Travelling to Jerusalem from London gave me mixed feelings.
There was the ongoing political situation with no resolution in sight and then there was the suppressed religious side of me buried from the experience of going to a Catholic school as a child and learning all about the religious stories of the first and second testaments of the bible. Palestine or Israel, if you prefer, has long been the claimed holy land of different religions with each of them placing a different historical trace back to this land. My reasons for visiting the Holy land was not to fulfil my religious needs…I have not considered myself a Christian or any religion for over twenty years (Buddhism would be my choice). I do however feel that the stories communicated through various holy books to be a great source of information that I consider more than anything else to be a great historical, astrological and scientific timeline. My journey to the Holy Land was to both explore the location that these historical stories are based in whilst also discovering the current divide of the Israeli and Palestinian territories.
Landing in Tel Aviv airport around 8:30pm I had researched that I could use a shared minibus called a Sherut. The Sherut was a cheap, regular and efficient way of travelling from Tel Aviv airport to Jerusalem. They run 24 hours a day and are a reliable alternative to buses and taxis.
Twenty minutes into the journey, whilst seated at the back of a full Sherut I noticed that it started to rain. We were on the motorway that led into Jerusalem, located approximately 50Km away. Very quickly the rain turned into light snow. The light snow started to get heavier to the point that the minibus had to stop….the wheels were stuck. So there we were, all of a sudden….in a snowstorm. Roads became gridlocked, cars were swerving to get out of the snow and the Israeli men in our minibus attempted to push us out of the snow.
So just like that, I was stuck in an emergency situation. I shared the packed bus with about 10 others and 3 of them were from the UK. One of them was a women who was more interested in the photos I was taking that “Might” become useful to her daughter, an editor of a Jewish newspaper based in London. She passed me her email address requesting firmly that I sent her those photos ASAP. After sitting in the cramped minibus for over an hour, tired, cold and fed up, emailing photos was not my priority. As I looked outside the window, the snow was coming down heavily and the task of being rescued became a wish.
Using the ‘photo’ woman as a translator, I went to the front to ask the driver how far we were from the centre of Jerusalem to which he replied at a guess… 10-15km.
I contemplated walking. I did not want to be stuck all night on a bus.
I discussed my idea with the other english speakers, trying to convince them to join me. A different women that was travelling with her son begged me not to attempt it and she was perfectly right to do this. It was cold, snowing, dark, I was carrying a large backpack and I did not know the full address of my hostel.
The adventurer in me kicked in and I decided to go for it. Once I had made this decision, there was no turning back. This trait in me has so far worked out in my life, by believing in myself and using my strong intuition, it has always guided me safely to where I’m meant to be.
As I wished everyone goodbye and resisted their pleas for me to stay in the bus, I grabbed my backpack and over the shoulder bags and walked through the snow in the direction the driver had given me. A few minutes away there was a bus stop which also gave free wifi. I intially had 15% battery, but after taking a few photos and videos, I was shocked when this quickly went down to 2% so I desperately tried to type in the name of my hostel but everything turned into hebrew. Damn.
Video
I walked for about an hour alongside the motorway, secretly excited about the task ahead. In the near distance off of the main road I could see some shops, cars and people. With my phone battery now dead, I walked into a bakery shop (with no food displayed) asking them if they knew how to get to the square my hostel was located on. They all looked at me with a blank stare so I thanked them in hebrew and walked out. I realised that I was lost at this point! The local roads off of the motorway were not gridlocked and a few cars were moving slowly along in the slushy snow. Desperate measures resulted in me standing in the middle of the road with the attempt to hitch hike.
After a few cars almost driving into me, one stopped. There were 3 men and one women and they looked at me with curiosity. I asked if I could get a lift but then they drove off.
As I continued walking, I noticed a few men playing outside with the snow, a rarity in Jerusalem. I started to ask people for directions. Some passed me onto english speakers who would indicate the direction I should walk in and ask for help once I got there. This wasted a lot of time. Some of the directions were wrong, sending me uphill with all my bags and realising at the top that it was the wrong direction.
I found myself in a busy road with lots of men observing a tree that had fallen on top of a car in the snowstorm. People were throwing snow at each other and I only saw men and no women or children. I tried my luck asking for directions again, giving out the name of my hostel and the square it was located on. One man took me to a very helpful man that was originally from New York. He gave precise directions telling me it was a very long walk and to be careful.
I followed his directions and found myself lost at the end. I saw two local women looking out of their window who laughed at me for being out all alone in this mess. Thankfully, I laughed with them which led to them giving me my last set of directions through an alleyway that led me straight to the hostel!
When I got inside, I realised how wet, cold and tired I was. The hostel manager looked at me strangely asking what had happened to me. When I told him, he said I was crazy for walking 3 hours in the middle of the night in this city. The next day, my story had travelled to other people staying at the hostel. Everyone was stuck inside due to the snowstorm, there was no transport running. I reflected on my previous night and thought about how most people in the world want to be helpful, they want to be kind but some people really don’t care. Its only in some desperate situation that you really get to see the world for what it really is.
I also used my time getting to know some great other travellers and managed to send my photos to the lady from the bus whilst also asking her on the email what happened after I left them. She replied that they were eventually rescued and had to sleep in a shelter for the night. She didn’t bother to thank me for the photos or ask how my experience was.
But, it wasn’t all bad. She got her photos and I had arrived safely in Jerusalem.
