The date of the mouse course was approaching and I still had no idea
where it was being held. I figured it was someplace in Ein Kerem but
that's like giving someone directions to your apartment and telling
them what apartment complex you live in but not the building or
apartment number. Are they supposed to knock on every door in the
place in order to drop off your sweater? No, they're going to leave
your sweater hanging from one of the bushes in the parking lot.
They're not going to look too hard for you.
So I asked the woman I work with if she knew where it was. She had no
idea so she tried calling the number given to her by the vets' office
in the animal unit, which was for the woman in charge of all the
animal courses. No answer. So she gave me the number to try later. I
had her email address as well from the form I filled in and emailed
to her, so I sent her an email asking her where the course on July
20th was being held, since I will always choose the method
of communication which involves the least amount of actual
communication with the person. She responded that because of all the
emails she was getting she wasn't sure which course I was talking
about. So I sent her another email with additional details to which
she never responded. I sent her a slightly more urgent one a few days
later, to which she still did not respond. I decided that the
situation was dire enough to warrant a phone call, which she did not
answer multiple times. I even left messages for this woman, but she
was obviously on vacation, either literally or figuratively. (If
you're asking how someone can figuratively be on vacation, just take
a glance at the postal workers in the post office next time you pass
by. If at least 2 of them aren't on their phones, chatting with
friends that dropped in to show off their babies, or reading the
paper with a cup of coffee in hand, then I want to know where you
live so I can go to your post office).
When the day of the course finally rolled around, I still had no idea
where it was. My plan was to get there early and wander the halls
until I ran into someone that knew something. Not the greatest plan,
but the only one I could come up with. I started with the animal unit
on the 7th floor. There was no one else congregated there but
since I was 20 minutes or so early, I figured maybe I was just the
first one there (as unlikely as that sounded to myself). When I
walked into the first office I saw, I found everyone in the middle of
a meeting, staring at me. I backed out slowly and decided to go down
to the second floor where I work and ask the secretary if maybe she
had any idea where the course was usually held. She didn't know but
she tried to call a few people who either didn't know or didn't
answer the phone. So I thanked her and went back up to the 7th
floor.
It was 2 minutes before the course was supposed to start and all I
found was another woman wandering around looking just as lost and
confused as me. However, she knew the way to the vets' office through
the double doors on the left after the elevator, at the end of the
hall, through another short hallway, at the back of the large room
where they appear to wash large things, and then in the office to the
right. I'm sure I would have found it by myself eventually (like in a
month or so). Now that I think about it, maybe it's not that Israelis
are bad at giving directions, maybe it's just that it's so
complicated to get anywhere that directions are just too confusing to
give. You will inevitably forget a hallway or a right turn somewhere.
We found some dude standing in the office sipping coffee but he knew
where the course was. Turns out it was on the ground floor (floor -2)
in the first room before the library. Incidentally, that happens to
be a few meters away from the entrance to the building, where I had
entered half an hour before.
When we finally got there 15 minutes after it had started, the woman
giving the course turned to us and said “you're late.” I spent
the rest of the course glaring at her. It was a 2 part course, one a
lecture given in broken English (because of all the foreigners
working at the labs there) about not losing the mice or smuggling
them out of the animal unit in your pockets, etc. The second part was
a tour of the animal unit most of us had already been working in
“unofficially.” This is where we learned what we were actually
supposed to be doing in there. Turns out the process of importing
office supplies is more complicated then just giving 'em a shake and
wiping them off with your shirt first. It's a sterile unit, meaning
entry necessitates the use of lab coats, gloves, booties, and
sandwich baggies for phones. Sneezing on mice is frowned upon and
pens must be properly irradiated and heated before being allowed in.
Obviously, this requires filling out many forms specifying exactly
what you need sterilized, and the items are left in a large box at
the entrance. You will probably get the stuff you need a week or so
later (or not), assuming they can match the right forms to the right
items. This is clearly a more efficient system than just having a
bunch of pre-sterilized supplies already in there.
At the end of the tour, we were supposed to get palm printed. In
order to prevent people without the proper security clearance from
making off with all the mice in the dead of night, they give you a
personal ethics code plus take your palm print (fingerprints are
obviously not secure enough for a department full of mice), which you
need in order to enter the unit. Unless someone happens to open the
door while you're standing there, but hey, every system has its flaw.
They asked someone to volunteer to go first and since no one else
moved, I volunteered. When they didn't find me in the system, I just
sighed in resignation. They told me that I obviously hadn't been
entered into the system yet and didn't have a temporary ethics number
but that they'd hurry the process along so I could get printed as
soon as possible.
A few
days later, the woman who is in charge of both the temporary ethics
numbers and all the animal courses (whom I'd sent the filled out form
to and whom I'd been stalking for a week to find out where the course
was being given), and who is obviously very good at her job, got back
to me about the matter. Apparently the form requesting a
temporary ethics number had not been adequately filled out and she
was obviously too busy to get back to me about at at any point in the
month between when I filled it out and the day of the course.
She was probably too busy mumbling to herself and bumping into things
while roaming the halls where she “works.” The confusion seemed
to lie in the section where you mark off your status at the
university. Since I am both a student and a lab worker, I had to
choose one of these options. I chose the wrong one. I was thus doomed
to live my life as a leper and an outcast from the system.
Once that minor matter was cleared up (a month and a half after
having checked the wrong box), I got a temporary ethics number and
was finally able to get my palm printed. I found my way back to the
vets' office (back through the double doors on the left after the
elevator, at the end of the hall, through another short hallway, at
the back of the large room where they appear to wash large things,
and then in the office to the right) by some beacon of desperation.
Of course there was no one in the office when I got there. Just 3
empty desks. I think it should be allowed to loot office supplies
when people are inexplicably not at their desks (especially if there
are more than 2 people who are supposed to be working in the office).
Just like it should be allowed for the light rail drivers to run over
anyone not smart enough to get off the tracks when the train honks at
them. That right there should be an entrance exam into the gene pool.
Luckily there was someone in the office next door. I went to her and
asked if there was anyone at all around who could take my prints. She
confirmed that I had taken the animal unit course and then looked me
up in the computer. She couldn't find me in the system (surprise!) so
she made a phone call to yell at the person who was supposed to have
entered me into the excel spreadsheet 2 weeks ago. She took me to
this person's office where she rifled through the papers on the desk
until she found the appropriate handwritten list. Then we went back
to the vets' office where the computer went down for a few minutes,
and finally printed me when it came back online.
She assured me that I should be able to get into the animal unit from
that moment on and I immediately went to test it (excuse me for being
skeptical at this point). I was in! I cried a bit out of happiness
and relief and then went to throw myself a celebratory party at the
bar down the street with the mice (after smuggling them out in my
pockets).
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