I finally made it out this afternoon. Still raining and since yesterday had been so lovely, I had packed up my umbrella and was unable to find it before heading out today.

Before heading out though, I crossed paths with Elad. He was on his way to work and was dropping by to change his clothes. Gasp! He had cut off all his hair. He had been growing his hair out for about 8 months and had a pretty decent fro going on. When I was wet, nice and tidy, but when he played with it, it would puff up to a good size puffball. He apparently had had enough, and cut it all off. He asked me how I liked it and when I said it would take some getting used to, he said that I didn’t like it and he wanted to cry. Awww. Honestly, I tried to tell him before that somewhere in between would be best, but he seemed convinced otherwise. Now it is short all around and just and inch or so on top.

Anyway, after the shock, I headed out in the rain. By golly, I had things to do, rain or not! Thankfully, the bus came quickly and I rode it all the way down to Ben Yahuda St. I have a list of things to take care of, miscellaneous odds and ends including final gifts. First stop, book store, to exchange Siddur, check! Second stop, Mahene Yehuda to buy some spices and teas for gifts and perhaps pick up a snack or two. Who should I run into there, Rayek. Too funny. I swear I didn’t tell him I would be there. We ended up both buying spices and shopping together.

One gratuitous stop in a clothing store. Rayek suddenly is into shopping, and I found myself buying a sweater and some shirts. Well, at least I no longer have to borrow Elad’s sweater. I’m beginning to fear for what I will do for my short stay in London. Temperatures there are in the 50’s. This will help.

Elad and Yonaton have just come home. They are so distracting. No wonder I haven’t done a fraction of the work here that I thought I would get done. Too much fun to just hang out with them and do nothing. I am resisting their call right now to stay here and type. We’ll see how long it lasts.

A few more stops and we were finally on the mission that I had set out to do, to buy a tallit. I pretty much knew the one that I wanted and within an hour had secured a good price and had tallit in hand. I met up with Bettina for one final dinner before saying goodbye. I’m beginning to be sad about this whole thing. She dropped me off at home. I had thought to go back out and continue shopping, but realizing that I had the whole house to myself, I practiced my Torah portions. Wow, there is a light at the end of the tunnel there. I pretty much have the Haftorah down, now just to get my Torah. But I was able to sing along pretty well, and I remember that’s how it started with the Haftorah, so there is hope!!!

Where was I? Right, Thursday morning, Stalactite Cave. I called Rayek up the night before and asked if he wanted to come along. There something good about being the only two people on vacation, you always have someone to do something with. I picked him up in my car, boy, it feels just like at home, and we drove out the same way I had come in the night before. It actually wasn’t that difficult to find the cave. This particular cave had been discovered when they were doing blasting for some mining. Now, they sealed up the hole in the hopes that they hadn’t destroyed the whole thing and give educational tours.

It was a lot of fun and they sort of relish trying to find the shapes in the formations. We beat the crowds, for just as we were leaving, whole school busses showed up. Phew!
Ok. I’m compromising, I’m bringing the computer out and will type out here, but they are talking in Hebrew and watching football so I might not as well be here. Why did they all me out of my warm bed?

They seem to no longer care what I am doing, so back to the story.

Once we finished the cave, I gave a call into Shoshanah. We were now in her neck of the woods and perhaps she would have some suggestions of something to do in the area, and she did. She recommended that we find this little monastery not too far from her house.

The monastery, Beit Jammal, was a bit harder to find than I imagined. We passed the place twice before finally finding it. Rayek had been nice enough to bring a little picnic. Apparently he had an ulterior motive. He wanted to talk. Great. We talked and while I listened to what he had to say and I got to get a few things off my chest, somehow we ended up not in a lighter place but more pissed off than ever. I walked away a bit and he pretended not to hear me. Fine.

So I walked around to corner to discover a basketball court filled with olives, no seriously. Olives! Thousands of them. We toured the small chapel in the back where supposedly Saint Peter’s remains had been originally placed. The man who shared the story of the chapel was so very old, between every sentence he had to stop to breath. I fear that he might not be around too much longer.

Then back around to the front. Somewhere there was a shop to buy locally made olive oil and wine. We waited and expected our same guide. Instead we got this other old man, friendly and slightly crazy. The caretakers of this space are Italian, so I found myself trying to speak Italian-Hebrew-heavy-on-the-English-with-French-sprinkled-in. I have been saying “vente” instead of “esreem” ever since. It was a fun conversation and Rayek bought wine, oil and honey.

As we were making our way to leave, I saw a nun closing a door that we hadn’t explored before. Shoshanah had said that there was singing at 4:00 but it was only 3 and we didn’t want to wait around, but my instinct said to stop. We should stay here. We turned around and just in time too. For some special reason, this day they would begin the singing early. A kind woman, not one of the nuns, let us in and showed us the way to the balcony of the chapel. We got up there just in time.

The singing was astonishing, 4 and 5 part harmonies. The nuns and monks all dressed in white, standing, each in her own little cubicle on the side of the chapel of pale wood and white. The affect was just as it should be, you felt closer to G-d. This is a French order and apparently there are 10 such monasteries all over the world.

Sadly, though, there came the point when the incense came out. I eventually was smoked out and had to listen to the remainder from the hallway. Shoshanah had said that you could purchase the music and I knew that Meghan would just love this. Sadly, though, they had sold out of the CD, however, our stalling in the shop had given Shoshanah and her husband Avraham time to show up. Turns out that she had been inspired to come hear the singing, but, well, as you know, it was early and they had missed it. Turns out though, Avraham and Rayek know each other through a Chochmat connection. Not too surprising.

Rayek and I made our way back to Jerusalem and Rayek had a restaurant all picked out, however, we found ourselves going through Ein Karen and I remembered that this was supposed to be a sweet small town just outside of Jerusalem. And, look, there was a restaurant, and I wouldn’t have to fight downtown traffic and find parking. All good things in my book. Turns out to be a Lebanese restaurant, no, really, that’s what it was called, the Lebanese Restaurant. The food was good, and the cats entertaining. Rayek and I were only able to finish about half of our dinners, mine chicken and his turkey. While Rayek got up to go to the restroom, one of the cats made off with his chicken. It wasn’t like the cat jumped up on the table and I could shoo him away. No, he was trickier than that. All I saw was a set of ears as the chicken slipped off the table. Poor Rayek, I offered him my chicken, but chicken apparently doesn’t sit well with him. So much for lunch the next day.

Dropping Rayek off at home, I called Elad and swung by Shoshi’s to pick him up. I am such a natural at driving in Jerusalem. I don’t know what I was worried about.

Sex in the City has been interrupted for a newsbreak. Apparently some feel it necessary to have a pride parade here in Jerusalem. Last year they did this and someone was stabbed. Why? This simply doesn’t make sense. Why not have it in Tel Aviv? There isn’t any reason to have the parade in Sacramento when the community is in San Francisco. It just seems to provoke the other side.

Back to the show and back to my story.

The next day, Friday, would be my last day with a car, but I had to have the car back by 1:00. Where could we go with such a short amount of time? Why not Jericho? Well, there actually may be a “why not.” Turns out Jericho is part of the West Bank and Israelis are not allowed to go there. Many felt that it wouldn’t be safe for us to go, but we were willing to try.

Passports in hand and just enough gas, we made our way to the boarder. You think we were going into Iran for all the fuss that everyone made. It really turned out to be very easy. We showed our passports first to the Israeli police and then to the Palestinian police. Everyone just waved us in.