LOST AND FOUND IN JERUSALEM

A few weeks ago my daughter rang me.
“Mum you’ll never guess what happened. Someone took my baby stroller from the bus. When I went to take it and get off the the bus it wasn’t there any more. I couldn’t believe it."
“Oh I’m sure it wasn’t stolen . Someone was probably in a hurry and took the wrong one by mistake. I’m sure you’ll get it back again soon”

“Mum, I ‘d really like to think you’re right. But it can’t have happened by mistake. You see I was the only person on the bus with a stroller. I got on only a few stops from my house and the bus was almost empty and there were no other strollers there.
The bus driver and I searched all over the bus in case it had rolled to another corner or something, but – it had definitely been taken”

I really wanted to think it had been a mistake. I’ve always tried “ dan le’kaf zechus” , judge others favorably, but from the story my daughter had told me it wasn’t easy.

With five young children, the money for a new stroller would be difficult for her to find so she didn’t give up straight away.
First of all she rang Egged’s legal department to see if the bus company had any insurance to cover theft on the buses, but unfortunately they don’t.
For two weeks she searched the local newsletter’s lost and found column ‘ just in case’ but saw nothing.
So she bought a second hand stroller to replace hers, as it was just too difficult managing without one, and it certainly seemed that hers was gone for good.

Two weeks after she bought a replacement she called. “ Mum you’ll never guess what I saw stuck on the bus stop outside our house today. A notice saying “ A baby stroller was taken off the 52 bus by mistake on November 15th. Please call …….. to get it back”

Of course she immediately called the number to find out what had happened.

At the bus stop after my daughter had got on, two young women with children got off the bus. A schoolgirl and an old man got off as well. As the bus drove away the schoolgirl noticed that the stroller was still sitting at the bus stop and the two women were walking down the road with their children. She ran after them with the stroller thinking that they had forgotten it, but both said it didn’t belong to them. Obviously what must have happened was that the old man had tried to be helpful and had taken it off the bus thinking it belonged to one of them.

By now the bus had disappeared into the distance and so one of the mothers took the stroller home with her.

The following day she contacted Egged's Lost and Found department, told them what had happened and asked that if anyone calls in reporting a missing stroller they should be given her telephone number.
However my daughter never reported it missing to the bus company, as she hadn’t left it on the bus. The Lost and Found department of Egged deals with items that were forgotten on buses. But my daughter knew for sure that it hadn’t been left on the bus – it had been taken off the bus before she got off.

The young mother also contacted the local neighborhood newsletter to ask them to list it amongst the lost and found items.

When she checked the newsletter two weeks running and never saw the notice, she called the editor and discovered that there are so many items for that list that the editor limits the number he prints every week and it and it can take a month or more for an item to appear.

But this young mother was so determined to find the stroller’s rightful owner, she followed the route that the bus took, and at every bus stop from where she got off to the end of the bus route, she put up a notice.

And the next day, as she was waiting for the bus, my daughter saw the notice.