All For NS13.50, Less than $5-

Travelling on public transportation here in Israel is discounted for senior citizens, and if you know how to buy the "all day inclusive" chofshi yomi tickets, even for youngsters prices are very reasonable.

Things have been simplified. The country has been divided into districts. And to make life easier for the drivers and also speed up the trip for the passengers, we have to buy our tickets before boarding the bus. You either buy from special machines or a phone app, which unfortunately isn't compatible to all phones or use a special attachment, which costs only NS5- on your computer.

We have the special attachment. Just plug it into your computer, and register on the Ravkav site. Once you stick your actual Ravkav card into the plastic reader, you'll see how much money is in your card and all sorts of ticket possibilities.

You can choose your type of ticket and the date you need to travel. We generally buy the "all day inclusive" chofshi yomi ticket for the "Jerusalem Metropolitan Area," which not only covers Shiloh to Jerusalem  but as far as Ein Gedi to the southeast, Hebron to the south and includes Gush Etzion, Mevasseret Zion and Maale Adumim.

And the all day travel costs us only NS13.50. It would be double if we weren't senior citizens. That's still not much money at all.

For a bit more money we can buy a Jerusalem-Dan District all day ticket which would take us to Tel Aviv and beyond. There are more options. All can be found on the site.

Happy traveling!

Adventure on The New Jerusalem High Speed Train

One great advantage of our age and being retired is the opportunity for spontaneity. There are very few strictly scheduled events to worry about. After a lovely lunch in Center 1 with friends from all over the world, my longtime buddy and I decided to take the lightrail to the center of Jerusalem. Since we had a few minutes before the trolly's arrival, she wanted to ask some questions at the nearby Navon Train Station of the new Jerusalem High Speed Train. The young man at Information informed us that "today," meaning yesterday, we didn't need advance reservations to take the new train to Ben Gurion Airport. All we needed was our trusty Rav-kav.

And so, within seconds, we were on our way. The young friendly help staff assisted us in "purchasing" our free roundtrip tickets. We're still young enough to enjoy an unplanned adventure.

We had read about the Jerusalem High Speed Train, which like when the lightrail was new, is offering free rides. I must admit that I had been nervous about the long escalator ride underground. I'm still traumatized by old wooden escalators in the London Underground at Kings Cross to the Northern Line, which I had taken forty-three years ago. I must tell you that these new Jerusalem escalators are wonderful. I felt very safe and didn't feel any ear pressure when we got deep underground to the tracks.

In keeping with the festive mood of the pre-opening of the Jerusalem High Speed Train, we were given little chocolates. It was clear that many of the passengers, including young families, were on the train as a lark, like us, but there were also quite a few who appeared to be legitimate airplane travelers. They had lots of luggage with them.

We sat in the upper part of the train and looked out of the window, but it was disappointing to discover that a large portion of the route was in tunnels. We could see at times that we were speeding much more quickly than the cars of the parallel road.

The biggest time-waster was when we got back to Jerusalem and couldn't find an up escalator. All there seemed to be were a few much-too-small elevators. They were crowded and slow in coming. I think that only one was actually working. If that's so, then Gd willing it should be easier to get up once they're all fully functioning.

For people who live in or near Jerusalem, the Jerusalem High Speed Train is great. To and from Shiloh it isn't. We're actually as close to the airport as we are to Jerusalem. That's another reason why I enjoyed yesterday's adventure. I may never have another real opportunity to take the train.

eating the free chocolate candy

The actual train ride is just over twenty minutes in each direction, and there's a train every half hour.

In just over 90 minutes we traveled to Ben Gurion Airport, walked around the arrivals area and took the train back to Jerusalem.

Public Bus Travel Update, Easier Than I Thought

For the first time in ages, last Friday I traveled via the Jerusalem Central Bus Station. The last time I had taken a bus from there, I just had to say "senior" when I bought my ticket from the driver. I remember being "insulted" that he didn't claim I looked too young or at least ask for identification.

Now since I heard that I'd have to put money into my RavKav bus/train card and use it to pay, like a prepaid credit card, I was nervous. I had never done that before. Friends told me that it was the only way I could get the senior discount.

I'm lucky that I know Hebrew, because so many of the signs were Hebrew only, but the machine does have an English option. I went to a clerk; I prefer people. I asked him to put ns100 into my card, which he did. Of course I paid. I used a credit card.

The RavKav is personal. It has my Identity number and a photo of me. You only get a discount if you have a personal one, and you're old enough, or handicapped, of course.

Tourists pay full-fare. Actually a few years ago when I was in the states and took the train from New York to Philadelphia, I was told that my US passport didn't qualify me for senior discount. I needed a special American card. Later on in the visit my friend and I went to the special office to get one, and they still wouldn't give me. They said that I needed something other than a passport. And I'm an American citizen...

Apparently, here in Israel, if you're qualified for a discount, the sum you deposit in your card is doubled automatically. When you pay a fare, the "full fare" is subtracted from the card. But it's really the half fare, because as in my case the ns100 became ns200.

Not only was I able to use my RavKav to pay for the bus to Ashdod, but in Ashdod the local bus driver accepted it for payment to the hotel.

The only English signs I found in the bus station told people about the special bus to Ben-Gurion Airport and the bus to Tel Aviv. Information about depositing money in your RavKav was only in Hebrew. The powers there figure that anyone who's Israeli enough to have a RavKav must know Hebrew.

And if you need English explanations, I hope this blog post helped you.

Jerusalem Egged Buses Modernizing, Part 1

For the past few weeks, there have been announcements and warnings about major changes on Egged's Jerusalem buses.

To speed up travel, bus drivers will no longer be "clerks" selling tickets and making change. They aren't going the way of the American "exact change only." We are supposed to use these little machines to load our RavKav cards with the tickets we need.

This is fine if the bus stop has one of the machines, like the one here, and you have a charge/credit card and time. Some machines will take cash, and there are special RavKav centers in some of the malls around town. Passengers on the Jerusalem Lightrail have gotten used to the fact that we can't buy a ticket on the train, but the trains are more frequent than than many buslines. It can be very annoying to miss a bus that only comes every twenty minutes, because you were loading your card.

Frequent travelers who get a monthly pass will just have to deal with it once a month. Many other regular users of the trains and buses keep a number of trips on their card, so they won't be caught empty. You can check the content on those machines. For people like me, who usually begin our bus travels to Jerusalem in Egged Taavura, it's less problematic, since our bus drivers can load the RavKav cards with the various options. There are no ticket machines in our area.

The only people who will really find this problematic are tourists and others who don't have RavKav cards*, but I think they can be purchased from the machines and other places.

If I've gotten anything incorrect here, please let me know, thanks.

*There are two basic types of RavKav cards. One is the personal one, with a picture, registered to a single person. It automatically charges discount rates for the Senior Citizens and those officially recognized as handicapped by government authorities. The second is the "anonymous" card which can be used by anyone. It gives the 90 minute transfer but no senior/handicapped discount, nor can you do the special "all day" ticket.

The Saga of The Missing Bus Rides

Can this only happen to a Baile Rochel?

For someone who of my generation, knows nothing of computer/internet technology besides how to turn the various newfangled machines on and off, I still haven't a clue how a little card like this is the same as money when I travel here in Israel. I don't know how it usually at least pulls out/credits the right sort of fare and knows how long since I first got on the train or bus.

To me it's still science fiction in action when if you lose one, you can go to an office which has a computer program which can reproduce your account, so you don't lose money. You do have to pay a bit for a new card, though. And a couple of years ago, I discovered that the "paying machine kiosk" by the lightrail can show you how many rides and "packages" of rides the card is "storing."

When I first started using the Rav-Kav, רב-קו, I was always very nervous about being on the lightrail and discovering that it was empty. There's no place to pay on the train, and if an inspector comes on to check before you manage to get off to pay, you're fined a lot of money.

That's why I kept refilling the card with packages of twenty 20 rides long before I had finished a package. The card isn't all that smart. It doesn't finish a package before starting a new one. When I began to check I'd find three or four packages being billed. It would say something like:

6 rides
8 rides
3 rides
20 rides

I quickly got into the habit of checking, and then from one day to the next I was horrified to discover that the full package of "20 rides" had disappeared!!! Nobody had an answer for me as to where they had gone. I figured that some computer geek had hacked my account and stolen them.

A few months after that I began to get suspicious about the fact that rides seemed to get used up too quickly. Then I discovered that sometimes instead of getting the free within 90 minute transfer, the bus or train had billed another "package." After that I made a point of getting to absolute zero before buying a new ride package of 10 or 20 depending on how much cash I had to pay the driver. Yes, I had stopped trusting the machine by the train.

Last week I knew that I had reached zero on my previous bus ride, so when I got on a bus I was ready to pay. The driver was nasty and told me to put my card on one of the machines in the bus, since he didn't want to waste time. But I insisted that there was a good chance that I'd have to give him cash for a new "package." I put my card on the magic surface expecting a red light to flash indicating "empty."

Imagine my great surprise when it was green, and a receipt popped out saying I had 19 trips left. Yes, that package of twenty 20 had been there in my account all this time. Whew... I hadn't been robbed!!!

Raining Mud

Those of us in the mountainous parts of Israel had been warned about another snowstorm for last night and today. I had received numerous emails and phone calls begging me to change the day of the local elections scheduled for last night, but I kept on refusing.

"If it's snowing by 5:30pm, then we'll think about it," I kept telling everyone.

And to the comments about "stormy weather," as the evening progressed, I was incredulous.

"What storm? It's just a bit windy."
"Isn't it raining?"
"No."

The closest thing to a "storm" was the mud rain I found myself out in when trying to make my way home. Because of another RavKav (bus/train card) foul-up I had missed the 3:15 and 3:30 buses home. So I tremped, but it was one of my least pleasant attempts to tremp. I ended up waiting a long time in the nasty weather. There wasn't all that much rain, and whatever came down was mixed with sand, turning it into a "mud rain."

I'll have to launder my coat. I'm glad I don't wash windows. Car washes should be doing good business as soon as the weather clears.

"Card Game," The Perils of Public Transportation

It was no game of Solitaire, certainly not Free Cell or my favorite computer card game Spider Solitaire. We're not taking about those sorts of cards. The card that had me running all over the Jerusalem Central Bus Station.

The RavKav looks like such a cheery fun card in this picture. But today, it caused me much stress and aggravation. Early in the day it was fine. When I took the train and buses it worked, but I knew that there were few rides left within Jerusalem and none between Jerusalem (or Sha'ar Binyamin)-Shiloh. So I needed to fill it. I like to fill the Jerusalem trips in the City-Pass office in Binyan Clal and the Shiloh trips in the bus station. (That's a subject for another post.)

from a different day, but
there are always lines

My friend convinced me to try the machines by the train and promised to help. I had a bad experience trying to pay that way once, which is why I don't use them. We succeeded in putting 20 trips into the card. After that I took my nephew to lunch, introduced him to kubbehs- a north-African delicacy, did some shopping in Machane Yehuda and then walked to the bus station.

At the bus station I purposely chose a clerk who didn't look familiar because I've had too many bad experiences with some nasty ones. I told her what I wanted, paid and then... a red light kept going on when she tried to put the "trips" into the card, instead of the green light.

"Sorry, but something is wrong with your card."
"How could that be. I just put in 20 rides for inside Jerusalem."
"Yes, but now I can't work it. You need to go to the "Superbus" office near #1. Don't worry, he'll take care of it, and then you don't have to wait on line."

So I went to that office, opened the door and saw some guy behind a desk eating.

"Lady, I'm on a break. Come back at 2pm."  

It was then  1:30.

"But I'll miss my bus."
"So, what? It's my break. Can't you see?"
"You can go to hell," I replied. That's not what I'd normally say, but I always put down my fork/food when a customer needs me at work.

Then I ran back to the clerk, pushed my way to the front and told her that he was eating and wouldn't see me. She quickly made a phone call.

"Go to Reuven by #22. He's expecting you and will help."

Well, I pushed my way and the guy guarding the door listened, called to Reuven who said I should go to a different clerk. She tested my card and said it was fine. When I explained the problem, she said to go to Eyal at #17.  So I went there, and they said that he had gone home. Yes, I went back to the clerk. She couldn't understand why Reuven didn't help me. Luckily someone who seemed to be the supervisor was there. He heard the story and then took me back to Reuven who made me smile into the camera for a new card.

Then I took the new card back to the clerk who transferred the Shiloh-Jerusalem rides I had just bought to it, but she couldn't transfer the internal Jerusalem rides. Hopefully, that card will still work in Jerusalem, if not I have to go to the City-Pass office.

By 2pm I was waiting for the bus home, which came a couple of minutes later. But the story isn't over. I put the card on the bus's "card reader," and red-light went on. I almost had a nervous breakdown. There was no time to run back to the clerk. The driver told me to wait, when he heard that I had just loaded it. I took a front seat and waited. After we started the trip home to Shiloh, we tried the card again, and it did work, B"H.

Annoyed at the Jerusalem Bus Station

I don't go to the Jerusalem Central Bus Station aka CBS very often for various reasons. One is that I can pick up the bus to Shiloh  in other parts of Jerusalem. Another is that when possible I try to save money and tremp, meaning get a ride or hitchhike. 

Though I did go the other day, mostly because I needed to fill my "ravkav" prepaid bus/lightrail pass with more rides. I can get those at the bus station by paying with my credit card, saving me cash and the inconvenience of having to deal with money and change when traveling to and from work. 

When I got there, I saw that two out of three pay stations were closed, and there was a long line for the only open one.

This was very annoying. It also blocked access to the buses, so people kept breaking through to catch their bus.

I got to the back of the line and rushed forward when another opened. One woman was ahead, but she needed such complicated help it took almost as long as if I hadn't gotten on the newly opened one. At least the clerk was pleasant, and I had the time. Some of those clerks are awfully nasty. If I would treat my customers like they do, I'd be fired in a jiffy.

Controlling the Panic, Thank G-d

Today is the first Friday in Israel post-Daylight Savings Time.  I have to keep reminding myself that I have much less time to do all the Friday, pre-Shabbat chores.

Usually when I work on a Thursday I take out my yoman, little pocket diary/calendar, and write down next week's schedule. I had been about it a couple of times during my shift, but I was always distracted, and then my boss told me that she still had to go over it and finalize it.

Recently, I've been keeping the yoman,  in a little bag with my equally small and pocketable T'hillim (Psalms) and Mincha Siddur (Afternoon Prayer book.)  I used to wear a second "fanny pack," wearable pocketbook which had them and meant that I always had those little books with me.  By wearing two "pouches" or "fanny packs" I was able to keep my cellphone and ravkav (public transportation ticket) separate. There are those who say that the phone can erase the pre-bought rides.  But recently to take pressure off of my back and pelvis, I started wearing only one.  And being a female, whose clothes don't have pockets most of the time, I need my phone, wallet, keys and camera in the pouch on me all the time when out of the house. And to make things more complicated, now I have to move the little bag around to make sure it's always "with me."  I have my Matan day backpack, in which my Bible studies books "live," and my work backpack which houses things I just need for work and is big enough to hold most of the shopping I do at Rami Levy each time I go to work in Yafiz.

Yesterday I had morning shift.  Now that we're no longer on Daylight Savings Time, I find myself in a rush to find the time to say my T'hillim (part of a group in which we commit to say certain chapters daily) and doven mincha pray the afternoon prayer before the sun begins to go down.  I've been working an hour or more after the end of morning shift recently.  That means that sometimes I have to use my "break time" for those things.  Yesterday I signed out first and then sat down near the exit to start.  But, you guessed it, I couldn't find the bag with those three little books.  I had no way of knowing if I had just left them at home or the bag had gotten lost.  There wasn't enough time to just say "so I'll doven and say T'hillim at home.  I needed to do it immediately.  I had no idea who would have those books, but I did know where I could possibly find them.

There's a small synagogue in the Rami Levy Supermarket.  I ran there, turned on the lights, found some books and quickly began T'hillim. I was planning on staying there until I had finished everything, but suddenly there was an announcement on the loudspeaker for Mincha.  Since there's no Ezrat Nashim, women's section, I took the siddur outside and finished dovening where I had attempted to start, near the exit/entrance.  I then reentered the store and asked a man near the shul to return the siddur for me, did my shopping and went home.

I kept telling myself that I had heard that you can go to the "citypass" Ravkav office and they can reproduce the card if it's lost, because all of my ticket purchases and travel are computerized in their humongous data base.  But, Baruch Hashem, thank G-d I found the small bag on the table.  So I was right. There was no need to panic.