Garage owner's 'Jesus lives' joke goes viral
The Local Norway - [email protected]
Published: 11 Nov, 2015 CET.
Updated: Wed 11 Nov 2015 10:18 CET
A garage owner from western Norway has become a minor celebrity after responding to the new sign erected on the wall of a neighbouring evangelic church with his own cheeky message.
It started when volunteers from the church carried out a renovation, erecting a floodlit cross along with the words “Jesus Lives”.
According to Richard Solli, who owned the garage next door, the rest of the village did not exactly welcome the new decoration.
“The general feeling from people was that it was a bit much, with all the big writing on the wall and the spotlights which lit it up, and it ended up with me going into the garage to make my own sign.”
“It was important to find a sign that didn’t offend anyone, but would definitely be funny.”
He rejected ‘Doffen is dead’, a reference to an old tear-jerker supermarket advert where a little boy finds his pet goldfish dead, and plumped instead for “I live too”.
When a neighbour posted a picture of the sign on Facebook it took off, and soon he was being interviewed about his sign on the radio, and getting coverage in Norway’s main newspapers.
“People keep stopping to take pictures, so it’s brought a little extra trouble, but I’m taking it positively,” he told NRK.
The only problem is that he recently shut down his Facebook account, so the only way he can track how many ‘likes’ the sign is getting is to log on as his wife.
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It started when volunteers from the church carried out a renovation, erecting a floodlit cross along with the words “Jesus Lives”.
According to Richard Solli, who owned the garage next door, the rest of the village did not exactly welcome the new decoration.
“The general feeling from people was that it was a bit much, with all the big writing on the wall and the spotlights which lit it up, and it ended up with me going into the garage to make my own sign.”
“It was important to find a sign that didn’t offend anyone, but would definitely be funny.”
He rejected ‘Doffen is dead’, a reference to an old tear-jerker supermarket advert where a little boy finds his pet goldfish dead, and plumped instead for “I live too”.
When a neighbour posted a picture of the sign on Facebook it took off, and soon he was being interviewed about his sign on the radio, and getting coverage in Norway’s main newspapers.
“People keep stopping to take pictures, so it’s brought a little extra trouble, but I’m taking it positively,” he told NRK.
The only problem is that he recently shut down his Facebook account, so the only way he can track how many ‘likes’ the sign is getting is to log on as his wife.
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