Tel Aviv – Tips For the Visitor

“Brilliant! A cheap flight coming back on Saturday evening from Tel Aviv,” I unwittingly enthused. My Airbnb host cheerfully pointed out that this was because there is no public transport on a Saturday afternoon. Because of the Shabbat. And despite the Ashkenazi ^[I] and lo, I am part Ashkenazi – ask my DNA according to 123andrapeyourgeneticprivacy – just like Scarlett Johansson and her imaginary twin sister pronouncing it SHAH-bus, there ain’t gonna be no bus on the day of rest.

How to get to Ben Gurion Airport from Tel Aviv on the Shabbat.

Okay, I’ve got nothing. Taxis for more than the price of the Easy^[II]Difficult?Jet flight are out, just on principal.

Lime looks like an electric scooter rental provider operating in Tel Aviv. But perhaps not. I can’t unlock one of the many Lime scooters as the app refuses to verify any of my ID, which makes me suspect it’s an elaborate ruse to gain photos of identification documents for sale on the black market.^[III]Black Market being the name of a sneaker shop down the road

A 5 hour walk to the airport of just 24km. My Airbnb host shook his head many times when I suggested making the anti-Shabbat spite-hike. Possibly because he’s an observer of the day of rest.

So all I’ve got so far for this one is to try and get a Wind^[IV]Wind is an Electric Scooter company operating in Tel Aviv. The two wheeled personal transportation devices for this company are powered by Hummus and Falafel as far as I can towards Ben Gunrun, and then walk the rest. But ^[V]half-bakedbaked into this plan is the assumption that vehicle rental is sanctioned on the Shabbat, and the associated bank transfers that would happen on this holy day.

Now, don’t read this and think I’m any more sacrilegious than the next goy^[VI]giddy(?), gentile(?), ginormous(?) boy. If someone from 3832 years ago thought that a non-believer using a bus^[VII]omnibus? waggon with horses ferrying multiple passengers? was an insult to he^[VIII]He who shall not be named ^[IX]this was 3837 Before Voldemort – born on New Year’s Eve don’t you know, then that’s fine by me. But if you’re going to employ gentiles to make sure that there aren’t other Jewish folk breaking the sacred laws (can they drive cars to do so?) then surely you could allow a gentile bus for gentile people,^[X]I can you can’t – see League of Gentlemen to help them take advantage of low airfares and get them out of your holy land?

I love the fact that there’s an explanation of “the melachah of kindling/cooking contains driving (which is powered by combustion), turning on and off lights, and operating electrical appliances.” While there are far more activities explicitly precluded on the Shabbat which are more pertinent to ancient times – no sewing, milling, tying or untying – there’s something about kindling, which apparently means you can’t turn on light switches which were only invented in the year 44 BV^[XI]Before Voldemort . Or drive vehicles^[XII]vehicles powered by combustion engines and presumably hollowed-out, pre-tied, pre-slaughtered kosha sheep driven by internal combustion engines too powered by internal combustion engines. And just in case you thought you might be able to squeeze into electric cars, they have switches. Even the ones without keys.

I’ve spent all of eight minutes thinking about this, and I might need to write to my local Rabbi and ask him (I presume it’s a him) and see if he can get the internet routers, internet switches and for all that is holy, every single website explaining the 39 Melachot turned off from around about Friday evening until around about Saturday evening.

Since using the internet is illegal at the moment, please send your tips for getting to the airport to be before noon tomorrow on a postcard, otherwise I’m setting off on foot. Or hotwiring a Lime and heading for the hills – or at least Holon which is as close to the airport as I can reasonably get. (It looks like a short walk down the motorway to a Synagogue from which I might be able to get a taxi?)