DIBs vs. JAPs

Remember those two acronyms? Damn Israeli Bastards vs. Jewish American Princesses? Well, it seems the underlying cultural differences are still there. This fellow, Marco Greenberg, put it into his head to hire an Israeli au pair. He's far too generous in his assessment ("Well, it was only three out of three, and you can't tell about an entire nation based on three bad examples"); I could have told him that even had he tried 30 times,the chances for success wouldn't have been more than 1:10 at the very best. Partly this is because of the kind of young Israeli women who'd even ever consider taking such a job, but mostly it's a cultural thing. Israelis aren't good at giving service. Not all 7 million of them, of course, but lots of the 7 million of them. True, over time the help-desk sort of places have trained people to respond correctly by phone, but remember that most of those people manning those phones aren't there for a career. They're on their way up, and it's a temporary thing so they manage to control their nature. And even then, they're interacting in Hebrew with other Israelis (DIBs).

One of the insurance company has had a series of advertisements running for a few years already, in which they call other places, get a quote for a service, and then they say "WHAT??!! At [their place] it costs 643 NIS less!!!". and then they record the responses. Employees of the expensive agency caught on the phone saying things like "Really? I'd never buy from us with a gap like that". And all sorts of similar answers. My point being that by now you'd have thought the bosses of the other companies would have cottoned on to the possibility that their staff is being recorded in such cases, and if not lowering their prices, at least they'd have instructed them to shut up. But no. Israelis don't shut up. Can't happen. They're citizens in a democracy, they've got freedom of speech, and they'll use it, come hell or high water.

Come to think of it: what was that Marco fellow even thinking of? Had he found a successful Israeli au pair, would he have wanted her around his kids? Influencing them? Really?