Saturday, November 9: Thank G0d for Shabbat

Saturday, November 9: Thank G0d for Shabbat

First: Happy Birthday to Robin! Except the 7 hour time difference and Shabbat makes it a bit difficult for a birthday phone call or facetime.

For the first time this trip, we got to sleep past 6:30. Wow. Thank G0d for Shabbat! 

Seemed like everybody at the hotel had the same idea, because the dining hall was filled.

Even though our paid-for lunch at the hotel was at 2:00, we decided to walk to Jaffa and take our chances. We started our trek on Ben Yehudah street, which was particularly not impressive – borderline (or more) seedy. And it was rather warm out as well, so we crossed the street whenever we found ourselves not in the shade. One nice thing – there were lots of randomly placed benches for breaks from the humidity.

Our first goal was HaTachana – the site of the old railway station. Descriptions of it alluded to an upscale area with shops and restaurants. It was a challenge finding it on the paper map and Google maps.

When we finally did find it (45 minutes later), it was nothing like what we were expecting – didn’t see any shops (of course it was Shabbat, so perhaps nothing was open), but we did see run-down looking buildings with restaurants. And we found a theater that seemed to be having a piano performance, and also a dance school. We were still not sure we had actually found “it”, but we sure did find a gelato store. Good enough!

So we gave up on the HaTachana concept, and continued our walk till we found the Jaffa clock tower:

Kept going to find the intersection where the Jaffa fleamarket should have been, but it was not. 

Kept going to walk through the Jerusalem Gate of the Jaffa old city, but the road was very steep and there seemed to be not much of anything to see, and it was very warm. We contemplated giving up, but instead we decided to have lunch then perhaps tackle the Jaffa old city from the other direction.

So we randomly picked a restaurant at a random intersection that managed to not have a menu in the window, but I saw people eating felafel, so it had to be ok. The restaurant seemed to be in two halves on either side of the street. We picked the half on the right.

We sat down. There were menus on the table, but they are in Hebrew. Not helpful. I couldn't remember how to say “menu” in Hebrew. We asked a waiter for a menu in English. He disappeared. Then reappeared. Without a menu, and proceeded to ignore us as if we had never asked him for anything, or perhaps we were figments of his imagination. Or wished we were.

Tried a different person – a woman who at least made some effort to find the English version of the menu. But soon she too was distracted and we are back to where we started – no English menu.

I asked the waitress again, and this time she talked to a manager-like looking person – she returned to tell us that *he* will tell us what’s on the menu and help us out. We saw him picking up menus to check, only to finally figure out that the apparent only copy of the menu in English is at a table at the other half of the restaurant. Why he couldn’t ask those people if they were done with it, I don’t know.

So, he says, “We have fish and kabob. But this is a fish restaurant. So you should have the sea bass. 120 shekels {$30?!?}, no problem.”

$30 for lunch per person? Really?

What about the kabobs? Well, yes they have kabobs, “But this is a fish restaurant, so you should have the sea bass, 120 shekels, no problem.”

Um. What?

We didn’t want to spend $30 per person.

“Well normally 110 shekels, but TODAY it is 120.” He says like this is a discount, when in fact it’s and extra fee because he’s open on Shabbat.

Still not clicking here. Try one more time regarding the kabobs.

“Yes, but this is fish restaurant. You have sea bass, 120 shekel no problem.”

Wow going nowhere really fast. I was beginning to wonder if this side of the restaurant was fish and the other side was meat. We had seen something similar in Jerusalem where a restaurant was actually two – one for meat and one for dairy.

So how about we share a grilled and filleted sea bass? Ah HAH, since we’re now talking about fish, this is fine. 40 shekels per person, plus the salads, no problem. Ok! Now we’re getting somewhere.

Pita, salads, drinks arrive. Sea bass arrives. It is very good. Then I notice that at the table behind us they are having -  you guessed it – chicken kabobs.

What happened here? I have no idea.

Ok, so finally we are back on our way climbing up a different steep street, but this time finding a square with shops, a fountain and a St. Peter’s Catholic church, which has a beautiful ceiling. We realize this is actually the first church we’ve been in since coming to Israel.

St Peter's Catholic Church

Eventually, after a full day of walking up hill the novelty finally wore off. We decided to start the trudge down the {endless} steps down to the port to find a cab back to the hotel. Of course, halfway down the {endless} steps we see a directory – of all the shops we missed because we turned to the right to come down. If we had turned left, we would have seen more side alleys with shops. But of course, there was no way of knowing if they would have been open (we said to ourselves).

Once at last down at the port level, we walk for a bit and ponder how far we’ve walked from this view of Tel Aviv:

We walked all the way from almost furthest left edge of Tel Aviv to where we took this photo. That's far.

We figure it’s been about a 5 mile trek today. But, we’re done. We grab a cab back to the hotel to rest a bit before heading out to dinner on Dizengoff Street after Shabbat.

Tomorrow – our last day of the tour.