Honesty Policy

September 6, 2007 - 3:00 PM by Stephanie

Who among immigrants and longstanding residents of Israel can’t identify with the feeling of frustration that comes with this scenario:

Paperwork collected into a neat dossier, you make your way to the Interior Ministry in the thick of the summer heat. Doesn’t matter what your intended project is. Choose from a long list.

Once there, you stand in the security line, go through the metal detectors 3 times – “it’s the belt I tell you!” – and take a number. And wait. And wait. And wait some more.

The person sitting next to you may have had onions for breakfast. Or may have forgotten to apply deodorant. Or shower. For a month.

Or instead of sitting you’re standing alongside the hordes of Philippine newcomers and African transplants gathered at the VISA department window clamoring for the guy behind the counter to give you a number or tell you where to go.

After at least an hour of idle waiting it’s FINALLY Your Turn! to see a clerk. Who, after glancing your paperwork for a nano-second, duly points out: “You’re missing a hair specimen from your grandmother on your father’s side. Come back tomorrow.”

“WHAT?” you exclaim. “But I brought a fingernail sample! That’s what they told me to bring!”

“Nope. NEXT!”

You shout or cry or scream obscenities and threaten to leave the country because why should you put up with this anyhow?

But you eventually slink away and show up again at a later date with the necessary strand of hair.

Just another bureaucratic day in Israel.

Apparently, the prime minister has also had to bring a hair sample. By the looks of it, his own.

Because when a group of new immigrants arrived to the country a few days ago, he greeted them with the truth: “…it’s not an easy country to live in as it has security problems in addition to bureaucratic problems.”

Ya think?

Hesder Oleh blogs about the “new way of selling Israel” – the bureaucracy via the truth – here. Vive la…oh heck, i dunno. Certainly not the bureaucracy.

Share with others