Hi, I’m Nitzan, you might know me as the girl who got stuck in the Aardvark elevator for an hour and a half. But never mind that I was a proud citizen of the Ofek community last semester and now an equally proud Eitan community member. Meaning I am an honorary Tel Avivian for a whole year. I want to say MAZAL TOV, you have officially taken your first steps to become an Aadvark Israel member, waking up at the ungodly hours before 7 am and arriving at a new address on a random street that will soon turn into your home. In my experience over the past 4-ish months, I learned the most important thing. That I am not alone. Coming here my first week, knowing basically no one, my initial feelings were that I was alone. Physically, I was never alone in my apartment of 5, and my madrichim, the community manager, and the neighbors looking through the window, and the street cats, and of course Ben dod. But it was still hard. It wasn’t until I took a deep breath and looked around that I realized everyone is just really good at being masking their emotions. The more and more I talked about how uncomfortable and how difficult this crazy adjustment was, the more we all began to see that we were in fact all feeling the same way. In this big balagan (craziness), the choice that helped me the most was to opt in, to say yes even to things that at the moment felt lame, but actually helped me connect to my soon-to-be friends. It was through the late-night AM-PM runs, the collective laundry dates, and tossing a frisbee while waiting for the bus that I connected with my soon-to-be friends. That made my first semester so full of joy. The point is that this is the semester of your making! my advice? be lame, say hi, and remember to take a deep breath, look at each other, and see we are all in this together!
