I don't think I've talked about Israeli drivers yet. So here are the rules of the road:
1. Green means keep going and red means you can go if there are no other cars
2. You can drive in whatever lane you want, that includes the middle
3. You can immediately switch lanes without warning, that includes going from the far left to the far right to switch lanes.
4. If you almost crash, which happens often, you can get out of the car and start yelling at each other in the middle of the road
5. There's no speed limit
6. If you do crash, then you can still yell at each other in the middle of the road
7. If you're a pedestrian, red means don't cross and green means cross. This is the one rule that they do follow. There is a fine if you don't. But none of the Americans follow this rule because if the light is red and there are no cars coming, why not cross?
8. check the horn because although it's not often used, a foreigner will always use it due to the way Israelis drive.
9. remember...you can always just stop in the middle of the road and do whatever you need to do
We left for the Negev/Ramon Crater early Friday morning when no college student back home has gone to sleep (5:30 am). We made it to Be'ersheva in five hours where we stopped at a shuk for breakfast, but not before getting into an accident. The bus driver and the car driver started yelling at each other from their cars and then we pulled over and there was a whole debacle, but I think that it was the car's fault. Everytime I'm on a bus, I see a car almost hit the bus so it was bound to happen, but it was totally the car's fault. Anyway, we also passed Be'ersheva University so now I know where my brother was for a year...the middle of nowhere. After getting food at the shuk, we went to Ben Gurion's grave and home. It was nothing too exciting. David Ben Gurion, a prime minister of Israel and one of the original pioneers, lived in a simple but nice home. His grave site overlook was gorgeous and peaceful. We drove to Advat and after lunch, we learned about the history of the Spice Path and the Nabaeteens. There was a bunch of old ruins which was interesting to see and our tour guide told us their story. Finally, we made it to Ramon Crater and we walked up to an overlook and managed to fit forty people on a small platform. By sunset, we headed off to the Bedouin tent and made a dinner of pita, meat, and various salads. After a shortened Kab. Shab. (Kabblat Shabbat), we ate. And for dessert we had s'mores, but one of the madrichim forgot to bring the chocolate bars so we used chocolate spread which was just as good. We were also served Bedouin tea, but it was too sweet for me.
The next morning we awoke at a more reasonable time and had breakfast. I think that I had too much coffee (only a cup, a literal cup) because I had so much energy for the rest of the day, but that was a good thing. We hiked from 9 in the morning until 430 in the afternoon. We walked in and along the crater. It's not actually a crater because no foreign body hit it. I think that it used to be a mountain and it was eroded so now there's a big whole in the ground. We took breaks during the hike, but not a lot which was good because hiking with forty people is only fun when we don't stop every five minutes. We also climbed the mountain (I want to say Har Hebron, but I think that's wrong) at the end of the trail and you could see everything! It was gorgeous especially since the sun was beginning to set. I tried to take panaromic pictures of the view. Oh, and the climb up was at a 100% slant. It was a straight line up. But that's because we were all racing each other (only 15 people did this everyone else stayed at the bottom) and the path kinda ended, or so we though, and we made up our own path. Going down was easier because this time the tour guide was in front of us and showed is the path. It was a tiring, but really fun weekend. This week is full of stupid presentations and tests. Ick.
Pictures will be in the next blog. Or when I have time. Or when I want to procrastinate. One of those.
1. Green means keep going and red means you can go if there are no other cars
2. You can drive in whatever lane you want, that includes the middle
3. You can immediately switch lanes without warning, that includes going from the far left to the far right to switch lanes.
4. If you almost crash, which happens often, you can get out of the car and start yelling at each other in the middle of the road
5. There's no speed limit
6. If you do crash, then you can still yell at each other in the middle of the road
7. If you're a pedestrian, red means don't cross and green means cross. This is the one rule that they do follow. There is a fine if you don't. But none of the Americans follow this rule because if the light is red and there are no cars coming, why not cross?
8. check the horn because although it's not often used, a foreigner will always use it due to the way Israelis drive.
9. remember...you can always just stop in the middle of the road and do whatever you need to do
We left for the Negev/Ramon Crater early Friday morning when no college student back home has gone to sleep (5:30 am). We made it to Be'ersheva in five hours where we stopped at a shuk for breakfast, but not before getting into an accident. The bus driver and the car driver started yelling at each other from their cars and then we pulled over and there was a whole debacle, but I think that it was the car's fault. Everytime I'm on a bus, I see a car almost hit the bus so it was bound to happen, but it was totally the car's fault. Anyway, we also passed Be'ersheva University so now I know where my brother was for a year...the middle of nowhere. After getting food at the shuk, we went to Ben Gurion's grave and home. It was nothing too exciting. David Ben Gurion, a prime minister of Israel and one of the original pioneers, lived in a simple but nice home. His grave site overlook was gorgeous and peaceful. We drove to Advat and after lunch, we learned about the history of the Spice Path and the Nabaeteens. There was a bunch of old ruins which was interesting to see and our tour guide told us their story. Finally, we made it to Ramon Crater and we walked up to an overlook and managed to fit forty people on a small platform. By sunset, we headed off to the Bedouin tent and made a dinner of pita, meat, and various salads. After a shortened Kab. Shab. (Kabblat Shabbat), we ate. And for dessert we had s'mores, but one of the madrichim forgot to bring the chocolate bars so we used chocolate spread which was just as good. We were also served Bedouin tea, but it was too sweet for me.
The next morning we awoke at a more reasonable time and had breakfast. I think that I had too much coffee (only a cup, a literal cup) because I had so much energy for the rest of the day, but that was a good thing. We hiked from 9 in the morning until 430 in the afternoon. We walked in and along the crater. It's not actually a crater because no foreign body hit it. I think that it used to be a mountain and it was eroded so now there's a big whole in the ground. We took breaks during the hike, but not a lot which was good because hiking with forty people is only fun when we don't stop every five minutes. We also climbed the mountain (I want to say Har Hebron, but I think that's wrong) at the end of the trail and you could see everything! It was gorgeous especially since the sun was beginning to set. I tried to take panaromic pictures of the view. Oh, and the climb up was at a 100% slant. It was a straight line up. But that's because we were all racing each other (only 15 people did this everyone else stayed at the bottom) and the path kinda ended, or so we though, and we made up our own path. Going down was easier because this time the tour guide was in front of us and showed is the path. It was a tiring, but really fun weekend. This week is full of stupid presentations and tests. Ick.
Pictures will be in the next blog. Or when I have time. Or when I want to procrastinate. One of those.
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