Stewart: Restroom Rules

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These sorts of signs are in every restroom at Haifa University. The translation for the top one is: “Please! The paper goes into the trash can.” The bottom one says, "Throw the paper into the trash can." We’re not really sure what to make of them. As you can see from the picture, there is a small wastebasket next to the toilet. The wastebasket is almost always empty, just like this one. On the occasions when I have seen discarded paper in the basket, the paper is never … how to say this delicately … streaked with brown. The signs are in both the men’s and the women’s restrooms, which eliminates one obvious possibility. We want to do the right thing with our paper, but we're confused. We’ve asked numerous Israelis to explain the meaning of the signs, but not even the native speakers seem to know what to make of them.

The meaning of the last sign, with the woman pinching her legs together, seems obvious, although there isn't a similar sign outside the men's restroom. Make of that what you will. This sign appears in the Carmelit, Haifa's subway. Built in 1956 when Haifa was much smaller than it is today, the subway connected what were then the two main parts of the city: the downtown waterfront and Central Carmel, located on top of a ridge. From the downtown station to Central Carmel station is a vertical rise of 274 m (900 ft). Not something you'd want to hike up and down on a daily basis. The Carmelit is the smallest subway system in the world. It runs 1800 m (a little over a mile) and has only two cars going in each direction. The cars operate simultaneously: one car runs uphill while the other is running down. They pass each other at a widened part of the track half way up the ridge. Because of the steep slope of the subway tunnel, the cars are built on a slant with stairs inside. Portions of the route are more or less level, and while traveling through these portions, it feels as though the seats are leaning backward.

Weather update: To our great relief, it’s finally warming up. Recently it's been sunny with daily highs of 15-20 degrees Celsius (60's Fahrenheit). Up to about a week ago it was really cold: afternoons would reach only 7-13 degrees Celsius (45-55 degrees Fahrenheit). We have an electric space heater—as yet unused—but otherwise there’s no central heat in our apartment. As a result, when it's cold the temperature inside often doesn’t feel much different from that outside. On cloudy days we never warmed up, whether we we’re inside or out. The University is on top of a hill, so it’s noticeably colder and windier than our neighborhood. When we arrived there one morning at the end of the cold spell, we were shocked to see the ground covered with snow! Turns out it was a light dusting of hail. As you can see, sometimes it really is cold here.

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Photos

Restroom stall
Can you tell whether this is the men's or women's restroom?