April 9, 2005

Alison on Aliyah:  A Friendship That Spans All Boundaries

            When I first began to seriously contemplate making aliyah, I remember worrying that I would never truly “fit in.”  I will never forget one day when I turned to one of my best friends with a fearful wail and asked him if I would ever find friends who really understood me in such a foreign country.  All the friends I had already made in Israel on my various trips here didn’t matter.  “How will anyone truly understand my sense of humor?” I beseeched him, both of us knowing full well that my humor is based solely on Seinfeld, Saturday Night Live, ‘80s movies, and an array of potty jokes, few fit for public arenas.

            Although I worried about this in the recesses of my mind for quite some time, it didn’t take me long to build up a group of good friends and a solid support system in Israel.  Of course, many of my closest friends here are Americans, new immigrants like myself who are equally well-versed in my favorite TV shows and movies.  I now worry that I will continue to sequester myself in the “American bubble” that tends to surround us immigrants, whether we like it or not.  We are bound by experiences too similar to not draw us together, and differences from our families and friends back in the “old country” too large to ignore.

            I have one unique friend in Jerusalem, however, who makes me think that there is hope for the Israeli inside me after all.  He owns a shop in the Machane Yehuda market in the center of Jerusalem – in fact, the only non-kosher shop for miles in any direction.  Leave it to me to be drawn to a store that gets religious Jews demonstrating once a week against its very presence in its strongly kosher surroundings.  Dudu (a nickname for David) is fiercely Jewish, however, and his father owned a shop in the market when he was Dudu’s age.  He simply found an untapped market (Russian specialty foods) back when it was still untapped, and his store is arguably one of the most successful in the market.

            I met Dudu about three hours after getting off my aliyah flight from New York.  He wanted to pet my dog, and after telling him that we were both three-hour-old new immigrants, he told me that if I ever needed anything, he would be there to help.  Little did I know he meant it – from that day forward, Dudu has not once faltered in his support.  He has lent me money, advised me on my car purchase, used his connections all over the city when I have needed special help with a utility company or government office, and even accompanied me on my first apartment hunt in Be’er Sheva.

            The other day, I was hanging out talking with him at his store, and he said something to me in English.  This was the first time I had ever heard a word of English come out of his mouth, and my jaw dropped.  I was as shocked as I would have been had my dog sauntered up to me and started reciting the Gettysburg Address in Chinese.  It was the first time I realized that Dudu and I know each other only in Hebrew.  From the moment I met him, I spoke only Hebrew with him, because it was clear that his English is close to non-existent.  As our friendship progressed, I would come to the shuk daily and spend hours in his shop, just practicing my Hebrew in our own private lessons.  He has known me since I was barely able to express myself to him at all.

            And now, a year and a half after that fateful first meeting, I am able to converse freely with him in Hebrew.  We talk about how the past week went for both of us, how his kids are, our respective relationships, and my classes.  We talk about deep psychological issues, we share intimate details about our lives, and we laugh together all the time.  He is one of my best friends, and he has never once heard me express myself in my mother tongue.

            The other day I asked him to describe me, thinking surely that something had gotten lost across the mutual language barrier.  He looked at me, grinned broadly, and said, “From the moment I met you I knew you were smart, not just smart but sharp as a tack.  And you are honest, a straight-shooter.  You’re kind and you’re a good person.”  I, not content with these generalizations, pushed him, asking how he knew these things from the beginning, through our broken conversations and my inability to really “be me” in Hebrew.  “I just knew,” he said.  “Some things exist beyond language.”

            And I realized, for the first time, that certain things really do span boundaries of all kinds.  Dudu has never seen Saturday Night Live, but we make each other laugh all the time.  He has never heard me talk about my experiences in college, but he knows I’m intelligent.  Perhaps we actually know more about each other because we are somewhat limited in our abilities to communicate, and perhaps we communicate on other levels entirely.  We are pretty different, Dudu and I, but sometimes I think he knows me better than anyone.