In the morning...

I can't believe that I haven't updated this blog in over a week.

Alot has happened the past couple of days.
We need to work on the big move.
I need to travel to San Diego to meet with our soon to be head Shliach, Rabbi Fradkin. Here's the story:

You see, Rabbi Fradkin has the policy to not make any Shlichus under him official, until the Shluchim to be actually meet with him in person.
Therefore, we were planning on making a stopover in Diego to meet with the Rabbi, once we would already be on our way to Cabos, Mexico. That makes it cheaper for us and it would be more convenient as well.
Problems began when I realized that there were lots of things in Crown Heights that I couldn't take advantage of before going on Shlichus, because I wasn't officially recognized by Merkos as a Shliach.
Some people give generous donations to new shluchim. They give it only if there is a letter proving your new Shlichus position.
Kehos will give membership and the shluchim's discount only if proven that you're actually a genuine and legitimate Shliach.
Anyways, all this meant that I would have to see Rabbi Fradkin earlier, so that I can have all these Crown Heights issues dealt with before I even head off. It would make everything that much easier.

But little did I know what was in store for me... On Thursday, I wake up to several text messages, wishing me Mazel Tov and good luck on Shlichus etc... I figured that these friends who are sending me the texts just heard the news from some of the other friends whom I've told in person.
But later on, at Shacharis in 770 is when I figured out that it wasn't so simple. You see, there are Lubavich news websites who like having all that competition with the other sites. It makes them feel fuzzy inside and proud, when they can tell everyone that they got the news up the first. The best websites put up the news for the people. They're not slow and inconvinent. I guess it keeps people coming back for more... But never was I on the receiving end of that attitude. Never did I ever have to suffer for their competitiveness. Until Thursday.
Apparently, it was Shturem.net that somehow found out that I was going on Shlichus and then Crownheights.info got ahold of it too (apparently, they both work together).
Shturem.net, without any consent or even permission whatsoever puts up an article about new Shluchim heading out. They even put up some picture of Kovi, Sonia and myself. I don't know where they got it from. It was probably from a personal family blog or something. But without any consideration that Merkos has not yet approved these new Shluchim and publicizing it could jeopardize the upcoming Shlichus, they posted it, happy and content that they had found out the first and the world now knows only because of them...

I found out that it was put online in 770 and I was upset. I specifically hadn't sent in any info about our Shlichus because it wasn't officialized yet. But I still let it go. I don't care what the media writes. I didn't send it in and that was it. It was wrong of them to do that, but they're the media, so what can you do...

I had that attitude until later on in the day, when I began seeing the comments that were coming out of Shturem.net... People apparently had assumed that I had sent in that picture, which had me in some sweater (no hat or jacket) standing next to the wife and child. So they got upset at fact that I publicized a picture of a woman on a Lubavich website, which is borderline Tznius. Their problem was that as a Shliach, I need to have higher standards than this... "How dare I go around publicizing such a picture!!" "I should be ashamed at myself for calling myself Chabad!!" "I'm supposed to be a Neir LehoIr, not Ch"v ...!!!"
These were some of the comments that I read.
This made me extremely upset and prompted me to write Shturem the fiery letter, about how they have the nerve to publicize something that is still private. They are jeopardizing my entire Shlichus for their own gain. So that they can have 100 more people look at their site.
I was furious that our name and charachter had been scrubbed and degraded to be looked down upon like that by the Lubavich world.

Anyways, after a verbally violent phone call that my wife made to crownheights.info and a very nasty email that I sent to Shturem, the pictures were finally changed... But I still got a call from Rabbi Polichenco in Diego asking me if I put it up, because if Fradkin sees it, it may have a negative effect on our being hired by him.
I need to explain to him that I had absolutely no part in it and it was done without any permission whatsoever.

So that's my suffering story, with regard to the media and the horrible powers that they are capable of.

Kudos to Shmais and collive for not publicizing that news. I am going to send them an email thanking them for being responsible and Mentchlich about others feelings...

We'll see.