My Israeli adventure, Part 2: The Saturday

It feels a bit strange to be writing about my Israeli trip, while actually I've been traveling to places in Belgium and the Netherlands last weekend, but let's try to keep it chronological. :) I just hope I won't end up being too lazy to write about all the places I've visited this winter. ;)

Today I'll write about my Saturday in Israel. Even though nowadays the majority of Israelis aren't very religious anymore, Saturday or Shabbat (which actually starts on Friday after the sunset) remains a very special day. I'd say that its of bigger importance than Sunday for Europeans, which isn't so much different from other week days anymore. At first, I was quite surprised to learn that there was no public transport on Saturdays in Israel (maybe just on Saturday evenings, but that's already Sunday according to the religious laws). I'm sure they could find people to work as bus or train drivers on Saturday, especially if they'd be paid more than on normal days. Yet it turns out to be a huge political discussion and one of the examples of Israel being a country of big contrasts - and sometimes contradictions. On one hand, it's a very liberal country, which even recognizes gay marriages (it means that same sex couples can't get married in Israel, but if they do it abroad, the state of Israel will recognize their marriage - I don't think Ukraine will have such progressive laws anytime soon!), but on the other hand there are no trains on Saturday, because it might offend the religious people. It might be not very logical, but if you think of Israel as of home to people coming from all around the world and following slightly different traditions, it must be difficult to maintain the balance and build a harmonic society. Moreover, it seems to me that most of Israelis have cars, so they don't get upset about lack of trains as much as I do! ;)

On Friday the weather was just terrible, it was raining almost all the time, but I think I was still rather lucky to have just one day like that during my whole stay in Israel. We went on a short walk to the seaside during the day and then in the evening I asked my friend, whether we could go to the local synagogue. I've been to a few synagogues in Europe, but never during a service, so it was a really special experience for me, even if I could barely understand anything. :) Later we had a fancy supper at my friend's home, which is one of the few traditions that secular Israelis still keep on Saturdays.

Fortunately, on Saturday the weather was better and so my friend's brother was kind enough to take us by car to Caesarea Maritima - an ancient port and town founded by Herod the Great about 25 - 13 BCE. 

Caesarea Maritima

During its long history the town used to belong to Arabs, Crusaders and the Byzantine empire and has survived several earthquakes before turning into ruins. Nowadays it seems to be quite popular among tourists even in January.

I think it was a mosque. And palm trees of course :)

It was quite cold and raining sometimes, but we've been able to walk a bit, as well as to watch a short movie about Caesarea's history and to drink some coffee. :) Actually, I'm a bit surprised to see how nice the sky looks like on my photos thanks to the changeable weather.

The sea looked really beautiful.

Later we relaxed a bit and in the evening went to Old Jaffa together with my friend's parents. It's an ancient port city (I think it's over 4000 years old), but nowadays it's actually a part of Tel Aviv (therefore the official name of the city is Tel-Aviv-Yaffo).

The famous clocktower in Jaffa.

The clocktower, built in the beginning of 20th century in honor of a Turkish sultan, is one of the most popular Jaffa's landmarks. And yes, there are palm trees growing next to it, so I had something to get excited about! ;) We got a bit lost walking around the old town, but finally have found some really lovely streets.

A street in Old Jaffa.

It's also a very multicultural place. I'm not (yet) great at Israel's history, but as far as I know, until the 20th century Jaffa's population was mostly Arab. Nowadays there are also quite a few mosques and churches. 

A mosque. And a palm tree! :)

I'm glad we went to Jaffa in the evening, because old towns have a really unique atmosphere at night. Of course, I'm not great at taking pictures in darkness, but does that really matter? :) I think the wonderful memories are much more important. Thanks to my friend's family I had a lovely Saturday in Israel despite lack of trains! :) And the next day we went to Jerusalem, but that's something I'm going to tell you about in my next blog entry. :)