A day of.... incidents. (Israel, Day 7)
Dec. 31st, 2008 03:21 pm![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
rhuThere were times when I thought today would be the day the vacation fell apart, but it was actually a nice day after all.
We left Eilat around 9am and started driving north. Since we'd missed Masada on Monday, we had to go back along Route 90 instead of our original plan of visiting Timna and Machtesh Ramon today. (We did Timna yesterday instead of the Dolphin Reef.) It turns out that Beersheva was hit by Qassams yesterday, although we probably would have driven around it anyway. So the day was basically going to be a lot of driving.
We were about 2/3 of the way to Masada when Alissa announced that she needed an emergency pit stop. By the time we were able to pull off the road, it was a little too late; we spent the next twenty minutes cleaning her off. Fortunately, she was good-natured about it, and we had enough supplies with us to deal with the problem.
We got to Masada around 1pm. We had lunch at the base building of the cable car, and then rode up. The new cable cars are a lot faster than the old ones, and we were up and going. The kids were fascinated, and kept switching between playing at being Zealots and asking questions. What's wonderful about visiting Masada is that you get to see both what life in Herod's palace was like and understand the nature of the siege and its tragic conclusion. The Roman siege camps are remarkable, as is the ramp that they eventually built to attack the water gate. Tani noted that the Zealots had built an awful lot of miqva'ot (ritual baths).
It was extremely windy up there, but we managed to fit in about 2 hours up top before heading down. Then Alissa got a splinter in her hand, and we spent 10 minutes trying to calm her down enough for us to get it out.
We continued driving north, retracing our route from Monday. On the approach to Jerusalem we had about a 20-minute backup at the security checkpoint; the first time we've had one that bad. We parked in a municipal lot by Rivlin St.
Tani wanted to use the restroom there, and the lock on the stall door jammed. We spent 10 minutes trying to talk him through unjamming it, but he just wasn't strong enough. So I went to the office and found the security guard in his "bitachon" vest, and asked him, haltingly:
Me: Atah omer Anglit? (Do you speak English?)
Him: Rak k'tsat (Just a little)
Me: Um, b'ni, um, basherutim, v', um, hadelet, um, lo patuach? (Um, my son, um, is in the rest room, and, um, the door, um, it doesn't open?)
Him: Ohhhhh! (Ohhhhh!)
He came with me, and tried to talk Tani through opening the door with no greater luck than we'd had. The stalls were very high, and the door opening was very small, so he went and got a large plastic bucket. He climbed on the bucket and then the sink, and launched himself over the stall wall onto the toilet and down to the ground. It then took him only two tries to get the door open. We offered him a tip (hm, how much is my son worth to me?) but he laughed and declined to accept it.
We then wandered around the neighborhood trying to pick a restaurant. It was an embarrassment of riches, although most of what we saw was either too fancy or too fast-foody. After half an hour of examining several dozen places, we decided on "The Village Green", a vegetarian cafeteria-style place on Rechov Yaffo. It was quite good; I had a bowl of soup and a salad and it was very satisfying.
Then we wandered up and down Yoel Solomon and Ben Yehuda streets, doing some of our souvenir shopping, and finished the day at Aldo, a gelato place on Rechov Yaffo, for fresh Belgian waffles and gelato. Excellent.
On the way out of the parking garage, our friend the security guard waved to Tani, who smiled and waved back at him.
And now we're back in Efrat, unpacking and getting ready for tomorrow's day trip to Tel Aviv. And if I get time, I need to associate pictures with the last three posts.
We left Eilat around 9am and started driving north. Since we'd missed Masada on Monday, we had to go back along Route 90 instead of our original plan of visiting Timna and Machtesh Ramon today. (We did Timna yesterday instead of the Dolphin Reef.) It turns out that Beersheva was hit by Qassams yesterday, although we probably would have driven around it anyway. So the day was basically going to be a lot of driving.
We were about 2/3 of the way to Masada when Alissa announced that she needed an emergency pit stop. By the time we were able to pull off the road, it was a little too late; we spent the next twenty minutes cleaning her off. Fortunately, she was good-natured about it, and we had enough supplies with us to deal with the problem.
We got to Masada around 1pm. We had lunch at the base building of the cable car, and then rode up. The new cable cars are a lot faster than the old ones, and we were up and going. The kids were fascinated, and kept switching between playing at being Zealots and asking questions. What's wonderful about visiting Masada is that you get to see both what life in Herod's palace was like and understand the nature of the siege and its tragic conclusion. The Roman siege camps are remarkable, as is the ramp that they eventually built to attack the water gate. Tani noted that the Zealots had built an awful lot of miqva'ot (ritual baths).
It was extremely windy up there, but we managed to fit in about 2 hours up top before heading down. Then Alissa got a splinter in her hand, and we spent 10 minutes trying to calm her down enough for us to get it out.
We continued driving north, retracing our route from Monday. On the approach to Jerusalem we had about a 20-minute backup at the security checkpoint; the first time we've had one that bad. We parked in a municipal lot by Rivlin St.
Tani wanted to use the restroom there, and the lock on the stall door jammed. We spent 10 minutes trying to talk him through unjamming it, but he just wasn't strong enough. So I went to the office and found the security guard in his "bitachon" vest, and asked him, haltingly:
Me: Atah omer Anglit? (Do you speak English?)
Him: Rak k'tsat (Just a little)
Me: Um, b'ni, um, basherutim, v', um, hadelet, um, lo patuach? (Um, my son, um, is in the rest room, and, um, the door, um, it doesn't open?)
Him: Ohhhhh! (Ohhhhh!)
He came with me, and tried to talk Tani through opening the door with no greater luck than we'd had. The stalls were very high, and the door opening was very small, so he went and got a large plastic bucket. He climbed on the bucket and then the sink, and launched himself over the stall wall onto the toilet and down to the ground. It then took him only two tries to get the door open. We offered him a tip (hm, how much is my son worth to me?) but he laughed and declined to accept it.
We then wandered around the neighborhood trying to pick a restaurant. It was an embarrassment of riches, although most of what we saw was either too fancy or too fast-foody. After half an hour of examining several dozen places, we decided on "The Village Green", a vegetarian cafeteria-style place on Rechov Yaffo. It was quite good; I had a bowl of soup and a salad and it was very satisfying.
Then we wandered up and down Yoel Solomon and Ben Yehuda streets, doing some of our souvenir shopping, and finished the day at Aldo, a gelato place on Rechov Yaffo, for fresh Belgian waffles and gelato. Excellent.
On the way out of the parking garage, our friend the security guard waved to Tani, who smiled and waved back at him.
And now we're back in Efrat, unpacking and getting ready for tomorrow's day trip to Tel Aviv. And if I get time, I need to associate pictures with the last three posts.
![[identity profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/openid.png){kind=small}
(no subject)
Date: 2008-12-31 10:42 pm (UTC)Atah omer Anglit?: (Do) you say English?
Um, b'ni, um, basherutim, v', um, hadelet, um, lo patuach? : Um, my son [biblical style], um, is in the rest room, and, um, the door, um, aren't open?)
Methinks this makes the story even better!
Regardless, I'm sure that guard had a significantly more interesting day than usual!
(no subject)
Date: 2009-01-01 12:50 am (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2009-01-01 02:00 am (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2009-01-01 02:01 am (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2009-01-01 05:32 am (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2009-01-02 04:33 am (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2009-01-03 04:29 pm (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2009-01-03 04:30 pm (UTC)(no subject)
Date: 2009-01-04 05:26 pm (UTC)What's modern style? (I would have said b'ni too, well, if I had a son and it had happened to me. So now I'm wondering what the alternative is.)
(no subject)
Date: 2009-01-05 11:52 am (UTC)