The City of David

I’m back for more Jerusalem recapping. To catch you up: there’s a lot to do in the Holy City. For example, you could visit the City of David, which we happened to do. Coincidence? Don’t over-think it.

The City of David is the site of an ongoing archaeological dig located in a very old part of Jerusalem.

There’s some controversy surrounding the findings so far, which should come as no surprise to you. Jerusalem attracts a lot of controversy. For example: where can you find the best bagel in the Old City?  Holy Bagels or Tal Bagels? Oh, the controversy!

We joined a guided City of David tour, which turned out to be mostly useless because for every clever question meant to stump, baffle, and amaze us, my dad knew the answer. After a while he just stopped answering questions, but I could tell he was quietly suffering.

Our tour guide was actually very sweet. At one point she made a joke about King David carving “Dave & Sheeba 4 Eva” into a tree, and the crowd paused awkwardly and then let out a belated chuckle. I guess it’s a thing to hate humor now?

The guided tour took almost three hours. There was a lot of interesting stuff about water tunnels and engineering and history, but much of it was lost on me because the tunnels were craggy, bumpy, and low-ceilinged. Most of my mental and physical efforts were spent on proudly representing the family name by not tripping like an idiot.

One time in high school I took the Myers-Briggs, so I know myself pretty well, and I knew that I would feel safer and more at ease once I was back on a wide, well-lit path. I was right.

We became quite fond of our tour guide, even if she did spend a lot of time preaching to the choir (the choir being my dad). She posed cheerfully with  my mum and her BFF at no extra cost:

By the time we had learned all we could learn about Hezekiah’s Tunnel, Warren’s Shaft, the Pool of Shiloach, and the Bottomless Pit where you die of starvation (you’ll have to visit the City of David to find out which of those things I just made up), it was dark and we were hungry.

We rested our legs and stuffed our faces at the Armenian Tavern. The food was tasty, the company pleasant, and the atmosphere charming.

It was a very good day, followed by me sleeping for at least 10 hours. One thing (in addition to the many other things) I will say about Jerusalem: it’s exhausting.