A Christmas Tale

It's wet and miserable today. Can't complain, we need the rain desperately. I decided I need to use my car less so I took the bus into work this morning, intending to walk home. As I left work the heavens opened and the rain poured down. After a soaking twenty minutes I was at the train station when I decided, enough! I stopped at a 029 bus stop and waited. It was wet and dreary, the wind was howling and the rain pelting down. I was hunched up in under my umbrella thinking wet and wild thoughts when the bus finally pulled up.

I've watched the buses pass this stop during my morning and evening walks. It's usually completely empty as this is near the beginning of the line. Tonight as the bus pulled up, it looked full, and many huddled bodies were silhouetted against the steamed up windows. I was happy to escape the weather, so I jumped on, paid my 4.90NIS and pushed into the bus. What a sight. I had stepped into another world. Every seat was filled with beautifully dressed women, decked out in what must be traditional Filipino holiday wear. The aisles were packed with men. All squeaky clean, dressed in their Sunday finest. They were chattering excitedly, some with small children on their laps. As I made my way through the bus everyone smiled at my drowned rat look and shifted up to allow me a place to stand.

The bus crawled through the jam-packed rain drenched traffic. The rain always brings out the worst in the never pleasant Israeli traffic and we hardly moved. I had plenty of time to get used to my spot. Once I had settled in, the guy standing next to me, dressed in a dark suit, pink shirt and white tie, shyly told me they were all off to church. He pointed out his wife, a beautiful woman, dressed in a bright purple sari-like wrap holding his young son, who looked like a tiny waiter in a high class restaurant. They had all boarded the bus in Nof Yam where they live. I assume they work for the rich of Herzliya Pituach. They left the bus en masse in downtown Herzliya, their church is in one of the buildings near the old mall. The few remaining passengers and I continues our journey in muted silence, the color and joy was gone.

I miss Christmas. There is no hint of it here. Nothing. I miss watching the rush and panic to buy presents. I miss the cold weather and how everything slows down on Christmas eve. I love that its not my holiday. There is so much to look at. I could watch from a distance how people struggle to deal with the oddities of their visiting families and sympathize with their having to travel during the worst of the weather and prices. But here, there is no Christmas. Hanukkah, has candle lighting and latkes (our's rocked last night) but that's it. So no presents, no Christmas cookies, no annoying music in every store, no poinsettias, no outrageous light-decorated houses, no funny red hats and green and red sweaters. But we do have Filipinos dressed to the nines on the 29 bus. Merry Christmas to you all.