Hungary's "Customer Service"

Well, I found out today that we will not get Internet service at home anytime soon. This despite having ordered it a month ago. Despite going through an agent who told Peter we would have it within a week. Despite having a contact within the company try to push it along for us. Technically, they still have a few days because according to the agreement Peter signed, they only guarantee that the services will be up and running within 30 days. 30 DAYS!?!? For Internet hookup? And I thought SBC was bad. Peter explains to me that the reason for this abominable service is that Magyar Telekom (the Hungarian phone company - owned by Deutsche Telecom - that supplies DSL - our apartment building doesn't support cable Internet) is a monopoly and therefore has no incentive to actually serve customers' needs. I guess that makes sense. But it seems so short sighted to me. Because at some point there will be a competitor. And then Magyar Telekom is going to hear what Ross Perot so elegantly termed, "That giant sucking sound." And the sound will be its customers running to the new kid on the block because anything has got to be better than these monopolistic crooks!

I'M A JEW MAGNET
Everywhere I go I manage to meet traveling Jews, usually much older than myself, usually from New York. This last trip was no exception. I met the Wassermans in the airport in Milan only minutes before boarding out flight. We got to chatting and, perhaps because it was so obvious that they were Jewish (the accents were dead giveaways), it came out that I am Jewish, too (though they were incredulous. "You have the face of a shiksa dika," they said in unison. I had never heard this "dika" phrase before but I got their meaning). No sooner did they learn of my Jewish heritage than did they start to probe into my private life, primarily, I presume, to determine if I was married and if so, was he Jewish. The answer was no on both counts, much to the Wassermans' dismay.

What is it about Jews that makes us think that when we meet another Jew all the normal boundaries that exist (and should exist!) between strangers are dissolved? I wonder what made the Wassermans think it was okay to tell me to "get rid of the Hungarian boyfriend" - that is a quote - so that I could meet a nice Jewish man and get married and start having little Jewish children? Not only that, Mr. Wasserman told me that he has extra clout with "the man upstairs" (his wife later explained that this extra clout comes from his giving loads of cash to Jewish causes. I refrained from telling them that I didn't think the Jewish God was one that could be so easily bought off) and will say a blessing for me that he is sure will be heard. And the blessing will be this: that I meet a nice Jewish man and develop a serious relationship within the next 18 months, one that leads to marriage. And, as a bonus, he is going to ask that I be blessed with twin boys. I suppose so that I can make up for lost child-rearing time, since his plan won't have me married and pregnant until I am at least 35.

Why do Jews have to be like this? Are Catholics like this, too? Other Christians? For some reason, I just don't think so. Yes, there are busybodies everywhere, Jews don't have the monopoly on that (though we did invent the word Yenta). But is it distinctly Jewish to pressure strangers to choose a partner on the basis of faith/cultural heritage alone? I know many Muslims are like this, as I have watched Gigi navigate that community's intense pressures regarding relationships. So is this one more way in which Muslims and Jews are more alike than we are dissimilar? I remember at Tara and Scott's wedding, back when I was dating Adam, and one of their wedding guests and I got to chatting about relationships, etc. I said something about my boyfriend not being Jewish and this woman - this complete stranger! - said, "You can't do that. If you don't marry a Jew you are committing an act as bad as the Holocaust itself." For real? Who are these people?