The Dan Accadia, Room 4
W The cast: Eitan ?(24.5?) and Yamit ?(29?). Married two days earlier, spending a weekend in the hotel ?("A present from my sister" − Eitan?).
W The hotel: Dan Accadia, Herzliya, the lower wing, ground floor, dual-use suite ?(sleeping, hosting?) with a double bed ?("ctually two beds pushed together", a living room with a coffee table, two television sets ?(flat screen?) and a mini-bar ?("NIS 17 for grapefruit juice" The first section contains a well-equipped, all-marble bathtub ?(beige?). The door in the back section opens out to a small porch, grass and sunbeds. It?s hard to see the ocean, but its presence can definitely be felt behind the bushes. Back to the sleeping section. On the table is a pack of Marlboro Lites and a Diet Coke; on the dresser is a laptop and on the bed are wedding remains.
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W Wedding remains: A bridal gown and a box laden with checks and bills. Close by is a guitar, on which Eitan played ?For my wife,? a song he wrote for the wedding.
W The wedding: Two stages. The first, two weeks earlier, took place in the synagogue of Mazkeret Batya, near Rehovot, with a rabbi and close family; the second at the Zuk Palmahim banquet hall with 300 guests, the huppah and breaking of the glass, hosted by the singer and actor Dan Toren ?"$600)− we found him on the Internet??).
W Bachelor parties: Eitan had two. One at home, with "barbecue and alcohol," the other in a winery, a day-long affair ?("The guys from Rehovot rented a minibus").
W Bachelorette parties: At Star Bar in Tel Aviv with girlfriends and karaoke until 2 in the morning.
W Heart-stopper: Two days before the second event, the banquet tent company canceled due to "fear of showers." Eitan: "For the past seven years it didn?t rain on May 10 − I checked." In the end, he drew up a list ?("using Excel"?) of 77 companies that supply canopies and tents, and with the help of six friends manning the phones found someone who was available ?("These days, everyone is booked half a year in advance"?).
W Bridal gown: The rental cost NIS 6,500 ?(for one evening?). Eitan wore "white trousers and a light-colored shirt" ?(NIS 1,000?).
W Wedding song: "Can't Help Falling in Love" ?(originally by Elvis?), performed by Israeli rocker Berry Sacharof ?("Terrific").
W Financing: The parents ?(NIS 200 per guest?).
W Gifts: All checks, apart from two books ?(Plato, and Israeli poet Natan Alterman?) and a lock ?(someone from India?). The checks did not cover expenses, they say ?(?But we?re not upset about it??).
W Tomorrow morning: They will pack and fly to Rome. In Italy they will rent a car and spend 10 days in Tuscany and at Club Med ?("At the tip of the heel"?).
W Livelihoods and occupations: Yamit − "At the moment, nothing." Immediately after the honeymoon she plans to start her own business, selling designer items in private homes ?("Such as our home, for example"?).
W Eitan?s livelihood: Computer programmer, independent sub-contractor with Intel and another firm, where he maintains hardware and writes code ?("for the payroll system"?), and also oversees the Internet site of a third company. In the evenings, at home, he is developing a business of his own ?("It's a secret; I have a strategic partner"?). He works a five-day week ?(7 A.M. until midnight?) and believes that by the end of next year he will be a millionaire.
W Yamit's bio: Born 1978 in Rishon Letzion, lived in Kochav Yair from the age of 14. Her father ?(a civil servant?) immigrated to Israel from Yugoslavia in 1948; her mother ?(a civil servant?) came from Uruguay at the age of 14. Yamit attended elementary school in her home town and high school in Kfar Sava. She was a sharpshooting instructor in the army.
W Sharpshooting: It has to do, she says, with breathing, concentration, stability and a gentle squeeze of the trigger ?("I was among the best"?).
W Event during service: She was tried for "making out in public" after being caught ?(with her boyfriend?) on the grass by the base commander, and was sentenced to remaining on the base for Shabbat ?("He got too close to me"?).
W Bio ?(cont.?): After the army, Yamit worked for a catering service in Herzliya for a year ?(?I was champion of the crepes??), saved up money, traveled to the Far East ?(India, Nepal?), picked apples in Australia, wasted NIS 25,000 in half a year, returned to Israel, went to Milan in the wake of love ?("The guy told me he had to say something to me face-to-face"?), came back depressed ?(three months?), worked as a waitress, then worked in a girlfriend's kiosk, began studying aerobic exercise at the Wingate Institute, worked in another cafe, moved in with a boyfriend, and left him in the spring of 2005, when she met Eitan.
W Eitan?s bio: Born in Santa Barbara, California, 1982 ?(?I was a ?mistake,? actually??), where his father, who was a scientist at the Weizmann Institute in Rehovot ?(nuclear physics?) and a former Prisoner of Zion in the Soviet Union ?(for two years?) before being allowed to immigrate to Israel in 1973, was spending a sabbatical. His mother, from Lithuania, was and remains an artist ?(?something Impressionist??). His godfather, he says, was Prof. Walter Kohn, who would afterward ?(1998?) be awarded the Nobel Prize in chemistry. Eitan was two weeks old when he arrived in Rehovot, where he attended elementary and high school, started smoking at 13 and fiddling with computers from third grade. He left home in the middle of 12th grade ?("a door-slamming scene"?) and moved into a rented apartment.
W Rented apartment: He lived with Thomas, a German, and made a living constructing Internet sites ?("I've been doing that since I was 16"?). With his earnings he bought three things: a mobile phone, a set of tools and a CD of the Israeli singer Meir Ariel. At the same time he did his matriculation, but before his army service he was caught smoking something illegal.
W Reformed: He was sent to clean up his act through the framework of Al-Sam, the anti-drug organization, where he met ?("for the first time??) someone he could talk to ?("It was the best thing that happened to me"?) and became, he says, a mentsch.
W The result: He was drafted in 2000, served in intelligence ?("in the best unit there is"?), dealt with programming, became a team leader ?("a tremendous achievement?"), and afterward went to work for a startup ?(Envara?), which members of the unit established. The company was eventually bought by Intel, and he, as an employee, received NIS 50,000.
W Afterward: After retaking his matriculation exams in order to improve his grades, he also improved himself at the Homnication Personal Development Center in Petah Tikva ?("I did workshops in 'Essence' and 'Source'"?), understood that he had dreams to realize, went to India, drove around in a Suzuki Omni, contracted intestinal typhus, spent two weeks in a Tibetan hospital ?("terrific staff"?) without telling his parents, recovered, went to meet an "enlightened person," was not impressed by him, did Vipassana meditation in Dharamsala ?(10 days?), learned that silence is a tool for understanding that everything is transient ?("pain, too"?), flew to Hong Kong and then to Buenos Aires, where he studied Spanish and guitar, and visited Chile before returning to Israel.
W Return to Israel: In April 2005, he enrolled in the "Transition" workshop at Homnication, and there he suddenly saw Yamit in the corridor.
W The meeting: She was working as an office manager ?(?executive secretary??) and was ?really gorgeous?; he had a beard and wore a colorful shirt. Zamir ?(a young woman in the workshop?) introduced them. Eitan: "I thought she was really hot.? Yamit says she fell in love instantly "with the smile and the beard." At first he had a hard time with her being four and a half years older, and having a boyfriend, too, but he got over it ?("I was simply drawn to her"). Afterward, by pure chance, the two of them took the same workshop ?("Dialogics"?) and by chance traveled together to the Central Bus Station in Petah Tikva, where he heard from her for the first time that it was wrong to keep things bottled up, such as "things like love." On that occasion he did not try to understand the practical significance of what she had said ?("Because she has a boyfriend and I am a good guy. Up to a point"?), but invited her ?("and her boyfriend") to a party for Lag Ba?omer ?(a Jewish holiday that takes place in spring and during which bonfires are traditionally lit?).
W Lag Ba?omer: She came alone. They sat next to each other the whole evening, and you could have cut the air with a knife, they recall. Here, Eitan says, something happened that changed their lives.
W What happened: "Our legs touched in what was a seemingly minor way, but the whole of Reading [the power plant at the Tel Aviv port] passed between us." The next day she broke up with her boyfriend. They became an item, involved in a relationship that later underwent a big crisis.
W Big crisis: After three months ?(they were living together in Tel Aviv?s Yememnite Quarter), she threw him out ?("the 'ex' pressed hard"?) and he decided to find "the love of his life" elsewhere. During this period he saw her every day at Homnication ?(where he now had a job?), but nothing happened. One day, she invited him over and he went ?("I knew we would sleep together"?). He stayed for a month, until she suggested that he come back to her altogether, to which he set a condition.
W The condition: "Only if you are ready to walk the trails of life with me." The next day she gave him heraffirmative reply, after agonizing over the question ?(Eitan: "I have hair on my back".)
W Children: Eitan − seven; Yamit − four, tops.
W Settling down: In a moshav, a cooperative farming village ?("Something close to Kfar Sava?").
W Educational orientation: "Regular. We won?t send them to any 'stream.'"
W Television: "We don?t and won?t have one."
W Political orientation: Yamit − not into it; Eitan − Bibi Netanyahu.
W Romance: "Rubbing soles in bed" − Eitan; "when the whole body touches" ?(Yamit?).
W Quarrels and making up: "Anyone who grasps that good intentions are the basis of the other side, doesn't quarrel" − Eitan.
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