Avi Rubin's Blog

Harbor Labs - my new venture

2012-01-24T16:56:00.000-05:00

When I returned from Israel, I decided to leave the security consulting company that I founded in 2005. While I enjoyed my time at ISE, and I learned a tremendous amount about business and the security industry, I felt it was time for me to move on. I am focusing a lot more energy now on building up the security group at Johns Hopkins, and I'm very excited about our new executive director who I believe is leading the way to great success. We expect to hire up to two faculty in Security this year, and we are pouring tremendous energy and funding into our information security institute.

Meanwhile, I have founded a new company called Harbor Labs, which is a consulting company focused on the litigation industry. The objective of Harbor Labs is to provide expertise in legal cases, including testimony, reports, source code review and analysis. My goal is to partner with other experts and to put together a technical team that can support either a plaintiff team or a defense team by de-mystifying technical concepts and presenting the facts in a clear and understandable manner.

I have been working as an expert witness in high tech litigation on and off for sixteen years. How do I decide whether or not to take on a case? First, I determine whether or not I or any of my partners or employees have any conflicts of interest with any of the parties. Assuming that we pass the conflict check, I then listen to the lawyer's explanation of the lawsuit to evaluate whether they have a good case and that they are on the right side of the issues, and that I have the proper domain expertise. If I feel that their case cannot be supported by the facts, that the lawyers misunderstand the technical issues involved, or that the subject matter is outside of my area, then I politely decline.

At this point, it might seem that no case can ever clear these hurdles. But, many of them do. The next step in my decision is to utilize whatever information the lawyers share with me to assess if I am speaking with the party that ought to prevail in the case. If that is so, I contemplate whether or not the case is interesting, if I like the attorneys involved, and whether it is worth putting time and energy into the project. Finally, I decide if I have the time and resources available for the job, or if someone on my staff is available to do the work. If all of these criteria are met, then we sign the engagement agreement, and move forward.

It is an involved process, but I firmly believe it is important to vet the projects up front to the extent possible. I also make sure that the lawyers understand that I will only tell the truth, whether it helps or hurts their case. If they don't want to hear what I really think, or if they are afraid that I might say something that puts their case in jeopardy, then they need to find a different expert. Gauging the attorneys' reaction to this statement is one of the best ways that I have found to decide if this is a team I want to join.

My model at Harbor Labs is to utilize my technical staff for all of the aspects of the project that they can handle, and to only get involved myself when I am needed. Thus, I am able to work on projects that are much larger than I would be able to handle on my own, given my commitments at the university and at home.

I am happy to accept resumes from anyone interested in joining the technical team at Harbor Labs, or to discuss partnerships with other experts who testify in high tech litigation. Contact me at rubin@HarborLabs.com.

FAQ

2011-07-05T04:47:00.001-04:00

Spend a year in Israel, and you encounter many questions from curious Israelis and Americans. As we prepare to fly back to Baltimore tonight, let me take some time to answer the most frequently asked questions.

Are you going to stay in Israel?
This surprising question was the most common one asked by Israelis. They must be used to Americans who make aliya (move to Israel) because our response was often greeted with disbelief. Many Israelis whom we barely met resorted to arguments and bribes in an effort to persuade us to move here permanently. For example, the bike shop owner who rented us our bikes for the year offered that we could keep the bikes for another year at no charge if we stay. The bookstore owner where be bought the kids' school books promised us that we would be back and that we would stay for good the next time we returned. And many of the teachers at the children's school and the parents of their friends cajoled us with the good life that is to be had in Israel.

After almost a year in this country, I now expect some comment about staying in Israel when I meet someone, and it is the unusual Israeli who does not broach this subject. In fact, at this point, I am insulted when I meet someone and they do not ask me to stay. "What's the matter, you don't want me here? You don't like me?"

We had a great year; we learned a lot; we made great friends and spent time with old friends, but this country is not our home. I expect that we will visit many more times, and that we will perhaps have another extended stay some day. But our permanent home is in the United States, and we can't wait to get back there.

What were the highlights of your year?
There were so many incredible experiences that it is hard to limit this answer to just a few. Here is a summary of the most memorable aspects of our time here:

Passover Seder at the Gevas: We sat outside in a beautiful tent and shared the Seder with 31 friends and relatives of the Gevas. It was a traditional Seder in the deepest sense, and I gave our hosts the ultimate compliment when I told them that my father would have loved it. We had all of the customary foods, games for the kids, four questions, stimulating discussions, a major power outage, delicious food in outrageous quantities, amazing desserts, afikoman, and singing late into the night.
Negev trip: We took several long trips this year, and none as interesting, exciting and fun as our weeklong trip to the Negev and Eilat. We visited Timna National Park, one of the most wondrous places I've ever been; slept in a Bedouin tent village; rode camels; hiked Ein Avdat, with its harrowing trails; toured Sde Boker, the burial place of Ben Gurion; drove through Mitzpeh Ramon with breathtaking views and colorful sand; and of course stayed in Eilat, one of the most gorgeous and fun places on Earth. We snorkeled, took an underwater boat ride through coral reefs, ate amazing meals, and celebrated Hanukkah each night, lighting candles at various sites that we visited and in our hotels.
Trip up North: The week before Pesach, we went North to the Upper Galilee. These were some of the most gorgeous hikes I've ever experienced. My favorite was Tel Dan, which I liked even more than the most popular Banas. We visited Fort Nimrod, Mount Hermon, and many other beautiful natural wonders.
Yehuda Poliker and David Broza concerts: These two artists have been among my favorite lifetime musicians. We had the good fortune of seeing Poliker at the intimate Zappa club where we set 2 meters from the stage and listened to almost three hours of him belting out old favorites while I and the rest of the crowd sang along. Yom Shishi At Yoda'at was unbelievable, and I got goose bumps during Kshetigdal. We then saw David Broza in concert with the Israel Philharmanic at the new Cultural Center auditorium downtown by the Opera building. A memorable evening.
Ari's Bar Mitzvah: My newphew had his Bar Mitzvah at the Kotel. My entire family except for Tova's branch came to Jerusalem, and we spend several days together wining, dining and celebrating in honor of Ari. Then, my sister Rachel and her family stayed in Tel Aviv for a week, and we got to spend a lot of time with them.
Receiving visitors: One of the mot enjoyable aspects of living in Israel is that many of our friends visited. Getting together in Israel is particularly special. I enjoyed spending time here with the Bellovins, Blavits, Getz, Whitemans, Malkin, Boneh, Leshinskys, Glazer, Greenberg, the Fortify gang, Jacob and Liz, and others as they came through Israel. The best part was spending six weeks with my parents. The kids really got to know their Bube and Zayde, and we enjoyed seeing them just about every day while they were here.
The Tayelet: The 11 km boardwalk along the West Coast of Israel spans from Yaffo to Tel Baruch beach, which is right near our apartment. During most of our stay, I biked on the tayelet several times a week. The views are breathtaking. Every Friday morning, Ann and I biked to the Namal (the port) and bought items at the market for that evening's Shabbat dinner, a ritual that I will sorely miss.
Chopping the top three spots in a big poker tournament: It took me a while, but I finally broke into the poker scene in Tel Aviv. I had a blast getting to know the game in Israel, playing at least once a week and sharing first place in my only tournament this year. I made some great friends at my regular games, and I plan on getting together with them again to play cards whenever I'm in Tel Aviv again.
Soccer at the Yarkon Park: Most Sunday mornings, I played soccer with a group from the US embassy. The game was fun and friendly, and hopefully kept me in decent shape to return to my regular games back in Baltimore.

What do you miss the most from back home?

You don't realize just how great life is in the United States until you spend significant time somewhere else. Perhaps the most difficult part of living in another country is the feeling that you do not understand how things work. The bureaucracy and the laws have subtle differences that place you in awkward situations, exacerbated by the language barrier. I miss knowing how to get things done, realizing what resources are available, and being able to manage myself comfortably in most situations.

Are you glad that you did this?

Yes. This was one of the best years of my life, and one of the most important ones for my family.

How was the year in Israel for the kids?

I think the kids will appreciate this year more when they look back on it than they did while they were here. It is very difficult for a 12 year old to adjust to a completely new environment, a different language, and a set of classmates who are all new to her. Elana handled it like a champion, and although the first several months were very challenging, I believe she would agree that she is a better and stronger person for the experience. She now has a greater appreciation of the world and of her lot in life, and I believe being away helped her forge even stronger ties with her best friends back home.

The twins had a much easier adjustment. Eight year olds accept new kids much more readily than twelve year olds, and there was at least one English speaking kid in each of their classes. Tamara and Benny each found a "best friend" here, and in fact, the separation as we head home is hard for them.

All three of our kids learned Hebrew and can now speak, understand, read and write fluently. This was one of our primary objectives in coming here, and I could not be more proud. Elana declared that she is going to speak Hebrew to her children so that they will have an easier time learning it than she did.

How would you summarize your experience?

Leaving home for this much time is not easy. We took a big risk, and as a result, we experience a year of immeasurable value. All five of us improved our Hebrew language skills. Ann studied at an Ulpan and can now understand any simple conversation and can communicate the basics when speaking. I feel entirely fluent, and the kids have a very good grasp of the language.

Israel is a unique and wonderful place. But, it is full of cultural, religious, and racial tensions. There is a persistent terrorist threat, and the people of Israel have as much trouble getting along with each other as they do with their neighbors. It is sometimes easy to forget that all of the Jews in Israel share a heritage. The country is at the same time divided and yet more united than any other place. When missiles fly in from Gaza or Lebanon and when neighboring armies threaten to invade, people unite as though family.

It will take a long time to fully process this experience. I will miss many aspects of living in Israel, while at the same time, I am relieved to head home, back to our normal lives in the States.

Advice for Israelis coming to the US

2011-05-20T16:36:00.011-04:00

Congratulations, you've received an offer from a US academic institution, and now you're going to spend a year or two abroad. I have prepared some advice for you to help you adjust to the cultural differences between our two countries. My observations are by no means exhaustive, but hopefully provide enough guidance to get you through your year with minimal discomfort, awkwardness, and embarrassment. Here is a top ten list, in the spirit of David Letterman (Don't worry, you'll know who he is pretty soon.).

Top 10 Cultural Differences

10. Dress code

On my first day of work at Tel Aviv University, I arrived at the office wearing dress slacks and a button down shirt, what I would call business casual. I got the casual part right. Needless to say, on the second day, I showed up in shorts and a T-shirt. The US is a lot more formal than Israel, so don't throw out those flip flops or sandals, but before you wear them to work, see how the others dress.

If you are invited to dinner at someone's house, I would not recommend jeans or shorts, especially if it's Shabbat dinner. In a fancy restaurant, you may need a coat and tie. I have been in Israel for almost a year, and I have not worn a tie once despite experiencing Rosh Hashana, Yom Kippur, a Bar Mitzvah, and an upcoming wedding, to which I will not wear a tie. We easily spotted the American students in shul on Yom Kippur - the only ones wearing ties except the Rabbi (and he's American). Every one of those occasions in the US requires a suit. This advice is geared towards men, as the complexities of the female dress code are well beyond me. For expert advice on this topic, I refer you to my 9 and 12 year old daughters.

9. Respect for advisor

Even if you do not respect your advisor or mentor in the US, you should pretend you do. In Israel, it is not uncommon to tell your advisor that he is wrong to his face. A proper Israeli advisor will respect your candor before yelling at you and explaining why he is never wrong. The correct way to express the same sentiment to an American advisor is to hesitantly ask if he might have considered another way of looking at the issue. Then wait for him to ask what you mean. You will then have an opportunity to give your opinion, after which a proper American advisor will thank you and politely explain to you that he is never wrong.

In lab meetings in the US, it is customary to let people finish what they are saying in a discussion. The more people in the meeting, the more formal the behavior. It is not uncommon to have brief intervals of silence as the participants look towards those higher in the pecking order to see if they want to speak, and only then, if the opportunity presents itself, make their contribution to the discourse. Of course, I'm exaggerating, but if you are used to the way lab meetings run in Israel, this is a close approximation of what it will look like.

8. Driving

Lay off the horn. In most American cities, you will hear cars honk their horns fewer times in a year than in one afternoon in Tel Aviv. Drivers in the US are much calmer and more laid back than the ones you are used to. However, as you approach bigger cities, especially in the Northeast, you will start to feel more at home on the roads.

You will not have painted sidewalks encoding the parking rules, so you will have to observe signs to figure out where you can and cannot park. Also, while you are used to pulling up onto the sidewalk when street parking runs out, this is not advisable in the US, as your car will get towed.

Slow down. Speeding tickets are much more common in the US, and speed limit signs are not there only to provide humor and irony. If you see a car has the right of way, do not try to avoid eye contact with the driver to see if you can sneak in ahead of him. Americans will not look upon that as favorably as Israelis (although they are less likely to honk at you). Whatever you do, make sure you do not drink alcohol and drive. In many states you will go to jail, and in some states you will lose your license and possibly even your car. In many cities there will be checkpoints at night, especially on the weekend. The checkpoints are not there to check for legal documents as they are in Israel. Rather, someone may administer a breath test or ask you to walk in a straight line. It is not advised to joke around with these people under these circumstances. More on that later.

If you have no experience driving on snow or ice, do not attempt to do so. No matter how much confidence you have, and no matter how pressing the trip, you are better off hanging out at home in front of the fire. (Most houses have fireplaces in cities that get cold in the winter.)

7. Food and drink

In the States, social events tend to center more around alcohol than food (with the exception of Jewish events, which more closely resemble what you are used to). The typical home BBQ in Israel tends to resemble a gourmet 7 course meal. However, if you are invited over for a BBQ in the US, you can expect lots of beer and soda, hot dogs, hamburgers, potato chips, and if you are lucky, maybe potato salad or coleslaw. (Unless the people are Jewish, in which case you will get a huge spread that will always include 7 different flavors of cream cheese and a wide variety of bagels.)

While it is safe to try a random, unknown restaurant in Israel even if it is not very crowded, the typical, average restaurant in the US is quite bad. Unless you have a recommendation, the likelihood that you will get fresh ingredients and a chef with more training than at McDonalds is pretty low. The flip side is that the best restaurants in the top cities in the US are quite a bit better than in Israel, but they are very expensive. In any restaurant, you will also have to almost double your tip because you are expected to tip about 18%, give or take, depending on the service. (For that matter, tips are much more common in the US and are expected by taxi drivers, by the hairdresser, by the car valet, and by pretty much anyone in a hotel who makes eye contact with you.).

Here are some other aspects of eating in a US restaurant that you may find unusual. You can leave the tip on your credit card, and in fact it is expected. When you reserve a table for 7 pm, they will not tell you that you will have to clear out by 9. The waiter will not give you a hard time if you request a substitution of mashed potatoes for fries. In general, restaurants in the US are much more accommodating of substitutions, and they will actually put the dressing on the side when they say they will. If you ask if the chicken dish contains white meat, they only say yes if it is in fact white meat, whereas in Israel they always say yes, and it never is.

When I asked my wife for input on this blog posting, she said to make sure to mention that the desserts in restaurants are much better in the States (except for crepes, which are served widely in the land of milk and honey). When I asked an Israeli living in the US to comment on the differences between restaurants in the US and Israel, she said to be sure to mention that desserts in Israel are much better. So, we'll call this one a draw.

The following foods are better in the US: Chinese, Korean, Indian, and Mexican. Be sure to eat these often, as you will miss them when you return home.

The following foods are better in Israel, so be sure to have your fill before you depart: Hummus, pita, hummus, falafel, shawarma, eggplant, and hummus.

Americans eat earlier in the day than Israelis, perhaps due to the time difference. Lunch is at noon, and dinner is usually around 6. You are probably accustomed to eating a large lunch around 2 or 3 pm and then a light dinner. In the States, lunch is typically a sandwich or a salad, and dinner is the big meal. (Since I'm a dual citizen, I split the difference by eating a large lunch and a big dinner.) If you want to have dinner in a restaurant at 10 pm, make sure that it is open that late, and good luck finding someone to go with you. I suggest seeking out a European, a South American, or another Israeli as your dinner companion. Most Americans do not like to eat that late.

If you want shakshuka for breakfast, you will be sorely disappointed. Instead, you will typically find cereal, eggs, french toast, pancakes, or waffles. When you get back to Israel, you will miss skim milk, low fat yogurt that tastes good, the variety of cereals, and having any fruit you want any time of the year (but not nearly as fresh as in Israel). Did I mention that the Chinese food is very good in the States?

6. Guns and security

When you start living in the US, you will wonder how Americans survive. It will seem that there is no security anywhere, and you will not see any guns (If you do, run for cover.). At the shopping mall, no security guard will go through the trunk of your car, and there will not be a security check at every external doorway. College campuses do not have walls and gates around them. Nobody will look through your purse as you enter a building - if someone tries, alarm bells should go off in your head. The only places where you will feel at home are in government buildings and at the airport. Speaking of the airport, when you fly, you will have to take your shoes off at the security line. This accomplishes nothing, but please make sure to wear clean socks that day.

When you do see a security guard or a policeman, do not try to joke with them, as humor is not their strong suit, especially when they are dealing with Middle Easterners. Don't think that your Israeli accent will protect you, as most Americans cannot tell the differences among accents from the Middle East, and anyway, given the average education level of a security guard, he might not know that Israel is an ally.

In America nobody really thinks about terrorism. The culture shock is in the other direction, when Americans go to Israel. So, be prepared to have to re-adjust to security when you return to Israel. It is easy to get used to complacency, an unappreciated luxury in the States.

5. Grocery shopping

Grocery shopping is much less stressful in America. First of all, you will not be subjected to a security screening when you enter. Furthermore, the store will not hold 5 shekels hostage to provide you with a cart. People at the checkout line will be civil and will wait their turn. It is a lot less likely that there will be a mix-up at the checkout scanner than in Israel. In the rare instance where such a complication occurs, you do not need to worry about the people in line behind you starting to yell and complain that you are holding everything up. In fact, in many grocery stores, you will simply check yourself out at a self service station.

At the deli counter, most often, you will take a number and wait for your turn. If there is no number dispenser, then you can count on the customers keeping track of whose turn it is. When you return to Israel, you will have to re-acquire your pushing and shoving skills so that you are not shut out entirely at the deli counter.

The bread will never be as fresh as back home, but you will have many more choices of almost every product. For example, there are at least 40 different dry cereals to choose from, and any large supermarket is likely to stock all of them. So many options are available because unlike in your homeland, there is no boycott against companies that sell to the United States, and thus no spineless corporations conceding to the pressure not to sell to you.

In many states, supermarkets are not allowed to sell alcohol, so you will have to go to a liquor store for wine or beer. Some states, such as my home state of Maryland, do not allow stores to sell any alcohol on Sundays. So, make sure to stock up before then. Of course, since you are Israeli, you probably don't drink that much, and you are used to working on Sundays, so this is not really a big deal.

The express line operates differently in American grocery stores, and might take some getting used to. The 10 item limit is strictly enforced. It would not be considered normal for you to haggle and argue with the sales clerk and to raise your voice because you only have 11 items. It is even less likely that as you stood your ground, the people in line behind you would start to call you names and to yell at the clerk for not moving on. And do not expect six people to simultaneously yell at each other at the top of their lungs as a result of this unlikely confrontation. As you can see, the express line requires an adjustment period for any Israeli, and is perhaps the place where you will first start to feel homesick.

4. Smoking

If you smoke, you might want to skip this section. Not only because you might find it offensive, but also given that you do not have as long to live as the rest of us, you should probably do something more fun than reading my blog in your remaining time on Earth.

In the US, there are many more non-smoking places than in Israel, despite the fact that smoking is no longer allowed in most buildings there. Americans take their non-smoking rules very seriously, and they get very annoyed if people smoke where they are not supposed to. Most buildings are not only non-smoking, but require those partaking in this practice to stand a fixed distance from the entrances.

Among native Americans (not to be confused with Native American Indians), you will find very few smokers in the educated, academic community, and in fact, there is a social stigma associated with the practice of inhaling nicotine in many circles. It is highly unlikely that you will find a house where smoking is permitted, and most people will not let you even smoke in their yard, and definitely not around their children.

I might add that smoking is not good for you.

3. Sports

If you do not play any sports then you can safely skip this section. Also, you should really try tennis. It's so much fun.

I used to play soccer in Baltimore with a group of Israelis. There was always a lot of yelling, cursing and blaming throughout the game, after which everyone parted best of friends. Any American who plays soccer with Israelis for the first time is in for a culture shock. This cuts both ways. If you have the opportunity to play soccer, basketball, tennis, or any other sport with Americans, you will have to contain yourself. If someone makes a mistake, try "better luck next time" rather than, "what kind of pass was that, you idiot!" If someone doesn't pass you the ball, try "by the way, I was open" instead of "your mother is a billy goat!"

Ironically, I am now living in Israel and playing soccer in Tel Aviv with a group of Americans from the US embassy. The game is polite and civil as one would expect from your typical group of American adults. In most cases, friendly sports games played by grown ups in the US are cooperative, supportive and sportsmanlike. So, leave the yelling at home. If you are loud and confrontational, you will be very unpopular, and you will not be invited back, even though you are probably better at soccer than any of them (another reason they may not want to invite you back).

2. Gatherings and meetings

Two situations. Very similar, yet so different. Both true stories.

It was 2010 and the day before the children started school in Ramat Aviv Gimel, and the teacher held a meeting with the parents in the classroom. Most of the parents were wearing sandals, shorts and T-shirts. I felt overly dressed up in my jeans. The teacher managed to get through the first 3 minutes of her prepared remarks unscathed.

The first outburst came from the back of the room, "You are absolutely wrong! This is what's wrong with our school and with our educational system and with our government. This is why our children cannot learn anything!" The second outburst came from the other side of the room. "Shut up, she's trying to talk". Another parent offered up, "Can you guys stop arguing so that I can hear what the teacher has to say?" At that point, the teacher attempted to recover, but she did not get another chance to speak, as I remained the only person in the room who was not yelling. This went on for almost an hour, after which I went home and took some Advil.

It was 2009 and the day before the children started school in Stevenson, Maryland, and the teacher held a meeting with the parents in the classroom. The parents were dressed nicely. Some of them came from work in their suits, while others wore slacks or skirts and dressy shirts. I felt a bit under dressed in my jeans. The teacher went over the curriculum for the year. The parents all sat in attentive silence, most of them taking notes. The teacher then explained what the children needed to bring on the first day and what the parents needed to buy for them. The parents scribbled. After 45 minutes, the teacher asked if there were any questions. One of the parents stated, "I just wanted to tell you how excited we are that you will be teaching our children. We have heard such great things about you." There were nods of agreement. Another parent asked a question about the dress code for gym. After the teacher answered, she said that if there were no more questions then she thanks us for coming, and looks forward to a great year.

When you go to a gathering or a meeting in the US, you will need to act more like the parents in the Maryland school than in Ramat Aviv Gimel. Most meetings at the university in Israel degenerate to shouting matches at some point. This rarely, if ever happens in the US, and when it does, relationships are broken for life. In Israel, you can yell and scream at your friend or colleague, and then pick up where you left off the next day. In the States, if you yell and scream at someone, they will think you are a lunatic, they will be offended, and they might not consider you their friend anymore.

You might get cut some slack for being an Israeli, but I recommend, before arguing too enthusiastically with someone, that you see how others are behaving and follow suit.

1. Bureaucracy

In a previous blog posting, I wrote about bureaucracy in Israel and our nightmare story with the ministry of the interior. While it is true that the amount of red tape in Israel is overwhelming, the US has its own brand of institutionalized insanity.

Take the department of motor vehicles.

In Israel, the clerk will not necessarily be nice or polite (and in most cases rude), and might automatically say "no", but will bend the rules wherever possible (and impossible) to help you, once you go through the requisite arguing, lose your temper and start yelling.

In the US, the clerk will greet you nicely. So nicely, in fact that you will feel he is an old friend, and that you are likely to get whatever you want. But, still smiling, the clerk will tell you that he can't fulfill your request. No amount of pleading will sway him, and in fact, raising your voice will get you thrown out, and he might call the police (with whom you must remember not to crack jokes). Any increase in effort on your part to get your way will strengthen his resolve. You will be denied. In Israel, raising your voice is not only acceptable, it is somewhat expected. In the US, it is counter productive.

In the States, when you encounter resistance from a service representative on the phone, never raise your voice, but rather politely ask to speak with his supervisor. This may at times immediately result in getting what you want. Or, if the higher up gets involved, you may or may not get your way, but you will probably be treated with great respect, and that's got to be worth something.

Bureaucracy is not fun anywhere, and anyone who travels feels that the system is worse in the new country than back home. So let me assure you of this. Yours is worse.

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I hope that my top ten list has provided you with some guidance and a rough idea of the major cultural differences between Israelis and Americans. Have a wonderful trip, and I assure you that you will return to Israel as a more well rounded person who can poke as much fun at the American culture as I have at the Israeli one.

Yom Hashoa

2011-05-02T04:16:00.002-04:00

When I was 16, I traveled to Israel on a youth program through the Jewish Federation. As part of the trip, we toured Yad Vashem, the Holocaust museum in Jerusalem. I remember being traumatized by the experience. For days I was extremely upset and could not get over the magnitude of the tragedy, and oddly, I felt guilty for not being even more upset.

Years later, as an adult with a wife and a child, I visited Anne Frank's house in Amsterdam. The famous hiding place was converted to a museum. Once again I was haunted by the images and the story. I had nightmares for weeks. More recently, I visited the Holocaust museum in Washington DC, and I marveled at the human capacity for evil, beyond what a rational person could fathom.

For the last couple of weeks, preparation for the upcoming independence day festivities have been in full swing. Israeli flags are everywhere, hanging from rooftops, on cars, on buses, and on street corners. There is excitement in the air! But today, the city takes a break from joy to commemorate those who were killed by the nazis. As Yom Hashoa (Holocaust remembrance day) approached in Israel, the weight of the moment was tangible. The evening before restaurants and shops closed, and the children prepared for a memorial service at school. Experiencing Holocaust Day amid the backdrop of the Independence Day preparations provides an interesting mix of patriotism, excitement and gravity.

This morning, I woke up thinking about the Holocaust and about the seriousness of the day. As is my custom here each morning, I walked to the gym, but as I should have guessed, it was closed for Yom Hashoa. So, I decided to take my bike for a ride along the beach. I would get some exercise and reflect about Yom Hashoa and being in Israel among so many people who were personally touched by the Holocaust. As I was ready to leave home, I looked on my cell phone and saw a breaking news alert. Osama Bin Laden was killed by US forces. Osama Bin Laden was killed by US forces. I had to read it twice to believe it. I checked that the date was not April 1, and I quickly yelled to Ann to inform her of the startling news.

My first reaction to the death of the most evil human being on the planet was excitement and joy. I felt a pang of guilt at rejoicing over someone's death, but I quickly got over that. I felt it was appropriate that on the day that we mourn and remember our lost souls from the Holocaust, that we can take comfort in the justice that was served to Bin Laden today. Yes, today is somber, but the news about the extinction of the leader of Al Qaida definitely eases the pain.

I rode my bike along the tayelet, the boardwalk that stretches for 11 kilometers and links Tel Baruch beach with Yaffo. I rode through the Yarkon park and then down to Yaffo. On my way back, I noticed that it was about 9:30 a.m. and I had been riding for two hours. I had heard that at 10 a.m., sirens rang in Israel, and that everybody came to a halt and observed a minute of silence and remembrance. I thought about the best place to see and observe this, and decided to time my return ride so that I would be at a busy intersection in Tel Aviv. I arrived at the intersection of Derech Namir and Keren Kayement Leyisrael a few minutes before 10 and parked my bike. I sat on the street corner at a bus stop and waited.

I was not sure what to expect, and when my watch read 10:00 a.m. and nothing happened, I began to suspect that I had been mis-informed. Traffic was crazy. Cars weaving in and out and honking at each other, buses all around, motorcycles everywhere buzzing past me. Pedestrians crossing at the intersection. A typical Tel Aviv morning. And suddenly, there it was. A deep crescendo, and the sirens were wailing everywhere. What followed was like a scene out of a movie or a dream. I can't describe it any other way. As though on cue, everything froze. All of the cars stopped in their tracks, and all of the passengers stepped out. Every bike, motorcycle and pedestrian froze as well. It looked as though someone had paused the DVR of life.

One of the cars that was close to me was driven by an elderly man, I am guessing in his 80s. He stood next to his car with his head slightly tilted. He looked like he was crying. I examined the faces of the people on the road. Young, old, middle aged. Male, female. Suits, shorts, sandals, long hair, short hair; religious, secular. Every type of person was represented. And they all just stood there and stared straight ahead looking somber. I stood there and felt that my legs were shaking. It was the most religious experience I have ever felt. Almost 70 years had passed, and in this country, for one minute, I could feel the weight of the tragedy in a manner that I did not experience as a teenager at Yad Vashem nor at the Holocaust museum. A minute where the world stands still and everybody remembers.

And then, as though God pressed Play again on the DVR, everything was back to normal. Drivers jumped into their cars and tried to beat out the car in front of them, motorcycles revved up, pedestrians crossed the street, buses came and went. I stayed in my spot and observed life in Tel Aviv. So vibrant. Did that moment of silence really just happen? It was so fleeting. The longer I stood there the more incredible it seemed. And then I felt a strong emotional connection with life. The joke was on you, Hitler. The Jews not only survived. We thrived. Look at this city. Look at all these people. There are children playing in the parks, babies being born, buildings sprouting up left and right. Hitler, you were a complete failure. A joke. I spit on the ground to curse your memory, and I laugh out loud that our people are vibrant and alive. Every generation will have its Hitler and its Osama Bin Laden. But good will triumph over evil, as it did today.

Did America really not vote for Pia?

2011-04-08T15:23:00.000-04:00

Let me take a break from blogging about my Sabbatical in Israel to comment about an equally important topic, American Idol. In particular, electronic voting on American Idol. In past years, I've picked the top two or three (as did everyone else), when there were around ten contestants left, and it was pretty obvious that we were all correct. This year, I picked (as I assume did most people) Casey and Pia as the top two, or at least two of the top three (along with James).

Now, American Idol airs in Israel several days after the show happens, so I have not seen this week's episode. But I have been following the excitement online. I have to say that one of two things (or both) must be true. Either I am completely out of tune with the American Idol audience, or something is messed up in their voting system. Interestingly, I'm just saying, American Idol adopted a form of Internet voting this time around (for a terrific description of how it works, see Ben Adida's blog posting). Unlike voting in public elections, people are actually encouraged to vote multiple times, up to a limit, and votes are not private.

So, a few weeks ago, Casey (touted by Randy as the most talented contestant ever on the show) was voted off early to everyone's shock. The judges saved him. Now Pia, my personal prediction to win the whole thing, was reportedly voted off. The judges have no more saves, but would clearly have saved her if they could. Is something going on with the voting? Who knows, but when Internet voting systems produce unexpected results such as this, questions will be asked. Personally, I'm very sorry to see her go, and I can't believe people really voted this way. I will miss Pia, and I am starting to doubt the integrity of the voting on American Idol. Or, maybe I'm just out of tune with pop culture. Yeah, that's probably it.

We're staying!!

2011-04-01T00:57:00.001-04:00

This Sabbatical year has been a transformative experience for me and my family. While we always enjoyed our lives in Baltimore, there was always a feeling that something was missing. I was never able to put my finger on it. Was it a great, supportive community? No, we had that. Was it inner peace? No, we achieved that. Not until we spent some time in the holy land did we realize that what we were really missing was not a single, individual object or feeling, but something intangible, something bigger than all of us. There is an expression that you don't know what you had until it is gone (I think Shimon Peres said that about the Sainai desert.). In our case, we did not know what we were missing, until we had it. Humus on every street corner. Falafel on every plate. Shawarma wherever you look. But it's not just the food, it's the whole package. Israel completes us. They had me at "Shalom!"

So, it is with a heavy heart and a full stomach that I'm letting you know that we have decided to stay in Israel, and that we will be moving to Tel Aviv permanently. The heart is heavy because we will miss our home and our friends in the States. I will miss Sunday morning soccer, the Baltimore Ravens, poker with my favorite donkeys, the JHU computer science department, and two day weekends. Ann will miss her regular mahjong group, tennis league, Hadassa Gila meetings and events, ladies night out, and English. I would say what Elana is missing, but I'm having trouble finding out because we're currently not on speaking terms, and I've stationed a guard at the house and one at the airport to make sure she stays in Israel. The twins don't remember what it was like in America, so there's no issue there.

Since we're going to be in Israel, we have also decided to complete a lifelong dream and to become observant Jews. It is much more convenient to be religious in Israel, and given the shifting demographics in this country, we have decided to chose the team that is growing fastest and most likely to win. I'm not too thrilled about the whole not driving on Saturday aspect of this, or the daily leather straps, but I see advantages as well. For example, I've noticed an increasingly growing bald spot on the back of my head, which I will now be able to hide under my yarmulkah. As part of our transformation, we have decided to adopt more religious names. Going forward, Ann will be known at Tsirl. Please call me Mendl, and our kids will be Yentl, Tentl, and Bentl. We are also going to adopt a dog and call him Bob.

We are so excited about celebrating all of the Jewish holidays in Israel from now on. The only real downer, and it's a big one, is that April Fools Day is not observed that much here in Israel. It's always been my favorite holiday. The time of year that I get to say, in a loud voice: APRIL FOOLS!

Purim 2011 in Tel Aviv

2011-03-30T04:22:00.000-04:00

Purim in Hebrew means "lots". Having lived in Tel Aviv now for over 7 months, I do not think it's unreasonable to celebrate parking lots. But actually, the story of Purim has to do with the evil haman (I prefer not to capitalize his name), who cast lots to determine on what day to kill the Jewish people. Queen Esther found out about it, and she and Mordechai managed to foil the plot. That's the abridged version, but there is literally a Megilah describing everything that happened. It is often said (and please forgive the cliche) that most Jewish holidays can be summed up in three short sentences:

They tried to kill us. They failed. Let's eat.

I wish I could be as brief, but my description of Purim in Israel requires a deeper exposition. This holiday in the land of the Jews is a complex cross pollination among multiple world events, with several mutations. Think Mardi Gras in New Orleans meets Carnaval in Brazil meets Halloween in the US, with a hint of Hanukkah and a dab of crazy. It's a week-long holiday filled with costumes, joy, parties, gift giving, parades, festivities, and rituals. A week I'm sure the kids will remember for a long time and will sorely miss in years to come. It's the Purim I grew up with as a young child in Haifa, and which is unique to Israel.

The week leading up to Purim was filled with holiday-related activities at school. The children dressed up in costumes one day, celebrated upside-down day another (I still haven't figured out what that means), wore special colors, and silly outfits yet another time. Every day had its theme. On the streets, people of all ages wore costumes the entire week. It was so strange to walk down a wide boulevard in downtown Tel Aviv and to encounter at least 30% of the adults in elaborate costumes, walking along as though nothing was unusual.

Cleopatra

Ninja

Sponge Tamara Square Pants

Like all Jewish holidays, the celebration begins at sundown the night before. On Erev Purim, we ate an early dinner with my parents and another friend from our congregation and then walked over to the community center that houses our conservative shul in Ramat Aviv Gimel. I was probably the only person not in costume. Even my parents surprised me by dressing up.

The primary ritual of Purim is the reading of Megilat Esther, the scroll containing the story of Purim. We arrived at services for the Megilah reading a bit early. The sanctuary consisted of a room with about 75 chairs by my estimation. By the time services were set to begin, it appeared that twice that many people showed up, including a delegation of high school students from the United States whose counselor was less than pleased about the accommodations. Our quick thinking Rabbi came up with a solution, and we began passing chairs from one end of the room out the window in the back, where someone received them and stacked them into piles. Soon, we had a side of the room with chairs for those who needed them, and most of the shul was standing room only. Ad libbing is one of the most crucial skills in Israel, and I give the Rabbi high marks.

The Megliah reading, if done properly, is one of the most entertaining and enjoyable activities in Judaism, and I dare say in the entire world, at least what I've seen of it. When I was growing up in Nashville, the congregants used to literally flip the Rabbi three times throughout the service, as the rest of the congregation cheered on. It is a mitzvah (commandment) to drink so much on Purim that you get drunk. In our Orthodox synagogue that I attended as a child, no mitzvah was observed with such dedication, fervor and enthusiasm as this one. After all, we were commanded to drink, so bottoms up!

As the reader recites the story of Purim from the Megilah, with a special tune that is only used on this holiday, the children are at the ready. Armed with noisemakers and groggers, they hang on every word waiting for that infamous name whose utterance will send the place into a wild and raucous frenzy. In my synagogue in Nashville, there was a game played where the reader pretended to try to say haman's name so fast that the children would miss it, and he would continue. Of course, the kids always caught him. But here, there was no such play. Before the first utterance of that evil name, the reader built up to a crescendo and exclaimed, "HAMAN!!" and then paused. And we broke loose. People shouted their boos, while others banged on anything that would make noise. The groggers spun while parents for once encouraged their children to make as much noise as possible. The remainder of the evening, every time the reader said, haman, the noise would repeat, the intensity rising, as the parents' enthusiasm for the noise level gradually decreased.

The Rabbi here added an interesting element to the reading. Between chapters, children performed Purim songs on various musical instruments. We were given two week's notice, but Benny and Tamara worked hard and prepared songs. Benny rocked the house with Chag Purim on the piano. It was actually pretty incredible. He played it loudly and really well, and the entire room sang along. I could see he was having a blast. Tamara decided to play her song on the recorder, an instrument that she learned to play in school here. She played the same song, and everyone sang along as well.

On Purim day, we went to the nearby city of Holon to view the largest Purim day parade in the country. The population of Tel Aviv is about 400,000, and it seemed all of them beat us there. I was unable to find legal parking, and rather than describe what I did with the car, let's just say that my photograph is hanging prominently in the Holon post office. Wanted! …for extreme parking behavior. We walked to the center of town where we utilized the cell phone algorithm to successfully find my parents, perhaps the latest in a string of miracles performed by God in Israel. It was the biggest parade I've ever witnessed. While I'm not a huge fan of crowds, this experience was worth it, except for the part where Elana and I freaked out as we were caught in a mob trying to go in the opposite direction of another mob. We were trapped for several minutes in a sea of bodies all seemingly with the intent of getting from one side of us to the other, with the incorrect assumption that going through us was quicker than going around us.

As fate would have it, Purim this year was also Elana's 12th birthday. We celebrated by going to dinner with my parents and our friends the Gevas. We had a long table at Max Brenners, and the kids (and their parents and grandparents) pigged out on chocolate-based delicacies. Outside, we were treated to a parade of party goers in outrageous costumes heading to a club next door where a high faluten Purim party was getting underway.

When we came to Israel for a year's Sabbatical, I anticipated that Purim, along with Independence Day, would be one of the highlights of our experience, and my expectations were exceeded. What a week!

Four months left

2011-03-09T07:47:00.001-05:00

Parking at Tel Aviv University (and in this city in general) is not unlike my favorite hobby of playing poker. It requires patience, skill, and a decent amount of luck. In fact, for the last six months, getting into the parking lot at work was a test of wits. I arrived at the university gate armed with my letter from the Dean of Engineering stating that I am a visiting professor here. Most often, that did the trick. However, at times, the security guard was particularly prickly and would not accept the letter. "No sticker, no parking!" he would declare, sounding a bit like the Soup Nazi on Seinfeld. As the line of cars behind me grew, along with the volume of their honking, I would reason with him. "Listen, I am a visiting professor here. I need to get in to do my job. This is no way to treat visitors." Sometimes it worked, sometimes it didn't. Either way, I drew satisfaction from knowing that I was developing my negotiating skills in Hebrew, an important capability for day to day survival in Israeli society.

When I first arrived at the computer science department back in August, I filled out some paperwork requesting a parking sticker. I was warned that it takes some time because the bureaucracy is a bit slow (like Charlie Sheen is a bit nuts). After one month, I inquired about the parking sticker and was told that the form I submitted was no good as the process for obtaining parking stickers had changed, so I needed to fill out a different form. I happily complied. Two months later, as fate would have it, our rental car company offered to replace our car with a brand new one with 8 Km on the odometer, and I felt fortunate not to have received my decal yet. I inquired about the parking sticker and mentioned that I had a different license plate number. Well, that rebooted the entire process. Filled out forms again. Kept waiting. Mostly biked to work.

Last week, we had heavy rains, and I drove to work. My ability to negotiate and charm apparently faltered, as I was not allowed into the lot. After complaining to an administrator in the department, I was assured that my parking sticker would arrive shortly. Amazingly, on Sunday, I was told that my sticker was available for pickup at the university security office. I was working from home that day, but was so excited about the parking sticker, that I went into work. As I approached the campus security office, a little voice inside my head told me that it is never, ever this easy in Israel. I put the odds of my actually ending the day with a parking sticker near zero. Sure enough, while the security office was open, there was a sign that stated that parking stickers can be picked up on so and so days at such and such hours, and of course, I had missed the window for Sundays.

After only six and a half months in parking limbo, the story has a happy ending. I noted the hours for Monday and made sure I was at the campus security office at the right time. I received a beautiful blue parking sticker which I proudly affixed to the windshield of my car. That will get me in the gate from now on, I hope. Finding a spot once inside, well that's another problem. Meanwhile, I'll celebrate the small victory.

My experience overall at the university has been positive. I'm currently advising a masters student here, and the other day we had a meeting scheduled. He told me that he was in the miluim, which is the army reserves, so he would be a bit late. In Israel it is very common for people to have to suddenly leave their jobs or whatever they are doing and serve in the army for days or weeks at a time. It is part of society, and they are used to it. So, this student shows up in my office in full army uniform, and we had our meeting. When he turned to leave, I noticed that he was wearing a holster around his waist with a handgun. I couldn't help but think how different the dynamic would be with my students back at Johns Hopkins if they were packing heat. Lab meetings might have quite a different dynamic.

We now have less than four months left until we return to Baltimore. Elana is doing much better. She has a small group of nice friends, and is particularly close to one girl. I drove them to a Bat Mitzvah party last night (a weekly occurrence these days), and they were in the back seat giggling and yapping most of the way. She communicates with her friends mostly in Hebrew, and I think Elana is starting to enjoy being here. She is very excited about her upcoming birthday. However, she'll probably be the one most anxious to return home when this is over. Here is a picture of Elana and Tamara on the Tel Aviv Tayelet (boardwalk).

Ann is continuing her Hebrew studies at the Ulpan, and I've noticed now when we shop at the shuk (market), she often speaks Hebrew with the vendors when their English appears weak. Benny is enjoying his chess club and his soccer training and appears to be totally comfortable in Hebrew with his friends. Here is Benny leading a parade of Fulbrighters in the Lower Galilee.

Tamara has fewer activities now because her jewelry making teacher and piano teacher each gave birth and subsequently took breaks from their activities. Still, she has some very nice friendships. Each of the kids seems to have found a "best friend" that they hang out with a lot, and the nice thing is that most of the time we can walk to their houses. Here are the twins in the lobby of our building.

The last couple of weeks have been particularly fun because my parents are visiting. They have a great apartment downtown, and we spend time virtually every day either at their place or ours. Besides touring around, visiting the Nemal and the Shuk, we play a lot of bridge with them, and all I can say is that I'm glad poker is played for money and that bridge is not because my skills at the latter are quite lacking. My mom loves Israeli dancing, and she leads an Israeli dance troupe in Nashville at Vanderbilt University. Here is my Mom dancing along the Tayelet last weekend.

We are now very much looking forward to the upcoming holidays of Purim and Passover. These holidays are something special in Israel, and being here to celebrate them will be a highlight of my Sabbatical. In addition, my nephew, Ari, is having his Bar Mitzvah at the Western Wall in Jerusalem in a few weeks, and much of my family will be here for that.

We are planning a four day trip up North in about a month and a half to visit Akko, Rosh Hanikrah and the Golan Heights, places Ann has never been, and where I have not been for years. In May, we will visit with the Schechter 8th graders who will be on their Israel trip, and we've enjoyed the steady stream of visitors whom we have had the chance to meet and hang out with.

So, our trip is not quite winding down, but the finish line is in sight. We're in no hurry, but we'll be very happy to return home to our normal lives, and to see all our friends again.

Halfway & Hummus

2011-01-29T02:22:00.001-05:00

A year is a long time. It may not seem so in the abstract, but it is enough time to really feel we are living somewhere and not just visiting. Now, halfway through our trip, most of the novelty is gone, and our lives have taken on a familiar set of routines, establishing a status quo. The kids have their regular activities, school, piano, jewelry making, soccer, chess club, and scouts. I have poker night; Ann has a book club starting next week, and we've begun attending events with the Israeli Michigan alumni club. Friday night is Shabbat dinner, and we've started a new tradition that is sure to continue when we return, date night on Tuesdays. So far, we've savored over a dozen of Tel Aviv's nicest restaurants, and we've got a list that should get us through the rest of our stay.

We found a great piano teacher for the kids. She's so good, that I started taking lessons again, and I practice just about every day. After taking lessons for 12 years, I had 26 years off, but I'm highly motivated and taking it much more seriously than I ever did when I was forced to play as a child. Meanwhile, our kids are thriving on the piano, and they had a really nice recital a few weeks ago. As luck would have it (bad for us - good for her), our teacher gave birth to a baby girl recently, and she is taking a couple of months off. Our first attempt at a replacement seemed decent enough, but the kids objected to his lack of personal hygiene, and having come in contact with him, I appreciated their position, and so we are continuing to look for a temporary replacement.

The kids are getting more acclimated to their school, but they really miss home. They work with a tutor who comes to our house four days a week to help them understand and complete their homework. We were very proud when Tamara received a 95 on a science test that was entirely in Hebrew, the same exact test taken by the rest of the class. We're not sure how much Benny is getting out of this year academically, but he's made a lot of friends and is constantly playing at other kids' houses and inviting friends over. He's even starting to speak to them in Hebrew on occasion. Elana made a determination to speak Hebrew to her friends, and this has helped her socially, although she still longs for Baltimore and her close friends back home. Parents are asked to volunteer in the carpool line. Here I am, ready for service:

Although we are at the halfway point of the trip, the first month or two were spent adjusting and so the next five months should be much more normal and productive than the first half of our stay here. Also, in a few weeks, my parents are visiting for six weeks and getting an apartment downtown, so it will be great to spend time with them - more time than I've spent with them since I left home in 1985. Ann & the kids are also very excited that they are coming. In March, my sister is having her son's bar mitzvah in Jerusalem and most of my family is coming to Israel for a couple of weeks. So the second half will definitely be much more interesting and fun.

The kids' Hebrew is getting noticeably better (mine too). I also find that I'm rarely using the GPS to get around town, and navigate pretty easily around most of downtown. A typical day begins around 6:45 when the kids start getting ready for school. I head down to the gym next to our building and kibbitz with the regulars there. By the time I get back upstairs, the kids have already left for their 10 minute walk to school, and Ann is getting ready to leave for her Ulpan class downtown. After showering and breakfast, I usually practice the piano for a while and then head to the university. I either bike (13 minutes), walk (30 minutes), take the bus (12 minutes) or drive (5 minutes). I love having these choices. I also work at home quite a bit, an even shorter commute. On Sunday nights, I play poker at an apartment downtown and usually get home around 1:30 or 2 a.m. So, Monday I'm usually tired and sometimes take a nap in the afternoon. Tuesday night, our tutor comes in the evening, and Ann and I celebrate date night.

Around 4 or 5 pm, I start receiving loads of email from the States. Most evenings, I spend quite a bit of time over Skype with colleagues in the US, and often I find myself working past 10:00 pm, my preferred bed time. At first I had a tough time dealing with this schedule, but I've gotten used to it. One thing I look forward to when I return to the States is having more relaxed evenings.

Now, let me say a few words about a very sensitive topic. It's such an important and yet delicate topic that I hesitate to even go there, at the risk of alienating my Israeli friends who might read this posting. But, a good journalist does not shy away from the truth, no matter what the risks. The topic is, of course, Hummus. There, I've opened up a can of worms, let the genie out of the bottle and closed the barn door after the horse already escaped.

I had no idea how important the topic of Hummus was before I came to Israel. The first hint of the gravity of this subject matter came when we first arrived, while we were waiting for our luggage at Ben Gurion airport, but we were not in tune enough to register the import of the discussion. A gentleman standing beside me struck up a conversation. "Where are you going? For how long? Where will you be living? Oh, Ramat Aviv Gimel, that's a great place. Pause. There is an excellent Hummus place there." A seemingly benign observation. From my perspective, he might as well have said, "There is a great pizza place there," or "There is a good coffee house in Gimel." Only now, with the benefit of hindsight do I realize how he went out on a limb with that comment. He took a position; drew a line in the sand. Indeed, those were fighting words. You do not praise a Hummus place lightly in Israel.

Over time, I came to realize that while there are many religious debates raging in this part of the world, few are as ferocious or as universal as the wrangling over Hummus. Take Rosh Hashana. We were invited over to the Israeli parents of friends of ours for one of the evening meals. Before dinner, we're sitting in the living room, and one of the locals declares that the best Hummus in Israel comes from an Arab village outside of Jerusalem. This was followed by a silence that would have made E.F. Hutton uncomfortable. It was eventually broken by a somewhat timid and yet defiant Israeli who opined that while that Hummus was definitely above the bar, it was nothing compared to his place of choice in Yaffo. Everybody stopped what they were doing and looked back at the original speaker. This was a critical moment. The fate of our evening seemingly hung in the balance. I was nervous, but also curious to see how this would play out. The battle lines were clearly drawn, and neither side seemed likely to concede an inch. Fortunately, the host was able to dissolve the tension by declaring that dinner was ready, a sure fire tactic for breaking up any confrontation among Jews.

The Rosh Hashana Hummus debacle was a forerunner of things to come. One day, I noticed that our corner grocery store had dozens of Hummus containers with every flavor one could imagine.

I took a picture with my phone and posted it on Facebook musing that there were so many types of Hummus to be found, "And none of them are any good!" was an immediate comment posted by one of my Israeli friends, causing a chain reaction of replies that made me wonder if the topic was going to end up on Mark Zuckerberg's desk and cause a change in Facebook's tolerance policies.

Perfectly reasonable people continuously surprise me by their passion for Hummus and their close mindedness with respect to anything but the Hummus that they believe in. On several instances when I had lunch with faculty at the university, the topic turned to Hummus, and I observed reasonable people discussing the ins and out of this delicacy (who knew that Hummus had ins and outs?). How Hummus should be prepared, how it is served, where to buy it, how long it keeps. The level of intensity and passion people bring to this subject is stunning. Thus, it was no surprise to me when I mentioned to a colleague that I sometimes bike to Yaffo in the morning, that he sent me this link to his favorite Hummus place there.

One of the funniest moments came when Ann and I were in services during the high holidays. The Rabbi was giving his sermon and making some announcements in Hebrew. I was simultaneously translating for Ann. At the end of the speech, the Rabbi announces that on Sukkot, there is going to be a potluck dinner. He then went into some detail about how there was a need to coordinate what dishes people bring because "we can't have everybody bringing Hummus". Clearly this had been a problem in the past.

I actually really like Hummus. But to me, it all tastes the same. I'm sure that for writing this, I am now on a Mossad watch list, and that a more heretical statement could not be made. Ann tells me Hummus is fattening, so I'll be limiting my consumption, to the extent that it's possible to do that in Israel.

If you visit Israel, you should look forward to having great Hummus as well as great Hummus discourse. I'm told that it's much better than the packaged stuff you get in the US. I wish I could taste a difference.

Hanukkah in the Negev

2010-12-23T03:58:00.001-05:00

Israel is beautiful. The splendor of the Nevada desert, the awe of the grand canyon, the tranquility of summer in Aspen, Colorado, and the beauty of Monterrey, California are all packed into the Southern portion of this country, known as the Negev, in an area smaller than half of New Jersey. (Everyone always compares the size of Israel to New Jersey, and who am I to differ?) For Hanukkah, we took a family road trip to the Negev for six days. A full photo album of the trip can be found here.

The first day, we picked up the kids from school and drove two hours to a Beduin tent camp site situated about halfway between Sde Boker and Mitzpeh Ramon. I'm not one for roughing it, so we opted for the heated cabins over the communal tents. Dinner was served Beduin style, on rugs in the sand in an open tent. As soon as we were seated a tray containing the entire dinner arrived. The food consisted of roasted chicken, pita bread, hummus, potatoes, rice, and various salads. I was expecting to eat with our hands, but there was plastic silverware.

After dinner, we walked around the camp site and huddled around a large fire they had built. Then, we went back to our cozy cabin, grateful we did not have the idea of roughing it and sleeping in the open tents. It was quite cold out. Before bed, I explained to the kids how to put their socks over their shoes so scorpions would not get in. This was totally unnecessary, but I got a perverse pleasure from their seriousness on this matter. I learned this trick from my survival days in the desert, or maybe it was from a movie I saw, I can't remember.

The Beduin village (a.k.a. tourist trap) boasts a herd of about 20 camels, and the next morning, we took a ride on these large, gentle, awkward animals.

After our camel ride in the desert, which lasted about 30 minutes but left a pain in my buttocks for a bit longer than that, we drove to the Mitzpeh Ramon crater, Israel's version of the Grand Canyon. We took a short hike and then made several stops on our way South.

At one point, there was an area with mounds of colored sand that the children used to fill test tubes in artistic fashion.

After Mitzpeh Ramon, we headed South again, with our sights set on Eilat, a resort town on the edge of the Red Sea, bordering Jordan and Egypt. The trip took about two and a half hours from our last stop at Mitzpeh Ramon.

Eilat is known for its fancy waterfront hotels, expansive coral beaches, underwater observatory, and great nightlife and restaurants. We stayed at a place called Isrotel Agamim, about a 10 minute walk from the water. We opted for the half board option, which included breakfast and dinner. We arrived there on Friday night, and I was pretty disappointed with the dinner. However, my opinion changed on subsequent nights when the food was nothing short of gourmet, and Ann observed that since the restaurant was kosher, Friday night dinner consisted of food that had to be prepared in advance because no fire or electricity could be used on Shabbat. This explained why the options were so limited that first night.

The hotel had a ballroom reserved for lighting Hanukkah candles each night, and we were given the candle lighting times. I expected everyone to show up and light as a community, but strangely, each family picked a spot and a hanukkiah of their own and said the blessings themselves. There were parallel renditions of Maoz Tsur throughout the rooms, sung in various keys and intonations. It was quite a sight. We took turns with a different family member lighting each night.

On our first day, we went snorkeling in the coral reef area, with spectacular underwater views. This picture was taken from the underwater observatory.

The next day, we took a glass bottom boat tour for an even better view of this precious underwater phenomenon.

Here are some more pictures showing the beauty of Eilat.

We spent one of our afternoons and evenings in Eilat in Timna park, which needs to be added as a "must see" to anyone traveling to Israel. This park consists of some incredible natural desert sights, and several man made ones. The area was used in ancient times as a copper mine, and there is access (for those with less claustrophobia than I have) to the underground caves. The rock formations are like nothing I've ever seen before, and driving from one spot to the next, we felt that the views could not be more spectacular. The rock below is called the mushroom, for obvious reasons.

These rock formations are known as Solomon's pillars, although we were disappointed to learn that King Solomon was not actually here, nor was he in historic times.

Here is Benny, pictured after climbing through the hole in the rock at the top of the picture.

This view of a naturally formed bridge in the rock is stunning.

Timna park was historically significant in large part because there was an oasis of water, which made it habitable. The children filled platic jars with colored sand in front of the Timna lake, and later everyone at the park participated in a Hanukkah candle lighting ceremony.

After three fun filled days in Eilat, we headed due North (the only direction to drive and stay in Israel) and stopped at the Hai Bar nature preserve. The place provides refuge for and rehabilitates endangered species. We took a driving tour through the park, guided by a CD, which explained the history of each of the species of animals in the park.

We stopped in Mizpeh Ramon for lunch, and then visited an alpaca farm, where the children rode alpacas and their father tried to ignore the smell.

After the farm, we headed further North and spent the night in a Kibbutz, where we had booked sleeping accommodations for two nights. At dinner time, the food in the dining room was our least appetizing meal of the trip, and we made a note not to eat there again the second night.

The next morning, we drove to a national park called Ein Avdat. This is one of the real national treasures of Israel. Unfortunately, the park has a hiking path that becomes one way about halfway through. There is a steep climb in the rocks, and given that 1,500 people take the hike in one day, they do not allow you to backtrack. Most tour groups have their bus drop them off and then meet them on the other side. As we were there with our car, once we reached the halfway point, I had to backtrack, get the car and drive to the other side to meet the family. Backtracking was very difficult, as there were several steep stairways carved out of the rock, full of Israelis who did not appreciate me going against traffic. Some of them expressed this to me in colorful language that I'd rather pretend I did not understand.

Ein Avdat has some of the most breathtaking views anywhere.

This stone staircase below is the one I had to navigate against traffic. I made my way bit by bit as people passed me and gave me a hard time. It was pretty scary. At one point, an Ibex startled everyone by running up the cliff side. The animal was disoriented by all the tourists, and it was actually quite scary. So much so, that everyone below him went back down, and everyone above him went back up. The animal left, and I got to start my descent against traffic from the beginning, with a bigger backlog of people at the bottom. It took me 45 minutes to get down.

In the afternoon, we drove to nearby Sde Boker, which is where David Ben Gurion spent his final years, and where he is buried. We visited his tomb, which overlooks the desert crater.

And, behind the tomb, we took one of the few family pictures with all five of us.

We returned to our Kibbutz, which had an indoor, heated pool, quite rare in Israel, and the kids swam and played for a while. Then, we decided to drive to Be'er Sheva for dinner. We found a great Asian restaurant which was quite better than the Kibbutz food, and then went back to the Kibbutz for our final night. In the morning, we drove a couple of hours home to Tel Aviv, and two days later the first storm of the year, a massive one, hit the country. Pretty good timing!

You cannot and should not visit Israel without a tour of the Negev. It's natural beauty is compelling, and all the major sights are within short driving range. One would have to purchase several airline tickets and budget several weeks of travel in the US to see a comparable, diverse set of marvels that can be seen in a six day trip with easy, short drives, in Israel.

Elementary School in Israel

2010-12-14T07:39:00.000-05:00

It would be an understatement to say that the schools in Israel are different from those in the States. Our friends Peter & Tammy Stone spent a Sabbatical here a couple of years ago, and their children are close in age to ours, so we were well briefed on the Israeli school system in advance of our trip.

In Baltimore, we have a wealth of choices for educating our children. There are, of course, public school, but also enough private schools to meet every budget and for virtually every religious denomination. In Israel, unless you want to send your kids to the English speaking International school or to special religious schools, they most likely will attend public school. The schools vary in quality, mostly based on the demographics of the neighborhoods, as children are zoned for a particular school, and it is very difficult to get them into a different one. This circumstance is not without its merits, as it is common for elementary school children (grades 1-6) to walk to school and to live among their classmates in the same buildings or in adjacent ones.

When planning where to live during my Sabbatical, our first priority was finding the best school for the children. Several of our friends recommended the schools Nitzanim and Aruzim in Ramat Aviv. However, we had trouble finding housing that met our needs (more accurately our wants) in that neighborhood. Furthermore, upon inquiring, we were informed that the third grade at Nitzanim was likely to be full, and as we have two children in that grade, the likelihood was that we would not be able to register them there.

There is a neighborhood called Ramat Aviv Hahadasha that looked promising, but the school there was one to be avoided, according to various sources. Ultimately, we ended up in Ramat Aviv Gimel at the Gimel elementary school. The process of registering the children involved obtaining a lease to prove that we are Gimel residents and getting a notarized power of attorney letter giving Sharon Geva the authority to register our children. After several hours of my life (that I will never recover) at the Israeli embassy in Washington, I obtained the letter, mailed it to Sharon, and she took that and our lease to the city government building in Tel Aviv. Then, our kids were officially enrolled in school.

Ramat Aviv Gimel is the largest elementary school in Tel Aviv. The very popular long-time principal is on Sabbatical this year, and a young, energetic new interim principal is in her place, an ambitious young man who appears determined to make his mark. I estimate that Ilan Grossman is in his early 30s, and I predict that by the time he is 50, he will be in a senior administrative position in the Israeli department of education.

Shorlty after we arrived, we received a call from a woman named Anna, declaring that she was Tamara's teacher, and that she was interested in meeting all of us. We came to the school that same day, and met a delightful, young, energetic and charming teacher. She is originally from the Czech Republic and has been in Israel for about 14 years. She went over the curriculum with us and showed us what books Tamara needed to buy. She reassured us that Tamara would do fine in her class, and I believed her. We've been unbelievably impressed with Anna, and frankly, she may be one of the best teachers that I've ever known. She sends the parents weekly email updates about what is going on in the class, and she went out of her way to make sure Tamara had friends in the class, encouraging other parents to call Tamara for play dates. Thanks in large part to Anna, Tamara is having a very positive experience in school. She has regular play dates with classmates, occasional sleepovers, and to my delight, she is even developing a bit of an Israeli accent in Hebrew.

Elana and Benny are not faring quite as well, but for different reasons. Elana's teacher, Gila, is wonderful. She does not speak any English, which is probably a good thing for Elana's Hebrew, although she cannot communicate with Ann, so everything goes through me. Gila is on the verge of retirement. Apparently, the only person who retires more often than her is Brett Favre. The last time I spoke with her, I asked if she was coming back next year, and she sighed and said, she was retiring, but that maybe she would come back. She wasn't sure. Gila is very conscientious and has made a substantial effort to get other girls in the class to call Elana and to include her in activities. However, 12 year old girls are quite different from 8 year olds, and it's taken Elana a bit of time to integrate into the class. Of our three children, Elana is the only one without a classmate who speaks English fluently, and she has had to survive on her (rapidly improving) Hebrew alone.

But, I think the biggest problem for Elana has been the structure of the Israeli school system. Elana loves learning. She is constantly reading, looking up topics that interest her on Wikipedia. School for her has always challenged her and satiated her thirst for knowledge and understanding of the world. Whenever we encounter the need for a fact, before we consult Google, we ask Elana (who we nicknamed "encyclopedia") and very often she knows the answer, on many different topics. Learning is not always easy to come by in an Israeli classroom. Class sizes approach 40, with one teacher, and Israeli children tend to be much more wild and unruly than their American counterparts. For a child who cherishes learning and information, school here does not provide the kind of outlet that she is used to at Schechter, and it is sometimes very frustrating for her.

Whereas most of the girls in her class tend to wander around Ramat Aviv Gimel arm in arm with their girlfriends whom they've known since infancy, Elana does not have a strong friendship like she does back home. However, recently, things have begun turning around for her. There are girls who regularly come get her when it's time to go to out of school activities, such as the Scouts (Tsofim), and they walk her home. She often has lunch on Fridays with her friends from school in a shopping center near our house, and last night she attended a Bat Mitzvah party for one of her classmates and had a very good time. She got a ride there with one girl in her class and a ride home with another. In Gimel, a Bat Mizvah resembles a sweet 16 party, except it's for 12 year old girls. There is no religious component to it. Just, every girl gets a big birthday party when she turns 12, and it's called a Bat Mitzvah. Elana is turning 12 here on this trip, but we're planning an American style Bat Mitzvah for her next year in Baltimore. She'll have an aliya, read from the Torah, give a sermon, and if she does a good job, we'll let her have a party.

And now Benny. Oy, Benny. For the first month and a half that we were here, Benny decided he was on vacation. We did not realize this at first, but after a while, we grew suspicious of his claim that there was no homework, given that Tamara was getting a couple of hours worth a day in her class. We tried contacting his teacher, Ronit, and asking why Benny never comes home with homework. Ronit said that the homework was too hard for him because Benny does not know any Hebrew, and so she is giving him a break. She also delicately asked us if Benny had any learning disabilities or perhaps attention deficit disorder.

Deep breath. Here's more or less how we responded to her, through clinched teeth. Okay, first of all, Benny knows plenty of Hebrew. He knows how to read and write, and speaks it at least as well as Tamara. (It was helpful to have a twin in another 3rd grade class to make our point. We knew that Ronit could never compete with Anna in terms of the attention that she gives each student, but we felt she could try a little harder.) No, Benny does not have a learning disability. Sure, every parent thinks their kid is a genius, but based on his results at Schechter we are confident that he's well above average in every aspect of learning ability and cognition. Sure, he has trouble sitting still, but Benny is a very smart kid. And in this case, he's decided to apply his talents towards getting away without doing any work. Would it be too much to ask you to make sure he copies down the homework every day? We have a tutor at home that we hired to help the kids understand their assignments, but we need to know that he copies them down. That's all we're asking.

Her response was to refer us to the principal. Ann tried to reach Ilan on his cell phone number, which he had given me in case I ever had any questions. Don't hesitate if you need anything, call me, he had said. The principal answered and asked her if this was an emergency. He then gave her a lecture about calling him on his cell phone for non-emergencies. At this point we were wondering if his constant apparent concern and involvement was just an act. But, in truth, this was a while ago, and I've since formed the opinion that he must have been caught on a bad day. Israelis tend to be much more direct than we're used too, and they can easily offend Americans without realizing it. Anyway, the principal began by asking if we've had Benny tested for learning disabilities. We patiently explained that we believe that the problem is that he's getting away without doing any homework because his teacher has decided that it is not worth the effort to give him any assignments because he can't do them and because we're returning to the States next year. All we want is for the teacher to make sure he gets his assignments. The principal said that the only way to resolve this is to meet with Ronit.

The meeting was held the next day, made a bit awkward by a long, flaming email message that I sent her the night before. I couldn't help myself, and in hindsight, it was the wrong move. She started out very defensive. At Ann's urging, I profusely apologized for my message and said that I'm sure she's doing everything she can, and that all we want to do is something simple. When Benny comes home from school and says, as he always does, that there was no homework today, we want to know if it's true. She showed us where she writes the assignment on the board every day, and that gave me an idea. Every day, Benny has to copy the assignment from the board and get her to initial it or write a check mark. If he comes home without the check mark, then he will be punished. If there is no homework, then he needs to write "no homework" and get the teacher to sign or put a check mark. Ronit agreed to the plan.

I then had a long and serious talk with Benny about the importance of education, school and responsibility. I can tell you that I would not have enjoyed being on the receiving end of that talk. I probably would have hated it more than Benny did. It was the kind of "talk" that I had on a few memorable occasions when my Dad was less than pleased with me, and I'm still traumatized by those encounters. I explained to Benny that his vacation was over, and that he was going to have to get serious about work. Then I laid out the consequences of him coming home without the check marks. Without going into details, let's say that he tried it once or twice, and then realized it wasn't worth it, and since then, he's been getting his assignments and doing his homework.

Socially, Benny has been doing great. He is an extremely confident and social kid. I went on a class field trip to Jerusalem with him and saw that he was at the center of attention every step of the way. On the bus, all the kids wanted to sit with him. Walking to the Wall, he was the leader of the pack, and I noticed at one point that a couple of the girls offered him candy. He mostly speaks English to the other kids who answer him in Hebrew. The language does not seem to be a barrier for him. He is constantly on play dates and sleepovers, and if he had his way, I doubt we'd see much of him on weekends. I don't think he has an insecure bone in his body.

Much of the communication from the school to the parents happens over email. My Hebrew reading skills are not on par with my speaking ability, and this has resulted in some misunderstandings. For example, we received an email saying that we were supposed to meet with all of the kids' teachers for parent/teacher conferences. We decided that only I would go because Ann would not be able to understand what the teachers were saying anyway. I made the 3 appointments. Elana's was first, and so on the indicated day, I took off from work, went to the school, and met with Gila. She closed the door and said, "So, what was it you wanted to talk about?" I was confused and said that the email from the school said to make appointments with the teachers. She said that I misunderstood the message, and that it was just saying that such meetings are going to be held in the future. Oh. So, anyway, we had a nice discussion about Elana, and then I called the twins' teachers and cancelled the meetings, although Anna said she'd be delighted to speak about Tamara anytime. Later this week, we have the real parent/teacher conferences (I think), and I'll find out more about how they are doing.

Overall, the school system in Israel is disappointing. While I believe we ended up in one of the very best public schools, with two out of three exceptional teachers, I can't help but wonder how this country, which values children so much, got its priorities so wrong. Children in these schools who cherish learning are out of place. And, from what I hear, most other schools are a lot worse. Violence among the children is apparently commonplace, although we have not seen much of this first hand.

I understand that Israel has to spend a tremendous proportion of its GNP on security. The country has a great public transportation infrastructure. Wonderful parks. Great public beaches. And, while the economy lags behind the US and some other countries, Israel appears to be in pretty good shape. But, they are killing their seed corn. One of the greatest resources here is the talent level of the people. Israel's impact on high tech, medicine, biology is legendary. And, rather than nurturing their young minds and encouraging academics at an early age, the school system is ridiculously under funded. Instead of 40 screaming kids per teacher, they should have 15 (without the screaming). Magnet schools should be set up, and a program should be in place for identifying gifted and talented kids at an early age. Israeli children are in school from 8 a.m - 1:30 p.m. six days a week. That system needs to be re-examined. No other country in the world (to my knowledge) practices these hours. If American middle schoolers can handle 8 a.m. - 4:00 p.m., so can Israeli kids. The teachers are each given one day off during the week, so they effectively have a 5 day work week. On the days that their teachers are off, the students are occupied by a hodgepodge of activities, including origami, playing with animals, and other non-educational subjects. It is a true shame that a country that I believe boasts more brain power per capita than any other is letting the opportunity to nurture this potential go to waste.

I have no doubt that the kids will return to Schechter in Baltimore next year and will hit the ground running. They have kept up with the math from back home, in addition to learning the math that is taught here, and whatever little they might be behind in some of their English subjects is more than compensated for by their life experience and their advancement in Hebrew subjects. Overall it is a big win, and while the kids are finding it challenging and at times overwhelming, I believe that the risk we took coming here for a year has definitely paid off.

Dealing with Medical Issues

2010-11-24T05:26:00.001-05:00

One of the most intimidating aspects of spending a year abroad is the prospect of dealing with a foreign medical establishment. Everything is different. Expected wait times, dealing with insurance, doctor-patient relations. I knew that it was impossible to go a whole year without some medical issues, and sure enough, in the first 3+ months, we've had our share.

I should point out that I viewed my potential interaction with medical treatment in Israel both as a consumer, and as a researcher, as my Fulbright project involves working with the Israeli HMOs on medical record security. So I approach each health challenge with some degree of curiosity, along with the anxiety that always accompanies such experiences. When I injured my wrist (described below), my host at Tel Aviv University, Ran Canetti wondered if this was my way of embedding myself in this issue, the way I became en election judge when working on e-voting.

Our first interaction with the Israeli medical system came when Benny managed to split open his foot running through the apartment. We were worried that he needed stitches because the cut would not close. Coincidentally, I had a meeting with one of the doctors at the Maccabi headquarters that day. Maccabi is the largest HMO in Israel and services over 2 million patients, just under 30% of the population. Ann and I spoke by phone, and she decided to take him to the Maccabi clinic near our house. They dressed and closed the injury, but when Ann was ready to pay, they were surprised to learn that we were not registered with Maccabi, and they said they did not have a mechanism to collect payment. The doctor wanted Benny to be re-examined a couple of days later, but the administrators at the clinic said that we could not be seen unless the children were registered.

Ann called me on my cell phone during my meeting at Maccabi, and a few minutes later, the clerks at the clinic were speaking with a senior official from their HMO. However, they were adamant that unless we were registered, they could not treat us, and apparently going over their head had no impact. Meanwhile, I obtained the number of a private doctor for Benny. Ann called the doctor who informed her that he did not see patients outside of the HMO, but that she should just get into a cab and ask him to take her to Magen David Adom, which provides emergency medical services and runs an ambulance service. I can just picture the wide open eyes of a Tel Aviv taxi driver as a frantic, American mother enters with her wounded child and asks to be taken to Magen David Adom. That cab ride would probably put him in more danger than his injury. We began looking for another private doctor, but in the meantime, Benny's foot healed.

Having a general purpose clinic right near our home is a great feature of living in a city like this, but not if they won't treat you, and I did not like our chances when it came to sneaking each kid in until it was time for payment and then being kicked out. I figured that this only works once. So, I went to the clinic and was forced to wait about an hour in the waiting room before I could meet the head administrator and request to register our family in the clinic. She said that only Israelis can be registered. I pulled out the childrens' and my Israeli passports and said that we were in fact Israelis. She frowned as though this was not what she was expecting nor hoping for, and sat down at her computer. After punching her keyboard for a few minutes, she looked up and said that I have to go to the bituach leumi, which means national insurance before I can register myself and the kids. I tried in vain to argue with her, but she said that without a visit downtown to the bituach leumi, there was nothing she could do.

I know the drill in Israel, so I decided it was worth wasting a few hours, or maybe days, of my life to take care of this. I called the bituach leumi office several times before I managed to speak with someone, and that person told me that it would not be a problem. She said I should bring my letter from Tel Aviv University regarding my appointment, all of our passports, Israeli and American, my Fulbright award notice, and anything else I could think of. I realized that what she was saying was that I would probably not be greeted with cooperation, and that I need to be prepared to make my case.

Feeling like a lawyer heading to argue his first case before the Supreme Court, I collected all of the relevant materials and headed downtown to the bituach leumi offices. The entrance to the national insurance office, once I got past security, was a complete mob scene. I was mentally prepared to spend my day there and to deal with a slow uncooperative bureaucracy, but I was still taken aback. There were people everywhere. I wanted to get in line somewhere, but I could not find a line. I saw a security guard, and I asked him where I'm supposed to go for . . . but before I could explain what I wanted, he stated that he was just security and had no idea. I decided that this was one of those moments when I had to put my manners and all of my cultured upbringing aside. I looked at the part of the mob that seemed to be going most aggressively in a particular direction and decided that this is more likely to be the right mob than the other ones. I started squeezing my way to the front. People yelled at me and asked me to get behind them, and I said that I just had a question. People replied that they all had questions. That made sense, but I pushed on ahead. Several times I was yelled at, but I just yelled something back. After about 45 minutes, I ended up near the front of the mob, and I managed to approach the desk. I explained why I was here, and of course, I was told that I was in the wrong line, and she pointed to another collection of people at the other end of a long hallway.

I went down there and discovered that there was a number dispensing machine. So, I took a number. I looked up at the board with the numbers, and saw that my number was several hundred higher than the displayed number. So, either they already called my number a while ago, or something was wrong. I asked one of the people waiting what the deal was with the numbers, and he explained that everybody is keeping track of when they came because the number dispenser is not working. I asked him how in the world I'm supposed to know when it was my turn. He looked up and yelled very loudly, "Who is last?" And some woman in the back yelled, "I am". He turned to me and said, you are after her. Over the next hour, people showed up and they seemed to know what to do. They yelled "who is last?" and got the reply. And thus, when it was finally my turn, I went right after that woman who had responded initially. Peculiar system, but it works.

When I finally got to meet the clerk at the bituach leumi, I started explaining that I'm a visiting professor on a Fulbright, and I pulled out all the evidence and laid it out. He asked me what I wanted, and I said that I and my children are Israeli citizens, pulling out further evidence, and we wanted to register with Maccabi. He looked at me and said. "That's impossible." Just like that. I knew that I was expected to argue with him, and I did not want to let him down. But, nothing worked. I asked to see his supervisor, and he said that he was the supervisor. I was feeling desperate, so I said to him, "Here's the situation. I'm in this country for a year. I have three young children. What am I supposed to do if they get sick?" I know that Israelis are super-sympathetic to children. I even showed him their picture on my cell phone. He said that he was very sorry, but that there are private doctors who will see them if they are sick. I said that when I called on the phone, the person told me that I should bring all this stuff, and that it would work out. He rolled his eyes and launched into a lecture about how the people on the phone are college students in Beer Sheva who don't know anything, and how frustrated he is with them always giving out wrong information on the phone.

I gave up and left.

Shortly after that experience, I injured my foot playing soccer. At first I thought it would heal on its own, but when I was still limping 3 weeks later, I decided to have it seen. I asked around, and a friend of mine recommended a private hospital in Herzeliya called the Herzeliya Medical Center (HMC). I called them up and made an appointment to see an orthopedist. He was American and seemed very good. He ordered x-rays, and told me I had a bone contusion (bruise), and that I was fine, and I could do anything but use pain as a guide. It was a good interaction and not that different from how such a doctor's visit would go in the States. Furthermore, the HMC accepted my Seven Corners health insurance that I received as part of the Fulbright program.

But, luck was not on my side. A couple of weeks ago, I fell off of my bike riding to work. I missed the ramp from the sidewalk because I was looking to see if any cars were coming, and I happened to go off the curb over a sewer drain, which was a bit high up. My front wheel collapsed, and I hit the ground hard. I put out my left hand to break my fall, and when I finally got up, my hand and wrist were killing me. I went home and immediately drove to HMC. Lucky for me, there was a hand surgeon there. Unlucky for me, he was not nearly as nice as the orthopedist who saw my foot. I ended up spending 6 hours there, about 3 minutes of which were with the doctor. He made me wait outside in the hall while he met with other patients and performed surgery. I was told that he had squeezed me into an already overpacked schedule, and I was grateful, although I was not happy about the service I was getting. In my brief meeting with him, he told me that the x-ray was inconclusive, but that he did not see a fracture. However, he thought I may have broken my scaphoid, a small bone that usually required surgery to repair. He said that I should wear a brace all the time, and that he wants more x-rays in 2 weeks to determine whether or not there is a fracture. I was supposed to take it very easy with my hand.

So, for 2 weeks, I wore the brace, did not ride my bike, and took it very easy. I was optimistic that the bone was not broken because after a few days, the pain went away, and there was only the discomfort of wearing the brace all the time, even to sleep. On Sunday, I went back to have the repeat x-rays taken, confident that I would be told I was fine. The doctor was not there, so I left my cell phone number for him to call me with the results. Ann and I had plans at a very nice restaurant that night. As we were leaving the house for dinner, my phone rang, and it was the doctor. He said that he saw a line that looked like a fracture. He asked me where I lived, and I said Tel Aviv. He said that in that case, he wanted to see me again next Sunday because he was not going to be in Tel Aviv until then. And he hung up. I was in complete shock. If my wrist was broken, shouldn't it be in a cast? Am I supposed to wear the brace? There's no way I'm waiting a week to take care of this.

Ann and I went to the dinner, and while I enjoyed the food, I was absolutely miserable. I faced the prospect of 6 of the next 7.5 months in Israel in a cast, possible surgery in this country, and an unpleasant recovery. I was particularly disappointed because I had convinced myself that my wrist was fine before that call came in.

The next morning, I made my mission to find the best hand surgeon in Israel and see them right away. In hindsight, nothing could be more naive. I pulled out all the stops and wrote to everyone I knew here in Israel asking for recommendations. Several people started making phone calls on my behalf. The big breaks came from the doctors I had met here as part of my research, including a private doctor and some doctors at Maccabi. I also had an orthopedic surgeon in Baltimore and my uncle who is a famous doctor on the case. By the end of the day, I had the names of two well regarded hand surgeons who practiced in Tel Aviv, among other places.

I called one of them, and the earliest appointment I could get was for December 21. I begged and pleaded and explained the urgent nature of my situation. I had a potentially broken wrist with no cast on. I needed to be seen by a specialist ASAP. The receptionist would not help me. So, I googled the doctor and found her email address through some of her research publications. I wrote her a long desperate email, invoking my professor position at Johns Hopkins, hoping that she would make the association with medicine. But, she never answered. In the meantime, I called the other doctor and sent her a similar email message. The other doctor, Dr. Hagar Patish responded to my message in the afternoon and said she could see me the next evening at her house where she has a clinic. Bingo!

I had to go back to HMC to pick up the x-ray so that I could bring it to Dr. Patish. Tuesday morning, I drove to Herzeliya and retrieved the CD containing the x-ray. The receptionist there told me that there was a report with the x-ray. I said that I knew that, and that I had spoken to the doctor. She suggested putting the report in the case with the disk. On my way to the car, I opened the report to read it, and to my surprise, it said "no fracture found" and it was signed by a radiologist. What?!?!? A wave of relief swept over me, but I still was a bit nervous. What was that doctor who called me talking about? Tuesday night could not come quickly enough.

I don't remember much about Tuesday (yesterday). All day long I was preparing for the meeting with the hand surgeon. I was barely able to eat. At 4:45 pm, I drove Benny to soccer practice and then proceeded to enjoy an hour of Tel Aviv traffic as I headed to the doctor's house. Ann went to get Benny when his practice was over. Dr. Patish greeted me warmly. She asked me some questions and then pulled up the x-rays on her monitor. It was the friendliest experience I can ever remember having with a doctor. She showed me every aspect of the x-rays, and pointed to a line on the scaphoid on the first set of x-rays. She said that this line could indicate a fracture, but that strangely, the line continued past the bone, so maybe it was just something on the picture. She then pulled up the x-rays from two weeks later and we went over them. She took several minutes and told me that she saw no evidence of any fracture, and that she was pretty comfortable ruling out a broken scaphoid. She said that if there were a fracture from the first x-ray, two weeks later it would be magnified. She then performed a physical exam (does this hurt? does this hurt?) and said that she was even more certain that the wrist was fine. She also said that I absolutely should have been in a cast immediately after that first set of x-rays. If the scaphoid was broken, and there was reasonable evidence that it might be, it would be very serious not to have it in a cast. Yet more evidence of how much of a loser that first doctor was, and a lesson to me about finding the right doctor early when something serious is going on.

After the examination, we launched into about a 40 minute discussion of electronic medical records, about my research, patient privacy and about her opinions of medicine in Israel versus the US. Finally, I asked her if she could take the Seven Corners insurance or if I should pay and then get reimbursed from my insurance back home. She responded to me, "You are my guest here." At first I did not understand, but then she explained that she was not going to charge me for the visit. I was embarrassed and muttered something like "Are you sure?" and tried to protest, but she would have none of it.

Only in Israel.

On the drive home, I was just amazed at the quality of treatment I had just received. No doctor had ever explained to me my condition and all the potential ramifications as clearly or thoughtfully as she had. She showed me the x-rays and discussed them as though I were a medical student and she was my professor. And in the end to not charge me. I know from some of my phone calls on Monday that most orthopedists in Israel when treating a foreigner as a private patient charge 800 shekels (a bit over $220) just to say hello.

I'm not thrilled about the prospect of dealing with whatever medical issues come our way in our remaining time in Israel. But, the knowledge that there are doctors here like Dr. Patish, even if they are hard to find, is very comforting.

Poker in Tel Aviv

2010-10-17T08:10:00.000-04:00

I've written a blog entry about poker in Tel Aviv, but I'd rather not post in on my public blog. If you are interested and did not receive it from me by email, please let me know, and I'll be happy to email it to you if I know and trust you.

15 Simple Facts and Observations in Israel

2010-10-10T09:09:00.000-04:00

1. There are cats everywhere. Theories I've heard as to why range from the need to control viper snakes to dealing with rats and mice. Regardless of the reason, you see stray cats everywhere. They are mostly not too afraid of people and usually expect food from you. On Yom Kippur, they seemed especially vocal and pushy, probably because there were not as many scraps to be had. Israelis seem very friendly to the cats. One of our neighbors regularly feeds the cats that hang out by our building. The cats appear to favor a particular location, and I've become familiar with some specific cats that hang out in various spots around town. But most of the cats here also carry diseases, and we've instructed the kids to look but not touch them.

This poor cat is injured. He hangs out next to my car most of the time.
Here he is by the back door of our building.

This is my favorite cat by the office. I see him just about every day.

2. Cash is more common than in the US, and credit cards are eschewed in many places. But, don't try paying for something small with a big bill. They prefer small bills. The largest bill is 200 shekels, worth about $50, and most vendors complain if you pay for something small with such a large bill.

3. The food tends to be fresher here. People have smaller refrigerators that they refill more often. Most people seem to shop several times a week, buying less than we do in the States. Fruits are locally grown and only available in season. I have not ever seen canned vegetables or fruit served in a restaurant, on pizza or anywhere else, and even the corner tiny restaurant served homemade pasta when I ordered a bowl of penne. We've been to a couple of unbelievable restaurants here, and even the cheap corner falafel stand can be counted on for culinary satisfaction. Israel is way ahead of the States in the food department. Hands down winner. Bucking the trend and not nearly as good here are beef (not enough to graze on in the desert?), broccoli (so much for my favorite stir fry dish), and corn on the cob (we're spoiled by locally grown corn on the cob in Owings Mills). We have not found skim milk here and few reduced fat foods, although Israelis on average appear thinner than Americans.

4. You cannot buy a wireless router in Israel. I know. I tried. The WiFi router in our house is so weak, that I can't get the signal in the room around the corner. I'm having my cousin bring me an 802.11n router (time capsule, actually) when she visits.

5. It is not that easy for an adult to find a soccer team in Tel Aviv. You can go to the Yarkon park on Friday afternoons, but you may have trouble getting into a game. After 5 weeks of trying, I finally made it onto a team, and proceeded to injure my foot within 40 minutes. Now I'm on injured reserve.

6. It seems impossible to find a live poker game in Tel Aviv. I had a few close calls, but none of them panned out. Still trying ...

7. Watch your step! There is dog poop everywhere. I'm not kidding. If you are not vigilant you will step in it. Israelis love their dogs, but many do not pick up after them. Dog poop is an unfortunate trademark of sidewalks all over the place in Israel. I'll resist the temptation to include a relevant photograph.

8. Traffic lights operate slightly differently here. When the light is green, it flashes a few times before turning yellow. When the light is red, the yellow comes on along with the red before the light turns green. For those of you who do not speak the language, a simultaneous red and yellow traffic light means "floor it!" in Hebrew.

The yellow light turns on before the red turns to green.

9. It did not rain for the first 52 days we were in Israel. On the 53rd day, we had bad thunderstorms for half an hour, and then the sun came out.

10. Israelis give extremely high priority to elderly, to babies and to the infirm. Here's an example. At the post office, you take a number and typical wait about 20-30 minutes to be served, and you cannot avoid visiting the post office - that's how you pay bills, add credit to the cell phone SIM card and handle various other details. I've learned to bring reading material. The other day, there was a particularly long line ahead of me when an elderly woman with a walker came in. She had difficulty getting a number out of the dispenser because her hand was shaking. One of the women in line walked up to the window and said something to the postal worker who proceeded to drop the current customer, handle the older woman, and then return to the original customer. Nobody complained. This type of catering to weaker people is commonplace, and I've seen it numerous times. A parent with a small baby will almost always be moved to the front of any line, especially if the baby is screaming. On one occasion, I was tempted to ask our kids to try to misbehave a little louder because I was quite certain we would be advanced in line, but looking around at the other Israeli children, I did not think we could compete.

11. At the supermarket, the shopping carts are linked to each other with small metal chains. To extract a cart, you insert a 5 shekel coin into a slot on the cart thus releasing it, and that coin remains in the cart while you shop. To recover your coin, you must attach the cart back to the other carts. It's an ingenious system that ensures that people will put carts away and that Americans who are new to the system will realize they left the 5 shekels in the cart as soon as they get home.

12. There is recycling in Israel, but it takes a real effort. Scattered around town are these large metal cages with holes just big enough to stick in plastic bottles. Those who care to recycle have to collect their plastics and then carry them a block or two to these recycling cages to dispose of them. Apparently, much of the recycling operation in Israel is controlled by organized crime.

13. Keys are different here. On most standard house keys, the key is more of a female than keys in the US. The grooves are on the inside of the key, whereas a standard house key in the US is male and bares its grooves on the outside.

Our house key.

14. There has been no real estate downturn in Tel Aviv. Prices only go up.

15. Sunday is a regular workday here. The kids have school on Fridays, but everyone else is off; the university is closed, and there is no mail delivery. One of my colleagues at the university told me that Friday morning school is the best Israeli invention, as the parents get to hang out for brunch, there's no work, and you get a 4 hour break from the kids, who get home around noon that day.

My uncle Asher, may he rest in peace

2010-10-01T11:04:00.003-04:00

My father is the youngest of five boys. This week marked the end of an era with the passing of one of his brothers. We are all extremely saddened. My father and his remaining three brothers, Emanuel, Mordecai, and Yussel wrote the following obituary. Asher was incredibly accomplished and loved his family very much. I had a great relationship with him, and I already miss him dearly.

OBITUARY NOTICE

Asher Rubin, a retired Deputy Attorney General for the State of California and a devoted husband and father, died peacefully at his home in Marin County on Wednesday, September 29.

Asher was born in Atlantic City, New Jersey, on November 9, 1936, to Sophie (née Greenberg) and Jacob Rubin, a teacher of Hebrew. In the company of four accomplished brothers, Emanuel, Mordecai, Joseph, and Abba, and a mother who threatened to trade him for one of Eddie Cantor’s daughters, Asher early in life developed an outspoken personality mixed with humor. When Asher was eleven, the family moved to the town of Liberty, in New York’s Catskill Mountains, where he went to high school. He honed his sense of humor while working for six summers as a busboy at the famed Grossingers resort hotel.

Asher graduated from Columbia College in 1958 and then entered Harvard Law School, where he graduated in 1961. His younger brother Joseph was also a student at Harvard while he was there. Asher’s most notable achievement at Harvard was, at a public gathering, telling the feared and formidable professor of law, James Casner from the stage, that his younger brother Joseph was “bitterly disappointed that he was not being called on enough in class.” After graduation, he moved to California to serve as a clerk to Justice Thomas P. White of the California Supreme Court. He joined the office of Attorney General Stanley Mosk in 1963, where he remained until 2001, except for a brief interlude in the Office of the General Counsel of the Peace Corps and on the public relations staff of The Weizmann Institute in Israel.

As a Deputy Attorney General, Asher represented various officials and agencies in appellate and trial litigation involving many of the important political and social issues confronting California from 1962 through his retirement in 2001. He appeared before the United States Supreme Court in two cases, Honig v. Doe and California Human Resources Dept. v. Java, which settled significant disputes regarding special education and unemployment insurance. He appeared before the California Supreme Court in controversial cases that affected reproductive rights, unemployment insurance, industrial safety, and health care benefits. He represented President S.I. Hayakawa during the bitter student strike in 1968–69 at San Francisco State University.

Asher was known for his sense of humor and could not restrain himself, even in court. During the student strike, when Judge Ira Brown asked him whether President Hayakawa would comply with an order of the court, Asher replied that Hayakawa would probably move the campus to San Mateo County. When an attorney for the appellants applied to the Court of Appeal for the second time to file a brief over the page limit allowed by the rules, Asher filed a short reply: “The appellants think it not nifty to have their brief reduced to fifty.” When a federal court judge asked him whether he should recuse himself, he replied, “Right here in front of everybody?” And when he asked another federal judge for extra time to file his brief when George Deukmejian was Attorney General, the judge was reluctant, commenting: “What do you people in the Attorney General’s Office do all day?” Asher replied: “Well, we spend most of our time trying to spell Deukmejian.” The judge granted him a forty-five–day extension.

Asher was active beyond his professional life. At the Attorney General’s Office, he wrote, appeared and sang in holiday skits and wrote poems in honor of innumerable deputies at their retirements (“Do not go gentle into that little cubicle.”). With Morris Bobrow, he wrote musical reviews such as If You’re from Milwaukee, You Must Know Bernie and Premises, Premises. He was also a member of the Tiburon Theater Troupe. His community achievements were many. He was a past president of the Tiburon Peninsula Club, a feature writer for the Nob Hill Gazette, on the board of directors of the San Francisco Jewish Community Center, chairman of the Tiburon Art Festival and a board member of Image for Success.

How would Asher’s many friends describe him? He was a New Yorker. Although of long tenure here, he never assimilated the relaxed rhythms of a Californian. For him, right now was too late, impatience was a virtue, and observing the 90-degree rule on a golf course was for the other guy. In golf as in life, he took it straight from tee to green as fast as he could go. He was always a good friend, helpful and supportive, a strong tennis player on the Tiburon Peninsula Club team, and a delightful poker player and golf partner, although he described his golf game as “painfully average.”

The center of Asher’s life was his family. He is survived by his wife Diane and their two children, Jacob, a student at Stanford Business School, and Shaina, a student at Brooklyn Law School. He was very proud of their accomplishments and he loved them very much.

We are saddened by his passing and we will miss him.

Finding our rhythm

2010-09-29T06:08:00.006-04:00

Just over six weeks in Israel and we're getting into a regular groove. We have soccer practices and games, piano lessons, parties, play dates, school, homework, and all of the every day activities that accompany regular life. Ann observed the other day that it no longer seems like we're on a trip, because we have all of the same routines that we do back home. We still have cooking, cleaning, shopping, laundry, taking out the garbage, recycling, buying gas and other chores. Gas costs double here, and at the moment, it is easy to figure out the conversion because there are 3.8 litres/gallon and the dollar is just under 3.8 shekels, so the price in shekels/litre is almost equivalent to dollars/gallon (a fact that I found much more exciting than Ann did). My last fill up cost 6.35 shekels/litre so you can do the math. However, we drive very little here, as walking, biking and buses are usually better options.

Although we've settled in and are starting to feel at home here, hardly a day goes by without some episode that is pure Israel. Experiences that could never happen anywhere else. A case in point is the purchasing of our bicycles.

Nestled between Ramat Aviv and Ramat Aviv Gimel is a lovely neighborhood called Neve Avivim, which sports several expansive parks with playgrounds, dozens of apartment buildings, and two small shopping centers, one of which plays host to Mordechai's bike shop. Mordechai is an Orthodox Jew who looks the part. I might describe him as a "Black Hat". He wears the requisite uniform, complete with yarmulka, tzitzit, and full beard and looks like someone you'd more likely expect to see praying at the Western wall than running a bike shop; someone whom at first glance I would associate more with the study of Torah than the adjustment of chains and brakes. His grease stained hands were in stark contrast to his overall facade.

Upon entering the bike shop, I was greeted by Mordechai with a warm smile, and a firm handshake.

Bruchim Habaim! What can I do for you?
Well, we're here for a year and we're interested in bikes.
Where are you here from?
Baltimore, Maryland in the United States.
And you've come to Israel! That's wonderful. What are you doing here?
I'm here on Sabbatical and I'm a visiting professor at Tel Aviv Univer . . .
It's so great that you've come to Israel, finally. But why just a year?
Well, the sabbatical is only a year, and then I have to get back to . . .
Why just a year? Why not two years? Maybe you'll like it and you'll stay. Any chance you think you might stay? Israel is a great place. I am telling you. Israel. There's nothing like it. Stay. You'll see.

I knew I was in trouble. We had not even begun talking about bikes yet, and he's already negotiating with me. Eventually, I identified a couple of bikes that Ann and I liked, and as luck would have it on that particular random day, all of the bikes that we considered were on sale, according to Mordechai. Of course, none of them had any prices posted, but amazingly, he knew all of the prices by heart. I pointed out that I was not just buying two bikes but five, and that surely there was a volume discount. Mordechai assured me that I was getting even better than the volume discount. We haggled a bit over the price, and I then asked if he would buy the bikes back from me in 9 1/2 months when I left Israel. Although he assured me that he would, I was not entirely satisfied, and I suggested that we determine the buy-back price now and then subtract it from the purchase price, in a sense renting us the bikes for our remaining time in Israel. He agreed and even threw in the helmets, bike locks, and baskets. He would not take anything other than cash, and when I asked him about paperwork, he scoffed and said, "I'm here. Where am I going to go? You have a problem, you come back and I'll fix it without charging you." I nervously mumbled something about getting that in writing, and Mordechai looked at me as though I had just landed from Mars, and I quickly dropped it.

We returned the next day with the children and they each picked out a bike. For Tamara, Mordechai suggested that rather than buying a new bike, I take this really nice used one he has at a really good price. It was indeed used, but not really nice, and the price didn't seem so great, but who was I to argue, so I agreed, over Tamara's protestations. The store was very busy, so Mordechai suggested that we come back later in the evening when he would have the bikes ready for us to take. Upon our return several hours later, we ran into Dafna, the mom of a girl in Tamara's class. Dafna had lived in the States and speaks English well. She came to the bike store to get some service on her bike, and when she saw the bike we were buying for Tamara, she took Ann aside and told her that this was her daughter's former bike, and that they had donated it to the store with the request that it be given to a needy family. Meanwhile, I noticed Mordechai glancing uncomfortably at the two women speaking from across the store. Ann told me what Dafna said, and suddenly Mordechai did not seem so pious. Meanwhile, the hour was late, the store closed, and we were asked to return the next morning.

When I arrived back at the bike shop the following day, Mordechai told me that he had bad news. Apparently the bike that he was going to sell Tamara had already been promised as a donation to someone, but to make it up to me, he was offering me a brand new bike in its place at the same price. Really?!? Once again I negotiated a price that included the return of the five bikes, including the helmets and locks, at the end of my Sabbatical, and I paid him in cash with no paperwork. He seemed very eager to please me and get me out of his store. His demeanor could be summarized with one word - "Busted!"
I should point out, though, that I never did ask Mordechai why he tried to sell me a bike that had been donated, and so it is possible that it was an honest mistake.

As I was leaving, I asked Mordechai if he didn't want some guarantee that we would bring back the bikes. He said that for most people he would request 2,000 shekels, but that I had an honest face and he trusts his judgement of character, and that he was not at all worried that I wouldn't bring back the bikes. I suppose he is right.

The bike purchase was an interaction that felt uniquely Israeli. At least that's what I thought, but I did not have a true sense of the Israeli experience until I opened up a bank account here. Up to now, I managed to get by with a US credit card and using ATM machines, but there are too many situations where it is inconvenient to be without a checkbook or an Israeli credit card, so I broke down and took the plunge. After our experiences with Israeli bureaucracy obtaining Ann's visa and getting my city parking permit, I dialed in my expectations, cleared my schedule, collected every possible document I could conceive of, except my American passport, which I assumed I would not need, and headed to the Mizrachi bank on my bike.

As an aside, my previous visit to a Mizrachi bank was somewhat awkward. I needed to exchange a document related to our apartment lease at a Mizrachi bank in Petach Tikvah, about a 15 minute drive East of Tel Aviv. When I arrived at the bank, there was a line of people standing at the entrance door and a guard holing the door to let people in one at a time after screening them. For some reason, he was not letting anyone in right now, so I assumed that there was some maximum number of people they wanted in the bank at any given time. The line was daunting, and I hoped that I would not have to wait in this line of about 15 people just to drop off my document and get a replacement. I walked up to the guard, avoiding the hostile stares of those whose line I hoped to cut and mentally prepared my case. "Excuse me, I'm just here to exchange this document," and I held up my one pager for him to see. He looked at me and sarcastically said, "Well, I'm just here to make a deposit." I was confused. "Oh, I thought you were a guard," I said. He looked at me like I was crazy: "What kind of guard? What are you talking about?" The crowd behind us was now more curious and perhaps entertained than hostile. I asked him why nobody was going into the bank if he's not a guard. Someone behind me replied that they were waiting for the bank to open. I sheepishly moved to the back of the line, and a few minutes later the bank opened, and I took care of my document exchange and got out of there as quickly as I could. Sometimes being a foreigner can make you feel very small.

Anyway, I did not make that mistake again and made sure that the Mizrachi bank in Ramat Aviv was open for business before entering. I asked someone who worked there where I go to open a new account and was directed to a desk in the back of the bank. As I sat down, I inspected the comfort level of my chair, as I expected to spend a considerable percentage of my time that day in it. The bank worker was very friendly, and she started asking me questions. Ten minutes later, we had gotten to know each other pretty well, but she had still not asked me a single question related to open up the account. To get us on track, I told her that I had never had a bank account in Israel, and so I was not familiar with the process. She assured me that it's very simple. She asked for my Israeli identity card and upon receiving it began typing on her computer. She paused from time to time to ask me questions. How old were my kids? What school do they go to? How do they like it here versus in the States? Questions that I suppose are necessary for opening up a bank account. Regardless of my natural impatience when filling out applications at the bank, I'll take extreme friendliness any day over any other kind of interaction. That said, I wondered if I was going to get out of this bank without an invitation to Shabbat dinner.

Once she had assessed the kind of account I wanted based on my banking needs (a judgment I felt I had to leave in her hands, as I was more confused by my options at the bank than I was about cell phone plans when I bought Elana's phone), the woman, whose name is Hen (pronounced with the harsh sounding H of Hanukkah, for which there is no letter in English) began printing out pages upon pages of documents, which she proceeded to review with me. These were the terms of my account. As she was turning the pages and showing me the terms, she whispered to me that nobody really reads these, and that she had never even read them, so I should just ignore them. Practical advice, which I don't imagine you get from the bank when opening an account in the States. The rules are different in Israel. You pay for every single teller transaction. You even pay to deposit cash in an ATM. There's apparently a fee for asking what the fees are and a fee for receiving the answer. Once the account was open, I was afraid to cough in the bank, because somewhere in my documents there was a fee listed for that. I declined an ATM card because the fees are high, and my US card works fine here. I did, however, sign up for a VISA card. Luckily, there is a promotion where you get an Israeli VISA card that is free for the first year, but then the fees are higher in subsequent years. Hen told me that there was no cancellation fee, and since we're leaving in less than a year, it seemed like a pretty good deal. When the time comes, we'll see if I'm really able to cancel the card with no penalties.

Banking is different in other ways as well. For example, when you order checks, you have to come back to the bank a week later to pick them up. They won't send them to your house, they don't notify you when the checks arrive, and they will not tell you on the phone if the checks are there. As I indicated, the service is much more personable. I was comparing stories with my cousin Abby who is visiting Jerusalem right now, and she told me of a recent bank experience. She was cashing a check and asked to get some of the money back in cash. When the teller looked at the amount, she said, "Why so much? Do you really need to carry that much cash around?" I cannot imagine that kind of comment at the PNC bank in Lutherville.

Once you have a bank account in Israel, the next step is to get money in. One way is to wire the funds from the US. Once the bank receives the wire, they call you, and you have to come in to transfer the money into your checking account. Of course, there are fees associated with that, and a commission on the exchange rate. The best way to get money into Israel seems to be via PayPal. I set up an Israeli PayPal account and linked it to my bank in the US and to the Mizrachi bank. Then I transferred funds through Paypal, and PayPal does the currency conversion at the going commercial rate, with no commissions. I was impressed that when I tried to transfer funds, my account was suspended, and the fraud prevention department at PayPal called me to verify my attempt before they would let the transaction through.

All told, I was out of the bank in less than two hours. The only two documents that they needed were my national ID card and, wouldn't you know it, my American passport. Apparently, I had to fill out a form to register as a dual citizen for some tax reason, and they needed a copy of my passport, the only document that I left at home. So, I brought the passport in the next day and everything was fine.

Tonight is Erev Simchat Torah, the Eve of the celebration of the Torah, which my friends in Nashville when I was growing up commonly referred to as "Another one of those made up Avi Rubin holidays". Here in Israel, this is one of the most joyous events of the year. We celebrate that another year has elapsed, and we roll the Torah scrolls back to their starting point and commence the reading of the Torah from "In the beginning." After the holiday, all of the neighborhoods have massive outdoor parties with bands playing music, dancing in the streets, food, etc. I've been told that it's not something to be missed, so we are looking forward to a great time.

Next week, Ann starts her Ulpan, which is an intensive immersion Hebrew program. She will have class downtown for almost 4 hours per day, four days a week for the next five months. The kids get back to school after more than a week off, and classes start at Tel Aviv University. So, our lives will get back on the daily grind track, enhanced by the novelty of being in Israel.

Yom Kippur

2010-09-18T15:38:00.006-04:00

Yom Kippur has always been my least favorite holiday. There I said it. I know it sounds heretical, but for me, the deprivation from food and especially water for 26 hours trumps all the meaningful sentiment that is part of the holiest day for the Jewish people. Despite having built up some additional reserves in the last several years, I do not handle fasting very well, and around early afternoon on Yom Kippur, I get very dizzy, cranky and miserable. Growing up, whenever life presented me with challenges, my Dad would say to me, ".קשה להיות יהודי" (it's hard to be Jewish), and for me this rings the most true on Yom Kippur. One of the standard greetings on this holy of holy days is, "Have a meaningful fast." And, while I've caught myself saying that many times, the real meaning is that I can't eat or drink, and I simply dread it.

So why do I do it? I suppose there are several reasons. Fasting on Yom Kippur is part of who I am and part of what I do. I can't imagine not fasting - it has never entered my mind. Not an option. There is something special about standing during services with hundreds of other (hungry) people who are sharing the same experience and chanting familiar songs that Jews all over the world are repeating every year. Songs that were sung by my grandparents and their grandparents, and even by my ancient ancestors; songs that I hear my children sing, and that their children and grandchildren will sing. These tunes have been refined over centuries, a melodic evolution that resulted in sounds that would spiritually lift even the most agnostic of people. The final song of the Yom Kippur service, Avinu Malkenu, echos in my head for hours, and I can't, and don't want to, extract it. It's a part of my heritage that I experienced as a child in my parent's synagogue, in college at Hillel, and at our own synagogue as an adult, and without which I would feel that part of me was missing. For me, it's all about tradition and community.

After having experienced Rosh Hashana in Israel, I knew what to expect on Erev Yom Kippur. The stores that even opened that day closed around 1 pm, and the buses stopped running, and then around 4:00, the roads went completely quiet. Here in Israel cars are not allowed on the streets on Yom Kippur. Instead, nonobservant Israelis take to the streets on their bikes, rollerblades and skateboards. In fact, we biked to Kol Nidre services because we knew we would not be able to drive home, and walking would have meant starting our fast even earlier to account for walking time, a totally unacceptable option. I recall Ann making some comments about biking in a dress or a skirt, but that problem was resolved when she remembered how people dressed for Rosh Hashana in shul. The average congregant wore either slacks or jeans, a polo shirt and flip flops. There were some Israelis who wore shorts and T-shirts, and a group of American college students conspicuous in their dress slacks and ties. The rabbi had prepared us for this by stating the dress code: no ties allowed, and anything else goes. At Kol Nidre, one fellow arrived wearing a white t-shirt, shorts and flip flops, with his rollerblades hanging over his shoulder, presumably his ride home.

After Kol Nidre, we left the shul to a unique spectacle. All of Ramat Aviv was out in the streets. Most were riding bikes, but many were just standing around talking. The streets were so crowded, that we had to ride our bikes for one stretch on the sidewalk, which I felt kind of defeated the purpose of being able to ride our bikes in the street. When we got to the major road, the crowd thinned out a bit, and we were able to ride in the middle of the street, along with hundreds of other people. You would think that on these split highways, people would ride in the same directions that traffic normally flows, but you would be wrong. There was random two-way bike traffic on both sides of the median, so we had to pay close attention as we rode to avoid bumping into oncoming bikers. This was especially stressful as I was the lead bike with my three children behind me and Ann bringing up the rear. While there are no traffic accidents on Yom Kippur, I would bet that the emergency rooms are more crowded on this day than any other because Israelis seem just as reckless on bikes as they do in their cars, and the bikers ranged in age from 2 year olds with training wheels to senior citizens. I shot this 17 second video with my iPhone right outside of the shul:

I woke up on Yom Kippur morning thinking of food and knowing from experience that I would be fine until about noon, when I would start deteriorating steadily. While Ann fed the twins breakfast upstairs, I got ready to leave for morning services. I don't know how Ann is able to prepare the kids' food during Yom Kippur while fasting. I prefer not to see anything edible. Elana fasted last year and was determined to do so again this year. I took great inspiration watching this 11 year old kid with a will of iron go through the day with no food or drink. Elana knew she could quit at any time, but she managed to fast until the very end. (Only later did I learn that she had a 10 shekel bet with her friend Daniel that she would be able to fast the whole time.) During some of my rougher patches, I looked at Elana and said to myself that if she can do it, so can I.

After Tamara and Benny had eaten breakfast, we rode our bikes to shul. It is one thing to know intellectually that the streets are safe for bikes, but it is still quite an experience to turn from our small neighborhood street onto a major road and cross a large intersection by bicycle, with the children following close behind.

The ride home in the early afternoon was uphill and more challenging because it was hotter out, and hunger, thirst and exhaustion were settling in. We considered riding back to the synagogue for the evening Neila service, but I did not want Elana riding a bike in her weakened condition, and was frankly not so confident in mine and Ann's abilities to ride safely either, so we walked. The rabbi announced that the service would end at 6:30, and a woman congregant raised her hand and exclaimed that it was actually 6:26 pm, generating widespread laughter. At 6:18, the Hazan (cantor), who had not paced himself that well, finished the service. An awkward silence ensued. The rabbi stalled by making some announcements, but could not fill the time. Sensing restlessness in the congregation, he sent someone outside to see if he could observe 3 stars, and upon an affirmative response, proceeded to call for the tekiya gedolah, a prolonged sounding of the shofar signifying the end of Yom Kippur. What followed is a blur in my memory, but somehow, approximately 3 minutes later we had made the 25 minute walk home and were sitting at the table eating delicious leftovers from Ann's pre-fast extravaganza. I'm not certain, but there's a pretty good chance that we set some olympic records getting home. I noticed that most of the people walking home from various services were not lingering to socialize in their customary way, but were setting speed records of their own, walking with a purpose, and carrying any small children with them who might have slowed them down.

Yom Kippur is a day of atonement when we seek forgiveness for our wrongdoings during the past year. I wish the Jewish scholars who set the rules had come up with something easier. How about a simple "I'm sorry"? But, they chose fasting, and so another year has gone by, and another fast is done. Until next year, I plan on enjoying every meal, every snack, and every nosh that comes my way. Gmar Chatima Tova to all my friends who observe Yom Kippur. May you have a healthy, happy, peaceful and prosperous year!

Rosh Hashana

2010-09-12T07:42:00.005-04:00

The warnings began on Sunday morning at the university. First, a colleague stopped by to give me a heads up. A couple of hours later, a friend, Benny Pinkas sent me an email tip. By the afternoon, Sharon Geva had weighed in sounding the alarm, and we woke up Monday morning at code red status. Putting off grocery shopping any longer would be at your own peril. Israel was about to shut down for almost four days, and you do not want to be last in line when Jews are stocking up on food.

Stores started closing at midday on Wednesday and would not re-open until late Saturday evening. Even in Tel Aviv, which is likely the most secular place in Israel, you could feel the electricity in the air. As Ann and I combed the grocery store isles on Monday to stock up our bunker, I could not think of a comparable experience in the US. The upcoming holiday hung in the air with a weight that I had never experienced before; anticipation was everywhere. It was part of every observation, every movement for the entire week. For some, Rosh Hashanah means a few days off of work and a couple of extra beach days. For others it is a meaningful religious experience. But in all cases, this week is a big deal. The country celebrates, each person in his own way, and without the commercialism that accompanies major holidays in the US. In the supermarket, it seemed people were shopping to feed an army, and given that this is Israel, in many cases they actually were. In offices that we visited, women were handing out candy bars and wishing people a happy new year.

On Wednesday afternoon, the buses went still, shops closed and the streets were eerily quiet, as ovens across the country lit up, and people prepared for the first of three dinner feasts in a row. Wednesday and Thursday nights were the Rosh Hashanah holiday dinners, and Friday night, of course, Erev Shabbat. We were invited to three different houses. If gastronomy were an Olympic event, Israel would have its share of gold medals, as each meal outdid the next in quantity, variety and quality of food.

On Wednesday night, we went to dinner at Zvi Geva's parent's house. They live just outside Rehovot in a beautiful house with a fantastic garden in back where the table was set up for about 20 people. Zvi's mom called for 7:30 p.m. (or 19:30 as it is known here), but Sharon advised us that start times here are "open to interpretation". In fact, on a couple of occasion we arrived somewhere at the announced time, and people were not ready for us yet. Israel is clearly the origination point for Jewish Standard Time (JST). We left home at 6:30 and hit the kind of bumper to bumper traffic that I remember from my days in New Jersey when I needed to get to New York City during rush hour. Although under normal circumstances there is little in the world that I despise more than being stuck in traffic, on that evening, I felt it was a meaningful experience, as millions of Jews were all heading to Rosh Hashana dinner at the same time, and most of them appeared to be in my lane. It was a shared moment that made the 5 mph drive a bit more tolerable (not really). We arrived about half an hour late, which meant that we were one of the first ones to show up.

The dinner was an absolute feast, and at midnight we rolled over to our car to head home - and once again hit complete gridlock. While my sensibility was telling me how wonderful it was to share the road with so many celebrating Jews returning from their holiday dinner, I would be lying if I said I was thrilled, and we got home well after 1:00 in the morning.

The next morning, we woke up the kids so that we could get to shul in time for services. The congregation is led by an American Rabbi named Jeff Cymet, whose brother coincidentally lives in Owings Mills and belongs to our synagogue there. The Rabbi had perviously reached out to us when we arrived in Israel and invited us to dinner at his house, and we got to know his lovely Australian-born wife and three kids, two of whom are close in age to ours. Benny who had been playing with their children all evening, commented when we left that he had forgotten he wasn't in America that evening, the ultimate compliment. Rosh Hashana services were very familiar. The only difference from the typical conservative service was that the sermon was in Hebrew, and I did my best to whisper a simultaneous translation to Ann, hoping not to get shushed by anyone.

After services, lack of sleep from the previous night took its toll, and we took afternoon naps to recharge our batteries as another major holiday meal awaited us that evening at Rabbi Cymet's house. We managed to force ourselves to show up a little late, and still felt like we arrived early. There were several families in attendance, one of whom actually arrived almost 2 hours late, during the middle of the meal. I think I need to buy a watch that uses JST to be more socially accepted here. I'll just set it back an hour and a half. The meal was completely out of control. There were at least four main meat dishes, a couple of vegetarian dishes, two types of soup, salad, gefilte fish, several side dishes, and many different desserts and fruit at the end. Luckily, my stomach had stretched out the night before, and I was able to consume about twice my previous record. We were 2/3 of the way through our holiday dinners, and I did not think I had the stamina to go all the way. Friday night, we had another feast at Sharon and Zvi's house, with many of Zvi's relatives, and while only two days into the new year, we had eaten about a third of our typical annual consumption by the end of that dinner.

During several of our holiday meals, and in the course of other visits here, politics were often discussed. Israelis have strong political views, and they are not afraid to share. This past week, the Israeli prime minister was in the States meeting with Obama and the Palestinian leader Abbas for peace talks, and it was interesting to observe the reactions of Israelis first-hand. It is hard to generalize the Israeli point of view for several reasons. First, we only came in contact with a limited set of people, and most of them are academics, coming from similar socio-economic and religious/secular backgrounds, and sharing similar world views. Second, in several instances my discussions were in Hebrew, and while conversationally, I get by pretty well, heated political discussions (i.e. political discussions in Israel) represent a challenge to my comprehension. That worked out okay because I noticed that the Israelis in my sample set were much more interested in telling me their political opinions than in hearing mine. Nodding and smiling worked great.

I'll summarize the Israeli points of view that I heard about the peace talks, but keep in mind that I've spoken with a relatively small, statistically insignificant number of people. The predominant opinion that I heard is that Israelis are jaded. They've seen this all before, and they don't expect anything to come of it. They feel that unsuccessful peace talks are worse than no peace talks, and that the worst outcome is a peace treaty that ends up meaningless. Several people expressed that they did not feel Abbas has enough power or control to live up to any kind of treaty anyway, and I heard a number of people state that they thought the talks were a setup to make Israel look bad. One person in a heated discussion expressed the opinion that the only outcome from peace talks is that more Jews will get shot as Arabs try to derail the process. I did meet a couple of people here who were more optimistic and who think that this time it is different, and that real progress will be made. Most people believe that some agreement will be signed, but that it will not amount to anything significant and will not change the situation.

What surprises me is the extent to which I sense polarity in Israel. I knew about the tension among the religious and the secular Jews, and I was aware that left and right were further apart than even in the US, but being here has brought home that the divisions here are much worse than I realized. I cannot tell if it is because I am older and more politically aware, because my Hebrew is getting better, or due to the fact that things really have deteriorated, but I am observing a political situation that is worse than anything I have seen here in the past. The religious right is growing in population and gaining control in the government. Many on the left see this as a threat to the nation and even to its security. One Israeli commented to me, "Who is going to protect our country in 20 years when the religious have full control of the country? They don't serve in the army; they don't pay taxes, and they don't contribute to society in any meaningful way." Another Israeli described to me how the ultra religious avoid army duty by studying Torah until the age of 26, and by then, they have several children, no practical education or skills, and they cannot hold a decent job. Yet another Israeli told me he can't stand Jerusalem anymore because "there are too many Arabs and religious Jews there." And finally, I also heard the opinion that Israel should return all the territories because that would "get rid of all the Arabs there, and they would no longer vote in Israel anymore and would have less representation in parliament". Several Israelis expressed to me that the difficulties that Ann had proving she was Jewish when obtaining her visa, and in fact the very need for her to provide this proof are evidence of the control that the religious right maintains in the ministry of the interior.

I have no doubt that the ultra-religious Jews harbor feelings for the secular Jews and the Arabs that are at best equally antagonistic and likely worse. My observation is that the Arabi-Israeli problem is perhaps no longer the biggest problem in Israel. The Israeli-Israeli and Jew-Jew problems are VERY serious. They are perhaps not as violent, but the long-term threats from this conflict may be just as dangerous to the future of this country. I am shocked at how negative some people are about prospects for inter-faith peace, and how unwilling they are to entertain possible solutions. In Ramat Aviv Gimel, we are living at the epicenter of the brewing conflict, as an international spotlight is shining directly on Ramat Aviv, adjacent to our town. The Chabad, a very religious orthodox sect of Judaism, is moving into the neighborhood in large numbers. I observed them on street corners on Fridays offering me and other passers by to put on tfillin and to say a few prayers. I've discussed this with incensed secular Jews who feel threatened by the Chabad who wait outside the middle school and try to walk with their children and preach religious faith to them. Before leaving Baltimore, I listened to an NPR segment about these tensions in Ramat Aviv, and now I've witnessed them first hand. If you let them, the politics can really get to you, and I've left several of these discussions pretty depressed.

Back to happier things, I'll summarize the holiday experience we had in Israel. They keywords are food, togetherness, more food, exhaustion, blowing of the shofar, political discussions, food, traffic, whole country celebrates, food, and little sleep.

My previous blog entry about obtaining Ann's immigration visa generated the most feedback to date. Some compliments, several personal war stories, and one comment that the Israeli immigration system is a utopian dream compared to the process for foreigners in the US. I have had enough exposure to the US green card system to concur. If adversity is what inspired me, then this posting will disappoint, as our Rosh Hashanah experience in Israel was uplifting and justified the effort of bringing the family to Israel for a year. A truly unique experience.

Bureaucracy

2010-09-07T07:55:00.003-04:00

Despite multiple composition courses in college and a career that requires constant writing, there is no way that my meager communication skills can properly convey the experience of obtaining Ann's visa to stay in Israel. Simply put, the English language does not lend itself easily to the kind of graphic description that is necessary to give the reader a feel for what it was like, as language requires words, and words alone cannot express the level of frustration that this experience engendered.

But, I will try.

I recommend not reading this if you are about to go to bed or if you scare easily, as what I'm about to impart might stir even the bravest soul and create a discomfort in your heart that you will not shed lightly.

I got my first taste of the dangers of dealing with the Israeli bureaucracy (בירוקרטיה) when I attended the orientation for new Fulbright Scholars in Washington a few weeks before leaving for Israel. The director of the Israel Fulbright program gave us a stern warning. He said that under no circumstances, and I REPEAT, under no circumstances should you go to the ministry of interior alone. I cannot emphasize that enough, he said. You MUST find the person at your university who is in charge of getting visas for visitors and have them accompany you to the ministry of interior office. Do not DARE attempt to do this alone, he said, and I've never seen anyone more serious in my life.

On our third day in Israel, we dragged the kids to the #27 bus and headed to the Ministry of Interior office (משרד הפנים) on our own. I figured, come on, how bad could it be? I speak Hebrew, and I'm pretty good at talking my way into things and out of situations. Surely it can't be as bad as he said. We were still all jet-lagged and did not think to bring any books or video games for the kids. This would be a quick in and out, and we'd be all set.

Let me back up and explain what we were trying to accomplish. I am a dual citizen of Israel and the US, because I was naturalized as an Israeli when my parents moved to Israel when I was a child. Despite the fact that I was still a child when they returned to the US (and still act like a child very often these days), I am considered an Israeli here. Ann, on the other hand, is a full red blooded American and thus to visit Israel for more than 3 months, she must obtain a visa permitting here to stay here.

So, we get to the Ministry of the Interior, and they are closed for lunch. Furthermore, they don't do visas any more that day. You must return on Sunday or Thursday from 8-12 or on Monday from 2:30 - 5:30, or every other Tuesday from 1:30 - 3:45, and every seventh Wednesday from 10:30 - 10:33 on odd days of the month, except during leap years, and the whole schedule is subject to change without notice. I figured that there was no way we would every be able to return on a day when they were actually giving visas at the right time. But, the next day, we tried again early in the morning. The kids were still waking up when we had been in the waiting room for 20 minutes. Again, we did not think to bring anything for them to do. After about three hours, our number was finally called, and Ann walked up to the counter and stated in English that she was visiting for the year and wanted to extend her 3 month tourist visa that she received upon entering the country. The bureaucrat behind the window at the counter was extremely rude to her and was telling her that she couldn't do it when I interrupted in Hebrew and started making a big deal about being a professor at the university and bringing my family here. I did it Israeli style, raising my voice and gesticulating wildly. This is considered acceptable behavior here, and in fact, is quite necessary in government offices.

The man asked me, "who are you?" in a somewhat threatening tone. I explained who I was and who Ann was, and he asked if Ann was Jewish. I said that she was. He asked me to prove it. Now, if Ann were a guy, I suppose there would be one approach I could take, but given that she is of the fairer gender, I wasn't sure what he meant. So, I said that no woman in America would know how to read Hebrew if she weren't Jewish, so here, test her. See that she can read Hebrew. He said that he need documented proof that she is Jewish. I asked him why it mattered. Couldn't a professor with a non-Jewish wife come to Israel? But anyway, she is Jewish, I said, realizing that I might have over-estimated my skills at talking my way out of situations with that last comment. The bureaucrat (whose name ironically also happens to be Aviel) told me that I needed a certified letter from our rabbi in the States certifying that Ann is Jewish, and that her parents are Jewish and that she is from a Jewish blood line. Otherwise, he said, there is a process they can use to get her a visa that is long and laborious, and can take over two months, and we might not get the visa in time before her 3 months expired, especially with the country about to go into hibernation for a month due to the upcoming high holidays.

To get the letter certified, we were told by the lesser Aviel, we need to go to the Jewish agency on Hashmonai Rd with the letter from the rabbi, a marriage document showing that we had a Jewish wedding, and any other documented proof that we can produce that she is Jewish, and after they certify the letter, come back, and she can get her visa. As we were standing around absorbing this, a nice young woman standing next to me said, "Don't do it." It was like the opposite of a Nike commercial. Don't do what, I asked? Don't go to that Jewish agency. I waited there for hours, and in the end I never got the letter. Here's what you do. I found this woman named Debbie who works at a special agency in Jerusalem that stamps these letters for you, and she will do it with no questions asked. Here's her cell number. I felt like I had just received the secret code to an underground society for breaking through the Israeli bureaucracy. I asked her how much Debbie charges, and she said it was free.

Armed with this secret phone number, I felt less intimidated by the lesser Aviel, who reappeared and told me that there may be a faster way we can do this, but it will cost us a lot of money. He said for 355 shekels each, he can get me the visas for Ann and the kids, but he said it was a lot of money, and we're better off getting the documents he suggested. I quickly calculated that this is about $340 US. I couldn't tell if it was a bribe he was asking for or just some kind of process that is expedited with money, but I jumped on it and said that I would pay it in cash and be done with this. He then asked me if we were moving to Israel permanently, and I felt it was a trick question. I said that we were here for a year, and then we would see. It was the best I could come up with at the time, and at this point, I was certain that I am the worst in the world at thinking on my feet and talking my way out of tricky situations. He came back about 20 minutes later with his boss (we were closing in on 4 hours at the ministry of interior) and said that there was a problem. Since I am an Israeli, my kids are Israeli too. So, they cannot be issued visas. In order to leave Israel, they need to be registered as Israeli citizens, which can be done at some crazy limited hours, and for that we need their original birth certificates and American passports. Furthermore, Ann cannot get a visa extension without proving she is Jewish, which can only be done by a signed, certified letter from the office of the controllers of who is Jewish.

We left the ministry of interior dejected with our tails between our legs, having accomplished absolutely nothing, except for setting various flags in some internal Israeli database that will prevent my children from being able to leave this country without 20 more hours of bureaucracy. The way the ministers behave, it's as though they are on reverse-commission, where their salary increases with every application they deny. The booming voice of the director of the Fulbright Israel program echoed in my head. Do not dare go to the ministry of interior alone. Do not dare go to the ministry of interior alone. Oy, why can't I listen?!?

I called this secret Debbie woman, and although she was not available, the person who answered said that she could help. All I needed to do was get a letter from the Rabbi in the US, and take it to their office in Jerusalem, and they would stamp it. I asked if they had an office in Tel Aviv, and they said that they did, but they did not know the address. I asked what their organization was called, and she said it was the Jewish Agency for Israel. Oy, a special trip to Jerusalem to get a letter certified to prove that Ann is Jewish. I felt like I was living in bizzaro land.

When I got home, I wrote to my Rabbi and asked for the letter, describing in great detail the extent to which it had to state that Ann was Jewish. I also sent an email to the person renting our house with detailed instructions of how to dig through boxes and files in our basement to find original birth certificates for the kids, marriage certificates in Hebrew and English for me and Ann, and to send these to us as quickly as possible. Happily, we received a letter that made Ann sound more Jewish than Abraham and the official documents in the mail a few days later. We have the best renters!

Once I was armed with the documents, I wrote to my host at Tel Aviv University (TAU) asking if he can introduce me to someone that can help with the visa issue. He pointed me to his secretary who told me that all I had to do was bring in our passports, and she would take care of it. I was very happy and excited and told Ann that our troubles were over. We now had פרותקציה! (which is a Hebrew term for someone who has a powerful person backing them) I brought in the passports, and she scanned them and sent them to some other office at TAU. That afternoon, the secretary calls to tell me that the issue of our visas is a bit more complicated, and that I need to speak to this woman Hava at the main university office for visas. Well, I was not thrilled that I had more to do, but at least I had finally reached the person who was going to make all this go away. Now Hava does not work on Tuesdays, and given that this was a Monday afternoon, Hava suggested that I come see her on Wednesday.

On Wednesday, I went to see Hava, who was very nice and friendly. She told me that it took her four years to develop an inside connection at the ministry of interior. All I had to do was take this letter that she was producing for me, and follow these 12 items on a special checklist she had, and Ann would be given an A-4 visa. I said that I had heard that what Ann needed was to extend her tourist visa, and Hava told me that this is where I had gone wrong. Also, Hava said that the kids are Israeli, and we would have to get them registered as citizens and Israeli passports. I asked Hava if she could come with us because after all the Fulbright people had told us not to dare go to the ministry of interior without being accompanied by someone from the university. Hava responded with a lecture about the Fulbright people and their expectations, and that I was a grown up and could go there on my own. She gave me instructions for finding her mole within the department of interior, and she even called her up and set an appointment for us for Sunday morning. It looked like there might be a light at the end of the tunnel after all.

Sunday morning, I woke up with a mixture of dread and excitement. Would the story really end today? Would Ann get her A-4 visa, and would the kids become real Israelis with passports? Ann and I walked Elana and Benny to school. Tamara wasn't feeling that well, so she didn't go to school and we dragged her along to the ministry of interior. We made it through security and headed down the hall to room #13 to meet with our secret bureaucrat. We were greeted with what I'll describe as latent hostility. I felt she was looking for a reason to make us miserable. She quickly found one. As soon as I explained who we were, she went on a tirade about Hava and the university people misunderstanding all of their procedures. She told me that Ann is not eligible for an A-4 visa because I am an Israeli. I did not follow the logic there, nor did I care to. What we needed to do was go to the other room (where Aviel works at the window) and take a number and get an extended tourist visa. Something primal ignited inside me, and I felt I was going to lose it. With forced calmness I said through gritted teeth that we had tried that road, and that I thought the connection with the university might lead to a better path, but that going through that window was not going to get us what we needed. So, she led me to the window and got into a heated discussion with Aviel about us. In the end, the lesser Aviel turned to me and asked why I'm complicating everyone's life. He told me what I needed to do last time and even got his boss involved. Do I have the letter from the rabbi? Yes? Okay, is it certified? No?!? Well, go to the ministry of controlling who is Jewish and get it certified. I said that I heard that this is a terrible, lengthy process, and he said (more like yelled) are you kidding? It's 5 minutes. Walk over there, it's around the corner, and you can get it certified, in 20 minutes you are back here, and your wife gets her 12 month tourist visa. It's easy!

My heart sank. Maybe we should just take a vacation outside of Israel every 2 1/2 months. Cypress can be nice. Maybe Italy? If we leave Israel and come back, then Ann gets a new 3 month visa each time. Of course, we'd have to leave the kids behind because they are not allowed out of the country without Isareli passports, but by the time we've been here 2 1/2 months, they should be able to fend for themselves, no? Okay, so we headed to the ministry of controlling who is Jewish. As Tamara was under the weather, rather than walk, I grabbed a cab. When I told the driver where we were going, he said, "it's right around the corner, why don't you just walk?" I told him that I was paying him, and that he should take me to that address because that's where I want to go, and I don't want to walk! I started to appreciate why Israelis are so impatient and yell all the time. If they have to deal with offices like the ministry of interior on a regular basis, that's justifiable cause for losing one's mind. We got to the address, and there is a sign outside the door. I can't believe my eyes. It is the Jewish Agency for Israel. The same secret society that Debbie from Jerusalem belongs to, and it's a 5 minute walk away. As Elana would say, OMG!!!

We go in, and they are very friendly. Very, very friendly, only there's one problem. The woman who certifies the letter from the synagogue is at a Rosh Hashana preparation party in Jerusalem and won't be back until Tuesday. But, if we leave the letter with them and copies of the letter from the university and copies of our marriage documents, they will stamp it and give it back to us on Tuesday, and we can get the visa after that.

We decided that since we were in the neighborhood, we would return to the ministry of interior and register the kids as Israelis and try to get their passports, at least Tamara's, since she was with us. We made the 5 minute walk back, and got a number and waited in line. It only took about 2 hours, but we eventually got the kids registered. That is, until the woman helping us asked if we had any proof that Ann is Jewish. I said I had a letter from the synagogue. She asked if it was certified. I said that it was in the process of being certified. So, she asks to see it. The problem is, that we left it at the Jewish Agency for Israel. Oh, okay, then I can start the process but I have to leave the kids' religion as "pending examination" because I need to see that the mother is Jewish before they can be considered Jewish. Fine. She said that once we get the certified letter and give it to Aviel in the other office, we should tell him to give her the letter so she can update the database that the kids are Jewish. In the meantime, we registered the kids successfully and applied for Tamara's passport, which would be ready for pickup in 2 days.

Two days later, and Ann and I awake and exchange nervous looks. What adventures will the ministry of interior have for us today? Would the Jewish Agency for Israel have the stamped letter? Would Ann finally get her visa? By this point the kids are walking themselves to school, so Ann and I take a bus downtown to the city hall. My aim is to obtain a parking sticker, which will allow us to park cheaply in designated spots in Tel Aviv and gives a 50% discount in municipal parking lots. The sticker gives you free parking at many beaches as well. The story of my dealings with the city bureaucracy for this sticker rivals the visa story, only on a smaller scale. I'm going to spare you the details because it's really not that interesting, and because recalling the experience might drive me to tears. While we were in the middle of one of the less pleasant stages of my discussions with the city bureaucrats, I received a call from the Jewish Agency saying that we should hurry up and go there to pick up Ann's certified document stating she was Jewish because the ministry of interior closes at noon, in one hour, and it won't open again for five days due to Rosh Hashana. I had come far enough along getting my parking sticker, that I did not want to leave, so Ann went out on her own, grabbed a cab and went to the Jewish Agency. When she arrived there, the woman asked her for her papers. The problem, Ann explained, was that we had left the papers with them. She was bracing for another Israel bureaucracy moment, but the woman found the papers. But, nothing was prepared, and the clock was ticking. Ann explained the urgency, and the Jewish Agency woman went to work, trying to prepare the certified document in time.

At 11:40 I finally got my parking sticker, and I jumped in a cab and called Ann. My call came in as she was walking briskly (in 95 degree weather) from the Jewish Agency back to the ministry of interior, carrying certified proof of her religious identity. I arrived at the ministry offices a few minutes after Ann, who was dutifully filling out the B-2 visa form. How we ended up with a B-2, I have no idea. By now, we had filled out forms for every permutation of letters and numbers in the English and Hebrew alphabets, and Ann had become quite adept at it. The lesser Aviel seemed very pleased with Ann and much friendlier, and she believed it was because he was finally convinced she was Jewish. While Ann filled out forms, I made copies of everything, and set out in search of the woman who had registered the kids as Israeli, so that I could remove the "pending verification" from their Jewish identities. I did not see her, so I got in the line for passport retrieval and 20 minutes later, I had Tamara's Israeli passport in my hand, and Ann had completed the paperwork for her visa. Sadly, a line had formed in front of her, and she was waiting to speak with Aviel again. I went back in search of the woman who could mark my kids as Jewish, and this time I found her. She remembered me, and dutifully pulled out their charts, pecked away at her computer and declared that Israel now officially considered my three children as Jewish. With that proclamation, any doubt I had been harboring about the religion of my children went out the window. Now all that is left to do is to bring Benny and Elana in and to apply for their Israeli passports. This can be done on Mondays and Wednesdays from 2:30 - 5:30 pm.

Aviel accepted all of the paperwork from Ann, issued her visa, affixed it to the passport and started cracking jokes with me. At that moment, I really loved the guy. I reached under the glass divide and offered my hand, which he shook warmly. We were best of friends, after all, we had done battle together and both came out victorious. As we were leaving, I heard the faint sound of Aviel telling the next guy in line that his paperwork was all wrong, that he had to go to the whatever office and get certified this or that because… I glanced back at the poor soul, and while I felt sorry for him, I couldn't help but feel that in approximately one month, when he gets it all straightened out, he will feel as good as I feel at this moment, and he will share a special moment with Aviel. I was the graduating senior looking at the poor, naive incoming freshman with nostalgia; the seasoned war veteran witnessing the fresh new recruit, still wet behind the ears.

Finally, Ann has her B-2 visa, good until September of 2011, with re-entry privileges, and the kids are all registered as Jewish Israelis. This chapter ended today at 1:15 pm, exactly 3 weeks from our arrival in the Jewish homeland. I love this country, and I think it's a great place to visit. But if you are not Israeli, and you want to come for more than 3 months, you will probably have to deal with the ministry of interior. And, I don't envy you one bit!

Day 15

2010-09-01T11:25:00.007-04:00

Summer vacation ended today, and all across Israel children swarmed the neighborhoods around 7:30 a.m. towards their local schools for their first day. It is a day that our kids anticipated with anxiety and even some dread for three months, especially Elana. She's been a real trooper so far, but it's got to be completely intimidating to go to a new school as a tweenager where none of the kids really speak English, and at an age where the girls tend to be cliquy and often mean, and the boys have cooties. The twins each had a lucky break. We were introduced through the school to a family who moved here from the States last year. The mom is Israeli, but the kids grew up in New York and had to make the same adjustment our kids are making this year. One of the daughters, Maya, is in Tamara's class, and they had a play date yesterday. We were thrilled to see that when we arrived at Tamara's class, Maya was saving her a seat. This made all the difference on Tamara's first day.

Benny is not at all self-conscious. I don't know where he gets his self confidence, even cockiness, and he was not nervous heading to the school. But when we got to his classroom, he observed that all of the kids already knew each other and that none of them spoke any English. He looked at me and said that he didn't know how he was going to play with anyone. I reassured him and found a seat for him in the back at a two-person desk. I stayed with him as the room filled up, and for the first time ever, I saw Benny look uncomfortable. Right before the opening bell, a woman came in with a boy and he sat next to Benny in one of the only remaining seats. The mom tried to introduce her son to Benny, and I interrupted saying that Benny did not speak Hebrew. She lit up and said that they were new here, and that they had just moved here from Argentina. The son spoke Hebrew because they are Israeli and spoke it at home, but he did not know how to read and write (Benny knows how to read and write but can't really speak it - a perfect match). However, the boy also speaks English. He probably studied at an American school in Argentina. So, he and Benny were off to the races, and by the time I left, they were engaged in a deep conversation in a language that is completely foreign to me, about something called pokemon. When we picked the kids up from school, Benny was describing his three best friends to us. Of course the Argentinian was one of them, but was not his best-best friend, of course. Looks like his adjustment didn't take long.

On our way out after we dropped them off, I poked my head into Elana's classroom. She was sitting at a desk by herself, while the other kids were in small clusters yapping away in Hebrew. Unfortunately, we did not encounter any English speaking kids in her class, and her teacher indicated to me that she did not know of any. The teacher made an effort to get Elana to know some other children. She had a couple of the girls stop by our place yesterday and pick up Elana for an event. They also walked her back, but unfortunately, they did not have a common language to communicate. She's very brave, and I think has a good attitude about school. I just think it's going to require some patience before she makes friends and feels comfortable there. After school, Elana said that some of the kids helped her out and were very nice to her, but she had no idea what her homework was supposed to be. She said she felt pretty lost. It will take time. We hired a tutor who used to teach at the school to help the kids 3 days a week for an hour each. I think the tutor will make all the difference.

I observed that most kids who are old enough to walk in Israel have their own cell phone. They are assigned a cellular phone number at birth and given a SIM card for their first birthday. Given that most kids over the age of 10 wander the streets in the barrio (wait, wrong country) alone, it makes sense. In fact, Elana and Tamara walk home alone from the tutor's house already. A couple of days ago, Elana attended a meeting for the incoming 6th grade class and was quick to point out to me that every single one of them had a cell phone, and they knew how to use it. It's not clear they knew how not to use it. I'm not one to get my kids something just because every other kid has it, but we decided to get Elana a cell phone despite the fact that she was the only one without one, and I thought it would be a nice surprise for her after her first day of school, which I expected to be a rough experience for her, but which actually turned out not so bad.

I can think of few experiences in life that I have had that confused me more than my three attempts to acquire this phone. At the cell phone store, I was given a plethora of choices, none of which appeared to be written down anywhere. The conversation was right out of the "Who's on first?" script. This is how many minutes? No, you have to pay for the minutes, but if I pay for the minutes how many do I get? You don't get any minutes. But I thought you said… Look, you pay 100 shekels per month and then you pay 60 cents per minute except for the included minutes. How many minutes are included? None. Why did you say I could get it except for the included minutes? Because that's not the kind of plan that you are signing up for. I don't even know what plan I'm signing up for yet. Well, then why are you giving me such a hard time? It's simple. You pay 149 shekels/month… I thought you said it was 100/month. That's with the other plan. What other plan? The one that you decided to get. But I haven't made any decisions yet. I don't even understand what my options are. And I had this conversation or some variation of it at three different phone places. The clinchers as that in the end, I said I just wanted any plan, I didn't care, just sell me a phone. And, they said they only take Israeli credit cards, which sadly, I do not have. They tried my visa and it didn't work. They won't take cash or checks (not that we have any checks). Just Israeli credit cards, so I walked away empty handed. At the next place, they wanted a 3,000 shekel deposit (which is to be fully refunded in 6 months) if I use a foreign credit card. I told them that I didn't care what it cost me or how many minutes I got or how many deposits I had to leave, I just want a damn cell phone for my daughter. Anyway, Elana now has a phone, and I'm quite a bit poorer. How much poorer, I have no idea.

When not trying to negotiate with Israelis, it's interesting to observe the demographics at the school. Here in Israel, very few children go to private schools. Kids are assigned to their local neighborhood school, and for the most part, that's what they attend. In some instances they appeal to other neighborhoods for various reasons, but that is the exception. So, you get a wide mix of people all studying together. While Ann and I are accustomed to the relatively homogeneous collection of Krieger Schechter parents back home, here, our children are sharing their classrooms with children of clerks, waiters, doctors, lawyers, the rich elite and the struggling lower class. Although the neighborhood is one of the more upscale and affluent ones in the country, there are still plenty of less well to do families as well, and Ann and I were keenly aware of the wide and variable mix of people among the other parents. Some had tattoos and wore ragged clothing, while others looked more dignified and wore cleaner shorts and T-shirts. There was not a single tie to be seen, and I don't remember even seeing a button down shirt. Israel is very casual. One of the great social equalizers in Israel is the army, in which everybody serves regardless of financial, academic or cultural background, and as a result, I think there is less of a sense of class here than in other places. The diversity is not only economic. There were a number of black students too, and they blended right in socially, as far as I could tell. This is a big change from when I was a kid in Israel and did not see anyone of African descent until we moved to the State when I was almost 9 years old.

A couple of evenings ago, I attended a meeting between the 6th grade teacher and the parents of the 6th graders. In Israel, the teacher usually sticks with a class for several years, so the 6th grade teacher taught this group of kids in 5th grade and knows them all well. She introduced me to the room because apparently, Elana is the only new student in the class this year. I said a few words about who I was and about Elana and hoped that one of the parents would tell me later that their child speaks English, but it was not to be. The most interesting thing to me about the meeting was the interaction among the parents and the teacher. Anytime the teacher said something that someone disagreed with (that is to say, anytime she opened her mouth), the parents would start to yell, and then they would yell at each other, and several times it got so crazy that I think I was the only one in the room not yelling. The teacher tried to gain control of the room, but was not always successful. I wondered if this is how she manages the classroom with the parents, how is she going to handle the kids?

Let me give another example that illustrates the way Israelis relate to people. I had an experience that I felt was so typical of the personalities here, that I could almost hear my Mom's voice in the back of my head saying "only in Israel!", an expression that my parents love, and it's also the title of a popular Hebrew song (Rak-beYisrael). So, here's what happened. I took Benny to get a haircut. Only once before has Ann entrusted me with such an important mission, and she gave me several stern warnings as I left the apartment. I got to the kids' haircut place, which is next door to our building, and I was told that they would be right with me. As time went on, more kids came in, and they sat right in the seat and got haircuts. After about 10 minutes, I went up to one of the people working there and stated that we were told they would be right with us, but that other people are walking in and getting served right away. I was told to have patience and they would be right with us. Meanwhile, he asks me where I'm from and I say I just got here from the States. And what are you doing here? I'm a visiting professor at Tel Aviv University. And so on for a while. Then he finished the haircut he was giving and called Benny over. He didn't ask me what I wanted, so I explained that I wanted it short but not too short, kind of like my hair.

He looked at me and said that he wouldn't do that to this poor kid. I think he meant it. Next, he pulls out the clippers and starts shaving away big swaths of hair. So, I asked him if he could please use scissors instead. He gives me a look of complete ridicule and exclaims in a loud, indignant voice: "Now the professor is telling me how to cut hair?" He snorts and proceeds with the clippers to practically shave Benny's head muttering under his breath about how I'm now the big expert on haircuts. Needless to say Ann was none too pleased when I got home and swore to never let me take the kids for haircuts again. The girls immediately vowed not to have their hair cut until we get back to Baltimore.

We've now been here 15 days, and we've come a long way towards getting settled in. I started work on Sunday at the university. The work week is Sunday-Thursday. Friday is usually a short day, and Saturday is the only full day off. I now have an office, a computer and several interesting colleagues to work with. Classes don't start at the university until October, due to the holidays, but many people are around, so there is plenty to do. I'm finding the time difference much harder to deal with than I expected. By late afternoon, around 4 pm, I've already put in almost a full day, and back home it's 9 a.m. and people are starting to work. Around 5 or 6 pm, I start to get a lot of work-related email, just when I'm getting ready to go home. In the evening, I find myself handling email, making conference calls through Skype, and basically having another work day. On Monday, for example, after a day at the office, I had a conference call at 10 pm, one at 10:45, and another spontaneous work-related call at 11:15 pm that lasted until almost midnight. I'm used to going to bed around 10 or 10:30 and waking up early. In fact, I'm still waking up between 5 and 6 a.m. here, and by the evening, I'm completely wiped out, and that's when the most action is going on back home. I'm not as good at juggling this as I thought I would be. I like getting an early start to the day. I joined a gym near our building, and I've been working out there every morning, except on the days that I go running. A friend of mine who lives here, Benny Pinkas, runs an annual 10k race every October, and he convinced me to train for it and run with him, so I've started jogging down to the beach and running along the boardwalk. It's beautiful. After I get home, shower and eat, I'm ready to go to work, and I get there around 9 a.m. It occurred to me that I would be better off shifting my entire schedule so that I go into work in the early afternoon, and then work very late, to coordinate with Eastern time, but I can't help waking up early, and I want to be around the university when the other people are there. Also, in the evening, the kids will have homework they'll need help with, piano practice, and I want to spend time with the family. So, even though I've been at work less than a week here, I'm already feeling exhaustion and pressure. When 4 pm comes around and email starts to flood in, my blood pressure goes up. I'll have to find a better way to deal with this.

One thing I love here is my commute. In Baltimore, I have about a 30 minute drive to work, which can also last over an hour during rush hour. And, it's a relatively unpleasant drive. Here, I have several choices, and I've tried each of them already this week. The first choice is walking, in which case, I have a lovely 20-25 minute walk, mostly through parks and quiet neighborhoods. I can also drive in about 4-5 minutes, depending on the lights. I was given a parking permit, and thee are plenty of spots in the university lot (that might change once classes start), or I can take the bus, which runs every few minutes and takes me about 12 minutes door to door, including a bit of walking on each end. I think this commute is up there as one of my favorite things about Israel.

Finally, I'd like to say a few words about how welcoming the community is here. We've been invited to dinners at peoples houses, to the beach, and just to hang out. I think our social calendar here so far is more active than it typically is back home; we've already received conflicting invitations for dinner this weekend. In the next week, we've got a party Saturday night at someone's house, plans for Shabbat dinner and for the second night of Rosh Hashana, and some prospects for the first night as well. Between my job, the kids' school, the kids' tutoring, piano lessons (more on that another time - we found an amazing piano teacher), Benny's soccer (he is going to start training with the Maccabi Tel Aviv youth soccer program tomorrow and twice a week for a total of 3 hours/week for 10 months!), homework, and piano practicing, there is little time in the day to catch our breaths.

A friend of mine described Israelis as the sabra (cactus) fruit. Hard and prickly on the outside and soft and mushy on the inside. I think it's a prefect description.

Israel - the first six days

2010-08-23T12:26:00.002-04:00

This is our sixth day in Israel, and after almost a week, I'd like to write down some thoughts and observations.

First of all, Wow!

I really don't know where to start. The first week has been all about getting acclimated and settling in. This was complicated by the fact that on the second day, I developed a painful crick in my neck, and so I was quite limited physically. It might have had something to do with an 18 hour trip with 15 suitcases and 3 kids.

My first major observation is that the adage that you can get by on English in Israel and that "everybody speaks English there" is simply wrong. This was evident, for example, when I tried to get a car. I did some research from the States and tried to contact several rental companies, but I got nowhere. So, I decided to wait until I arrived in Israel. Once I got here, I called around for prices and found that you can negotiate quite a bit, and in fact, you have to. That's definitely a universal theme here. Ultimately, I got a deal for 10 1/2 month rental. It's not much of a car, but it gets me from A to B (aleph to bet?) and it fits the entire family. Looking back, there is no way I could have pulled this off without being fluent in Hebrew. In fact, if my Hebrew were better, I probably would be driving a nicer car now at a lower price.

I've had to deal a bit with various local and national government offices, and I am certain that my ability to speak Hebrew is the only reason that the experience was only "painful" instead of impossible. I have had numerous experiences in less than a week that simply could not have occurred without my knowledge of the language. One scenario that has played out several times is when we're in a crowded food court at the mall or near the beach, and people are pushing and shoving, and the guys taking the orders are trying to rush everyone. It's a hectic enough situation for native speakers. Those with less fluency left to fend for themselves in English or broken Hebrew simply cannot compete. My observation has been reenforced at the grocery store, the pharmacy, on buses, and interacting with people on the street. I'm sure that if I did not speak a single word of Hebrew, we could still do this Sabbatical trip, but I believe we would not have accomplished even 10% of what we've done so far getting settled here. Most phone numbers that you call (e.g. pizza delivery, government offices, voicemail, etc) send you directly into an automated phone menu in Hebrew. So, it's pretty useless for Ann to try to make calls, even if the person who ultimately answers the phone is friendly (likelihood = 25%) and speaks English (likelihood 75%).

Our luckiest break came before we even got here. We have these amazing friends, Sharon & Zvi Geva, who used to live in Baltimore and who now live outside of Tel Aviv. (I recommend that everyone who wants to come to Israel find such friends - actually, even if you don't come to Isarel you should try to find such friends.) They found our apartment for us, dealt with some banking issues for us, registered our kids in the neighborhood school, and basically did a lot of the ground work that we were not able to do from abroad. It's also been great catching up with them here, as we haven't seen them in 2 years. Without the Gevas, we'd probably still be in some hotel desperately looking for housing that meets our long list of requirements. The apartment they found us is gorgeous, with an incredible view of the ocean, a 20 minute walk to the beach, a 20-25 minute walk to my office, and easy bus connectivity to everywhere. It's taken us a while to figure out how everything in the apartment works - everything is different, and not just the voltage. We were challenged by the laundry machines, the TV, the air conditioning units, the lighting, the alarm (insurance policy *requires* that we set the alarm whenever we leave the house), codes for entering the front door, the rear door (different codes), and thin, slow elevators that aren't very friendly to someone as claustrophobic as I am. At first, we couldn't get the hot water to work, the toilets to flush hard (hint: push the lever twice), or the oven to turn on.

But, we've pretty much conquered all of these.

One thing I'm very happy with is the cell phone & Internet service. I highly recommend that anyone who visits Israel follow the steps I'll describe. First, before I left home, I jailbroke and unlocked my iPhone and ordered Israeli SIM cards from an online site. When our plane landed at Ben Gurion Airport in Tel Aviv, I popped out the AT&T SIM card and inserted the Israeli one. Turned on the phone, and voila, it worked. Then, I activated Internet service (129 shekels/month), and I was online with 3G service that is faster than AT&T's network in the States. Now, I've found an incredible use for this. Whenever I go somewhere on a bus, I enter the destination into the Maps app on my iPhone, and then I watch as the GPS tracks my location on the map on my phone as the blue dot representing my current location moves towards the destination. In the old days when I traveled in other countries, I was always stressed out about getting off the bus at the right time, missing my stop, or getting completely lost. So far, tracking the bus route on my iPhone GPS until I get close to my stop has taken all of the excitement (that I could do without) out of the experience. And, once I get off the bus, the GPS on the phone guides me right to my final destination. What a pleasure! Also, the Internet service in my apartment is 10Mbps bidirectional, which means that Skype and iChat work great.

Grocery shopping is a pleasure here. The nearest grocery store is just slightly further from our building than my mailbox is from my front door in Baltimore. You fill a cart with all of your selections, and then give them your grocery card at checkout. They have your home address on file, linked to your grocery card, and after you pay, they ask you when you want your groceries delivered. If it's right away, then 5 minutes after you get home, they show up with everything and unload it in the kitchen. Sure beats shopping at Safeway in Owings Mills. Also, even at the local grocery store, all the breads, including the amazing pita breads, are fresh baked and blow away anything I have eaten in the States. Of course there is falafel and hummus everywhere. I think the food is better here. We haven't been to any find dining restaurants yet on this trip, but based on my experiences on prior visits, I believe they are as good as or better than the very best restaurants in Baltimore, and even rival those in New York. So, gastronomically speaking, Israel is a huge win.

While buying food is more convenient here, other supplies are much more difficult to come by. There is no Target or Bed, Bath and Beyond. We sometimes have to go to several stores that may be far apart to find simple supplies that would be in adjacent isles in a US department stores. I have yet to discover Israel's equivalent to amazon.com, and I've had bad luck in my attempts to purchase a printer/copier/scanner/fax. I think that I placed an order for one today, and that it will arrive within 14 business days, but I could be wrong.

We are not yet on a normal sleep schedule, but we're getting close. The kids are going to bed pretty late and sleeping in, but Elana has been up quite a bit during the night. I've been up at 4 a.m. most nights, and I usually fall back asleep after a couple of hours.

So, the adjustment is under way. Life is definitely more complicated here, but there are some real advantages. Ann registered for an intensive Hebrew language program downtown (Ulpan Gordon), and the kids start school on September 1. We've met Tamara's teacher, and we love her. Hopefully, Elana and Benny's teachers will be as good and as nice. We've heard good things about them from Tamara's teacher.

We are really looking forward to the High Holidays which start the week after the kids start school. I have not been in Israel for Rosh Hashana or Yom Kippur since I was a kid. We're also really looking forward to Hanukkah and Passover here in Israel. I remember that these holidays in Israel are absolutely incredible. I'm especially looking forward to a year without all the Christmas music in the malls. If memory serves, you don't even know when it's Christmas here.

We have not had any time to be tourists yet, and we'll probably be caught up in many more organizational details until school starts, but eventually, we will take some time to visit the sites and take in the experiences here. I have also not yet pursued finding a soccer team to play on, and I have not followed my one lead for a regular poker game in Tel Aviv. I'd like for Ann to be more comfortable here before I get involved in activities outside the house. But hopefully, I'll be able to play some soccer and poker here on a regular basis. We did join a pool and health club that is a few hundred yards from our building, and the kids have already enjoyed swimming there twice, with the weather in the upper 90s.

I will try to blog at least once a month and to post updates on our experiences. Elana is also posting on her own blog. It's quite a daunting undertaking to capture all of this week's experiences in writing. Hopefully, I've painted a picture of what it's been like adjusting to life in Israel. Please keep in touch and send emails. It's always great whenever we hear from our friends back home. I can't believe we're actually living here.

Sabbatical in Tel Aviv

2010-07-19T19:42:00.004-04:00

In advance of my upcoming Sabbatical at Tel Aviv University, I just read an incredible book, Start-up Nation: The Story of Israel's Economic Miracle. Absolutely fascinating. I lived in Israel for five years as a child, and I've been back multiple times, most recently last year, and I am fluent in Hebrew. So, this book resonated very strongly with me. The authors describe how several factors, namely an immigrant population, compulsory military service, enemies all around, and the Arab boycott contributed to the culture in Israel, which in turn resulted in the perfect storm for successful entrepreneurship. I read the whole book in two sittings - couldn't put it down.

After reading Start-up Nation, I'm even more excited about my upcoming trip. I plan on trying to post regularly about the year in Israel, both the professional and the personal and cultural aspects, for the duration of the Sabbatical. As far as research goes, I will be working on several fronts. At Tel Aviv University, I will be a Fulbright Scholar, and I plan to research security issues in electronic medical records. I have some contacts at Maccabi, which is the largest HMO in Israel, and I hope to collaborate with them on some of my work. My hosts are Avishai Wool and Ran Canetti, and I'm hopeful for some productive collaborations with them. In particular, Avishai has been working on electronic voting security, a subject near and dear to my heart. I also have two new grants at Johns Hopkins related to different aspects of healthcare IT security, and I plan on continuing these projects remotely using Skype, iChat, phone and email with my students and collaborators back home. Finally, I'm hoping to find some Israeli clients for ISE.

On the personal front, we will be living in Ramat Aviv Gimel, a neighborhood on the NorthWest corner of Tel Aviv. The kids are enrolled in a public school there, and so they will have to catch up in Hebrew. I'm sure it will be a great challenge for them, but I believe they will pick it up quickly, given their language base from Krieger-Schechter. All three of them can read and write in Hebrew, and I think despite what they are saying, they are pretty excited about next year. Ann is planning on studying Hebrew at an Ulpan and continuing to do ISE's legal work remotely. These days, she is busy packing up the house and getting it ready for our renters.

I plan to walk to work every day. It's about a 25 minute walk according to online maps, and I may decide to get a bicycle. I'm looking for a complete change of environment. Here I live in a suburban, almost country setting and drive 30 minutes to work. Nothing is within walking distance, or even less than a 15 minute drive from my house. In Ramat Aviv Gimel, or just "Gimel" as I understand they call it, I will be around the corner from a shopping center, two blocks from a large gym and sports facility, 3 blocks from the kids' school, and I'll have a choice of several different supermarkets within easy walking distance. We're 15 minutes walk to the beach, and again, walking distance to work. City life for a year! I'm sure I'll be more than ready to return to our peaceful lives here, and knowing that is waiting for us will help during the times I feel suffocated by the big city.

During vacations, we plan on touring every corner of the country, and hopefully, I'll have a chance to sail in the Mediterranean. There's a big marina in Herzeliya, which is about 15 minutes away by car. I'll try to find a regular soccer team to play on, and hopefully there's a poker scene in Tel Aviv where I can unload some of my hard earned shekels. We also expect to host quite a number of visitors, and several slots on the calendar are already taken. That's part of the fun of being in Israel.

So, the countdown on our blackboard in the kitchen now reads 28. Four weeks from today we take off, and I cannot wait!

Television folds a pair of Jacks

2010-05-25T12:04:00.002-04:00

I do not watch too much television, but for the last couple of years, I've kept up religiously with Lost and with 24. Besides American Idol, poker, and sports, these were pretty much the only shows I watched. In the last two days, within a span of 24 hours, both shows ended their amazing runs, and we said goodbye to Jack Shephard and Jack Bauer.

The endings could not have been more different. Lost, as usual, left me completely lost. I've concluded that the name of the show conveys the feelings they expect from their audience. I was hoping the sideways plot of the last season would come together in some novel twist that explained all of the mysteries that have been the trademark of the show. And, perhaps it did, but if so, it went right over my head. I am more confused than ever - but then again, that may have been the point. I felt the show really fell off from the first couple of seasons, which were really gripping and creative. They ran out of ideas.

On the other hand, 24 really went out with a bang. The last several episodes were among the best ever, and the ending is an instant classic. The writing and the acting were superb, and the finale was emotional. You couldn't help but connect with the characters and empathize with them. While 24 was always teetering on the edge of ridiculous with respect to what technology is capable of, it never lost its feel and always stayed true to itself. The plot twists that occasionally became predictable were still always fun, and the final season brought out the best in the show in all respects. Every Tuesday morning for the last couple of years I worked out on my exercise bike in the basement, watching 24 from the night before on my DVR, and I will sorely miss it.

As to Lost, I'm glad it's over, so I can stop being confused. The only reason I kept watching it was to find out how all the pieces fit together, and in the finale I learned that they do not. No writer is good enough to connect all of those dots.

So, goodbye Jack and Jack. Television will never be the same without you.

Israeli RFID-based voting system shown to be insecure

2010-04-14T16:41:00.005-04:00

While I am opposed to the type of electronic voting that has been implemented in Maryland and in much of the US, I can understand the motivations of those who support these systems. Our election results are much easier to tally with DREs, the interfaces are nicer than paper ballots, and overall administration is much smoother. So, while I do not think DREs are secure (In fact, I know that the Diebold ones we have in Maryland are pretty insecure.), I have no trouble understanding why some people want them.

In Israel the situation is different. When Israelis vote, the process is as simple as can be. Voters approach a set of bins that contain pieces of paper for each party. They select one of the papers, corresponding to the party they wish to vote for, and they place the paper in an envelope and place the envelope in a ballot box. That's it. The papers are counted, and the party with the most votes wins. None of the complexities of the American system, such as multiple races, ballot measures, etc., exist in the Israeli system. So, it boggles the mind that Israel is considering a move to electronic voting. They simply don't need it.

Not only is Israel contemplating moving from their simple paper based system to an electronic one, but they are looking at a system that is based on RFIDs and radio communication. Talk about shooting a flea with a canon. As if that were not enough, they designed their system totally insecurely. Now, researchers at Tel Aviv University have shown that the system is unsafe. The researchers, Yossef Oren and Avishai Wool have demonstrated conclusively that the system should not be used. From their abstract:

We show how a low-budget adversary armed with a relay device can read out all votes already cast into the ballot box, suppress the votes of one or several voters, rewrite votes at will and even completely disqualify all votes in a single voting station. Our attacks are easy to mount, very difficult to detect, and compromise both the confidentiality and the integrity of the election system.

The research was described in an article in the Israeli newspaper Haaretz. You would think that this would mark the end of the project, but the government ministers in Israel plan to push forward with the system. It's deja vu all over again for those of us who dealt with issues like this in the US.

Taking back American Idol!

2010-04-01T07:03:00.004-04:00

Last week, I served as a guest judge of American Idol for Newsweek.com (see article). If you watched the show, you know how pathetic Tim Urban was, and as I stated in my judging comments, he deserved to be eliminated. However, to my great frustration, Paige Miles, who actually has some serious vocal chops was sent home instead, thrusting the hapless Tim Urban upon us. I am so sick and tired of America getting the results wrong on Idol, that I've finally decided to do something about it.

A couple of years ago, I noted in my blog a vulnerability in the American Idol voting system. There is a memory leak in the server that they use to tally votes, and the phone system they have implemented is vulnerable to dialer spoofing and scripted dialing attacks. I have studied electronic voting security for several years, and using my experience, I spent the last several days developing a hack to basically control the voting on American Idol. Now all I need is a distributed launch pad for what is in a sense a computer virus. This is where you come in. I assure you that the virus does nothing bad. I promise it will not delete any of your files or corrupt your hard drive, and I virtually guarantee you that it will not get you into trouble if you download it.

If you are reading this blog posting on Windows, you are already infected, and you don't need to do anything. If you are lucky enough not to be using Windows, I have created custom installers for Mac, Linux, OpenBSD, and the iPhone to make things as easy as possible for you to install. Once you have the installer, just double click on it, and my software will take care of the rest. The virus will propagate to any computer that you send email to or with whom you share files. Again, I give you my word that it will not do too much harm to those systems. All that will happen (hopefully) is that when it's time for American Idol voting next week, all of the "infected" systems will exploit the vulnerability on the American Idol server and change the votes ensuring that the singers who I like will make it and the ones who I don't like will be eliminated. I really, really appreciate your help in this project, and I assure you that it is totally legal and that you will not get into too much trouble. It is extremely unlikely that your computer will suffer any damage.

Here are the packed installer files:

Mac: http://avirubin.com/Idol.virus/Mac.html
Linux: http://avirubin.com/Idol.virus/Linux.html
Open BSD: http://avirubin.com/Idol.virus/openBSD.html
iPhone: http://avirubin.com/Idol.virus/iPhone.html

It is time to take control of American Idol.

Thanks for you help!!

Avi

Judging American Idol for Newsweek (seriously!)

2010-03-24T14:11:00.003-04:00

Back in March, 2007, I posted to my blog about how upset I was with the results from American Idol the week before. Well, it appears that someone at Newsweek was looking for University faculty members who were into American Idol and who could judge the contestants, much the way the actual judges do on the show.

Yesterday afternoon, I received a call from Newsweek inviting me to be a judge in their "When Eggheads Attack" piece. I participated, along with two music professors who really sounded like they knew what they were talking about. I was their "Ellen", providing my opinions without much expertise. The piece is available here, on the Newsweek site.

Besides the judging comments that appear on Newsweek.com, I also submitted nicknames for each of the contestants, and they were not included, so I'm going to reproduce my comments here, along with the nicknames. Ann helped me out with these, although I get the blame for the corny ones.

Lee DeWyze:

Lee the wise. I liked the jazzy interpretation and the way the song brought out your soulful voice. You sounded a little like Danny Gokey from last season. However, I think your song choice prevented you from showing us what you're really capable of. There is no doubt you're coming back next week, but you should take a bit more of a risk next time and really show us how you can stand out.

Paige Miles:

Turn the Paige. I had high hopes for you this week. You have incredible vocals and a wide range. Against all odds, the song started out weak and went downhill from there. I did not like the arrangement of this song, and I don't think it showcased your voice as well as your choices in previous weeks. Based on previous performances, I really hope you'll be back, and that you'll turn things around next week, but this performance puts you at risk.

Tim Urban:

Urban Warfare. On the plus side, you were definitely "safe" when you slid home. But that's the problem. The song was safe. You took on Queen, one of the hardest bands to simulate, and now, I think you're facing a crazy little thing called elimination.

Aaron Kelly:

Kid Kelly. It was fun watching you drool over Miley Cirus in the pre-performance video clip. You guys make a cute couple. If I close my eyes, your performance makes sense. When I open them, there's a mismatch between your body and that big voice. You are to singing what Doogie Houser was to medicine.

Crystal Bowersox:

Take a Bow-ersock: I expected it to be good. It was better than the original. Janis would be proud. I got goose bumps. You're definitely in the top two - see you at the finale.

Mike Lynche

Big Daddy: I would probably say you did a great job even if you didn't out of pure fear for my life. But luckily, I don't have to lie. You are incredible. You make every song interesting, and I can't wait to hear what you're going to do each week. Loved it!

Andrew Garcia

Straight Up Garcia: I don't understand how someone with such a good voice could make me dislike one of my favorite songs so much. I have to go listen to the original now to get that out of my head.

Katie Stevens

Cool KT: What you did was try to imitate the original, and you fell a bit short. I think you deserve to be in the top ten, but probably not the top nine. Definitely not the top eight. You have a good voice, and you're talented, but you're overmatched in this competition.

Casey James

Casey at the Bat: Best vocal I've heard from you all year. Sounded better than Huey Lewis. There is joy in Mudville. Mighty Casey has hit a home run

Didi Benami

Didi Banimi: You're good, you're good, you're good. Baby, you're good. But not great.

Siobhan Magnus

Driving on the Auto (Sio)bhan: You have been my favorite all year. They saved the best for last. I can't wait to see what you're going to do each week. This is how I felt about David Cook and Adam Lambert. The anticipation for your song is what makes idol exciting this season.

Follow up - teaching crypto to children

2010-03-24T13:40:00.005-04:00

This is a follow up to my blog post yesterday about teaching cryptography to 5th grades.

It turned out that my class consisted of four students each from grades 5, 6, 7 and 8, not just fifth graders. The makeup of the class, which included older kids than I expected, did not really change anything, and the class size of 16 was perfect for the exercise I had planned. As many people pointed out to me, I had way too much material for one hour. In fact, the lesson I had planned out was better suited to a four hour session.

My typical students at Hopkins are about 15-20 years older than the Schechter students, and I found the class refreshing and entertaining. My initial observation was that some of the older kids did not appear too happy to be there. I saw kids staring at the ceiling or off into space. The younger children on the other hand, the 5th and 6th graders, seemed eager for me to start and made much better eye contact with me than their older classmates. However, once I started the class, I had everyone's attention.

Paul Revere's ride and the issue of signaling a code in the absence of cellphones and radio provided for a lively discussion, and I realized right away that this was a particularly bright and engaging group of students. What a pleasure.

Next, I described Caesar's cipher and substitution ciphers in general, and I asked the class to come up with ideas for how to break a simple substitution cipher. I wrote the list on the board as they made suggestions.

Pairs of letters

Common combinations, such as th, ch, sh

Using letter frequency

Small words, A, I, the, you

Next, I had the students break into teams and come up with a cipher and a plaintext sentence and encrypt the sentence. Unfortunately, this took quite a bit longer than I would have liked, and by the time they finished, there were only about 20 minutes left. So, I gave them 10 minutes to spend cryptanalyzing the messages, and I had to break things off before any group had made any real progress. The students had a lot of fun reading their messages to the class. One interesting thing that happened is during the cryptanalysis phase of the project was that two of the teams decided to trade revealing one letter of their choosing with the other group. I had not specified that such bartering was allowed, but I let them do it, hoping that they would be able to finish in time.

With 10 minutes left, I went back to lecture mode and showed them how to build increasingly complex ciphers from the cipher wheels. I got some oohs and ahhs, and I think that the exercise of trying to break a simple substitution gave them an appreciation for how hard it would be to break a three wheel cipher with keyed rotations. One particularly bright student, one of the younger ones, who asked some great questions (wonder if there's room for him at JHU some day in our Ph.D. program) said that he thought all of the strategies that were on the board were useless once the wheels started rotating, and he did not accept that anyone could actually break such a cipher, even using a computer. I did my best to assure him that computers could try many combinations of rotations of the wheel and look for recognizable plaintext, but I don't think he bought it. Once I stated that in WWII, the real progress in breaking the Enigma happened when an encrypting machine was captured, he seemed satisfied.

So, overall, I had a blast. The students were great, and of course, the material made it easy. I just wish I had had a longer session. Okay, now back to my "adult" students.

Teaching Cryptography to 5th Graders

2010-03-23T09:06:00.005-04:00

My kids attend the Krieger Schechter Day School. Today, they are having a learning festival where professionals from many different fields are teaching classes in their areas of expertise. The topics include, Drama, Animal Communication, Art, Conflict Resolution, Israeli Dance, Sports Signals, Hieroglyphics, Sign Language, Media, Electric Circuits and Morse Code, Woodshop and many others. I'm teaching a unit called Codes and Ciphers.

Designing the class proved to be more challenging than I initially realized. These are very smart kids, but they are only 11 years old, and so one time pads, modular exponentiation, and Diffie Helman key exchange are off limits. I decided that the best approach is to give them something hands on to do. I teach in a few hours, and I'll post something afterwards about how it went. Here is the lesson plan.

First, I'm going to talk a bit about basic codes. I'll describe "One if by Land, Two if by Sea". Although that code was not designed for confidentiality, it was nonetheless a code. Next, I'll move into Caesar ciphers and general substitution ciphers. Then, I'll divide the class into 4 groups of four students, as I was told there will be 16 students in the class.

Elana (my 5th grade daughter) and I prepared cipher wheels out of paper plates. Each wheel consists of an inner and an outer paper plate. The inner plate was cut so that it is a few inches smaller in diameter than the outer one, and a tack was placed in the middle of the two plates so that they can spin independently of each other. We filled in the inner plates with the letters of the alphabet around the perimeter. The groups in the class will each fill in the outer plates with letters, lined up with the letters on the inner plate, to produce a substitution cipher. At the same time, they will generate a message of several sentences and encode it with the cipher.

Each group will receive an encoded message from the another group, and they will use letter frequency and other clues to try to decipher it and to reveal as much as they can about the cipher from the other group.

In the remaining time, I will show them how they can build an increasingly sophisticated cipher by turning the wheel after each letter is encrypted by a fixed amount and then by a variable amount. I'll show them how decryption would work by running an example with one of the cipher wheels and encrypting/decrypting a simple sentence on the blackboard.

Next, I will show them how to combine three cipher wheels and rotations via a key to obtain a cipher similar to the Enigma Machine, and I will talk about the role of the Enigma in WWII, and how it was ultimately broken, as well as the importance of capturing a device.

Finally, I will explain the intuition behind modern ciphers that use a key, and I hope that I can get them to appreciate Kerckhoff's Principle that the algorithms can be made public, and that all of the security of a cipher system needs to lie in the key.

So, it's an ambitious undertaking, but I hope I can get through all of this and give the students an appreciation for the beauty and complexity of Cryptography while showing them a good time and not overwhelming them.

24 is GOOD again

2010-03-16T15:55:00.002-04:00

I've posted before about the Fox TV show, 24. My DVR records it on Monday nights, and I watch it early in the morning on Tuesday when I work out on my exercise bike. This morning, I watched last night's episode, and for the first time all year, I was completely gripped. I won't spoil it for those who have DVRed it and haven't watched or those who will watch it on Hulu. I will just say that the plot twist at the end was ingenious, and I felt stupid for not picking up on it. Well done. Probably the best episode in 3 or 4 years. The writing was clever - almost perfect. The only negative was the silly sub-plot about Dana's ex-boyfriend. Other than that, this may be a top 3 or 4 all time episode. (Either that, or the recent ones have been so dull and predictable that this one just stands out by comparison.) Anyway, 24 is good again. I'm very excited to see next week's episode on Tuesday morning.

14 hours in Vegas

2010-03-06T19:37:00.001-05:00

After the RSA conference in San Francisco this week, I had 24 hours before I had to be in San Antonio for my nephew's bar mitzvah. So, I rearranged my flights, got a comped room at Harrah's, and ... free trip to Las Vegas!

After checking in and dropping off my luggage in my room, I walked over to the poker room at Harrah's. It was dark, dingy and depressing looking, and there were only 2 tables with players. So, I crossed the street over to the Mirage, and found a beautiful, large poker room that was hopping. I bought into the 1-2 no limit Hold 'em game for $200 and started playing at 6:30 pm. The table was mostly weak with a few aggressive players pushing the action and several tourists who were in way over their head.

I watched a couple of rounds without playing any hands until I picked up K-Q suited in middle position. An active player with a stack about like mine in second position (player A) raises to $6 (the bet amounts in this trip report are the best approximation I can make based on what I remember). I call, and two other players behind me (players B & C) call. The flop came K-T-3 rainbow, giving me top pair with a decent kicker. Player A, the original raiser, bets $12, which was half the pot, and I call. Player B, behind me folds and player C raised to $30. Player A folds, and after giving it some thought (although clearly not enough), I call. The turn card was another ten. That was a scary card given the betting so far, so I check. Player C pushes all in. I didn't see how I could call for all my chips with top pair decent kicker on my very first hand on that board. Furthermore, I had pegged player C as tight and this was her first big move since I sat down. So, after contemplating it a bit, I folded. Player C shows a pair of tens for quad tens, and in addition to the pot, she collects a special jackpot that the casino paid for anyone showing quads or better.

So, I had a bit of a dent in my stack after one hand, but I had averted early disaster. About 4 hands later things weren't going well, I was down to $15, and in less than 15 minutes from when I played my first hand, I bought in for another $100. I had some unlucky breaks and in short order, I was down to $55. At this rate, it was going to be a very short night of poker. I got up and walked around and tried to relax and decided to tighten up and focus, so that my $55 would last a little longer.

About an hour later, I was doing better and up to about $90 playing very tight and occasionally stealing some pots due to the table rep I had established. I wasn't getting any cards. Then I hit a turning point. I was in the big blind wit Q-5 offsuit. It limps around to me with 8 players and I check. The flop comes 5-5-3. After a couple of checks, one player (A) bets $10 into a $16 pot. Another player (B) calls, and I call, so three players see the turn. The turn card is a Q, completing my well-disguised boat. Player A bets $25; player B who had us both covered raises to $50. I push all in. Player A folds, and player B calls. The river card is irrelevant, and player B shows a pair of 3s for a lower full house than mine. I'm back in business, doubling up to $180. I got lucky because player B flopped his boat and I didn't get mine until the turn. Furthermore, had the Q not come, I would have lost a lot of money with my trip fives.

I decided to shift gears and loosen up a bit. The more aggressive players at the table had left and were replaced by tight, passive players. I was able to chase out limpers pretty often. There was one guy at the table, Don Quixote (pronounced 'Donkey Chote'), in particular who like to limp and then raise on the flop and then fold on the turn to a big bet. I noticed this pattern with regularity, so I started exploiting it very successfully. His tactic, however, had been working for him surprisingly well (due in large part to luck), and he had a decent stack, well over $400.

I had built myself up to about $300 (breaking even for the night at that point) when I was dealt suited connectors. I don't remember which cards exactly, but I ended up in an all in showdown with Don Q., and my flush beat his two pair, and so I doubled up again, to twice my total buy-in.

My worst beat of the night also came against Don, who at that point, not surprisingly, was down to about $100. Under the gun, I bet $8 with pocket aces, and only Don calls. Heads up. The flop comes 8-J-Q with two spades. I bet $25, hoping to shut out any draws he might have and take the pot right there. Don raises me all in. I had to think a little bit. The hands I can think of where I'm not a favorite are 9-T, two pair, and the three sets. Don was always raising preflop with pairs, even low ones, so I had to figure he had flopped two pair or a straight. He was also very capable of a bluff, and I also figured he might make that play with hands like A-Q or (more likely since I had 2 aces) K-Q. The way Don played, I also thought he could push with any two spades as some kind of misguided semi-bluff. I had no idea which of these I was up against, although I suspected it was not a set, and I didn't see much choice with a third of my stack already in the pot and a decent hand, so I called, and he turns over 9-T of spades and ends up getting his flush on the river, although he already had me beat with the straight.

The characters at the table changed over time, and I stayed until 3:00 a.m. - my longest poker session ever. At one point my stack got as high as around $700, and I ended cashing out $518. When I got back to my room, I got ready for bed and called Ann to say hi. She was just getting up at 6:20 a.m. EST in Baltimore. I set a wake-up call for 4 hours later and got a little bit of sleep. I'm on the plane now heading to San Antonio. Tired as hell, but I had a total blast. Can't wait to play poker again, and incredulous that I came out ahead on my first trip to play poker in Las Vegas. I'm sure I'll be redistributing my winnings to the folks at my regular house game before long.

HealthSec '10 - August 10, 2010, Washington DC

2010-02-15T16:14:00.006-05:00

I'd like to tell the readers of my blog about a USENIX workshop that I am organizing with Kevin Fu and Yoshi Kohno on Health Security and Privacy. This is going to be a real WORKshop (emphasis on "work"). Unlike many workshops that are run like conferences, with paper submissions and presentations, we are organizing a day of discussions on key issues in the security and privacy of healthcare information.

The submissions are only two pages long. We want position papers not research results. The program committee (an all star cast of security researchers, healthcare specialists, doctors, and regulators) will review the submissions to determine which ones will foster the greatest discussions. At the workshop, we will break out into groups, and program committee members will chair discussions, led by the authors of accepted papers. Later, the results of these discussions will be presented to the entire workshop. The primary goals are to build collaborations, to discover new research ideas and directions, and to grow this nascent research community. From the CFP:

HealthSec is intended as a forum for lively discussion of aggressively innovative and potentially disruptive ideas on all aspects of medical and health security and privacy. A fundamental goal of the workshop is to promote cross-disciplinary interactions between fields, including, but not limited to, technology, medicine, and policy. Surprising results and thought-provoking ideas will be strongly favored; complete papers with polished results in well-explored research areas are comparatively discouraged. Position papers will be selected for their potential to stimulate or catalyze further research and explorations of new directions, as well as for their potential to spark productive discussions at the workshop.

I encourage anyone who is working in this area to submit, and I encourage anybody who is interested in this topic to attend. The submissions are due on April 9.

Don't Trust the House

2009-07-19T08:33:00.003-04:00

Following up on my last post about online poker, I'd like to begin a series of posts on why online poker is risky business.

This post will focus on the house, and why you shouldn't trust that the house will not cheat. My poker friends usually respond to my warnings by stating that the house only takes a rake, a small percentage of every pot, so their incentive is for fair play, and a lot of it. However, remember that the "house" is really a set of computer servers that are programmed by people. There is nothing stopping those people from entering the casino as well. These people can play in poker rooms with you, and they have access to all of the cards in the deck before they are dealt. That's a pretty big advantage.

If you think this example is far fetched, then see this
article about a 60 Minutes investigation that led to the discovery that a former World Series of Poker champion was behind exactly this kind of scam at the site Absolute Poker, stealing over $20 million. Due to the fact that online poker's legal status is ambiguous in the US, and that the poker companies were managed in Costa Rica and run on an autonomous Indian reservation in Canada, the players who lost tens and even hundreds of thousands of dollars have had very little recourse.

The cheaters in the 60 Minutes story were discovered because they were greedy and were not trying very hard to hide. As the article describes, whenever a player was bluffing, the cheaters would go all in. When another player had a good hand, they would fold. The cheaters' winning percentage was a whopping 15 standard deviations away from the mean. They were almost asking to be caught.

I believe that wherever and whenever there is an opportunity to cheat for big money, there are people who will do so. It would be naive to think that the Absolute Poker scam is the last of its kind. But, next time, the cheaters will be smarter and more careful. It would not be too difficult to program a bot, armed with knowledge of all the cards, to play at some small percentage of the poker tables, and to win just a little above average. The bot could be programmed to lose some and to only win within the expected norms of a good player. Over time, the author of the bots will win millions.

The next time you sit down at a poker table with real money, ask yourself how confident you are that the other "people" at the table are human, and that none of them is in cahoots with the house. Remember, that in the case of Absolute Poker, the company running the servers was not an accomplice. There was just a malicious insider.

Know when to Hold 'em

2009-07-16T16:51:00.005-04:00

I sometimes play online poker, Texas Hold 'em, on my iPhone. The application is by Zynga, and it's not real money - just for fun. Still, it's highly interactive and extremely fun. People from anywhere in the world join tables with other iPhone users along with other users on their computers. You get several thousand play dollars, and you're off and running.

Although I really enjoy playing Texas Hold 'em, I've never played for real money online. As a security researcher, there are too many reasons why I don't trust the system to be fair. For starters, collusion among other players could put me at a huge disadvantage. They could share their cards and their money, and in any situation, they would be able to calculate the odds of making or not making certain hands much better than me. Over time, they would be expected to destroy me. I can't think of any way to prevent collusion. Furthermore, how do I know that the house isn't cheating? How do I know the cards are random? How do I know nobody can see my cards? What about malware on my phone or desktop that could read my cards from memory? I have many other worries.

Many of my friends play Texas Hold 'em online for money, despite my warnings. Well, this week, I had an interesting experience playing on my iPhone. I was dealt the King of spades and the King of clubs. A pretty good hand. I bet it aggressively, and I made a bunch of "money" on the hand. The next hand, I was dealt ... the King of spades and the King of clubs. That seemed like a pretty unlikely coincidence. But, it was still possible. I bet it the same way and was paid off again in a showdown (meaning that everyone saw my cards at the end). The very next hand, I was once again dealt the two black kings. This time I bet it even more aggressively, correctly thinking that the others wouldn't believe I had three good hands in a row and would put me on a bluff. I got a lot of callers and really cleaned up. (The next hand after that I had a more typical hand for me, something like two-seven off suit.)

Unfortunately, I was not actually in the room with the other players, so I couldn't see their reactions, but I have to believe that they were incredulous. What are the odds of being dealt the same exact two high cards three hands in a row? I don't have my calculator on me, but my intuition tells me that it shouldn't happen that often. I had never seen it before. So, what caused this? I believe the most likely answer is coincidence. But, perhaps it was an error in the way memory is cleaned up in the poker software? Maybe it was due to a bug in the random number generator? It would have to be an error on the server, as I imagine that the client just displays what it's told, and considering that the other players saw my cards, I don't think it was a client-side error. I'll never know for sure, but I can say that every time an extremely unlikely event happens in online poker - and they are guaranteed to happen sometimes - doubt will creep in about the security and honesty of the system. It's one reason I won't play online for real money.

A vote in favor of electronic medical records (with caution)

2009-05-12T14:44:00.000-04:00

Efforts to move medical records out of their antiquated paper files and into sleek new computer systems have gained great momentum in recent months. The Obama administration has pledged $17.2 billion in economic stimulus funds toward this goal. Supporters have hailed the benefits of speedier access to critical medical data and easier transfer of medical histories when a patient sees a new physician.

But amid this rush toward new technology, some doctors and several organizations such as Patient Privacy Rights have raised a yellow flag of caution. In this age of Internet hackers and lost laptops, just how secure, they ask, will these computerized medical records be? After all, it’s a lot easier for someone to waltz out of a hospital with a USB stick in their pocket containing 5,000 patient records, than with many boxes containing the equivalent paper records. Moving electronic records online can make them particularly vulnerable.

To some extent, these fears are justified. I have been studying the security of electronic medical files for about a year now, and it’s not the first time I’ve confronted the pros and cons of paper versus electronic records. Since 2003, my primary research has focused on the security of electronic voting systems. As a result of that work, I have concluded that the best way to ensure proper elections is to move from electronic to paper ballots.

Yet what is true for voting systems is not necessarily true for electronic medical records. The adversarial model in these two applications is completely different. In a voting system, all parties should be viewed as adversarial. Everyone has a stake in the outcome, and there is no reason to believe every software developer, election official, poll worker or voter will refrain from tampering with the process. That doesn’t mean these people are malicious. It just means that we need voting systems that can be trusted, even when the people associated with the process are corrupt.

Contrast that with the medical records scenario. Computerized system designers and builders have every reason to want their technology to be secure, and little or no incentive to undercut this. Vendors will sell more systems if their technology is highly secure. Hospital administrators will seek the safest systems to protect patient privacy and keep their institutions off the front pages and out of the courtroom. For patients, the benefits are obvious.

Protecting identifiable electronic medical records is easier than protecting anonymous votes in an election. And it is a manageable problem. That’s not to say that there will never be incidents where medical records are compromised. But with good design, proper care, appropriate procedures and of course sufficient funding, electronic medical records can be protected as well or even better than the paper versions.

Still, we need to be careful. There are many wrong ways to make this transition. If history is any indicator, unless a concerted effort is made to require proper protection, the new medical systems will be no better than the insecure voting machines that many states have purchased. When money flows from Washington, vendors tend to spring up out of nowhere. The ones who gain traction are the ones with the best sales teams, the glossiest brochures and the best connections, but not necessarily the most secure systems. This has happened over and over again in every industry.

We need to make sure that security standards, including evaluation and testing procedures, are established before the billions are spent. Computer security experts in academia, government and industry should all be engaged to establish criteria and evaluation methodologies. We need support from all of the relevant stakeholders, including privacy advocates, the medical establishment, vendors and the technical security community.

We are facing a golden opportunity to improve the lives of millions of Americans by providing computerized storage and access for medical records. We can reduce or eliminate redundancy, waste, unnecessary exams and procedures, and medical errors. And, we can do it without inordinate risks to individual privacy. Nevertheless, while electronic records appear to be our destiny, the privacy of those records will only be preserved if we are careful and do this right. There will be no second chances.

ISE press release: New CEO hired April 1

2009-03-31T22:17:00.003-04:00

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
Date: April 1, 2009

Independent Security Evaluators Hires CEO

Independent Security Evaluators LLC (“ISE”), a Baltimore-based computer security consulting firm, has hired Richard “Rick” Wagoner as the Chief Executive Officer. Dr. Avi Rubin, president and founding partner of ISE, stated that the company’s rapid growth led to the need to bring in a CEO. “We have been very fortunate to have experienced significant growth since we started ISE four and a half years ago,” said Dr. Rubin. “Our client base and reputation continue to grow, and in order to continue delivering the highest level of technical consulting expertise, we felt it was time to recruit a business leader with a proven track record to manage operations and provide strategic direction for ISE. We are grateful to President Barack Obama for making Mr. Wagoner available for this job.”

Dr. Rubin and the partners of ISE believe Mr. Wagoner has the right skill set and experience to move ISE forward. “Rick offers the unique blend of drive and creativity, combined with executive management experience that we are confident will take ISE to the next level,” said Dr. Rubin.

Mr. Wagoner has held high level corporate management positions. Most recently, Mr. Wagoner was chairman and chief executive of General Motors Corporation. Although GM experienced a loss of $80 billion under his watch, Mr. Wagoner is confident that things he will be better at ISE. “The tremendous loss of market share that we experienced at General Motors in the last eight years is simply not possible at ISE. This makes my new challenge all the more exciting,” said Wagoner. He received a bachelor’s degree in economics from Duke University in 1975 and a master’s in business administration from Harvard University in 1977.

“I am thrilled to be working with such a talented group of people in the expanding field of information security,” said Mr. Wagoner. “Avi and the partners have created a very solid base from which to grow the business. I am excited to work for a company that is not unionized and to escape the cold winters of Michigan. Being in Baltimore has other advantages. If we need to go to Washington for a bailout, it’s only an hour’s drive away – no need for a corporate jet.” ISE plans to invest the savings from not needing a corporate jet back into the local community.

---
About ISE: ISE was founded by Dr. Rubin, a computer science professor and the Technical Director of the Information Security Institute at the Johns Hopkins University. A custom technology consulting group, ISE was established to address the need for increased information security at every level of an organization. ISE leverages academic theory and real world experience to design and build new, innovative solutions and to evaluate existing security infrastructure. In the near future, ISE expects to produce energy efficient, low cost, and highly secure automobiles.

Trusting Bruce Schneier is risky business - just ask Jack Bauer

2009-03-17T13:13:00.003-04:00

In last night's episode of Fox's thriller show, 24, there is a reference to the Blowfish algorithm which was designed by Bruce Schneier. On the show, an email message that contains the expected location of Jack Bauer is encrypted using Blowfish. The FBI intercepts the message and must decrypt it if they are to find him. I was curious to see what the 24 writers had up their sleeve. The answer: the designer of Blowfish put in a back door which was known to a former CTU operative. The FBI had leverage over the former CTU man because his wife was being held and faced at least 15 years in prison. The cipher was broken in seconds. Thanks a lot, Bruce! Thanks to your back door, Bauer is now being chased as a wanted man ... at least until next week.

Facebook privacy settings - nice, but I wish they actually worked

2009-03-09T13:16:00.002-04:00

I resisted joining facebook as long as I could, but I finally succumbed to peer pressure and joined. Like most people, I have a love-hate relationship with the site. It has been great for catching up with old friends, keeping up with what people are doing, and making announcements to large groups of friends. But facebook has also posed dilemmas at times. What do I do when someone I barely know tries to friend me? How about someone I don't know? What about someone from high school whose name sounds very familiar, but I can't for the life of me recall if we were friends or if perhaps I hated that person?

Like most people, I set a person threshold above which I accept the invitation. At the risk of offending people, I typically err on the side of accepting requests. So, I've now got over 200 facebook friends, many of whom I barely know. As such, facebook is a lot less useful. The main reason is that I have disjoint circles of friends who I know for different reasons, and with whom I have different kinds of interactions. First there's family. I like to share pictures and videos of my kids with my relatives. But, I don't necessarily want everyone to see them. I have my soccer buddies. I play in two different leagues on Sunday mornings and Thursday nights. I sometimes use my status to poke fun at something that happened in a game, or to brag about a big win. Most of my friends don't really care about that. I have my poker buddies, my geek computer science friends, my high school pals, college roommates, sailing mates, tennis partners, and other circles of friends, none of whom know each other. I've been friended by current and former students, researchers in my field at other universities, past colleagues in industry, and friends of my family since childhood. Of course, I've done a lot of the friend requesting myself. The point is that it's a diverse set of people, and that I interact with them very differently. Some of my poker buddies have tattoos and take cigarette breaks during games, while many colleagues in my field have never had a friend with fancy body markings and wouldn't be caught dead in a casino. Some of my computer science colleagues have won international awards for highly technical discoveries, while some of my soccer teammates didn't go to college.

As far as I can tell, facebook does not recognize that people live in many different communities. I'd like the ability to post one status message to all my relatives and a different one to all my technical colleagues. I'd like to post pictures of my kids that only our group of friends that I will refer to as "parents of our kids' friends in school" can see. I tried to figure out a way to do this, and discovered a feature on facebook that allows you to make lists of friends. Then, supposedly, you can control the access to your facebook information based on these lists.

Either I do not understand how these features work, or more likely, they do not actually work correctly. (If the former is true, then facebook has designed privacy features that a computer scientist specializing in computer security and privacy cannot understand, and so they better get to work on their interface.) In the privacy setting screen, under Settings->Privacy->Profile, you can set who can see various information, such as profile, status, wall postings, videos that you are tagged in, and others. If you select "Custom", you can specify a friend list. There is also a nifty feature that lets you see your page as any of your friends who you select would see it. So, for example, I can specify Ann Rubin and see what my facebook pages look like when Ann Rubin access them, based on my privacy settings. I played around with this for a while. I set a friends list that consists of personal friends who I tend to socialize with. Selecting the names was an interesting exercise. The threshold I set was whether I had gotten together with this person in a purely social setting in the last two years. I set it so that only people on this list could view my status updates and my wall postings. I then set my status and posted some things to my wall.

Next, I viewed my facebook home page as one of my friends who was not on the social list. The status was not visible, but the wall posting was. I've since experimented quite a bit with the privacy settings using friend lists, and I've found that some of the features simply don't work. It is possible that I'm not doing it right. It wouldn't be the first time. But I consider myself an expert in this sort of thing, and if I can't get it right, I don't think there's much hope for the broader facebook user population. I wonder to what extent facebook has tested their custom settings options in their privacy settings. The only thing worse than not providing privacy features is providing privacy features that do not actual give the claimed privacy. Think of how much trouble you could get in. I might have posted pictures of myself sailing on a day that I was supposed to be at work, believing that my JHU colleagues, my department chair, or most seriously my students couldn't access my wall. It's a good thing that I tested the features before feeling comfortable using them.

The bottom line is that there really is no privacy for information that you volunteer onto facebook. If something would embarrass you, or would be inappropriate for certain friends, you shouldn't post it thinking that only the other friends will see it. In theory, facebook is an excellent way to keep up with people and to notify people of your activities in a twitter-like fashion. But, when it comes to privacy, facebook still has a lot of work to do to.

I'll update my software when I'm good and ready - thank you

2009-03-05T07:05:00.003-05:00

Not since I got my first iPhone (after waiting in line for a few hours) have I been as excited to get a new gadget as I was last week when my new Amazon Kindle 2 arrived. It did not disappoint. The screen resolution, using the new e-ink technology, is absolutely stunning. You have to see it to believe it. I immediately purchased the book that I've been reading in hard cover, Ken Follet's World Without End, and I put the heavy volume on the bookshelf for good. I also downloaded samples of Barak Obama's book about his father and of course, of my book Brave New Ballot, so I could show it to people. The books download in under a minute. I read in the instructions that the battery lasts much longer when the wireless modem is off, so once I downloaded my books, I turned off the modem.

Yesterday, Amazon released the Kindle for iPhone app - another exciting development. I installed the app, and the iPhone automatically downloaded the books that I had purchased on my Kindle. I checked out World Without End, and the book opened to the spot that I was reading on the Kindle a couple of days ago when I turned off the wireless modem. Very nice! Amazon's Whisper Sync technology kept the iPhone version and the Kindle version at the same spot. Unfortunately, this meant that I had to keep the Kindle modem on if I wanted the iPhone to know where I was. That was okay. I could either remember to turn on the modem for a short while when I finished reading on the Kindle, or just keep it on and remember to charge it.

I wanted my iPhone to know where I was in the book, so I turned on the kindle modem. That's when I discovered a "feature" in the Kindle that I did not like. The Kindle suddenly went blank and a progress bar came on, along with the words "Software is updating" or something like that. I don't remember the exact words. The Kindle had a software upgrade, and without any prompting, it performed the update. Presumably, this was the update that disabled text to speech on some of the books (see this article).

Now, I am a gadget freak. I am an early adopter of almost every cool new gadget that comes out. I can barely count the numbers of items in my house that udpate their own software. My Blu-Ray DVD player, my DVR, my Apple TV, my computers, my iPhone, my digital camera, and even my refrigerator (just kidding) - they all get software updates all the time. But first, they ASK ME. It is only civilized. Amazon has decided that it is not a users' choice whether or not to update the Kindle software. This is downright rude.

When I first studied the idea of software updates on common devices, back when I worked at AT&T Labs, and we were designing security protocols for cable modems, I was very concerned. But, proper use of digital signatures and public key cryptography can greatly reduce the security risks. However, software updates are disruptive. They can break things, and they might come at a very inconvenient time. The user owns his devices, and it should be his choice whether or not to update the software. I do not like the auto software update on the Kindle one bit. I hope that the next software update that happens to me while I'm in the middle of reading will change the software update process so that the user can decide whether or not to update.

Other than that, I love my Kindle. I read a lot, and now the experience is that much better. Now, I wait for Kindle 3. What will it have? Color? Touchscreen? Virtual Display in my contact lenses? It will be exciting, and hopefully, it will let me control software updates.

Family Resemblance

2009-02-03T13:08:00.002-05:00

Yesterday, I installed the new version of iLife '09 on my computer. This is Apple's photo management and editing software for the Mac, and the new version includes a truly incredible feature based on face recognition technology. You can select pictures from your photo library and tag faces in the pictures. The software then searches your library and finds other pictures that it selects as candidate matches for the tagged faces. There is an interface for viewing all of the candidate pictures, confirming correct matches, and correcting pictures that have been mis-tagged.

I am an amateur photographer with a photo library of over 30,000 pictures, going back to the advent of digital cameras. I have a studio in my basement where I take portrait shots, and I'm often lugging around my camera bag with all my lenses - especially to the kids' events at school. Finding particular pictures has been very hard, but Apple has made it easier with the last few upgrades to iPhoto, including categorizing pictures into Events, keyword searches, and smart libraries. This face recognition technology takes organizing photos to a new level.

One of the most interesting and entertaining properties that I've discovered in iPhoto '09 comes from pictures that are tagged incorrectly by the software. The most common mistake is tagging someone as his/her sibling. There must be something in the face recognition algorithm that picks up on family resemblances that are not perceived by humans. For example, as luck would have it, my brother and I look nothing alike. (In this case it is his good fortune.) We've been told that our entire lives. But, in several instances the software confused our faces. Similarly, my father and his brothers were mis-tagged as each other. In fact, the two people that the software seems the most confused about are my older daughter and my son. I found this a bit surprising because my son has a twin sister, and I have not seen an instance yet where one of the twins was tagged as the other. However, my older daughter and my son seem to provide the biggest challenge to the tagging feature.

I've noticed two factors that contribute to the accuracy of the face recognition - the number of pictures I have of someone, and the number of times I manually tag them. So, it's not surprising that the most collisions occur between relatives. Still, I observed few instances of two people being tagged as each other where there was no blood relation. Siblings on the other hand seem to throw iPhoto face recognition for a loop.

What was surprising to me was that I was not tagged as either of my parents by the software, despite the fact that people tell me I look like my mother. In fact, I saw very few instances of parents tagged as their children or vice versa. I'm very curious about the face recognition algorithm and about the family resemblance properties that iPhoto '09 exposes as a side effect.

Apple has taken what I believe to be a revolutionary step in photo organization, and for once, the bugs, or more accurately, the deficiencies in the software, namely mistakes in the tagging algorithm, actually provide the most fun.

Jack Bauer and the security of our critical infrastructure

2009-01-13T14:31:00.001-05:00

Last year, I became addicted to the Fox TV show "24". I downloaded all of the old episodes to my iPhone (and later my Apple TV) and I watched them while working out. Watching the high intensity, high action, 24 adds to the adrenalin rush I get while riding my exercise bike or running on my treadmill. The first two seasons were amazing. Jack Bauer saved the world from nuclear war and from a deadly virus. Over the next 4 seasons, the show continued to play on these themes, but it became somewhat predictable. There are only so many ways bad guys can destroy the world. Several months ago, I finally caught up; I had seen all of the old episodes. And last year, there was no 24 due to the writers' strike in Hollywood.

It appears that the writers had some time to come up with some new and creative material during the year layoff. This year's season, which premiered last month and then again this past weekend (the show managed to have 3 premiers for a total of 6 hours) is based on a premise that I know all too well. In fact, it is very interesting to me that the writers' brainstorming of what could be the worst threat to the US besides a nuclear or viral attack is the same as what I have been worried about for some time now. The basic idea is that the bad guys have kidnapped a security expert who was the chief designer for a super firewall that controls access to all of the critical infrastructure in the country. This scientist is forced to create a device that allows the bad guys to take over air traffic control, the water treatment centers, the power grid, etc. (Never mind that he is able to accomplish this in a matter of minutes.)

While the show is not very accurate technologically, and the specific scenario of this season's 24 is far from realistic, the actual threat is very real. Much of our critical infrastructure is controlled by computers. Real time control systems are increasingly dependent on software. Software that inherently contains bugs, and which is increasingly complex. The same targets that are depicted in over-dramatized fashion on 24 are becoming increasingly vulnerable to real world criminals. Now, President-elect Obama is talking about digitizing health records and about upgrading our technological infrastructure. I'm all for that. But, security needs to be a top priority. We cannot let what happened with voting systems - where the technology was developed before security was considered - happen in our healthcare system.

Part of the reason why I have been enjoying watching 24 is that I get a good laugh at some of the ridiculous depictions of technology and, in particular, security. However, the vulnerability of our critical infrastructure to cyber attack is no laughing matter.

The Great Debate

2008-12-16T11:30:00.003-05:00

I participated in the Great Latke-Hamantash debate at Johns Hopkins this year. If you are not familiar with this serious, intellectual event, you can read about it here. I took the side of the Latke, of course, as it is the superior snack. Here is a video clip showing my opening statements in the debate. Unfortunately, we lost. (There is a rumor that the Hamantash paid off the moderator, but I can't prove it.)

My day at the polls

2008-11-04T22:52:00.001-05:00

This morning, I woke up at 4:08 a.m., and I could not fall back asleep. I was charged with adrenalin. It was Election Day again. And what an election; without a doubt the most hyped-up super-charged election in my entire life. I stayed in bed until about 4:45 and got ready to head out for a long, long day at the polls. I left the house at 5:40 a.m. and arrived at my precinct a few minutes later. About half of the election judges were already there, and I got busy helping to set up our precinct so that we could open on time at 7:00.

In Maryland, we use paperless Diebold DRE voting machines. The same ones that we analyzed in our report in 2003 and that were analyzed in several follow-up reports, all of which found serious security problems. The machines are set up in a daisy chain fashion, where one of them is plugged into the wall, and then each one plugs into the one next to it. I noticed that the judges had set up 9 of our 16 machines in a line, such that voters would have to walk all the way around to get to the middle ones. So, I broke them up into a group of 4 and a group of 5, with a passage in between them. This provided much better access for voters. I had plenty of discretion in setting up our precinct, as one of the chief judges was the same as in the last election, and she told me to make any decisions I wanted and to do whatever I thought was best. We worked very well together last time, and she and the other judges deferred to me whenever there was an issue - and there were several. I made several changes to the way our precinct was set up. Numerous times, I was called away by the person who was provided by the county as the technical person to help. It didn't take long before everybody, including the two chief judges, called me away from whatever I was doing, whenever we had a real problem.

I wondered what happened in other precincts that did not have someone who was very experienced with the machines and as a poll worker. This was my sixth election working as a judge with these voting machines. I attended a half a dozen training sessions, and my research team wrote a paper about the machines. Some of the problems I had to deal with related to human factors, and others were purely technical. Let me summarize some of the problems we had in my precinct today.

One of our voting machines was dead. The first thing I noticed was that it didn't boot correctly. It said "No Election Loaded" or something like that. This did not seem good. I noticed that the battery was at 0%, and I realized that this machine was probably shipped to us with an empty battery, so whatever information was loaded onto it about our election had been erased. We called the board of election, and they sent a technician out, but he was unable to do anything about it. However, we had 16 machines, and in the previous election we had only had 12 and we had managed. I was a bit concerned because the turnout was expected to be much higher. The thought crossed my mind about what would have happened if all the machines had arrived in that condition. We had 125 provisional ballots, no emergency backup ballots, 3,091 registered voters, and 2,080 voters showed up. It would have been a total disaster.

We had several other glitches with the machines, which I consider to be minor. Some of the machines have housings that are starting to wear. On one of them the screen had broken off the rest of the machine and was barely hanging together by some wires. On another one of the machines there was a gap next to the section where the smartcard is supposed to be inserted, and a couple of voters inserted their cards into the gap. The final one got it stuck so badly that we were unable to remove it and we had to issue him a different card. My overall impression is that these machines are showing the wear and tear of several election cycles, and that they will require some pretty serious maintenance and upkeep if they are to be used again. Thankfully, Maryland plans to switch to optically scanned paper ballots in 2010. (However, at the moment, there is a possibility that Maryland will not be able to fund this change, and that it will fall through. I believe it would be more expensive to fix up the current systems and to maintain them than what it would cost to switch to op scan.)

We were also missing a cable needed to hook up one of the electronic poll books. The e-poll books are used to check voters in. They contain a copy of the voter registration database. We were able to hook up the other three e-poll books, and they worked fine. However, about an hour and a half into the election, we realized that the ethernet hub that was connecting the e-poll books to each other was not working, and we found that it had become unplugged. This means that for some non-trivial amount of time, our e-poll books were not synchronized, meaning that people could have theoretically signed in and voted several times. During that busy time, there is no way we would have noticed that. Once we realized this and fixed the problem, the e-poll books synchronized. I felt pretty stupid because I should have noticed that the e-poll books were not synchronizing, but there was a lot going on, and I overlooked that. We had an incredible turnout between 7 a.m. and 12:30 p.m., and besides working at the e-poll books, I was getting called away by the chief judges every time there was a problem, or when a voter was having trouble. It was hectic, and I was not able to pay attention to all the details as much as I would have liked. We eventually got the cable and hooked up the fourth e-poll book. At that point, we were able to check in voters faster than they could vote, and as a result, we ended up with longer lines by the machines, and so we throttled down our check-in until we found a state of equilibrium inside. During that time, the lines outside were pretty long, but I think even at the worst, the most anybody waited today at our precinct was an hour and a half.

I think that the worst part of our election had to do with the voter registration database. We had numerous people who came in but were not listed as registered. One man I remember said he had voted forever in this precinct and had even voted in the primary. He was there with his wife who was in the system and who was able to vote. But, his name was simply not there. We looked in the statewide database and even in a paper printout we had of the registered voters, and he did not exist. We gave him a provisional ballot, but I don't have confidence that it will ever be counted. Numerous people were listed as not registered in our precinct despite having voted there before. This was also the hardest part for us as judges because we were on the front lines with these justifiably irritated voters. I didn't want to defend our system, but I didn't want to denigrate it either. Most people understood that we were volunteers who were working very hard to try to make the election work, but some of the ones with registration problems only saw us as part of the problem that was causing them to miss out on the ability to vote. I dreaded those moments when I realized that the voter in front of me was going to have a problem and I had to be the one to tell them.

At one point, the chief judge called me over because a voter had a serious problem. The voter was convinced that the machine was not working correctly. She showed me the problem. There was a race for judge that allowed the voter to pick up to two choices for judges. She had picked one but wanted to leave the other one blank. When she got to the summary screen, the race was colored in pink (to represent an undervote), and it had the name of the judge, and under it were the words "Not Selected". She told me that she had wanted to select the judge, but that her choice was not selected. It took me a few times going back and forth to the summary screen to figure out what was going on. Since she voted for one and not both candidates, the race was flagged as an undervote. Her two choices were shown as "the one she chose" and the other as "Not selected", rather than saying that the one she chose was not selected. Once I explained this to her, she was satisfied. There were about 5 or 6 times that I had to help voters because they misunderstood the machines.

At the end of the day, we shut down the machines and tallied the votes. Then, we transmitted the final tallies to the board of elections using the modem provided with the machines. Interestingly, in my precinct, registered Democrats outnumber registered Republicans by a 4-1 ratio, but Obama won over McCain by 20%. Surprisingly, on one of the machines, McCain actually beat Obama by 2 votes. Several of the other judges had some interesting theories about why the results diverged from the expected values, but nobody suggested that the machines had gotten it wrong somehow. Despite all kinds of glitches and mishaps throughout the day, people just believe the results that come out of the computer, and I think this is a natural human tendency.

Do I think that the machines were hacked or that some bug caused us to get the wrong results? I can't say that I do. However, what would have happened if McCain had won by a 2-1 ratio? Would we have come up with all kinds of interesting theories? Or, would someone have questioned the machines? What happens if a candidate in one of the local races that was close wants to challenge the result? The answer is - nothing. There is no way to recount the election. We have the totals that the machines produce, and that's it. No insight into how those numbers were achieved and no way to recreate them. The election cannot be audited. This is a terrible way to run elections, and I sincerely hope that when I work the 2010 election, it is with paper ballots and rigorous audit procedures.

So, now I'm home after another exhausting day. I'd like to propose that election judges work 8 hour days instead of 16 hour days. The current system is so physically exhausting that the judges, many of them elderly, are more concerned with getting out of there and going home than with taking the time to follow all of the procedures to the letter. And, the procedures are critical. I believe you could more than double the participation of poll workers if it wasn't such a grinding, unforgiving day. I don't know how I manage to get these blog entries written, and I'm not sure this is a tradition I can continue because after getting up before 5 a.m. and working all day in one room, writing all of this before I go to bed is getting harder and harder. But, now is when it's all fresh on my mind, and I was afraid I would forget some of it; I had to get this out tonight.

So, now I'm going to watch election returns for a while with Ann, have a glass of wine, and then go to bed. Good night!

Another problem with DREs

2008-10-21T14:09:00.003-04:00

DREs really worry me because of security concerns and the fact that they cannot be properly audited. However, there is another problem with DREs, which this year, I think is going to be very serious.

News reports today are highlighting long lines at the polls for early voting. This is not unexpected, as the turnout for this election is bound to be tremendous. I'm very concerned about the impact a high turnout will have on an already stressed voting system. In Maryland, for example, we use touchscreen DRE machines. Precincts only have a handful of these machines, and they create a tight bottleneck in the voting process. As a poll worker, I've seen people take 30-45 minutes to vote. I've also seen it done in 5 minutes. The average, by my observation, is around 8 or 9 minutes. With an increased turnout, the expected growth in the lines is exponential. That is because the throughput of the election machinery does not change, so additional people will be added to the line much faster than the system's ability to absorb them, and the lines will be long - very long.

When Maryland switches to paper ballots with optical scanners in 2010, this problem will go away. The reason is that the time critical resource will be the scanner, and people can scan their ballots in seconds. The process of filling out the paper ballots can be massively parallelized. We could have 40 or 50 people filling out ballots at the same time, and even with only a couple of scanners, we can move people through the voting process much faster. Using touchscreen DREs, the time critical resource is the voting machine and voters spend on the order of 8 or 9 minutes, and sometimes much longer to vote. Paper ballots with op scan counting will eliminate long lines at the polls. And, I am worried that long lines are going to be a serious, serious problem in the election, which is two weeks from today. However bad it might be in early voting right now, and indications are that it's bad, I fear that on November 4, the problems will be worse.

Software dependence is dangerous in voting systems

2008-09-16T11:00:00.006-04:00

I wrote an op-ed that appears in today's Baltimore Sun. Here is the text of my article:

When it comes to voting technology, Maryland will soon take a big - and welcome - step backward.

In 2004, the state switched almost all of its precincts to Diebold touch-screen voting equipment, called direct recording electronic machines (DREs). In 2006, Maryland adopted these devices for all precincts. But when we cast ballots for president this November, Maryland will use DREs for the last time in a statewide election.

In 2010, we will return to a low-tech but far more secure system: optically scanned paper ballots. I know that many Marylanders have enjoyed the simplicity of tapping their candidate choices atop the DREs' sleek screens. But for me, the day these machines are tossed in the scrap heap cannot come quickly enough.

I have written extensively about the shortcomings of computer voting machines, and I will not go into detail here about why we can never be sure that these devices accurately count and report the selections made by the people who use them. Instead, I'd like to focus on a simple reason why software-based voting systems are impractical, given the state of voting system certification and the nature of the software industry.

First, consider the certification. Most states today require that voting systems meet federal standards. At specialized labs, vendors must submit their voting systems to a battery of tests in order to qualify for certification. In a rigorous process that can take many months, these labs check the resistance of the machines to temperature changes, evaluate the coding practices used in any software components and review other operating features, as required by federal rules, and in some cases even tougher state guidelines.

Once a voting system is certified, it is considered set in stone. Any change, no matter how small, requires that the entire system be recertified from scratch. This is appropriate, because a small change in one part of the system sometimes has significant and unanticipated effects on other parts of the system. This is especially true if the change is in the software. When it comes to computer voting systems, it is usually the software - the code that directs a computer to perform specific tasks - that harbors the primary Achilles' heel.

Here's the problem: The software industry has evolved in such a way that nearly all computer programs require frequent changes and repairs. This realignment takes place regularly and, to a great extent, invisibly. (How many home computer users understand what has happened during a regular Windows Update?)

Such updates are needed because software is complex and prone to glitches. It is not "often" buggy; it is "always" buggy. And when one bug is fixed, the fix itself can lead to other bugs. Microsoft releases new versions of its software and patches with regularity.

Even Apple, which has some of the best programmers in the world and spends more than most companies on software development, is aware that its products have bugs that must be fixed as quickly as possible. This property of software is not obvious to people who have never programmed, but for computer scientists, it is an accepted and well-understood phenomenon.

When bugs are found in software-based electronic voting systems - as they inevitably are - election officials often face an irreconcilable dilemma. They can ignore the bug, which could result in an incorrect vote tally or a paralyzing crash during the election, or they can try to have the bug fixed. But fixing the bug involves changing the software, and by law the voting system must then be recertified. Given the long time and additional expense that this process takes, recertifying may not be an option.

What if a serious software bug is discovered the week before the election? Even if it can be fixed in time, it would be illegal to use the resulting system in an election, and I would argue that there would not be time to properly test a bug fix for such a complex software system. On the eve of an important election, would you want to wrestle with a critical decision such as this one?

So the next time your laptop freezes up or a popular program on your computer crashes, ask yourself: How would you feel if this was your voting system on Election Day? Let's welcome the paper ballot system that is coming back in 2010. It is the best system for Maryland.

ISE exploits MMORPGs

2008-08-31T21:23:00.003-04:00

Researchers at my consulting company, ISE, discovered vulnerabilities in Age of Conan and Anarchy Online. The game producers were notified, and no details were released until the vulnerabilities were closed. It's instructive to see what was wrong and how such vulnerabilities can be avoided. The details are posted on our web site. A story appeared in today's Baltimore Sun.

How an iPhone debut is like an election

2008-07-12T09:56:00.001-04:00

I'm an iPhone junkie. I waited in line yesterday morning to get my iPhone, but I only had two hours, and after my time was up, I had made only minor progress, while the line grew pretty long behind me, so I abandoned my newfound iPhone junkie friends and left the Apple store (well, the line outside the Apple store) empty handed. Only later did I learn that the line was moving so slowly because of glitches in the system caused by so many simultaneous activations. John Markoff said it well in his NYT article today.

The setback was a classic example of the problems that can follow when complex systems have single points of failure. In this case, the company appeared to almost invite the problems by having both existing and new iPhone owners try to get through to its systems at the same time. 'There are certainly lessons in preparedness,' said Richard Doherty, a consumer electronics industry consultant who is president of the Envisioneering Group in Seaford, N.Y. He compared the day with Christmas morning, “the acid test for many years” for electronics companies because customers contact them in droves after opening presents and trying to get gadgets to work.

Of course, the Apple problems, as described in this article, are instructive when considering using electronic systems in elections. The debut of the Apple iPhone caused an unprecedented stress on their system on a single day, and there was no way for Apple to stress test their system in preparation for that day. I'm sure they performed many tests, and they clearly had plenty of notice to prepare for yesterday, and still, the system failed in unexpected ways when faced with the actual flash crowd of iPhone enthusiasts. That's not to say such a system will always fail. Sometimes it will work fine. But the takeaway from this is that a large, complex system, such as an election, running on a particular day, with no opportunity for a realistic to-scale test, may fail on election day in ways that cannot be predicted.

For this reason, it is important to keep systems as simple as possible, plan for contingencies, and assume the worst might happen. If it does not, there will have been no harm in having been prepared. But in the unfortunate circumstance where things do fail, as they did yesterday for Apple, we will all be better off for having been cautious.

"Paper ballots" not "paper trails"

2008-07-03T11:40:00.004-04:00

I've noted some confusion in discussions with reporters recently, and I have to assume that this confusion is somewhat widespread. The issue is whether or not a "paper trail" resolves the problems with electronic voting. The term "paper trail", in my opinion, is an unfortunate one. When I first got seriously involved in this issue in 2003, many of us advocated paper trails as a solution to paperless DREs. The thinking was that if every vote is recorded on a piece of paper and that paper was audited by the voter, then a correct tally could be produced by counting the papers. This could be used to audit the machines, or as the definitive ballots. In theory, this seems reasonable, but it doesn't work in practice, and the theory is a bit flawed as well.

As I describe this, keep in mind that the underlying premise is that the software-only DREs should not be trusted. Software often fails in unexpected and unexplainable ways, and in the case of national public elections, there is a threat that the software could have been rigged or modified, or just be plain old buggy. The bottom line is that elections are more trustworthy if we don't have to trust the software. So, given that premise, paper trails only provide some benefit if the papers are actually counted. Otherwise, the machines are just as vulnerable as ones that don't have paper trails. Unless there is a policy for checking the ballots, and unless voters actually inspect the paper trails, we might as well just use DREs because the paper trails are useless under those circumstances. In practice, things are actually worse. Vendors have developed paper trails that are unwieldy, difficult to count, printed with fading ink, and prone to failure and paper jams.

All of my experience with paper trails on DREs leads me to believe that instead of "paper trails" what we need are "paper ballots". In paper ballot systems, ballots are produced as in traditional elections, and these are the official ballots of record. By using touch screen ballot marking devices to create paper ballots (or even allowing people to mark them by hand), we avoid all of the problems of the paper trails. We end up with ballots that can be counted multiple ways, and which provide tangible evidence of the intent of each voter.

So, my advice is to abandon the term "paper trail", to abandon DREs with paper trails, and to start talking about paper ballots.

Adios iPhone

2008-04-01T07:48:00.002-04:00

I was flying back from California last week, watching a video on my iPhone, and next to me was this guy who kept glancing at me and smirking. "Is that an iPhone?", he finally asked. I nodded. "Humph," he grunted and assumed an air of superiority. I was a bit taken aback so I asked him why he didn't like iPhones. "Oh," he said, "they're okay, I guess," and then he mumbled under his breath "if you are into that sort of thing." I couldn't just let that go, so I asked him if he had ever actually used an iPhone.

He looked around as if to see if anyone else was looking, and gave me a conspiratorial smile. "I've got something to show you," he said. And he proceeded to pull out a tiny gadget that looked like an earpiece for a phone. "Check out my device," he said. "It's an integrated PDA, phone, GPS and HD multimedia station." I asked him how he dialed the phone, and he said that it uses a built-in address book with voice recognition. You just say a name , and it looks it up in your address book and dials. What about names that aren't in the address book? He says that since the device is always online, it does a directory search over the Internet and tries to find a match that way. But, how do you know what number it found? There's no display! Before I understood what was going on, he removed a contact lens from his eye and asked me to put it in. I thought this was crazy. But, he had a liquid that he sprayed on it to clean it. Still skeptical, I popped it into my eye, and I was completely blown away. As if floating in air was a transparent view of a screen with a phone style interface. "Now," he said, "use your pupil to navigate the cursor, and crunch your jaw to click. Right side of the mouth for right click, left side for regular click, and bite your tongue to scroll." It took me a little practice, but I was soon able to move things around the screen with ease. I could see as if I was looking at a computer screen. It was like nothing I've ever seen before. And then he played a movie for me. Unbelievable resolution, and hi fidelity sound. The growing pain in my tongue was the only downside I could see to this device.

The "phone" had a full fledged PDA interface. It had video watching mode, an Internet browser, visual voicemail, and many other features that I had never even heard of. I asked my new friend where he got this, and he said that it is a prototype of a new product he invented that he is calling the EyePhone. He had a few glitches to work out, and then he was going to try to commercialize it. I volunteered on the spot to be a beta tester for him, and he agreed. I now have a room full of these test devices, and a year's supply of Hi Definition contact lenses. Needless to say, I am dumping my iPhone.

So, if you ever see me staring off into space with a blank look, it's not that I'm ignoring you; I'm probably just reading email or looking something up in my calendar, perhaps checking to see what happened on April 1.

Lunar Eclipse

2008-02-21T10:46:00.002-05:00

Last night, there was a lunar eclipse - the last one until December, 2010. Since it was very cold and had just snowed, instead of setting up my tripod outside like I should have, I took some pictures and hand held the camera. Still, they came out okay. If you want to see the pictures, click here. My daughter was pretty excited about it, and was even willing (eager!) to extricate herself away from American Idol to look at it several times.

An article about Internet voting

2008-02-02T16:45:00.001-05:00

David Dill and Barbara Simons have written an excellent essay about some of the risks of Internet voting and a system that is being deployed for the Democratic primary. While the dangers of electronic voting with paperless DREs have been covered in great detail in this blog and in other places, the risks of voting on home computers over the Internet are significantly greater. It seems only fitting that Dill & Simons published this article on Groundhog Day. If you saw the Bill Murray movie where every day repeats as though for the first time, you'll appreciate the way Internet voting seems to appear again in every election in a similar fashion. Dill and Simons refer to Internet voting "experiments" as a whack-a-mole.

My cool Mom

2008-01-24T16:59:00.000-05:00

My Mom leads the Israeli dance group in Nashville, TN, where I grew up. They dance at Vanderbilt where she is Professor of Mechanical Engineering. They recently produced a short video about the group, which is narrated by my Mom who also stars in it with her dance group. Check it out.

ACCURATE annual report available

2008-01-21T13:05:00.000-05:00

ACCURATE is A Center for Correct, Usable, Reliable, Auditable, and Transparent Elections. We are funded by the National Science Foundation, and I am the center director. Our 2007 annual report is now available here. It highlghts the Center’s major accomplishments and activities in 2007. This coming election year promises to be our most interesting and productive, as members of ACCURATE engage in all aspects of the election, as well as in researching technologies for improving future elections.

2008 Election Judge Training

2008-01-10T14:56:00.000-05:00

I attended my Maryland election judge training session today. It was a 3 hours class for returning judges. There was really nothing new for me. I've already worked 4 elections using the Diebold Accuvote machines, and we will be using them again this year. I did, however, notice a change in the tone of the class.

Right up front, the instructor told us that the three most important factors for us to consider are "Security, Integrity, and Accuracy". These three things were stressed throughout the day. The instructor talked about the 20/20 segment where a hacker was able to change tallies on the machine (I think it was Harri Hursti), and told us of a new tamper tape that was placed on the corner of the machine where there is a screw for opening up the casing. As before, I had a good look at this tamper tape and determined that it would be extremely difficult to tell if the tape had been voided or not. I think these tamper tapes are emperor's clothes designed to make administrators feel good. One of the trainers referred to it as the "Lou Dobbs seal", in reference to Lou Dobbs' coverage of e-voting problems leading up to the 2006 election.

We spent more time training on the poll books than I had in previous elections. These are those machines that failed miserably in the 2006 primary. The instructor told us that the books would not work properly if they were turned on at the same time, so each poll book had to be turned on and enabled before the next one. I remember hearing this as one of the explanations of why so many stations failed in 2006. I hope that she is mistaken, and that the machines will still work even if powered up in arbitrary order. Otherwise, Maryland will have problems again in 2008, because I'm certain that not all judges will remember to follow these instructions. The poll books have a new feature this year that the instructor was very proud of. The chief judges can reverse a voter's check-in and reissue them a voter authority card. This feature is a bit scary, although I can see how it would be useful under certain circumstances. This is enabled via a 4 digit PIN that is supposed to be known only to the chief judges.

It struck me as ironic that we were required to fill out a survey about our experience as a judge, as well as an evaluation of our instructors. We were given the surveys on paper, with round ovals to fill in so that the survey and evaluation results could be optically scanned and tabulated. It struck me that the survey and evaluation of our election judge training was more auditable, secure, reliable and transparent than the machines that will be used in the actual election.

I hope that when I train for the 2010 election in Maryland, that we will be working on how to collect paper ballots, to avoid residual votes, and to work with precinct count scanners of paper ballots. If the state does not fund this change, then the measure to move to paper ballots that passed in the legislature last year and was signed by the governor will be thrown out.

Here are some pictures that I took at training today.

Ohio report is available

2007-12-14T10:59:00.001-05:00

Ohio's secretary of state, Jennifer Brunner has commissioned a study that appears to be on the same order as California's top to bottom review of their voting systems. There are several reports available on the SoS web site. The most remarkable report is that of the academic team who analyzed the ES&S, Premier Elections Solutions, and Hart InterCivic voting systems. The academic report, produced by some of the leading computer security experts such a Matt Blaze, Harri Hursti, and Giovannie Vigna, and led by Patrick McDaniel of Penn State, is available here, on the SoS web site.

Quoting from the executive summary:

"All of the studied systems possess critical security failures that render their technical controls insufﬁcient to guarantee a trustworthy election. While each system possessed unique limitations, they shared critical failures in design and implementation that lead to this conclusion:

Insufﬁcient Security - The systems uniformly failed to adequately address important threats against election data and processes. Central among these is a failure to adequately defend an election from insiders, to prevent virally infected software from compromising entire precincts and counties, and to ensure cast votes are appropriately protected and accurately counted.
Improper Use or Implementation of Security Technology - A root cause of the failures present in the studied systems is the pervasive mis-application of security technology. Failure to follow standard and well-known practices for the use of cryptography, key and password management, and security hardware seriously undermine the protections provided. In several important cases, the misapplication of commonly accepted principles renders the security technology of no use whatsoever.
Auditing - All of the systems exhibited a visible lack of trustworthy auditing capability. In all systems, the logs of election practices were commonly forgeable or erasable by the principals who they were intended to be monitoring. The impact of the lack of secure auditing is that it is difﬁcult to know when an attack occurs, or to know how to isolate or recover from it when it is detected.
Software Maintenance - The software maintenance practices of the studied systems are deeply ﬂawed. This has led to fragile software in which exploitable crashes, lockups, and failures are com- mon in normal use. Such software instability is likely to increase over time, and may lead to highly insecure and unreliable elections."

and later in the executive summary:

The report is an incredible read. This group, in only a couple of months, managed to completely subvert these system and to expose them as woefully insecure and inadequate for the real world. Secretary Brunner, to her credit, has now recommended the elimination of DREs in polling places in her state. Now if only other states will follow her lead and that of Debra Bowen, SoS of California.

Does your home address begin with a '5'?

2007-11-08T16:38:00.000-05:00

Tuesday was not a national election, and there was no election in Baltimore County, where I live, but there were local elections in many places across the country. This Washington Post story describes some problems in a local election in Maryland.

"Rockville's voting was complicated by a glitch. Thousands of residents who had not yet voted were mistakenly listed as having already cast absentee ballots because of a state database problem ... The state's [voter registration] list inadvertently marked as absentee the names of voters with a home address that begins with the number 5."

My home street address is actually 5, so I might have been affected by this, if we had had an election this week.

While this is an inexcusable occurrence, it is not really that surprising. The greater the complexity in a system, the more likely it is that unexpected glitches such as this will occur. I don't know if this was a software error, a programming error, a configuration error, human error, or something else. And the point is that it does not really matter. Complex software-based systems, especially ones developed the way voting machines today are built and tested, are likely to result in unforeseen problems. In the 2006 primary in Rockville, there were even worse problems with the electronic poll books. In 2008, the problem will probably be something new.

What worries me are not only the problems that we can observe, such as the ones last year and this week. I'm worried about the problems that might result in the wrong votes being totaled, without us ever knowing it. It is foolish to think that only really obvious errors will occur. Maryland's voting system, using only DREs statewide, is vulnerable to catastrophic error but also undetectable errors. And, although the state passed a measure to move to optical scanners in 2010, it now appears that the funding for this move may not be available.

A case of the wrong technology applied incorrectly

2007-10-26T09:42:00.000-04:00

In this week's Economist magazine, an article describes how the Swiss general election that was held on October 21 was to use quantum cryptography to protect the transmission of votes from the polling stations to the central tabulation centers. Quoting from the article:

The authorities will use quantum cryptography—a way to transmit information that detects eavesdroppers and errors almost immediately—to ensure not only that votes are kept secret but also that they are all counted.

I first became aware of this project when a New Scientist reporter sent me a note about it and asked for my opinion. I assumed that it was a joke or that the reporter had heard wrong. After all, protecting electronic transmissions is the one problem I can think of in all of this that is not really hard. Here are some of the problems in electronic voting that are hard:

Ensuring that the software on the voting machines is the correct software. The proposed solution of having a library of hash values of the correct binaries of voting machine software and checking the voting machines does not work. There is no way to perform the check of the hash of the code that is running in the machines. In fact, any attempt to check that hash value would provide an opportunity for an attacker to change the code then and there.
Ensuring that the software on the voting machines is not malicious.Even if the "correct" code is running on the voting machine, there is no deterministic way to determine that the code was not designed with a back door in it that could affect the outcome of the election.
Ensuring that no unknown bugs in the voting machines can affect the outcome.Even if the "correct" code is running on the voting machine and even if there is no intentional malicious code in the machine, there is no way to ensure that the code does not contain inadvertent bugs or unexpected failure modes that could disrupt an election or cause the wrong result to be computed.

Quantum cryptography is a novel and very interesting topic. There are potentially many applications that could benefit from this technology, and I have always been a big fan. But, quantum cryptography does not address the problems in electronic voting that are actually difficult to solve. Transmitting the votes from the polls to the central tabulation center can be done with traditional cryptography. Authentication functions can provide tamper resistance and encryption can provide secrecy, assuming that secrecy is actually desirable here. I believe it is not, as every aspect of the process should be transparent, and I see no reason to keep the precinct results secret. Just the opposite is true - it is important for observers to see princinct level results.

I applaud the Swiss for pursuing innovation, but in this case, they are using the wrong tool to solve the wrong problem in an inappropriate way.

Holt's H.R. 811 is finally coming up for a vote

2007-09-05T20:18:00.000-04:00

Congressman Rush Holt's bill requiring a voter verified paper trail is scheduled to come up for a vote tomorrow. I've been traveling out of town, and I just returned home this evening (to an overflowing inbox about this issue). I was planning on writing up my thoughts about H.R. 811, but I just noticed that Ed Felten did a great job of writing his up on his blog. I pretty much agree with everything he said, so no need to repeat it here.

I support Holt's bill. I know that many activists, including several who have contacted me today, are opposed to this bill because it does not entirely ban DREs. However, at the moment, I believe that we need this bill to pass. It would outlaw the voting systems used in places like Maryland and Georgia and, I believe, 13 other states that have entirely paperless voting.

What's sorely lacking right now are paper trails and mandatory audits. Holt provides these. I do hold out hope that some day we will be able to utilize the added benefits of end to end cryptographic systems. But right now, the Holt bill is the best measure I can foresee to have a realistic chance of eliminating the paperless DREs that I may have to vote on next November 4th.

Avi

The Virus Did It

2007-08-26T10:47:00.000-04:00

I attended Crypto in Santa Barbara this past week, and I was talking to a colleague of mine from another university. He had served as an expert witness in an interesting case involving a man who had been accused of having illegal pornographic images on his computer. His defense was that his computer had been infected with a malware virus and that "the virus did it." This may seem a little far fetched. However, my friend is a top security expert, and he had disassembled and reverse engineered the virus code, and he showed that indeed the virus was designed to download pornographic images from the Web.

The "virus did it" defense is likely to become more popular as increasingly nefarious online activity is uncovered. In a society where you are innocent until proven guilty, the possibility that a virus performed a malicious action from someone's computer, and that the person was not aware of this, may be enough to provide plausible deniability of almost anything.

Consider the implications of this for electronic voting machines. While the Princeton team showed how a malicious virus could copy itself to infect a precinct full of voting machines, and whereas the California top to bottom review team showed how even a single infected voting machine or memory card can compromise a back end tabulating system, in light of "the virus did it" phenomenon, the attacker's job in disrupting an election is even simpler. All an attacker has to do is leave evidence that casts suspicion that there may have been a virus. If an election audit reveals signs of a possible virus, the results are thrown into doubt, and a losing candidate has a legitimate claim that a virus may have tampered with the results.

The evidence of a possible virus can be created anytime prior to the audit, even after the election is complete. In a computerized system such as a paperless DRE, it is much easier to concoct false evidence that raises suspicion than it is in a paper ballot or end to end cryptographic system.

To visualize how scary this could be, let's take the example of Sarasota County, Florida in the 2006 election. Congressional District 13 was an extremely close race with the strange anomaly that an abnormally high number of undervotes were found in an important race. Several studies and audits were conducted, but the reason for the problem has never been conclusively determined. Now, imagine if an audit had turned up virus code on some of the voting machines. Even if no virus had ever executed or propagated, the mere existence of such code would have created chaos. Taking this idea a step further, imagine if such evidence were found in the Virginia Senate race in 2006. This extremely close race singlehandedly determined the party majority in the Senate.

When defending the use of DREs, vendors and some election officials argue that it would be very difficult to tamper with a voting machine in an undetectable way to change the outcome of the election. While I disagree with this statement, the truth is that it grossly overestimates the job of the attacker. All an attacker has to do is to create the impression that something went very wrong. The losing candidate will do the rest.

If in a future election we begin to suspect that "the virus did it," things are going to get very ugly.

Why nobody wants to buy Diebold Election Systems

2007-08-16T21:08:00.000-04:00

In an Associated Press story today, Diebold confirms that they tried and failed to sell their voting technologies business. Given the recent reports in California and Florida, I imagine it will be even harder for them now. I think people, even within Diebold, are coming to the realization that DREs are the wrong model for voting systems. There are several reasons for this.

DREs are too complex. There are typically 50,000+ lines of code in a DRE, much of that involves user interface and audio capability, and providing the DRE interface and user experience is not worth the hit in complexity.
DREs serve as a bottleneck on election day. DREs are expensive, and so it is unlikely that precincts will have more than they need. Since voters typically spend several minutes voting, and I've observed as a poll worker that quite a few voters take more than 10 minutes, the potential for long lines is tremendous. Once a backlog of voters is created, it only gets worse, as the effect propagates much like the airline systems gets backed up in a positive feedback loop of delays once some flights are late.
DREs are non-transparent. The public justifiably does not trust them. They cannot be independently audited, despite the vendor's insincere claims to the contrary. Even DREs with a VVPAT cannot be properly audited because they just don't work as we would hope. Voters often do not check the paper. The paper rolls used by most vendors do not lend themselves to easy recounts, and the retrofitting of DREs with VVPAT has led to awkward and sometimes ill defined procedures, especially when a voter disputes the printout.
Finally, a much better model for voting systems exists, namely, paper ballots with optical scan precinct counting and ballot marking machines for disability access.

So, it is no surprise that Diebold can't sell their voting business. They'd be as likely to sell 8 track players instead of ipods.

Secretary Bowen's clever insight

2007-08-07T22:02:00.000-04:00

On Monday, our NSF ACCURATE center held its second annual EVT conference. It was a smashing success with packed attendance and great papers. Today, we held our Principal Investigator (PI) meeting consisting of the PIs, graduate students and some of our advisors. To all of our amazement, Debra Bowen, the Secretary of State of California, who is on our advisory board, showed up for both days. This is particularly incredible given that last Friday she created a firestorm by decertifying most of the electronic voting machines in her state after the top to bottom review that she ordered showed tremendous flaws in the machines.

Secretary Bowen was an active participant in both our workshop and our PI meeting. Today on a panel of our advisors, she said something that really struck a chord with me. It was a simple comment, but it showed great insight into the computer software process as well as the election system certification process. Bowen's observation was that the certification process is not well suited to software. Most election officials defer to staffers or to academics such as us about technical issues, but Secretary Bowen sounded as much like a computer scientists as a state official this afternoon. She rattled off technical terms that she was completely comfortable with and made arguments based on a level of understanding of technology that I have never seen from a non-computer scientist. It is no wonder that she was able to put together the team led by David Wagner and Matt Bishop to study the machines and to appreciate their findings.

Back to Bowen's comment about software not being suitable for the way election equipment is certified. It is right on the mark. The current certification process may have been appropriate when a 900 lb lever voting machine was deployed. The machine could be tested every which way, and if it met the criteria, it could be certified because it was not likely to change. But software is different. The software lifecycle is dynamic. As an example, look at the way Apple distributes releases of the iPhone software. The first release was 1.0.0. Two minor version numbers. When the first serious flaw was discovered, they issued a patch and called it version 1.0.1. Apple knew that there would be many minor and some major releases because that is the nature of software. It's how the entire software industry operates.

So, you cannot certify an electronic voting machine the way you certify a lever machine. Once the voting machine goes through a lengthy and expensive certification process, any change to the software requires that it be certified all over again. What if a vulnerability is discovered a week before an election? What about a month before the election, or a week after it passes certification? Now the point is that we absolutely expect that vulnerabilities will be discovered all the time. That would be the case even if the vendors had a clue about security. Microsoft, which arguably has some of the best security specialists, processes and development techniques issues security patches all the time.

Software is designed to be upgraded, and patch management systems are the norm. A certification system that requires freezing a version in stone is doomed to failure because of the inherent nature of software. Since we cannot change the nature of software, the certification process for voting machines needs to be radically revamped. The dependence on software needs to be eliminated.

California source code study results

2007-08-02T16:44:00.000-04:00

The source code team reports for the California Top to Bottom review of Diebold, Hart and Sequoia's voting systems are now online. These reports are comprehensive and detailed and should mark the end of the use of these voting machines in public elections. From the executive summaries:

Diebold
Our analysis shows that the technological controls in the Diebold software do not provide sufficient security to guarantee a trustworthy election. The software contains serious design flaws that have led directly to specific vulnerabilities that attackers could exploit to affect election outcomes.

Hart
Many of these attacks can be mounted in a manner that makes them extremely hard to detect and correct. We expect that many of them could be carried out in the field by a single individual, without extensive effort, and without long-term access to the equipment.

Sequoia
We found significant security weaknesses throughout the Sequoia system. The nature of these weaknesses raises serious questions as to whether the Sequoia software can be relied upon to protect the integrity of elections. Every software mechanism for transmitting election results and every software mechanism for updating software lacks reliable measures to detect or prevent tampering.

I am most familiar with the Diebold system, and one thing that stands out is how every time there is another study of the Diebold code, more security problems come to light. Here are a few issues that this report identified:

The audit log does not adequately detect malicious tampering.

Buffer overflows in unchecked string operations allow arbitrary code execution.

Integer overflows in the vote counters are unchecked.

Multiple buffer overflows in .ins file handling allow arbitrary code execution on startup.

Setting a jumper on the motherboard enables a bootloader menu that allows the user to extract
or tamper with the contents of the internal flash memory.

Keys used to secure smart cards and election data are not adequately protected.

The machine does not adequately protect the supervisor PIN. (This same problem was identified in this week's Florida report)

Votes can be swapped or neutralized by modifying the defined candidate voting coordinates
stored on the memory card.

OpenSSL is not initialized with adequate entropy

...

And the list goes on. Dozens of such vulnerabilities are identified; I just picked a few at random from the list. This is the code that Diebold produced after they claimed to have fixed the vulnerabilities we found in 2003 and that Ed Felten's group identified last year. The backend GEMS system has its own serious problems as well. It is clear that they are simply not qualified to build these kinds of machines.

As I read the three new reports, I could not help but marvel at the fact that so many places in the US are using these machines. When it comes to perscription medications, we perform extensive tests before drugs hit the market. When it comes to aviation, planes are held to standards and tested before people fly on them. But, it seems that the voting machines we are using are even more poorly designed and poorly implemented than I had realized.

The more these machines are studied, the worse they look.

Florida SAIT report highlights more Diebold problems

2007-07-31T18:48:00.000-04:00

The Florida Secretary of State has just released a report from the Security and Assurance in Information Technology Laboratory (SAIT) at Florida State University titled "Software Review and Security Analysis of the Diebold Voting Machine Software". This report is the output of a study that Florida commissioned to determine whether flaws reported in previous studies of voting systems, including my group's study, had been fixed yet. I was a reviewer of this report, and my graduate student, Ryan Gardner, played a key role in the study. The group was led by Alec Yasinsac who led the previous FSU study on voting machine security for Florida.

I am pleased to see that there are so many studies of voting systems being performed. In this past year, Connecticut, California, and now Florida have conducted thorough reviews, and all of them have highlighted serious problems with the voting systems. All this is happening as the House is considering federal legislation to improve the auditability of voting equipment.

Once again this new report shows serious, serious problems with Diebold, and that they clearly have not fixed some of the most egregious problems. One of the weaknesses that our report in 2003 pointed out was that Diebold used a single, fixed encryption key for all encryption in the system. Diebold has moved from using DES to AES. However, the key management is just as bad as before, and possibly worse. Here is an excerpt from the new report released today.

The system key is generated by computing an MD5 hash of the machine serial number. Its value is never changed after generation. Since the machine serial number is public, the system key is also essentially public. Anyone who knows this procedure can generate the system key and can access anything it protects, including the data encryption key and anything that it is used to encrypt.

This is arguably worse than having a fixed static key in all of the machines. Because with knowledge of the machine's serial number, anyone can calculate all of the secret keys. Whereas before, someone would have needed access to the source code or the binary in the machine.

Other attacks mentioned in the report include swapping two candidate vote counters and many other vote switching attacks. The supervisor PIN is protected with weak cryptography, and once again Diebold has shown that they do not have even a basic understanding of how to apply cryptographic mechanisms. Quoting once again:

The supervisor PIN is now stored on supervisor smart cards as a keyed hash of the actual PIN. Specifically, the PIN is concatenated with part of the data encryption key (the first 64 bits), and an MD5 sum is computed over the resulting string. The first 4 bytes of the MD5 are stored on the smart card. The most significant weakness of this approach again concerns the key management of the data encryption key as described in Section 3.7.1.1. The key can be compromised by an adversary with sufficient access to a voting terminal, and an adversary with it can find the PIN using a simple brute force computation. Again, the act of using the same key for more than one purpose is generally considered poor practice within the cryptographic community. Moreover, the input to the hash function is 64 bits of the 128-bit data encryption key. Using only 64 bits of the 128-bit AES key in this manner may allow an adversary to recover the data encryption key significantly faster than exhaustive search.

So, Diebold is doing some things better than they did before when they had absolutely no security, but they have yet to do them right. Anyone taking any of our cryptography classes at Johns Hopkins, for example, would do a better job applying cryptography. If you read the SAIT report, this theme repeats throughout.

In my opinion, in his letter to Diebold the Secretary of State of Florida, Kurt Browning downplays the severity of this report.

A toast to Peter Honeyman

2007-07-31T16:56:00.001-04:00

My former Ph.D. advisor, Peter Honeyman won the prestigious Lifetime Achievement Award from the USENIX Association. I first heard about this from Matt Blaze of the USENIX board and a former colleague of mine at AT&T, and I was absolutely thrilled. I can think of nobody more deserving. As the recipient of his mentorship, I am delighted that he was called out for his role mentoring students for this honor. From the USENIX web site:

Dr. Peter Honeyman has had a profound and lasting impact on the field of computer science. While many know Peter for his seminal contributions to computing systems, such as Honey DanBer UUCP and Disconnected AFS, it is his efforts as a mentor that we wish to honor with the USENIX Lifetime Achievement Award. Peter's often highly unconventional stewardship of the countless students, researchers, and advisees he has touched is the stuff of graduate student legend. His penetratingly insightful (and potentially hazardous) questions and comments, combined with a paradoxically unflinching loyalty, consistently have led those under his tutelage to the pinnacle of achievement in security, systems, and networking. Peter's questioning during conferences and doctoral defenses, although sometimes frightening, always demanded better from those of us who attempt to advance science.

Peter has a page with some pictures of the event. I was unable to attend the ceremony when he received his award because I was on vacation with my family in Israel, but I made a video tribute for him that was shown at the conference.

Debunking the "laboratory" defense

2007-07-31T08:52:00.000-04:00

Yesterday, there was a hearing in California about the e-voting machines that were studied in the top to bottom review. I watched some of the proceedings that were broadcast on the web, and I read some of the press coverage, such as this article in the San Jose Mercury News. I'm struck (although not surprised) by the way the vendors attack the study results. As the top to bottom review concluded that the systems were highly vulnerable to all kinds of attacks, the vendors stand to lose business and revenue if the machines are decertified, so you would expect them to attack the study with everything they have.

Reading the news coverage of the hearing, it is clear that there is a common theme in the attacks on the study. Quoting the article:

Sequoia Voting Systems, which is used in Alameda, Santa Clara and Santa Cruz counties, called the review an "unrealistic, worst-case scenario" performed in a laboratory environment by computer security experts with unfettered access to the machines.

Several other people use the term "laboratory environment" in criticizing the study. I think these criticisms miss the point. Most, if not all of the vulnerabilities identified in the studies are weaknesses that are well known in the security literature and which can be avoided with proper design and implementation. The source code reviews have not been published yet, so I cannot comment on what was found there, but looking at the red team reviews, I can say that we know how to design systems that avoid the problems that were found there. So, regardless of whether these were broken in a laboratory or in a polling station, the fact is that vendors are not utilizing well-known security technology in designing their systems.

Rather than using technology provided by incompetent vendors who don't bother to hire real security experts to build voting systems, we should insist that these machines be scrapped. The debate should focus on whether or not the machines utilize the best available security, rather than on whether the proof that they are insecure was identified in a lab or somewhere else. If the vendors focused as many resources on improving the security of their systems as they do in criticizing the studies, then they wouldn't have to point out that the studies were done in a laboratory because studies that embarrass them would be less likely to exist.

More on California Top to Bottom

2007-07-28T09:00:00.000-04:00

I should point out that only the red team reports have been released so far. (As the SoS web site states, "The document review teams and source code review teams submitted their reports on schedule. Their reports will be posted as soon as the Secretary of State ensures the reports do not inadvertently disclose security-sensitive information.") The red teams are groups of talented white hat hackers who approach the system as though they were mailicious parties looking to disrupt the election. These reports do not take into account flaws in the source code. The source code analysis reports, which are akin to the study that my research team performed in 2003 about Diebold, will be very revealing because they will shed light on how Diebold responded to the flaws that we found four years ago. Considering that I had two (very talented) graduated students looking at the code for about a week, I fully expect that this team of professionals who spent a month will uncover much more serious problems.

It's important to keep in mind, as the California report states, that any security problems reported by them constitute a lower bound on the problems that exist. The reason is that they were limited in both time and in the information available to them. Some of the material they needed was given to them only a couple of weeks before their final deadline. Furthermore, in a real world scenario, hackers would not have a month to do the analysis and produce a report. They would probably skip the report and could spend many months developing their attacks.

California Top to Bottom results

2007-07-27T21:52:00.000-04:00

The Secretary of State of California, Debra Bowen has released the results of their top to bottom review of the Sequoia, Diebold, and Hart voting systems. This is perhaps the most anticipated voting system analysis ever. I just read the executive summary of the report, and the results are devastating for these machines. In all cases, the analysts were able to rewrite the firmware on the machines. This means that an attacker could change every aspect of the behavior of the voting systems. In a sense, these voting machines provide no protection against the most basic attack, which is the complete an unobservable reprogramming of the all the functionality of the voting machines.

One of the attacks against Sequoia that got my attention was that the team was able to determine when the machine was in test mode and thus could cheat but behave correctly whenever the machine was not in a real election. This undermines the common argument made by some that the machines are tested extensively. The analysts were able to defeat the physical security, bypassing the seals, on Sequoia and on Diebold. This undermines another argument often made by supporters of the machines that nobody could have undetectable access to the machines.

There are many other examples of attack that are much more serious than what I expected from this report - and I was expecting a lot. I don't see how anybody can possible condone continuing to use these e-voting machines, given the results that are summarized in the executive summary of the report. I will now read the detailed reports, and if I have anything more to say, I'll blog again over the weekend.

What is really disturbing is that these tests are taking place after the machines have been certified and deployed. This kind of top to bottom testing should be done before any voters actually vote on them.

ISE researchers find serious security vulnerabilities in iPhone

2007-07-22T21:48:00.000-04:00

The day after the iPhone was released, I purchased mine and blogged about it here. Although I still love my iPhone for its beautiful interface, well thought out features, and incredible screen, I'm now disappointed that it was not built more securely.

Researchers at my consulting company, Independent Security Evaluators (ISE) have found serious security vulnerabilities in the iPhone. They were able to take complete control of the iPhone device and run arbitrary shell code (see NYT article). To demonstrate this, they built an exploit that downloads personal information such as SMS text transcripts, address book entries, and email from the iPhone whenever a user visits a particular web site or connects to a particular WiFi network. However, the vulnerability can be exploited in many other ways. For example, an exploit could be written that would cause the iPhone to make an unnoticeable phone call to an attacker, who would then be able to monitor conversations by the victim. In other words, the iPhone could be turned into a bugging device.

We contacted Apple on July 17 and sent them all of the details of the vulnerability. We also promised not to release any specific technical details of the vulnerability that would allow someone else to exploit it until our Black Hat presentation on August 2. This gave them plenty of time to produce a fix, and we showed Apple how to patch the vulnerability.

However, we are disclosing the fact that the iPhone is vulnerable. Why are we doing that? Well, I believe that there is a social responsibility to report it when a device is vulnerable to attackers. People buy these things and use them in ways that put their identity and their online accounts at risk, and by exposing these vulnerabilities, we can make users better judges of how to use their high tech devices. In addition, vendors are much more likely to produce devices that are more secure if they know that independent security experts such as my team at ISE are likely to try to break them and to expose any vulnerabilities we find. Just look at the history of Microsoft's software security problems. They started paying attention when they were repeatedly embarrassed by the exposure of vulnerabilities. Now they put more effort into writing secure code than almost anyone.

EVT 2007

2007-07-17T12:20:00.001-04:00

Our NSF sponsored center, ACCURATE is putting on its second Electronic Voting Technology workshop (EVT '07) on August 6, 2007 in Boston. The program chairs are David Wagner and Ray Martinez, and they have put together a fantastic program. I encourage everyone who can to attend.

Report from Blue Ribbon Panel in Riverside County, California

2007-07-13T10:05:00.000-04:00

A report has been released by a Blue Ribbon Panel that was appointed by the Board of Supervisors of Riverside County in California. The panel held several public hearings, meetings with the registrar of voters, a meeting with the Board of Supervisors, three group study and writing meetings, and a presentation by Sequoia Services, the vendor of the DRE with VVPAT that is used in Riverside county.

I found the report to be extremely well thought out and well written. The panel was clearly open minded and considered all of the post 2006 election data and observations. The top conclusion of the panel was:

"Move as quickly as possible to a hybrid voting system whereby able-bodied voters make their preferences on paper ballots which are then counted by optical scanners."

The report details shortcomings and failures in the Sequoia Edge system used in 2006, and explains why the hybrid system would overcome these. I believe that this report, along with the top to bottom review that Secretary of State Bowen is conducting will result in California moving to much more secure, reliable, auditable and transparent election systems. According to this report, the hybrid systems will also result in faster results and less waiting time at the polls.

Giving into the force

2007-07-01T14:59:00.000-04:00

After reading endless articles and reviews of the iPhone, I decided that the slow Edge network from AT&T was a non-starter and that I was not going to get an iPhone. Many of my friends were surprised, as I am usually very excited about new gadgets. I was always on the waiting list for the newest Treo, and given what a Mac fanatic I am, an iPhone seemed like a no brainer.

This past week, old friends came out of the woodwork to ask me when I was getting my iPhone and if I was planning on sleeping in line. It was a big topic of conversation at work. I replied that I was going to be patient, and that I thought the drawbacks were serious, so I was not going to do it.

Well, this weekend was Ann's birthday, and I took her to NYC to a couple of Broadway shows while our babysitter stayed home with the kids. (After our 2 week vacation in Israel, a break from the little ones was necessary for our sanity anyway.) On Friday night, the Apple stores opened their doors to the masses for iPhones sales, and all of the major media covered it. Enthusiastic early adopters who waited in line for several days were shown on TV walking out with their new iPhones to massive applause. We watched from our hotel in the city on CNN. Our hotel was several blocks from the Apple store, and on Saturday morning, I was so drawn to it that Ann and I decided to go our separate ways for a few hours. She went shopping for shoes at Macy's, and I walked to the Apple store. It was really quite a sight. I found a table with an iPhone and played with it for about 5 minutes. My heart was racing as I began observing all of the features and the interface first hand. I was soon in line to buy my own without really understanding why. I had decided earlier that I was going to wait until the next version of the phone came out with fewer bugs and hopefully a faster network. After all, it wouldn't kill me to wait a few months. I've been fine with my Treo.

As I walked back to the hotel with my new iPhone bag, people on the street stopped me to talk and ask me if I really had an iPhone in there. Several made me pull out the box and show it to them. In the elevator in the hotel, people asked me about it. By the time I met up with Ann, I had already connected it to my laptop and downloaded a new version of iTunes to my computer that supported the phone. At breakfast this morning, I was playing with it, and the people at the table next to me started asking me about it. I decided that one of the undocumented features of this phone is that it makes people friendly.

Anyway, my Treo 750 that I used to love so much is now a paper weight. Yes, the iPhone has some serious drawbacks, but my love affair with it has begun, and when I leave it in the other room for a few minutes, I already miss it.

David Dill's excellent essay on the Holt Bill

2007-04-26T19:45:00.000-04:00

David Dill of Stanford, Verified Voting, and ACCURATE has written a terriffic essay on the Holt Bill. I'm posting it here in its entirety:

IT'S TIME TO OUTLAW PAPERLESS ELECTRONIC VOTING IN THE U.S.
by
David L. Dill
VerifiedVoting.org

Four years ago, when I began publicly opposing paperless electronic
voting, passing a Federal law to require voter-verified paper records
(VVPRs) seemed an impossible dream. Rep. Rush Holt introduced such
a bill in 2003, and another in 2005, but both bills languished in
committee until the clock ran out.

The dream is now achievable, due in part to the unending stream of
problems caused by paperless voting machines in recent years. HR
811, the third incarnation of the Holt bill, is a critical measure
needed to protect the integrity of our elections, and it now has very
good prospects of being enacted. It already has 210 co-sponsors in
the House, where only 218 votes are required to pass it.

There are two provisions in HR 811 that are especially vital for
restoring trust in American elections: A nationwide requirement for
voter-verified paper records, and stringent random manual counts of
those records, to make sure they agree with the announced vote
totals. The requirements in the Holt bill are superior to those in
almostevery state of the country (there are now 22 states with
significant amounts of paperless electronic voting, and only 13
states require random audits of VVPRs).

Success is not assured, however. The forces that have blocked
previous bills are still active, especially vendors of current poorly
performing equipment. Also, various concerns, reasonable and
otherwise, have been raised about the bill by other parties.

Some groups insist on optical scan machines, which read and count hand-marked paper ballots, and are not supporting HR 811 because it still allows the use of touch-screen machines. However, under HR 811, those machines must be equipped with so-called voter-verifiable paper trails, which print a paper copy of the vote that can be reviewed by the voter before being cast. Most of the current generation of inferior paper-trail machines would not be allowed under HR 811, which requires the machines to preserve the privacy of voters and requires the VVPRs to be printed on high-quality paper. This will create a strong incentive for local jurisdictions to purchase optical scan equipment. Furthermore, HR 811 makes the paper records the official ballots of record in audits and recounts, and requires election officials to post a notice explaining to voters the need to verify their VVPRs.

I would personally prefer to see optical scan machines be used
nationwide, if supplemented by equipment to allow voters with
disabilities to vote privately. If groups objecting to HR 811 can
cause such a bill to be introduced and line up the votes in Congress
to get it passed, that bill will have my support. Meanwhile, those of
us who have actually talked to Congressional staff have not seen any
significant support for such a requirement. It seems that we have a
choice between HR 811 or continuation of our current "Kafka-esque"
paperless system (as a French politician recently described it).

Another small but noisy contingent is opposing HR 811, sometimes
without revealing their true agenda, because they will be satisfied
only with a nationwide system of hand-counted paper ballots. In
theory, we could adopt hand-counting of all ballots. However, hand
counting is rarely used now. It is politically unrealistic to believe
that the overwhelming number of jurisdictions that have been using
automated voting in various forms for 40 years or more are going to
go back to hand counting. HR 811 does not prevent hand counting
for those communities who want to do it, but it provides a realistic
solution for the rest of us.

Some are troubled by the role of the Federal Elections Assistance
Commission (EAC) under the bill. Like many others, I, too, lack
confidence in the EAC as currently configured. But HR 811 gives only
minimal responsibilities to the EAC. I can live with that if the
other provisions of the bill are enacted.

Finally, election officials have expressed concern over whether the
timeframe of HR 811 is feasible. On the one hand, I want passionately
to avoid potential meltdowns in the 2008 general election, and I am
not convinced that the possibility of simply purchasing optical scan
equipment has been adequately considered by those jurisdictions
currently using paperless electronic voting. On the other hand, it is
obviously necessary to allow adequate time for implementation of the
bill. Congress has heard all sides of this argument, and I am
confident that they will strike the right balance. If the
implementation date needs to be extended, I hope it will be done in a
way to encourage earliest possible elimination of paperless electronic
voting, so that the maximum number of voters will be protected in
2008.

HR 811 will no doubt change as it travels down the long, winding
legislative road. With some luck, the bill will survive with
the key provisions intact, and may even improve.

A good bill that becomes law is better than a great bill that doesn't.
HR 811 will start moving soon. Please ask your U.S. Representative to
support it.

Paper ballot bill passes Maryland House

2007-04-10T07:57:00.000-04:00

I have not seen any press reports about it yet, but according to a source of mine, yesterday, the Maryland House passed an enhanced version of the bill that passed the Maryland Senate last week. The bill requires paper ballots with in-precinct optical scan counting. Some provisions were added addressing disability access. The implementation of audit is left to the board of elections. I have not seen the final bill yet, but if this is all true, then it is a positive step. Now we need some proper audit requirements and for the governor to sign this bill and Maryland will switch from having one of the worst voting systems in the country to having one of the best. The transition to optical scan will happen by the 2010 election. I think it's a shame not to do this by 2008, but on balance, I will take it, considering that without this bill, we'd probably continue using DREs for a long time.

More information on SB392

2007-04-06T19:54:00.000-04:00

I have obtained a copy of Senate Bill 392 which I am told passed the Maryland Senate today. I read through it, and I have mixed feelings. On the one hand, it definitely requires paper ballots and optical scanners by 2010. While I would strongly prefer 2008, at this point, I will take a guarantee that we will have this technology by 2010. However, what troubles me is that the required manual randam audit text has been removed from the original bill. While this new system will have audit capability, it is critical that audits be required and random. Hopefully, this can be fixed after the fact. For now, I still view this development as a minor victory.

Good news from Maryland

2007-04-06T16:58:00.000-04:00

What a sudden turnaround. The Maryland Senate just passed a paper ballot bill. I have heard from several people (including a comment posted on my previous blog entry) and one reporter, but I have not yet tracked down the text of the new bill. What I hear is that it will require paper ballots with optical scan and accessible ballot marking of paper ballots for disabled voters. I also have it on pretty good authority that there will be an effort within the Maryland House to pass the exact same bill.

The Senate bill passed unanymously! This is absolutely thrilling news.

I will post more once I track down the actual bill that passed and have a chance to read it.

What a great day for Maryland.

Disappointment in Maryland

2007-04-02T09:38:00.000-04:00

I'm away with my family in Tennessee for Passover, but I wanted to take a moment to go online and update my readers about Maryland. Unfortunately, once again the state senate did not pass legislation that would have provided for a paper ballot for every voter in the state. I'm not sure why this happened because there seemed to be a uniform support for this bill in the committee when I testified in the senate hearing a few weeks ago. This will set Maryland back in the quest for verifiable and auditable elections. A huge disappointment.

See you in ten

2007-04-01T08:33:00.000-04:00

I have decided to leave computer science and to leave civilization and to go live in the woods. I have been ignoring nature for too long, and I would rather hang out with trees and rivers than with computers. You will no longer be able to reach me by email or fax, but if you put a message in a bottle and drop it off in a mountain river stream, I might get it. Take care everyone. I will return in 10 years and blog about my experience.

Shmoocon

2007-03-23T21:24:00.000-04:00

I gave the keynote address at the Shmoocon Conference in Washington DC this evening. I promised the audience that I would post my slides here on my blog. Click here to download them.