Excuse me, what time is it in Jerusalem?

Today is one of my most confused days of the year.

I confess that I’m confused a lot. It’s partly because I live under Israeli military occupation, and it’s partly because I’m middle aged. But let’s blame the occupation for now. Okay?

Today, though, I am confused for a wholly other reason. It has to do with daylight savings time, which ended in Palestine on Friday but doesn’t end in Israel until Sunday.

That makes me crazy.

First of all, one of my kids attends a school that goes by Israeli time. Today, she’ll wake up at the normal time and go to school at the normal time. But my other kids go to school that goes by Palestinian time. They will wake up an hour later, leave the house while our clock says 8 am, but they’ll still get to school an hour later at 8 am.

To make matters worse, every Palestinian institution chooses which time to observe! Organizations right next door to one another may be observing different times. Of course this happens both when we start daylight savings time and when it ends.

There was a year that I had several appointments throughout the day, all of which were on a different time zone. There was a year when this gap in time change lasted two weeks, if I recall.

I guess I should be grateful. Sure I don’t know what time it is, but it’s only one more day!