When a Mother of 6 Got Onto the Crowded Bus
We Weisbergs are ALWAYS home for Shabbat. Except this week. This Shabbat we Weisbergs are scattered across the globe, in Venice, in a cottage in the Ontario wilderness, in Tel Aviv…
And me? I’m on my way to spend a quiet Shabbat with my 8-year-old Yoni by the Kinneret in Tiberias.
I thought Shabbat in Tiberias was an original idea, but judging from this bus crowded with vacationers, I see many others had the same idea.
The bus filled up in Jerusalem and right outside of Jerusalem a mother got onto the bus by herself with 6 young children, among them a baby girl awkwardly held under her arm in a car seat.
And then, seeing the mother, the entire bus swooped into action.
A sem girl with an open space next to her motioned for the mother to put the baby down by her, and played with her until she fell into a deep slumber.
A young father took her suitcases and put them up on the baggage rack.
And the other bus passengers reshuffled themselves so Eema could sit next to her toddler son and all her kids had a comfortable place to sit.
I was reminded of my most recent trip from Baltimore to the Newark Airport, on my way back to Israel from visiting my Dad.
I brought a heavy suitcase onto the train, which I needed to maneuver onto the top of another suitcase in the baggage niche. I was struggling with it for maybe 5 minutes, and none of the younger, stronger passengers who saw me offered to help.
It’s possible, I thought, that my fellow passengers had good intentions. Maybe they thought I would be insulted if they helped out, that I was trying to be an independent, strong woman who could manage all on my own.
But whatever the reason they didnt help, I am grateful to live in a country where people help one another. Naturally. Like family.
Actually, strike that like. We help each other because we are family.
Shabbat Shalom!
Beautiful, B’H!
This story encapsulates the reason anyone would want to live in Eretz Yisroel. I forwarded it to a friend of mine that just doesn’t get it why anyone would choose to give up their luxurious life in chutz laeretz to live in cramped quarters, struggling to make ends meet. But this camaraderie that is clearly seen in this beautiful story, exists no where else in the world. There’s no place quite like Eretz Yisroel! ❤
I totally agree!!
beautiful! Mi kamcha yisrael
when we made aliyah, I was visibly expecting and got on a very crowded bus. At least 10 passengers (many of them charedi men) got up and asked me to please take their seat. Coming from NY where most passengers keep their distance and ignore each other, it was very touching.