Israel Trip: December-January 2014-2015
I had read about the Tel Aviv Greeter program online in one of my many research forays, and it sounded neat: a free program matching interested visitors with a Tel Aviv local who will walk around with them for a couple hours and talk about the city. Nur walked us up Hayarkon, talking about the embassies and the history of the area, and also a lot about architecture, before turning toward Rabin Square (he offered to reenact the assassination with us, but we declined) and then walking toward Nachalat Benyamin, where we stopped at a cafe to have shakshuka together before Nur needed to leave.
We walked through the craft fair that was on the street, stopping to buy a hand-made dinosaur-shaped wooden puzzle with the Hebrew alphabet on it as a souvenir for the kids. Marcus could have stayed forever to watch a man melting down random bits of glass to make animals, or to talk to the makers of a different kind of wooden puzzle (pyramid-shaped), but the sun was getting close to setting and the market was starting to close, so we started walking more toward home.
We stopped at one of those exercise playgrounds (intended for adults) in a residential area, which happened to have a tent over it, and the kids played there for close to an hour while it started to drizzle.
For dinner we went to a Chinese restaurant, Furama, that we had passed on foot the night before, as we were sure they'd be open on Shabbat night even when many other things were not. The kids devoured the noodle soup, but we were underwhelmed by the steamed items (shu mai, har gao). It wasn't until we tried their deep-fried offerings (a porky deep-fried wonton and a juicy chicken deep-fried dumpling) that we were really happy, though--those were great. Still, everyone was happy, and as we left, a giant dog walked into the restaurant with its owner and hung out waiting for takeout--for Marcus that was the perfect end to a lovely evening. We stopped at a corner supermarket on the way home and grabbed some bread and more eggplant dip to restock our supply, and then went back to bed.
Saturday morning we didn't bother to get up super early, and we had breakfast in the apartment on the combination of fruit and bread and eggplant and cereal I'd brought from home. Then we headed out on the bikes, with the kids wearing rain jackets and rain pants as the skies looked like it might rain. We rode all the way south to Jaffa port, where we wandered through the port, admired the murals, watched another craft fair starting to set up, and rode down to the beach south of the port to investigate a burning truck tire on the sand. Two firefighters, one with a bucket and one with a fire extinguisher, arrived just as we did, and attempted to put out the fire with little success. Eventually their truck arrived with more firefighters and supplies and they were able to extinguish it. They were very friendly to the kids, letting them try on helmets ("But I already have a helmet!" explained Samantha, refusing, pointing to her bike helmet) and gloves, and offering to let them climb up onto their truck. I was waiting a bit further down the road (the path up to the beach had been hilly), and Robert didn't have the camera, though, so we didn't get pictures.
For lunch we locked our bikes near a fish market at the port and walked a few blocks to Abu Hassan's for hummus, as we knew it would be open on Shabbat and it was supposed to be the best hummus around. It was a really satisfying experience--the hummus itself, topped with ful (fava bean puree), and served with a sliced onion and lots of pita, was great, and the atmosphere was loud and happy and chaotic.
We walked past a monastary (hearing the combination of church bells and Muslim calls to prayer--the first time in Israel we'd heard either, never mind at the same time--was really cool) over to a little playground and let the kids run around a bit, until the dark clouds started to look much worse and we decided to ride for home.
Sure enough we got caught in the rain as we were riding north along the beach. We pulled over into the lee of a little old building and waited out the worst of it there for about 5-10 minutes, and then when it had stopped raining, and suddenly blue skies peeked through, we got back on our bikes and kept riding. We went home, dried out a bit, and did the aleph-bet puzzle we'd bought the day before, until at another break in the clouds around 3:30 we went back out on the bikes, heading north up the beach to go to Benedict's on Ben Yehuda Street for dinner. Benedict's thing is that they are open 24/7 (therefore obviously not kosher) and actually serve bacon. Their menu is an international assortment of breakfasts, which was fun. Marcus got french toast, I ordered an "Italian-style" (bacon and gouda) shakshuka, and Robert got their signature egg-balls (tiny fluffy omelets made in one of those cast-iron pans with individual wells, baked in the oven, and then tossed with a sauce for serving) with chestnuts and goose (really, the kosher equivalent of bacon--fatty and earthy and delicious) and with mango juice and hot cocoa, we were all quite happy. (Incidentally, Benedict's wall decor was cool, too--I took a picture for Sarah as it seems the sort of thing she'd do in her kitchen.)
It was darker than I liked when we rode home from there, but it had been another great bike outing--both kids loved every second of the bikes and wished they could go on forever. (See below for pictures of the apartment building, terrace, view, and door decoration of a different apartment in the building.)
After sunset, we took a taxi to the Azrieli center (a mall underneath the three tall towers built in a square, a triangle, and a circle shape, which we'd seen at Mini Isreal) and poked around the mall a bit, watching all the stores opening up an hour or so after sundown (post-Shabbat) and the mall come to life. We investigated the food court, the different cafes, and the small kids' play area before trying to go to the observation deck to see out. It was really hard to see anything at night, and the observation floor also happened to be a catering hall, where the lights were off, dirty plates and glasses and ashtrays were strewn about, and one or two cleaners casually moved items in a show of cleaning up. Robert went back downstairs and after an incredibly protracted discussion managed to get our money back, and then we took a cab home.
On Sunday we rode down to the old town of Jaffa again to return the bikes. This proved difficult as the store was still not open by 10:15, despite its posted opening time of 9:45. We ended up locking the bikes on a pipe nearby and giving the keys to an old man in an instrument repair stand across the street, and sure enough the bike woman called us back in awhile and said she'd gotten the keys. She sounded personally wounded that she'd missed us, though.
We made another stop at the market and another stop at a few small playgrounds, enjoying the sunshine, before packing up everything at the apartment and taking a taxi to the central bus station (which for some years had been the world's largest bus station until 2010, when Delhi surpassed it). Instead of taking a bus to Jerusalem, though, we took a sherut--a ten-passenger van that waits outside the station and charges just 5 shekels more than the bus fare. Sheruts seem quicker and more efficient than regular buses--you don't have to enter the giant bus station and go through security and navigate the different floors, and to Jerusalem at least they leave all the time, so we only had to wait about five minutes. On the sherut we met a nice American woman who's been living in Jerusalem for a few years, a doula who wants to train to be a midwife. She negotiated with the driver to let us off at the spot closest to our hotel, and then helped orient Robert to know which street to walk down (just about a seven-minute walk) to go straight to our hotel. Jerusalem was definitely chillier than Tel Aviv, but we managed to survive. We got to our hotel, the David Citadel Hotel right near the Mamilla Mall, about another seven-minute walk to Jaffa Gate of the Old City, and after putting down our things went back out for lunch, hummus at Ben Sira's, a hipster hummus joint a few blocks away. Marcus had a bean soup ("What kind of beans? Regular kind! Just beans!" our waiter said), and we had hummus topped with ground beef, which was a surprisingly delicious twist, and of course there was plenty of pita. We investigated the hotel pool, which is heated, and even put on bathing suits and went down to the indoor entrance, but only Robert swam--Marcus decided it was too chilly to more than wade, so we cut it short and went up to the room to change.
We walked over to Jaffa Gate and had dinner at a mediocre Armenian restaurant in the Armenian quarter. I hadn't even known the Armenenians had such a presence in Jerusalem, actually--they're on equal footing with Jews, Muslims, and "Christians" (Catholics and Orthodox sharing equal time--Robert observed that Protestants don't exist here at all) in the Old City. Still, the lamajun was decent with a lot of lemon, and the Armenian kebobs weren't bad.
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Created: 1/11/15. Last Modified: 1/11/15.