TABC Graduate, Israeli soldier, certified federal park ranger, noted singer of such tunes as the Jellyfish song and “Don’t Put Your Things on the Heater”, first person to kayak from Spain to Cyprus: Mr. Dov Neimand. Affectionately known as Kayak Dov, Mr. Neimand was perhaps the most interesting TABC faculty member for the duration of his six-month tenure back in 2016.
Until now, students interested in his life had to suffice with the few stories Mr. Niemand told in class and the Youtube videos he’s posted. None have read his full book-form account of his journey, If Things Go Right, which is awaiting publishing. None, at least, until me.
So what, you may ask, does it contain? My dear fellow students, buckle your seatbelts.
Mr. Neimand, in the distant past of around ten years ago, embarked on a journey of epic proportions. He decided to become the first ever kayaker to make the thousands-mile journey from Barcelona to Israel by boat.
If Things Go Right covers the first portion of the trip, as well as Mr. Neimand’s training on the Hudson River. Asked to explain why he embarked on this journey, Mr. Neimand said, “It’s such a beautiful world, and one of the best ways to see it is from the cockpit of a kayak.”
Mr. Neimand set out from Barcelona after a long wait for his gear to arrive. Once on the water, he battled wind, cruel Europeans who wouldn’t let him sleep in their marinas, hunger, cruel Europeans who wouldn’t let him sleep in their marinas, the difficulty of making Shabbos arrangements while kayaking a thousand miles, and cruel Europeans who wouldn’t let him sleep in their marinas. (Some Europeans were kind, but they were the minority. The fishermen especially seemed out to get Mr. Neimand wherever he went.)
In one chapter, Mr. Neimand, not wanting to overstay his welcome in a marina but unable to paddle on until his defective hatch was replaced, decided to accept the offer of hospitality from a friend’s host. This host lived in another town, and seeing that the necessary bus transfers would require more than one full day, Mr. Neimand decided to walk the twenty-two miles.
After memorizing parts of a map, he set out, walking, hitchhiking, then walking again, until finally ending up in a swamp. Like almost everything else he brought, the dry bag holding his electronics malfunctioned, and his computer and phone were swamped.
Now chafing and wet, Mr. Neimand finally found a hotel, only to be told that it was closed. A group of Arab men brought him to four more hotels, but all four were also closed. One of the men then said that Mr. Neimand could sleep for the night at the bar that he owned, but a bartender turned him out onto the street.
Finally reaching the town at 3:00 AM, Mr. Neimand had no idea where the house was, and so he lay down in a ditch by a highway. At 5:00 AM, he woke up, frost spreading around him, immobilizing him in his light sleeping bag for another two hours. Finally, as the day began, he found his host. This was merely one of a long series of escapades which occupied our hero, but to write about them all would require a textbook, not an article.
I asked Mr. Neimand about his interactions with the locals, and he said that his most frustrating interactions were with Chabad Rabbis at whose houses he stayed for Shabbos. Mr. Neimand told me that many (though by no means all) of them treated him as if he “were in the way” after it became clear that he would not become a Chabad devotee.
Mr. Neimand eventually made his way from Spain to France and then Italy, where his journey was finally sunk (at least for the season) by virtue of a cracked GPS. This was after his having survived a broken paddle, malfunctioning hatches, a missing kayak, and getting lost in a foreign countries multiple times. Mr. Neimand ends the book with a commitment to return and complete his journey.
I asked him whether that commitment materialized in the end.
“I learned I didn’t need to make it to Israel,” Mr. Neimand told me, explaining that even though he cut the second leg short at Cyprus, he had had fun, saw the world, and was still very proud.
A word about Cyprus: in the Turkish Republic of Northern Cyprus, Mr. Neimand was arrested in the middle of the night by Turkish police and held for a few days. He was released from jail after explaining that his last name was not Jewish but German; his Israeli passport, meanwhile, had gone miraculously undiscovered.
If Things Go Right is, as the phrase goes, not about the destination, but about the journey. The plot does not build in suspense; the intense enjoyment I derived in reading it came from the anecdotes, incessant in their pacing and uproarious in their content. Frequent motifs -- fishing, Shabbat, Mr. Neimand’s interaction with other people -- serve as the basis for most of these stories, building a picture of the man behind the kayak.
Mr. Neimand has an amazing spirit of adventure, and the kind of belief that proves the saying ‘hope springs eternal’. This is coupled with a sense of cynicism so keen that it falls upon the paragraphs of the book as ubiquitously as does rain on a field.
The result of these qualities is that Mr. Neimand is a remarkably gifted writer. His personal voice, which not long ago echoed in the hallowed halls of TABC, truly shines forth in If Things Go Right.
Another appealing feature of the book is the editorial footnotes, which are the work of Mr. Neimand’s older brother. They good-naturedly mock Mr. Neimand from the perspective of a normal person (the kind who wouldn’t kayak alone for thousands of miles in foreign territory).
Overall, I found the book to be an entertaining read, if somewhat disorganized. If Things Go Right is not a novel but rather an expanded diary; judged by this standard, it succeeds with flying colors. The book sets up Mr. Neimand as an empathetic character on whose behalf we feel emotional joy and pain, while simultaneously allowing us to laugh at him for his occasional slips of the mind and unconventional reactions to situations.
Nowadays, Mr. Neimand is pursuing a doctorate in Computer Engineering at Stevens Institute of Technology in Hoboken as well as teaching kayaking in the local area (he is rated in the top 2% of kayakers by the American Canoe Association).
And as for TABC?
“I don’t think I’m coming back,” Mr. Neimand said, although he spoke of his great respect for Rabbi Adler.
Mr. Neimand is still fondly remembered by many students, including myself. His exhortations to his classes not to crash spaceships, and the persistence he showed in teaching engineering, have left an indelible mark on all of our minds. Mr. Neimand, if you’re reading this, V=IR.
“Everything I know about coding is because of what he taught me,” said Junior Eitan Leitner.
Junior David Reese added, “I credit him completely for inspiring me in Engineering.” With a revitalized STEM program this year, perhaps Mr. Neimand’s educational legacy will be perpetuated.
And Mr. Neimand, veteran of the Mediterranean and the IDF and soon-to-be (IY”H) Dr. Neimand, will keep on paddling toward the bright future that awaits him in any port of call.
(Mr. Neimand’s books are forthcoming, but his website is Kayakdov.org)