Nefesh B'Nefesh in Israel - Not

So here's something important for you to know. NBN is an organization that promotes aliyah, largely through advertising, through providing information on a website, through a small amount of on-line information sessions, through arranging flights, and through helping you with the immigration paperwork. It helps. It's free to the recipient even though it costs the donors, including Israel's Jewish Agency, in general a fortune. The money does not appear to be well spent, but I'll leave that for the donors to examine.

That's really it. Once you get to Israel, NBN disappears. They remind me of a car salesman. Before the sale, you think you found a new pal. Once you drive that car out of the lot, you never met him.

In America, their ads appear every time you log onto the computer. That all stops once your IP address shows Israel.

They organize a tiyul or two in your first year or two. There is some lady who gives some help with job search. But that's it. It's nothing you couldn't get supplied elsewhere.

Am I criticizing them? Yes, but more importantly I am just outlining the reality. NBN is not your family in Israel. In fact, unless you have family, nobody is your family here. All the platitudes about the nation of Israel being a family, well maybe that occurs on some supernatural plane, but you won't see it in your actual life here. In fact, most people are so busy with their own lives, and the atmosphere here is so generally unfriendly, that you'll find yourself quite alone in the way of getting support.

NBN has a buddy family "program." How does the program work? They give a family your name. That's the program. NBN doesn't teach the family how to be a buddy, doesn't give them parameters, tips, doesn't check up on anything.

So what happened with us? We had two buddy families. We contacted the first and were told that they weren't available for a few months as they had family over. What the heck? That's not helpful. The first few months are when you really need them. We got rid of them and got a second, a family we knew from America. We told the coordinator, make sure you tell them that have to make us feel wanted. We called them. Never heard from them. They never even had us over. We complained to the coordinator but never heard back from her.

So that's NBN. You are dealing with a car salesman, only the car salesman knows he's out to make a buck. The NBN staffer actually sees him or herself as an idealistic person or is doing the great mitzvah of getting you to Israel. What happens when you get here is irrelevant.