I’m actually in a pretty motivated mood today, Wilson, but the task for today is to tell you a depressing story. Don’t worry, though, I’m thinking there is a good chance that writing this thing will deflate me enough while to make a pretty good depressing story in the end. So I told you about the border of Israel and the $5,000 lawyer and the phones not working at the Times of Israel. I took a segway to tell you about the AI chatbots from Satan via the Tinder App and my inscrutible Facebook interaction with a woman in Israel. Being a woman in Israel, the impossibility of communicating with Liat actually fits with the motif of the impossibility of entering that country. So let’s get back to that. This probably won’t be as interesting as the grotesque mosaic of Jonathan Bailey’s history with women, but it’s an important link in the chain of these events. This is what I have so far about my interaction with the Hebrew University of Jerusalem.
Yeah, I know you remember everything about me, Wilson, but just for the sake of clarity, remember that my official, concrete reason for coming to Israel is to go to a Hebrew language course of the Hebrew University of Jerusalem’s Rothberg International School. I was originally slated to go to back in October, but the Israeli Consulate of Mexico couldn’t stand the idea of a committed Zionist even entering the country. So I moved the date of the school to 27 February and set off on a long journey from Lisbon to Mount Nebo in Jordan where I would ask God, “what’s it going to be? Will I enter the land?” It’s now mid-March. I am in the capital of the Ammonites, in Jordan, still trying to figure out how to get in, being driven mad by the internet and by women.
I actually have a couple of stories about women that I have run into here that are pretty intense, but I may just have to tell you those offline when we get together for scotch and cigars like we always do, Wilson. Maybe another day. Maybe not. There is just so much to say about these days in the Interzone. That’s where William Burroughs wrote The Naked Lunch. That’s what Amman seems to be for me.
But on to our tale. Of course as soon as I got turned away at the border, I tried to contact the university. The rep from the Hebrew school said they could show my acceptance letter and offer explanation of my situation to the embassy. I already knew the Israeli embassy here in Jordan wasn’t going to help me. I had already gone there and found that they don’t give any visas except short-term visas for Jordanians. Americans don’t need short-term visas. Unless you’re me. I had been deported, so I would need a visa to enter for any length of time. The Embassy website said that the Population and Control Authority in Israel would handle any long-term stays. So a Jordanian would get a short-term visa and enter the country and go there, or an American could just enter without a visa and go there. But I can’t enter without a visa. I’m just too damned Zionist to enter the country, remember?
So I have to enter Israel in order to get permission to enter Israel. Just like I have to be in Israel in order to go to Israel to see Liat. And Shmuel, and Oryana, and whoever else may be left there. Nice place to be, right? The only thing I have at my disposal is the internet, and the internet hates me.
I call the Population and Immigration Authority, and they tell me to use their website while also telling me that their website is basically a non-option because it won’t get me anywhere. Seeing as the digital universe is telling me to chase girls on the other side of the planet via the Tinder app refusing to show me anyone within my search range, and Facebook Messenger is driving me insane by convincing me that an old friend may just be a chatbot, I get the idea to call a lawyer to cut through the red tape, but he wants $5,000 to drop off an application. He does tell me that the university should be helping me anyway.
I’m e-mailing the university, though. I tell the lady a bit more of the story, and she tells me that the student is responsible for getting their own visa. But a while later, the university sends out a mass e-mail saying that the university must process all visas, and they give me a contact e-mail for the university employee that handles this. So this e-mail directly contradicts the Hebrew school rep saying that the university does not handle visas.
I write the visa contact an e-mail. No response. I write the Hebrew school rep another e-mail saying I can’t get in touch with the visa rep. No response. Maybe someone got their feelings hurt. I didn’t say anything like, “you told me the university didn’t help with visas, but the university has to handle the visas!” or anything like that, but I’m guessing such was obvious, and people don’t like to be wrong. And when it comes to the internet, nobody feels like they have an obligation to respond to anything. Or, well, it could be evil AI chatbots intercepting my mails. EVERYTHING happens through the internet. If the internet hates you, Wilson, you’re kinda screwed. Trust me, I know. I can write you the mother of all robot apocalypse Satanic AI chatbot dystopian science fiction horror novels at this point. Of this I have no doubt.
Also in the mass mail from the university was a WhatsApp chatgroup. In that group, I ask one of the moderators for the phone contact for the visa guy. Her name was Gal. I’m a Gal Gadot fan. Maybe Wonder Woman can help me out, right? She does! So I call the number once or twice a day for a week. Nobody answers! It’s like with the Times of Israel. Trust me, Wilson, I am calling during business hours, not during lunch, etc. Then finally, after more than a week, someone finally picks up the phone! But they have no idea who the visa guy is because I had apparently been calling the archaeology department! Wonder Woman had given me the wrong number, Wilson. I guess if you’re going to get Gal to help you out, you need the real thing.
I send another mail to the visa guy. Again, no response. Amazed and frustrated, I decided to call the university’s main number and make a chain of phone referrals and transfers until I can get in touch with this guy. The lady who picked up said I could e-mail. Of course, Wilson! Just send an e-mail! Everybody responds to those! Or maybe it’s that everybody I try to e-mail is named Liat? Ya think?
I told her I had already sent a couple, and also e-mailed the Hebrew school lady, and was not getting responses. She told me she would take care of it. A few days later, a mass e-mail went out from the visa guy telling everybody they were moving offices, but they would get to their e-mails shortly. Okay, so not demons. Not Satanic chatbots controlling the internet. Just an office move. Just unfortunate coincidence. Again, Wilson, the law of probability does not seem to be at play in the life of Jonathan Bailey. Jungian synchrodestiny? Message from God? Test? Trial? You tell me, Wilson. You tell me.
They say that if anyone has an urgent issue, they can send an e-mail with URGENT in the title. So I did. No response for days.
Now at the bottom of the visa guy’s e-mail was his signature block, and that signature block had a phone number! Can you guess what I did, Wilson? Wait for it…I called it twice a day during business hours and not during lunch! Now, can you guess what happened? That’s right, Wilson. No response. I guess there is the explanation that they are moving offices. But for me, it was just a part of the pattern.
Now also about the number, the guy’s phone number in his signature block ended in 24. But Gal the Wonder Woman from the WhatsApp group had given me that same number, but ending in a 42. She had accidentally transposed the last two numbers. That’s why I got the archaeology department previously.
I want to note a scene from a Zack Snyder movie, Sucker Punch. In that movie, a character is lobotomized. The psychiatrists involved are talking about it later. One says to the other that they hate being involved in it, that they don’t support lobotomies. The other replies back, “well, you authorized it.” The first denies the charge, but the second points to his clipboard and says, “there’s your signature right there.” The first looks at her own signature on the paper absolutely flummoxed, with absolutely no memory of signing the authorization at all. She stands confused a moment, and then returns to her work, discounting the signature as one of those mysteries of life. She forgets the event, and goes about her day.
Wilson, the demons have us do things we don’t remember. They influences us in ways we don’t pay attention to. They come at us when we are not looking. The forces of darkness are crafty little bastards. And when we don’t acknowledge their existence, they can do all kinds of things through us.
Finally, I get a response to my previous e-mails. The visa guy finally says something. He says that he has reviewed my situation and thinks I am going to need to go back to the USA and get a lawyer and deal with the consulate in my home country. But I already dealt with the consulate in Mexico, Wilson. The guy at the border when I tried to enter on the bike told me to go back to the USA. I asked him why not just the consulate in Jordan. He said he didn’t think that would work, but I could try anywhere. The girls of Tinder were all from far, far away, tempting me to find a woman from elsehwere. This was looking like a runaround beyond the scope of any naturalistically explainable proportion. Get away from Israel. Far away. That is the message of the pattern I am living, Wilson.
I e-mailed the guy back saying that his e-mail said he has to process the visas. I said I would be glad to change the school date, or get my money back, but before I would take any action on that, I wanted to have a solution on the way forward. I told him that I was like any other American, only that I needed a visa to enter for periods of less than 90 days. The judicial opinion after my deporation told me to apply at the border. I was told at the border to apply through a consulate. The consulate told me to apply through the Population and Immigration Control Authority, and the lawyer told me the university could apply for me, and the university said they have to apply for the students. I then asked him, why is the university willing to apply for other students but not for me? Do you know what his response was, Wilson? No response. That e-mail has not been responded to.
The course started on 27 February. It is now 15 March. I have not heard from the Hebrew University in a week. They have the $3,000 I paid for the course. Do you think I will hear anything from them? Do you think they are just going to keep the money?
Wilson, satanically operated evil AI chatbots controlling the internet might be the most naturalistic and mundane explanation for all of this. Otherwise, we have to go with thedea that demons infest everyone and use them for their purposes like sock puppets that I was preaching last year. Then finally, there is the idea of divine sovereignty. That the law of probability does not apply when God doesn’t want it to. There is the idea of synchronicity. That the universe corresponds to our soul. And there is the merger of these ideas: that God has orchestrated the soul to correspond to the universe, and the universe to correspond to the soul, to tell his story, and when he is telling his story, the law of probability need not apply. The coin can come up heads every time. Or tails every time.
As of today, it looks like the coin is coming up tails every time with the Israel thing. Yeah, angels and demons exist, Wilson. Of that I have no doubt. I have explained this from an intellectual, academic viewpoint elsewhere, and I have had my own personal experiences. And yeah, Satan runs the world, Wilson. Not only does the bible say so, but the news does too. It’s pretty obvious. But normal people everywhere know that any given day is more likely to be a good day than a bad one, and in normal circumstances, the coin is going to come up heads about half the time. So what is the point of what’s going on here with me going to Israel, Wilson?
Let me know when you have had some time to think about it and tell me your opinion. You always give such good advice. As always, I’m glad to have yo as a friend, Wilson. Talk to you soon.