7th November
OK truth be told I’m writing you this entry a little after
the events have occurred. See I was so busy enjoying myself that I just plain
forgot to write about it. Plus as a very weak excuse the use of my laptop was
somewhat prohibited because the good people of Manchester airport had decided
to separate my box of electronics when they were being re scanned, only they
didn’t tell me so guess who left a box full of electronic devices and chargers
in Manchester Airport for a week? Still I guess it was a little holiday for
them too.
Anyhow back to Israel. I had heard horror stories regarding
difficulties being allowed entrance into Israel and the Palestinian territories.
Turns out I needn’t have worried. Once at Tel Aviv’s Ben Gurion Airport I was beckoned
forward at immigration by a young, pretty female immigration officer, now my
first thought was, you don’t see many f those about. Please bear on mind I have expected to be
placed back on the plane to Manchester the way my luck had been going of late.
The conversation flowed as such:
Immigration Officer: What is the purpose of your visit?
Me: Holiday
Immigration Officer:
Where are you staying?
Me: Natanya
Immigration Officer (now a little confused): Why?
Me: I’m staying with a friend
Immigration Officer: An Israeli friend
Me: Yes, well she has an English passport too (unsure if I
have said the right thing or not) here’s her name and Address
Immigration Officer: Ok enjoy your trip
When I retold this story to Liat, my ‘Israeli friend with an
English passport too’ I discovered that Natanya is a little seaside town, full
of old folk. I think the average age may be around 70 (ok I’m making that up)
but I was told it is definitely a place the immigration officer would never
have expected a single male traveller to be visiting. I like to think I made
that pretty officer smile when I answered her question, especially when she
thought of me lay on the beach next to all the wrinkly bodies.
My first noted able thing about Israel was that everywhere I
looked I could see people, young people in their early twenties in military
uniforms carrying guns. No one even flinched it was so normal. Apparently it’s
because between the ages of 18 and 22 it is compulsory for Israeli’s to do
national service. The military members where their uniform when commuting to
and from work and the gun must be with them at all times. Although it doesn’t have
to be armed when they are off duty. It was also clear that security measures are
taken very seriously here. It’s not possible to enter a train station, bus
station of shopping centre without having to go through airport style security
checks. I think the amazing thing about this system is how easy it was to
forget it was happening and just accept it as normal.
Natanya
Ok so I stayed here with Liat for 3 nights. She is living
with her grandmother and since it is within an hour of Tel Aviv it seemed
pointless paying for a hotel in Tel Aviv when we could just get a share taxi
home after. Our first night was spent catching up on gossip since Italy and the
next day was spent pretty much the same. Except this time we walked a little
outside too. Having arrived at night I didn’t get to see the sea upon my
arrival so today I was being walked into Natanya the scenic coastal way. It was
nice. I’d like to show you pictures but on this faithful night I was about to
embark upon I lost ‘me phone (not me shoes).
See we had decided to go into Natanya, get the bus to Tel
Aviv and then stay there for the night. It was great I saw the sights of
Natanya. Well to be fair there wasn’t many. There was a square which used to be
nice but was undergoing renovation, there was the beach and sea which was very
blue and then there was the woman mannequin in the shop who had had a boob job.
Seriously they were like two water melons, and the clothes she modelled never
enhanced her ‘natural’ shape. Unfortunately that’s probably the best I can make
out of Natanya so you won’t hear anymore about it.
Once in Tel Aviv we saw the 3 tall sky scrapers, whose name I
never discovered. They are the symbol of modern Tel Aviv and are shaped as thus
1 is square, one is triangular and one is round. They did make the sky look
pretty. We decided to take ourselves to Jaffa, the old part of the city where
we had a walk around the old streets and watched how the skyline changed
suddenly into a modern metropolis. I did get some really good photographs of
the skyline and of old Jaffa but like I say I lost my phone with the camera and
pictures in it, so I’ve made do best as I can with Google image search.
A nice skyline can only draw your attention so much so Liat
and I decided it was time to begin the night. It was already dark and there was
a local drink Liat was dying for me to taste. It’s called Arak and is 40% proof
and tastes aniseed esque. I didn’t enjoy it. We had even paid extra to have the
flavour enhanced with a hint of coffee. The coffee flavour only lasted for one
shot. After a few more shots we decided enough was enough and it was time to
start drinking beer. In essence it was a good idea because I like beer, but as I
got home later that night I realised that somewhere between my first arak and
my last beer, my phone had found its way out of my shorts pocket and was lost forever.
The next morning arrived far too quickly and catching up on
sleep was all I was interested in. A week of sleeping on people’s floors and
sofas in England is not good for anyone’s sleeping pattern and I was seriously
behind the amount of hours I needed. Sacrificing a day on the beach I slept and
slept and slept a little bit more. That night was a quiet one and it was just
what I needed.
Jerusalem
So the next day Liat was working until 1500 so we decided I
would go to Jerusalem and she would come and meet me after work. The hotel we
stayed in was clean, and had wifi. I think those are the only positives I can
find. The ‘designer’ (I use the term loosely) had a great idea that in order to
make the room appear like it had windows, curtains should be hung.
Less complaining about the room and more talk about
Jerusalem itself. I walked around the old city and saw the Wailing Wall. I
actually felt like an intruder stood there watching everyone pray. The history behind
the wall is that there was once a Jewish house of worship there like a million
years ago and now the only part that remains of it is this wall. I think the
idea is that you write down what it is you want from god, pray and then stuff
it into the wall (just as you do this about 5 other peoples wishes come falling
out). I’d like to say I wished for
something profound and selfless but I didn’t. I didn’t even get close enough to
stuff in my piece of paper, being non-Jewish it felt almost disrespectful to be
there observing, who’d have thought it eh.
I saw the supposed place which Jesus was crucified on and then the tomb which he was buried in,
and then I read information which said it wasn’t. Either way there was a big
church there which again seemed to attract a lot of very strongly religious
people and to be honest I didn’t feel as though I should be there. Maybe this
is religion trying to tell me something.
After my Jewish and my Christianity places of worship making
me feel as though I don’t belong I shouldn’t have been surprised by the response
I got when I tried to enter the Golden Domed Mosque. I’ll set the scene, man in
front of me walks past the security guard, gets waved in and almost receives a
smile from the armed guard. I try to enter and the guard says to me ‘Closed-
come back tomorrow!’ I would have argued, well not argued but at least
questioned, stated I just wanted to go in for a picture and I would be really
quick; but the guard had a gun, and I’m smart enough not to answer back to a
bloke with a gun so I turned 180 degrees and vowed to look on Google images to
find out what the inside looks like. It’s fair to say I felt rejected by 3
religions that first day in Jerusalem, I don’t think I’ve ever hit such a low
spot in my life.
So Liat arrived and after our very English night out in Tel
Aviv we decided to attempt an Israeli night out. For those of you unaware of
what this entails, an Israeli night out revolves around having maybe one drink
of alcohol and making it last the entire night, or supplementing it with
snacks, food, water and maybe shisha. The purpose of the night is not to get drunk;
it was a difficult concept to overcome when you think of the binge drinking
mentality that is standard in England. I am proud to say we did it. We ordered
two very large expensive beers which neither of us had heard of before and
enjoyed them, whilst people watching.
The Dead Sea
Our next day was devoted to visiting the lowest place on
Earth, The Dead Sea. I thought Liat was exaggerating when she said don’t put
your head in the water as you might swallow some of the water and need
hospitalisation, that is until I saw the sign displaying that very same
information. You can imagine both of our shock when we saw a fellow English man
trying to snorkel in the sea. I don’t think he saw much. The bus ride to Ein
Gedi (the location of our beach) took about 2 hours or there abouts from Jerusalem.
Because it was daylight and because I was actually paying attention to the
scenery this time, I really got a sense of how high Jerusalem is, no wonder it
was that little bit cooler. Thankfully the temperature at the beach that day was
37 degrees, and it felt great!
Once at the sea there was only one thing for us to do, try
and sink. It didn’t work, and I really tried. When I discovered that no amount
of effort on my part would stop me from floating in this huge puddle of salty
water, we decided it was time to crack open a tinny and do what Brits abroad do
best, have a beer in the midday sun, but
this time floating in the sea. It was almost like club Tropicana only minus the
lilo.
Once we’d had us beer it was time to make our skin all fresh
and youthful so we followed some people who had discovered a hole of mud in the
rocks, and we plastered each other’s bodies with this mineral rich mud. As the
mud dried I started to question why we had done this in the first place but
still it’s nice to know what I would have looked like had I been born black. I
think I could pull it off. Anyway whilst the sun was drying our mud and the mud
was doing whatever it did to our skin we enjoyed our second ‘tinny’ and then
waddled off into the sea to clean ourselves up.
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| Ok not really us |
When we had finally dried off we waded back up to the road
where the bus had delivered us, we found what looked like a leaving party for
the people who had just finished their compulsory military service. I wanted to
try and join in but Liat didn’t think my Hebrew was up to the level required
for me to pass as an Israeli and instead we went to wait for our bus back to
Jerusalem. That night we had decided to go out again, but this time earlier to
make the most of our last night in the holy city. I was glad we did. It might
not last until 4 am but Jerusalem is a really good night out and it’s really
not expensive. We were paying 24 shekels (£4) for a large beer, with a shot and
with shisha if we wanted it. Had we both had a phone each I’m sure we could
have utilised the wifi there but as we had both lost them on our last English
night out, it wasn’t possible. Still I would definitely recommend Jerusalem for
a night out, just maybe not a stag/hen do.
Bethlehem
The birth place of our Lord Jesus Christ happens to be in
the Palestinian territories. The bus ride there took us up even higher into the
hills and I started to get an understanding of how much effort it must have
been to move about back when Jesus, Mary and Joseph were creating their
stories. I’m glad it wasn’t me. Anyhow back to my journey we got dumped by the
bus next to some group of hotels and it soon became apparent we would have to
take a taxi to get to the church of the nativity, the place which is the place
which once housed the stable which Mary and Joseph stayed in all those years
before. The journey was a little bit of a nightmare.
Having agreed on one price our driver decided to stop, on
the side of the road, part way there to offer us his services as a driver. He
offered us many destinations on a tour we could design ourselves, which would
display all that Bethlehem and its surrounding areas had to offer. He would gallantly
deliver us to each of our chosen destinations. Unfortunatly we didn’t want to
go anyplace else, despite what a good price he was offering. It took us ten
minutes to finally persuade him of this. Those ten minutes spent by the side of
the road looking through his brochures seemed more like hours, all I wanted to
do was look at a little church. Eventually we found a way to make him believe
and we found ourselves at the birth place of Christ. We entered the church and
the que was huge. The queue was not to enter the church but to see under the
alter, the stone on which Jesus was born. If Mary gave birth on a stone it must
have been very comfortable. I think it makes me really appreciate the NHS and
the fact that I won’t ever have to give birth to children.
Feeling as though the day’s events so far had been
traumatic, there was only one thing for it, it was beer o’clock. And were
better to have a beer than the church of the Nativity, we toasted to Jesus. It
was also food time so we thought it would be rude not to try a little Palestinian
cuisine. Fed and watered I was off to attempt to find a person who could give
me a traditional cut throat shave. It was not a good experience. As you can
tell from my limited pictures my beard had grown a little. This was because my
beard trimmers had broken and I had yet to find a place which sold some at a
reasonable price which didn’t involve bartering. Since I was beginning to look
like a ginger Father Christmas it seemed the right time to get it all shaved
off. The only problem with it was that my wound I had after my biking accident
in Italy was still tender, hidden under my whiskers and when it came to the
time for him to remove the hair from my chin, my wound began to open again. Luckily
not enough to require stitches or anything to that extreme but enough for me to
stop him catch my breath and continue the shave with a machine. I’ve said it
before and i’ll say it again, I don’t like being clean shaven.
Tel Aviv
It was soon time for goodbyes again as it was my last night
in Israel and Liat had to go to work. This time goodbyes were said at a bus
station as we both parted and went in our separate ways. I’m not a fan of goodbyes;
they seem to be happening all too often these days though. My final night in
Tel Aviv was spent with a man I met from Couch Surfing. He showed me the
expensive side of Tel Aviv. Asaf was a part time general in the military and
spent the night trying to persuade people that I was an English hypnotist. It
seemed to convince some people, but others are a little more sceptical with
their beliefs.
The next day all I had to do was pack up and make sure I was
ready for my flight to Jordan. I had originally planned on missing Jordan
because of my week in the UK. My second plan had involved a coach down from the
Dead Sea to Eilat on the Israeli Red Sea coast and then crossing into Egypt at
the Taba border crossing and get a bus down to Sharm el Sheikh. However looking
into the area it seemed too risky and buses on my particular route had been
targeted by bandits. None of the attacks had resulted in any deaths but the
most recent involved being held hostage for 8 hours. I’ve never been one for
long coach journeys so decided best to use my back up plan flight to Amman, an overnight
stay and then a flight to Sharm El Sheikh from there. Still was just enough
time before leaving for the airport to head down to the beach, get a drink and
take in my last few glimpses of the Mediterranean Sea.
