How to Get from Here to There

April 22, 2009

Linda and I alighted from the #480 and boarded the #21 to take us close to the King David Hotel to meet our friends Pat and Norman. The bus was packed. We found ourselves sitting face-to-face, actually I was sitting knee-to-knee, with a young ultra-Orthodox man, who had flowing red peiot, a scraggly red beard, and thick wire glasses. He seemed nervous or perhaps absorbed in thought, when, after a few minutes, he asked in Hebrew where Rivka Street was. Even with Linda’s Hebrew, we could not provide much assistance, so he turned to an Orthodox man across the aisle who was similarly ignorant about the street. Then, I remembered that I had our detailed road map of Jerusalem with me, so with the same feeling that one gets trying to read a newspaper on the subway or in an airplane, I somehow managed to twist and turn the map to find the index in which Rivka was listed, and then twist, turn, and fold the map to find the coordinates. There indeed was Rivka St., quite a way from where we were on Jaffe St. I motioned to the man and showed him where Rivka St. was located, but the small quadrant was of no help, because we could not relate it to where we currently were. I unfolded most of the map and, because he was facing us, I turned it upside down, so he could see the writing, although he could not read English. We traced along Jaffe, to King George, to Emek Refaim which eventually led to the cross street of Rivka. He seemed to be relieved and although we got off the bus long before Rivka Street, I hope that we were able to be helpful to him.

After lunch on the terrace at the King David Hotel (recall Paul Newman in Exodus), we headed to the Tower of David Museum. Built into the walls of the Old City citadel. The museum expertly traces the history of Jerusalem from its earliest known history, about 3000 years ago, to modern times. Our main goal for the afternoon, however, was the City of David, a remarkable excavation beyond the southern wall of the Old City, on the moderately severe slope, leading into the Kidron Valley and that begins Mt. Moriah, on which the Temple Mount stands in the Old City. As is so often the case in Eastern Jerusalem, however, this site also contains not just remarkably valuable historical evidence, but remarkably challenging contemporary conflict, as the Jews and the Arabs struggle over housing (see the April 13 posting for a link to an Haaretz article about this site). This appears to be a very popular site in that the welcome area was swarming with school-aged children, teens, and adults in groups, large and small. The City of David website will do far more justice than I to describing this site, especially with its pictures and graphics. That said, our guide, Guy, who seemed to be in his late 20s, was dressed in a kippah and tzitzit, and we later learned was the proud father of a 6 week old baby, as well as a 2 year old and 4 year old. Indeed, his wife called on his cellphone twice during our 3 hour tour, obviously with her hands full. Including the guide, there were only 6 in our group, the sixth a young college aged traveler.

The discovery of a pool and steps which, when the recently initiated excavations are completed, will apparently lead up to the site of the Temple Mount is stunning. What has received so much lay archeological attention, however, is Hezekiah’s tunnel. Built to bring water from outside the walls during the anticipated siege of Jerusalem by the Assyrians in around 700 b.c.e., the tunnel is carved through solid rock for about 1/3 of a mile. Probably the first thing that anybody says is that if you are claustrophobic, it’s not for you. After working our way through sites as we moved down the slope, we come to the external entrance of the tunnel. There, everybody changes to their water shoes, puts on shorts or lifts their skirts, and takes out their flashlights. Then we climb down one or two steps into cool water that begins at about 8 inches as we snake our way through this incredible work of engineering that is perhaps 3 feet wide and about 6 feet in height, although some spots are only 5 feet. Within a few feet the water climbs to about 30 inches, but only for 10 or 20 feet, before resuming its depth of 6 to 8 inches. A little more than halfway through the tunnel, we reach a replica of the plaque that had been carved by the tunnellers to announce their accomplishment (apparently the original is in a Turkish museum, plundered during Ottoman times). Emerging at the other end, one is still both baffled by how they could have accomplished this with chisels and hammers, and in awe.