So … we’re here, which you probably knew if you read the site yesterday. I know we didn’t give a whole lot of detail, but there’s only so much you can say after getting 3 hours sleep in a 24 hour period! It wasn’t as bad as we thought it would be as both boys did outstanding.
On the flight from Boston to Germany, we took off at 4:40 PM and landed after the 6 hour flight. That meant that we were waking the boys at 11:00 PM their time. It really didn’t matter with Isaac, but Jake only had a few hours on that first flight. Thankfully, we were able to use one of the Lufthansa business lounges to find a corner for Jake to catch another 4 hours sleep before getting on the next flight. The flight from Germany to Tel Aviv was only 4 hours, and while Jake did not sleep at all, Isaac slept the entire time. While the total sleep time for both of them was only 6 instead of the normal 12 hours, neither of them were those “kids behind me that cried the whole time”. Phew. Jake was excited to be travelling on an “uff”. No food issues. No crying. No pressure.
Arriving in Tel Aviv, I was worried about saying that I would be working here for two months as the papers explicitly stated that you could not be employed in Israel if you were here on a 3 month tourist pass. I guess that I’m not technically “employed” in Israel. Regardless, it was simple and easy making it through. No problems.
The real problems started with the car rental. I go to the rental place and I don’t see a Trifty and I KNOW I made Thrifty reservations – i even have a confirmation code. A quick question and I learned they operate through an Israeli partner here so I approached their desk and they had the info. At first, I asked what kind of car we would have because I was concerned about getting to the apartment with 9 weeks worth of clothes, toys and gear for the four of us. After a little negotiation, I upped them from a tiny car to a small car.
As I signed the final contract, I happened to glance at the cost per day and noticed it was $20 instead of the $12 that I had confirmed for. (This sounds cheap until you realized they have a mandatory $17/day coverage car for theft and acts of … ummm … vandalism? The total price was $29/day.) I asked about the extra $8 (for an extra $500 over the full time) and they looked at me blankly and said, “What, we don’t have a rate at only $12.” To which I replied that I had both a confirmation code, but also an email with the explicit price of $84/week. They got on the phone with Thrifty and I think it turned out there was some miscommunication with the partner agreement.
After standing there for 30 minutes listening to them go back and forth, the lady got off and told me, “I think it’s your lucky day. It turns out they made a mistake and you will get the car for a TOTAL, insurance included, of $21/day. ” Do the math on that. It means we were getting the for a car for $4 per day outside of insurance. I wasn’t about to complain. We didn’t end up getting a small car though. it ended up being between a tiny and small car – a sminy car. And it didn’t have enough room for all our luggage.
That’s OK. My backup plan was to take the boys and some luggage and send Heidi and the majority of the luggage in a taxi while I followed them. It worked out “OK”?
I’m sitting in the car about to leave the airport and I wait for Heidi to walk over to the arrivals section and get in a taxi – which she does with the luggage. She gets in and motions for us to follow. Note that I’m not exactly “following” here because I’m in the paid rental section. While the taxi can pull away from the airport no problem, I have to go through a toll. This means they disappear out of sight. Guess what? It’s not just a place that you can pull off the roadway and wait – security is more likely than not to shoot and ask questions later for pulling off the road at the airport. As they disappear, I’m thinking that I gave the directions to Heidi and I can only go on what I remember from going to the web site a week back and printing directions. I pay the toll and leave. Going from memory, I follow the road through at least 3 road splits and … see them ahead of me pulled over. Praise the Lord.
Heidi was trying to tell the driver (she tells me after) that he should go ahead and I would follow. As he didn’t speak any English, it didn’t turn out to be so simple, but he got the message and she gave him the directions. Guess what? Directions in english mean little to Israelis who read and speak Hebrew. Oh well … he figured it out … and I followed. We finally got to our apartment around 6:00 PM – 3 hours after we landed. Checking in wasn’t too much problem. A supermarket next door provided the milk, juice, and cereal we needed for breakfast, and the pizza place across the road provided supper. Bed welcomed us around 8:00 or so (with Jake only wanting to go to bed with us).
Jake had a bad night last night though, which meant that we did as well. Jake and Isaac decided morning was at 2:00 AM. I only was up for an hour or so, but my wonderful wife was up for four and a half hours with Jake. Activities of the evening? Reading books, dropping things on the tile floor, eating peanut butter and jelly sandwiches, etc. Anyway, at about 6:00, Jake says that he wants to go to bed … 🙂
I was up this morning at 8:00 with Isaac and Jake let Heidi sleep till 10:00 or so. Early shift. Late shift. We’ll be on shiftwork here for the next few days I’m sure. As most people don’t get to work until 10:30 here in Israel, it works out well for the morning, but not so well for the evening.
More later on the first day at work. We’ll probably crash early tonight … 🙂