How the Electric Company nearly ruined, then saved, an Israeli wedding

I recently came across a cute website, Only In Israel, about - naturally - things that could only happen in Israel.

It included this heart-warming story about a mother-of-a-bride who was told there would be an electricity black-out in her neighbourhood on the day of her wedding.

My husband David called me up a week before my daughter Ruchama's wedding to Moshe Stein and said : “We have a wrinkle…”

The electric company had posted a notice on our apartment building announcing that there was going to be a power outage in our neighborhood to allow for a major repair.

The problem was that it fell out exactly on the day of the wedding... I called the electric company to ask (read: beg) them to postpone the repair work, since we really, really needed the use of the apt. to prepare for the wedding (you know – makeup, hair, etc.).

I was immediately transferred to a manager named Zion. He understood the problem and explained that they absolutely couldn’t reschedule the power outage but he would see what he could do.

Two days later we spoke again and he said that he had sent some people out to look at the site and that they were having trouble isolating our building from the rest of the area. But – not to worry- if he couldn’t resolve the problem – we could have a room in the electric company's building to use as we wish! I was flabbergasted – I asked him if he’d ever see a bride leave from the Electric Company. He said: “actually, it’s happened before”.

The next day he called and in a happy voice conveyed his best wishes for the upcoming wedding. He asked me to tell the bride Mazel Tov [congratulations] and that she would have electricity because he personally went to look at the location and he found a solution.

So we get up bright and early on Sunday, and lo and behold, there is a generator parked right outside of our building. That’s right – our building was hooked up to electricity all day from our own private generator while the rest of the neighborhood had a blackout!

Unusually, the story included a name and photos, so it's not an urban myth.