Vladimir (Be'er Sheva, Israel)

Vladimir (Be'er Sheva, Israel)

We came here from the Ukraine, from Sevastopol, 4 years ago. It so happened that we settled in Be'er Sheva. I work at the university as a physicist, a researcher. There is a foundation called the Shapiro Foundation that sponsors scientists from the former Soviet Union. I am not a professor, but I have some publications, so they decided to take me.

Our whole family keeps the mitzvos. My adult daughter is in Tel Aviv, and we have three more. One is in yeshiva in Kfar Chabad. They have huge bearded men there, so there's not much in the way of hanging out with them, they made a person out of him. My son is in 2^nd grade in "Eitz Chaim", my daughter in 1^st grade in "Ra'ananot", in the same system. They even have many children of Rabbis learning there, but my son is the best in his class in virtually all the subjects – good boy!

I could not find a place for myself to learn. I was learning in the evening kollel, but I felt that the learning there was not so effective. The internet seemed more effective to me. Here we have a subject that we are both interested in, and we move forward in a pace that is good for both of us. I still go to the evening kollel, but I find the online studies more interesting. In the beginning it's better to learn that which interests you. This encourages motivation to learn. We are learning Pirkei Avos with Kehati's commentary, this is what I am interested in. And in the kollel they learn Shulchan Aruch with commentaries, the laws of "Nidah", what size a stain has to be. This is important, of course, but not very motivating…

Everything has two sides – as we see, this is true for the internet as well…