Chronicles of the Holy Land: Part 2

It's not weird, it's different.

We quickly learned that they do some things differently in Israel:

Pizza - we have a problem:
They don't mix meat and dairy food at any meal. It's either a meat meal, or a dairy meal. Never the two shall meet.

This might lead to, for example, an interesting lunchtime experience in which one attempts to purchase a slice of pizza (clearly dairy) and take in into the falafel restaurant (clearly meat) to join one's friends and winds up getting yelled at by the falafel shop owner "NO DAIRY!!!". One then finds oneself eating pizza alone in the Old City. Never fear, however. This makes for some good people watching.

Going down?
The Shabbat elevator.

Fantastic for those who observe the rules of the sabbath and want a long, leisurely ride down to the lobby from the 13th floor.

Not so fantastic for the Christian tourist who merely wants to meet up with the rest of the group in the lobby quickly before they leave the hotel.

The result? About 15 people in a teeny, tiny elevator, stopping at every floor on the way down, all the while adding to the number inside the overburdened elevator car.

Word to the wise: your elevator ride will take more than 60 seconds if you are trying to depart your hotel around sundown on Saturday in Jerusalem. Just accept that as a reality.

Et tu, tofu?
Again, the meat and the dairy. This time, lesson #2. You think we would have learned by now, but no.

One of the last, and best, meals that we had was at a kibbutz in the Galilee. Wow. I mean, these folks grow their own food, and they do a darn fine job if I say so myself.

At dinner one night, which was clearly a meat meal, even to the untrained eye, a group of us gals found ourselves eyeing what looked to be a very fine display of ice cream. We concocted a lovely sundae out of the ice cream and went to town. I'm no ice cream snob or anything, but this stuff was just incredible. We just kept eating and eating, wondering how they made such tasty stuff.

Finally, we asked our guide what kind of ice cream this was. Godiva? Blue bell? Sorbetto? Do tell!

Tofu.

Soy-based.

And at that, my mouth dropped open. I had been betrayed by dairy. Tofu, I never knew ye.