Sometimes

Living in Israel, sometimes I find myself in a situation where I just have to laugh, be amazed and be thankful all at once. Other people refer to these moments by the phrase, "Only in Israel", which although I don't like to use myself, is one I really do understand.

One such moment happened to me yesterday. Normally I cycle to and from university, but as I had participated in a ceremony to mark Yom HaShoah, I was dressed in smart clothes yesterday and had taken the bus instead. As I walked home from the bus stop, I took a quick glance at where my bicycle was in the morning. I looked away and then did a double-take; my bike was no longer there. I looked again, more intently this time, and told myself that maybe I had left it somewhere else. I had just bought a hefty, thick new lock and was convinced that there was no way someone could have stolen my wheels. Certainly not during daylight hours, anyway.

Coming closer, I saw another bike, about a meter away from where mine had been, but leaning awkwardly against a post that had not been there in the morning. See the pictures below...





And then I realised what had happened. The parking meter to which I locked my bike every day had, for reasons unknown, been deemed unfit for purposes by the authorities. A new pole had been erected a bit closer to the street and the meter itself lifted from the old pole and attached to the new one. Now this is the part that fills me with pride at my country. Instead of leaving my bike attached to a pole or leaving it on the street so that anybody could have stolen it, the workers evidently lifted it up over the old pole, put it over the new one and then attached the meter, thus keeping my bike safely locked up.

I don't want to slur other countries or say this for certain, but I highly doubt that this would have happened to me if I still lived in England. Sometimes, as I said, life in Israel throws up a situations where I just have to laugh, be amazed and be thankful all at once. I love it :)