STRIKE!

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I knew it was going to happen, the moment I set off for Israel. It has to happen in a socialistic country that does not have an oppressive government. In the Holy Land, they happen like clockwork. It�s still strange when it occurs.

I�m at Ulpan, actually, I�m in the middle of the break, when the teacher walks over and says, �OK, they called a strike you can all go home.� It was just that nonchalant. People can get shot during strikes back home. People were not smiling when they said that, "Oh that�s right, UPS is on Strike," unless is was to benefit them.

Here, like it is generally in the states, we knew there would be a strike. This was an all encompassing strike, and that included the teachers. We didn�t think it would include the ulpan teachers, but we had considered it. So, when the teacher dropped the news, we realized that we�d have to work. We returned to the kibbutz, and I swept the roof of the spice factory. That was the entire extant of the strike to us on the Kibbutz. During a strike, we work. Slight irony.

Still, the ramifications are scary. The postal service was closed, so we couldn�t write out of the country. El Al was on strike, so we couldn�t fly out of the country, and Bezeq was on strike, so we couldn�t call out of the country. The buses were shut down so it was even hard to move around the country. I�m not normally claustrophobic, but I really don�t like to feel trapped. This was quite a bit unnerving.

I understand why the strikes exist. Everybody wants to show that their job is not one of the useless ones. It is getting out of hand, though. Seniors went on strike. No, not senior citizens, I mean twelfth graders. And it�s not because their teachers aren�t paid enough. It�s because they aren�t going on enough field trips. I�m dead serious. This is a legitimate strike, the picket lines are not being crossed. I wonder who the scabs are though.

Seriously. This is the problem with socialism. Everybody get paid in a relatively equal fashion, so without fortune, we seek fame. X has to therefore prove that you cannot survive without him. I have no problem with that. My problem is that they have become so commonplace, that it has turned into a joke, or at the least, a mere annoyance.

It�s like a filibuster in Congress. It used to be, when it was still a halfway original idea, that it would terrify the politicians that an opposition speaker would read the phone book, or sing �A Million Bottles of Beer on the Wall,� causing the time needed for the vote to expire, and in the process, disrupting the political process. Now, somebody says the word filibuster, and our representatives go out for drinks, and come back the next day. They know what�ll happen; so the effectiveness is lost. Same as in this case. Ideally, it should screw over the population when a central facility closes, but it is so common here, that nobody cares. Why scream �Hell no, we won�t go!� if nobody�s telling you to go?

It was declared a failure. I agree, but I think it was best put in a political cartoon I saw in the JP. There�s a guy holding a banner that reads, �STRIKE!� but half of the banner is on the ground, because no one else feels it necessary to help support it.

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Get me outa here!!!

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Michael Kadish
�People here are trying to take three day weekends. 40 percent of all �sick days� are on Monday and Friday.� -- Dilbert
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