas, countryside, olive oil and gelato and mozzarella. To doing a full cultural reboot in less time than it takes to watch The Godfather trilogy. Hummus, Hebrew, Rosh Hashanah. And that’s all without effectively leaving this city. The beach bubble of Tel Aviv. The beach bubble within an Iron Dome.

We still don’t entirely know what to expect here over the next three years but so far it’s comfortable living and often feels like a city built primarily with children in mind, so in that sense, we’re off to a positive start. And we look forward to see what this place and its people have in store for us.

– Yom Kippur, 2023