No cause for alarm

So, it seems there is a war going on. One of Kyle's roommates had two classes cancelled the other day because her professors got called up. Professors. Called up. Professors! Other than the stray academic ditching the University in favor of combat, life goes on as normal here.

We spent New Year's Eve in Tel Aviv at a tacky British pub that had Strongbow on tap. I was still in the thick of the "French Crud"--the potent, fever-inducing cold that wiped out the whole family over Christmas. On Jan 1st, we reassembled my bike, which had been taped up for the plane in a box that was my approximate height and about three times my width. We wheeled the baggage-laden bike to the central bus station. A security guard at the door was checking everyone's bag on the way in, but Kyle sweet-talked him into letting us in with the bike, and the guard didn't even look at any of the huge bags strapped to it. So much for security.

Getting onto the actual bus was trickier. The bags fit into the cargo space easily, but the space next to the open hatch was filled with huge suitcases from all the other passengers. The hatch doors on the other side of the bus, where there was space, were closed. Two thin, middle-aged Asian men saw Kyle and I trying to figure out how to fit the bike. "Push!" one of them said. The two of them proceeded to wave us out of the way, bend 90 degrees at the waist, and shove the heap of suitcases toward the back of the cargo hold. The bus driver started honking at us, and finally, with a little more shoving, we fit the bike. As soon as we got to Jerusalem, Kyle fell victim to the French Crud.

A few days later, when Kyle had started to kick the Crud, we ventured out to the Old City. In one afternoon, we saw the holiest Jewish and Christian sites in the world: the Western Wall and the Church of the Holy Sepulchre. The 2000-year-old W-Wall was part of the retaining wall that held the Temple Mount, on which the Second Temple was built. The temple was destroyed by the Romans in 70AD, and this bit of wall is the holiest part of what's left of the original construction. The Church of the Holy Sepulchre was built over the places where Jesus was crucified and buried. One can actually go see his tomb.

The day after our trip through biblical history, we decided to try a more modern excursion: to Jerusalem's mall. The way there involved a minor bus mishap, where we went to the northern outskirts of the city, only to find ourselves at the end of the bus line opposite the location of the mall. When we finally arrived, we had to stand in a ten-minute line to have our bags checked and walk through a metal detector before we were unleashed in a huge, US-style, indoor mall. We made a bee-line for the food court and were rewarded with lukewarm, kosher Chinese food. Delicious. We walked around the stores for awhile and then saw a bad American movie. Halfway through, a Hebrew word flashed on the screen and the lights came up. Was the film broken? Did we have to evacuate to a bomb shelter? No one around us seemed to be alarmed. It was only intermission.