Yerushalayim Shel Zahav: Jerusalem of Gold. Also, of shopping.

Woke up at an ungodly hour this morning to catch the 7 am bus to the Haifa train station, so I could catch the 7:40 train to Jerusalem. In the past 22 hours, I have been from Tel Aviv University Train Station to Haifa Hof Carmel Train/Central Bus Station station to Haifa University to Horev centre back to Haifa University back to Haifa Hof Carmel Train/Central Bus Station to Jerusalem central bus station...All by 9:30 in the morning, starting at 8 Pm last night. 12 hours of buses and trains, with no more than 6 hours in between any one method of transportation.

Lesson learned: Next time, i'll stay the extra night in Tel Aviv and just take the 1/2 hr bus from there, so that I don't kill myself trying to get everywhere. Because, oh my god. It's just so many levels of not worth the effort.

Except of course the shopping. And seeing the family. But especially the shopping. But especially the Family (which will, as of now, be capitalized, because we sort of are a mafia).

Arielle and I arrived at the Central Bus Station at 9:30, bags packed and desperate to pee, where Na'ava picked us up and escorted us to her apartment. I am now the proud owner of a key to 210 Rachov Yafo, in the case that I ever need to break in to the most remarkably spacious apartment to not have a refrigerator or a stove. I'll steal their valuables, i just won't be able to grab a snack on the way out. But seriously, good job to Na'ava on grabbing that baby; it's simply gorgeous. I'm leaning towards squatting in the kitchen, right where the major appliances would be if her landlord wasn't such a major tel-avivi tool. Like, dude. wtf.

Anyways, from there we dropped off our bags and taxied our way to the Jewish Quarter in the old city. After I yelled at the driver for not dropping us off when the fare was 25 NIS, as in, when I asked him to please לעצור בפינה (stop at the corner), and whereupon he dropped us off a whole 5 minutes later, in the middle of a narrow road where he shouldn't really have been able to stop without everyone dying/honking/ending up generally unhappy, we finally snaked our way through the Armenian quarter to the Cardo; the old Roman Quarter, now the relatively new (as in, in the last few centuries) Jewish quarter.

Woot.

Ari and I grabbed a bagel and some other fun things (soda at 9:45 in the morning rocks my planet. Fanta Orange, all the way. Also, salad on a bagel with humus; it's the new black), I found the place for Jewish Students in Need (of a place to stay for shabbat, some good jewish learning, etc), and decided that we had to go in. I announced to the guy that "I am a jewish student in need!", got information about a job in Israel's hi-tech sector (but in J'lem, hopefully with prospects in Haifa) which needs english speaking students to work for them for part time, got info about grants offered if you go to Jewish "learn-in's" at the Technion (100$ a month; enough to fund my Fanta Orange habit: i swear, I mainline the stuff), got on a list serve and got invited to a weekend in Prague. Wow. A lot of information packed into 10 whole minutes. Very nice.

After the info overload, we popped down to the Cardo, home of the most expensive shopping on the planet, unless you happen to have mad hookups, like I do, and get fire-sale prices on beautiful things, which I did. We had silver bracelets made and engraved at Hadaya(www.oneofakind.co.il), which is where I saw the bitchiest Yeshiva girls on the planet. I actually didn't know that Yeshiva girls could be such obnoxious little brats with ruder mouths than Torontonian japs. These girls are 18; why are they acting like a 12 year old at USDS? Little snots; where is God and why isn't he smiting anyone these days? We walked up and down the shops, visited Ronit at Chaya, oohed and aahed over the pretty things (well, and bought them, too. I can't just be expected to ooh and aah at Ronit's) . We went in and out of the arab quarter, which actually is a safe thing to do, according to my security advisor who moonlights as my father's cousin, because it was the first night of Ramadan, a month long celebration. Apparently, the last time some village guy tried to make trouble, the shopkeepers surrounded him, beat him to a pulp, and sent him back to his mother. Since then, it's been quiet and trouble free. Good to know.

After picking up our silver bracelets, we walked for 10 minutes down to Ben Yehuda street where every single overseas student in Jerusalem likes to congregate before Shabbat. I don't think any Israelis actually live anywhere near Ben Yehuda Street. Ari and I played Spot-the-American/Canadian earlier in the morning ( i didn't know how easy it was ), but the game goes on overload once you get down to BYS.

Weird event of the day: While about to get in the shower, I received a phone call....from sketchy-train-guy-Shai! Craziness. I didn't think people actually did that. Too funny.

Oh Jerusalem. If I forget thee, then I can forget about eating well ever again, because can David ever cook...