After sleeping in a bit, we all met downstairs for a delicious breakfast at the hotel. Man, these Israelis know how to eat! We decided to go to Sheinkin Street, which has a lot of stores, and do a little perusing. Mike, Pat, Julie, Aaron, Andrew, Jody and myself walked down there (about a 10 minute walk), and got to the big intersection of Sheinkin and Allenby. It was there that the Shuk (market) was. Pat didn’t want to go in there, so we decided to head on up Sheinkin and see what we could find. Aaron and Andrew and I split off from the others, and went in search of an ATM. We finally found one – at the end of the street. Interesting fact: in Israel, ATM passcodes are only 4 digits. So if you’re using a bank card from another country, you have to make sure your passcode is 4 digits – otherwise, you can’t get cash. I didn’t realize this, and my passcode is 7 digits. Hmm. I was unable to get any money. That’s not good! (Well, that’s why we have credit cards!)
We stopped into a pharmacy to pick up some drinks (it was a very hot day) and then worked our way back where we met up with Jody at the big intersection. We then decided to head into the Shuk, and got about halfway through before we decided to turn back (just before the meat section). It was crazy and bustling, and no one really found anything they wanted to buy. Once we got back out to the intersection, though Andrew did find some T-shirts he wanted to get printed, so he and Aaron did that while Jody and I walked back towards the hotel. On the way, we ended up walking behind someone who looked very familiar…. turned out to be Eli, our crazy driver from yesterday! We said “Hi”, and he mentioned how he was looking forward to seeing us for our trip to Jerusalem tomorrow. Uh oh. He wasn’t supposed to be going with us; we didn’t want him!! So Jody and I headed back to the hotel to let the powers-that-be know that Eli might be driving us, and they should fix that ASAP!