Monday, November 11 – back to Jerusalem
We had no real plan at all as to what we were going to do
for the next 4 days. Reuven said that his calendar was booked until Thursday.
This was ok. The tour had done its job of showing us
highlights, but now was the opportunity to return to places we thought we
needed more time to explore.
So, it was easy – beeline back to Jerusalem. Of the four
days in Jerusalem on the tour, we only had one afternoon in the old city. We
wanted to go back to the Cardo and finish shopping there. Maybe see the
Christian sites that had been assiduously avoided by the tour. Who knows what
we would decide to do.
After 10 days of being told where we were off to next, we
were FREE! Woohoo! But first we had to get there.
Reuven drove us to a bus stop on the shoulder of a major
highway and waited with us until the bus to Jerusalem picked us up. Half hour
later we were in the central bus station – with its huge mall.
We started walking down Jaffa street (road? Blvd?) towards
the old city. We passed by the Machane Yehuda market where we had seen the
madhouse crowds on our first Friday in Israel. No crazy crowds on a Monday
morning.
The weather was perfect – high 60s/low 70s and no humidity.
A pleasant walk following the light rail line. We figured once we were done
with whatever it was we were going to do, we’d take the light rail back to the
bus station – because we were walking downhill, which meant the return trip
would be uphill.
We found the Jaffa Gate where we had been the first Saturday
night in Israel to see the light show at David’s Citadel. Then we sorta back-tracked
to the upscale Mamila mall just outside the gate where I knew I could find a
bathroom. No more Gila to point out bathrooms – I had to turn on my
bathroom-dar for myself.
We sat in the mall for quite some time, trying to figure out
using GPS/Apple maps/Google maps exactly where the Cardo was. We didn’t want to
spend too, too much time getting lost.
But it became obvious that we were getting nowhere, so we
just walked back in through the Jaffa Gate and saw an information center. Where
the staff showed us on a paper map exactly how to get there. We were only 10
minutes away. Ok, so sometimes low-tech still works better than hi-tech.
The direct route took us directly into the Arab shuk –
though not quite as obnoxious as the shuk in Istanbul or Tunis, it was, let’s
face it, a shuk. So looking at any object for more than a milli-second was an
invitation for the sales guy to attack (“Madam, madam, such a lovely Jewish
star you have, where did you get it? I have others just like it, just step
inside, step inside….”).
We overshot the Cardo by only one block (street?), which we
thought was pretty darn good. We walked through the Cardo – up one way. Then
back the other. Hmmm. Was this all there was? There’s the place we bought the
bird “painting”. There’s the place where our tour-friends bought a shofar. The
Cardo seemed a LOT bigger last Sunday afternoon. I guess we really did finish
shopping here that Sunday.
Now what? Lunch!
We found the general area where we had lunch the last time.
Since it was Monday, we heard a Bar Mitzvah celebration from the Kotel (Torah
is read on Monday, Thursday and Saturday, and a bar mitzvah can occur on any
day Torah is read). At one point, we saw a processional: two musicians leading
the way with a boy under a chupah following behind, and his family behind him.
Awesome – they moved too fast and I couldn’t get a video of it.
We wandered around a bit looking for more shops, then
decided we would head to the church of the Holy Sepulcher.
It took maybe a minute, two max, to get lost in the bowels
of the shuk. Tried following the map, but streets on the map didn’t exist (or
couldn’t find), and streets we walking on didn’t exist on the map. Sometimes we
thought we had to be getting closer, because the ratio of Jewish to Christian items
in the shuk shops would shift from prayer shawls and hamsas to crosses and
icons. We figured we were really really close when the crosses and icons got really
really big.
At one point, we saw tour groups going by and we wondered if
we should just follow them – they had to be either on their way to or just left
the Holy Sepulcher. One shuk guy was very helpful, telling us that the church
was just a left and a right and a left – which put us into a small clearing –
we could see an opening, like an entrance/exit, and on the other side were
people staring up at something. But we turned left. And lost the church again.
Could see its dome roof above the shuk, but couldn’t get there. So close and
yet so far.
Based on help from another shuk guy that we needed to go
back a street and turn on St. Helena’s street, we suddenly popped out into the
church’s courtyard.
Of all the churches in the world, the Holy Sepulcher is one
not-impressive building from the outside:
Inside was crammed with pilgrims, all trying to touch the
last station of the cross
Or stand in some endless line for Christ’s tomb.
Nothing in this church is labeled and we did not have a
guide book with us. This meant that many things were lost on us. Especially a
rock encased in glass. We figured it had to be something very important, but we
had no idea what it was.
I’m not sure when or why it occurred to us to tackle the
climb up the Mount of Olives, but we had a map so we figured, why not? Back
into the shuk we plunged. And then we realized the exit out the courtyard was
the entrance we had seen about 45 minutes before, but had decided to turn left
instead.
Following the map, we headed towards the Lion Gate, weaving
through the shuk until we ran out of shuk. And then we were just random
tourists in the Arab quarter. And suddenly we had the narrow streets virtually
to ourselves. We knew we were headed in the correct direction, because we saw
these things on the way:
The Pool of Bethesda (which we didn’t see, because it
required tickets)
The birthplace of the Virgin Mary
Walking, walking, walking…out of nowhere a 10 year old boy
pops out in front of me clapping his hands in my face (shouting “HAH!”) as he
looked me directly in the eye. The clap had an odd sound – like he had honked a
horn. Mildly startling, it weirded me out just a bit. Just an obnoxious kid, we
thought, but we also thought there was a little aggressiveness there. Let’s
keep walking.
We stopped for a break:
Suddenly, a broom handle goes flying over our heads and
lands at our feet. Who comes to retrieve it? Our obnoxious little friend who
has brought another obnoxious little friend with him. Obnoxious kid #1 picks up
the broom handle and waves it at us, like he’s going to throw it to his buddy
over our heads. Exchanging nasty glares, we just move on and out the Lion Gate.
Andy decided to follow the signs to climbing the ramparts to
the top of the wall, so I sat outside the Lion Gate watching a guy load a
bobcat truck into the bed of a dump truck. Quite a crowd collected to watch him
do it – took a few tries, but he got it done.
In the meant time, Andy is following the steps up to the top
of the wall until he comes to a locked gate. He sees a couple of (new)
obnoxious boys, who speak to him in Arabic, which is, of course, a complete and
total waste of time. Andy turns to leave when he hears a faint noise – like a
small pebble hitting the iron fence. Like the boys threw a rock at him.
Time to move on to friendlier territory – we walked down the
hill to the street at the base of the Mount of Olives. We walked along the road
and saw another road to the left and going up the hill. But we figured that was
the car/bus road up, not the pedestrian way up. Which consisted of endless stairs.
We found that opening – called the “Pathway for the
Cohanim”. The Cohens (Jewish priestly tribe) are forbidden to enter cemeteries,
because coming in contact with the dead renders you ritually impure. And the
only way for a Cohen to purify himself of the cemetery requires a Holy Temple.
Which we don’t have.
Up we go!
Up we go!
Up we go.
Up.
We.
Go.
Oh boy.
The sun is going down and we really hope that:
- We get to the top in time to take a photo of the iconic view.
- There’s a taxicab up there to take us back to the bus station.
And wow that last 100 feet is a doozy of a steep hill on
asphalt.
BUT – we make it!
And there is indeed a cab waiting out front of the Seven
Arches Hotel. The cabbie was very talkative, chatting about his kids living in
the U.S. He dropped us off where he thought the shirut (little bus-vans) to
Modi’in should be parked.
Except the only shiruts on that corner are for local
Jerusalem locations or Tel Aviv. After finally following Shula’s instructions
(after she repeated them to us over the phone for the third time), we go into
the bus station, go downstairs and follow the signs to “Arrivals”. And there’s
the Modi’in shirut.
Shula retrieves us from the pickup spot and we spend a great
evening with the Resnicks.
Tomorrow: Return to Tel Aviv
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