Lost NIS 40,000 diamond ring that sent Jerusalemites scrambling is found
Jerusalem man found ring on Thursday, but was unaware of hullabaloo surrounding it until Saturday evening.
By JPOST.COM STAFFUpdated: JANUARY 26, 2016 00:02Sanitation workers and residents sort through masses of rubbish for a diamond ring that was accidentally tossed in the garbage, Jerusalem, January 21, 201(photo credit: MARC ISRAEL SELLEM)
A diamond engagement ring worth some NIS 40,000 that went missing last week, sending Jerusalemites on a mad search through piles of garbage, has been found and returned to its owner.On Thursday, a young woman in Jerusalem’s ultra-Orthodox Geula neighborhood, who is due to get married in a month’s time, was emptying her trash into a bin on the street. She placed her diamond engagement ring in her pocket for safekeeping while doing the errand.However, a small, empty food bag was also in her pocket and the ring apparently fell into it before she threw both into the dumpster. She then searched for the ring in her pocket and failed to find it.Moments later a garbage truck approached the dumpster and emptied it into the truck.The desperate woman realized what had happened and immediately alerted the driver to the problem. After a search on the street failed to locate the ring, the truck – with the approval of the municipality – was driven to a city warehouse and emptied to enable the family to search for the ring.The family then sent out a notice asking members of the public to help them with their search and many volunteers responded.It turns out that an elderly Jerusalem man, who wishes to remain anonymous, had already found the ring on Thursday, but didn’t realize it was the missing band.The man explained the moment he found the ring in an interview with Army Radio on Sunday. “I saw something on the ground and when I picked it up, I thought it was a child’s ring, because it wasn’t very big, it didn’t look serious.”He said that the “moment that you find something you say to the creator of the world: ‘Poor person who lost this.’ I put the ring in a drawer, because I wasn’t aware of the fact that the whole city was looking for the ring. I didn’t realize what a big issue it was.”The man then called the sister of the woman who lost the ring and asked her to describe it in detail to ensure that it was truly her sister’s. “She described the ring correctly and came with her husband to pick it up and there was great excitement here,” he said.