How many Jewish Boys does it take to get a sofabed upstairs?

Moving day.  Finally.  I thought the day would never come.  Managed not to give birth over shabbat so was around to supervise the removal men.

Having promised to give us a heads up [which they didn’t] we find them at our new house, waiting outside impatiently.  You would have thought the sight of a 9 month pregnant woman hoofing it up a hill in 31 degree heat would elicit a little sympathy but no, they announced they had been”waiting for us.”  Why does everyone in this country make you feel like they are doing you a favour, even when they are being paid to work for you? 

So they start unpacking the truck and thankfully we had colour labelled our boxes so we could direct the operation.  Unfortunately they weren’t brilliant at listening, so I had to repeat instructions like a nagging wife.  They also dumped our boxes with a little more force than necessary.  At one point I definitely heard a smash,  I checked and sure enough it was a box of ornaments.  After that I stopped looking.  I decided it was best not to know.  They kept asking me for cold water, even though I explained we had no fridge yet and that some bright spark had dumped boxes directly in front of the kitchen sink.  “Couldn’t you go to the makolet?” they asked me.  “Er, its a 15 minute walk, I’m 9 months pregnant and its a bit hot outside.  So  no, not happening.”  They suggested I send my husband who said not bloody likely…in the end our lovely new ethiopian neighbour came to the rescue.  God bless him.

 What really annoyed me was there were 2 boys bringing stuff in to the house, and another bloke called Chaim in charge of shlepping some of it upsetairs.   Every so often the pile for upstairs would build up and I would ask them to move it so we would have somewhere to put the new stuff.  “Chaim, Chaim – he will sort it out they tell me”.  Er yes, but Chaim is on his phone isn”t he? Or whinging about something.  Or standing around scratching his balls.  Whatever he was doing it wasn’t shlepping.  In fact Chaim was incredibly slow and complained about the heat, lack of cold drinks and then claimed there was no way he could get our sofa bed up the winding staircase, despite it somehow making it down our narrow stairwell in London.  Then the other boys start saying it will never fit and get me to sign a disclaimer that if anything happens to it, then it’s my problem.  As its a fairly robust secondhand sofabed, I wasn’t too bothered, so I wiped the guys sweat off the form and signed it. 

“I have faith in you.” I told them.  “I think you can do it.  Just use your brains.”

It took all 4 of them [2 to shlepp the thing and the other 2 to stand around and watch] but they managed it. 

Watching them engage in the backbreaking task of shlepping our electric sofas and chest of drawers upstairs, [I was quite fascinated by how they use their backs to bear loads] I actually felt a bit sorry for them until it dawned on me that at the end of the day they stop shlepping and go to sleep.  I still have a watermelon that comes with me absolutely everywhere I go.  Can you imagine if men had to have babies? Get over it boys.

The crowning moment was at the end, when the chap in charge of unloading the lorry [looked like one of those dodgy fellows you see on Tel Aviv beach in charge of the outdoor bar tables] asked me to sign a load of forms, and then informed me that I could tip the boys, if I wanted.  This was after I had filled out an evaluation form [in front of them] saying how they had done, with the 2 younger goodlooking ones smiling at me hopefully.  I told them they could have been more careful with our stuff, explaining my entire wordly possesions were in these boxes.  I sent for the husband to explain why we wouldn’t be tipping them, who then wimped out and told them he would send something to their head office.  Well, I suppose he might have done if they hadn’t ripped a hole in our divan and had a better attitude.

Jewish boys just aren’t cut out for manual labour, as the old saying goes.  And people say we built the pyramids.