Day Six, Friday 12th April

This is Charlotte Sims reporting live from Day Six in Jerusalem.

Today we went on a walking tour of Jerusalem with our friend and tour guide, Mel. She took us first to Mea Shearim, which means 100 gates, as there are 100 gates.  We had to be in ultra frummy gear as they might have thrown stones at us otherwise.  Mel told us that to keep their peyot curly, they wind them round carrots rather than using curling tongs.  As we walked around, there were a few people who didn’t want us to be there but one lady stopped to tell us about her life and family.  She had 14 children and so many grandchildren she couldn’t remember how many!!! 

We saw lots of different outfits and head coverings, including scarves, ‘beanie’ kippot (for the boys or under men’s hats), sheitels, big black hats, furry streimels, black coats, black stripy coats, beige stripy coats and so on.  Mel told us that they wear different outfits depending on which sect they belong to.

On the main road, we saw shops which had different types of religious clothing and food, for example, a kippot shop containing only black kippot, a kosher pick and mix which the girls all ran into, a tsitsit shop, a tallit shop and a shop selling Moshiach Popcorn!  The sheitel and wedding dress shops are always on side streets so men don’t see them.

What the mums noticed was that in Mea Shearim, all the men were doing the shopping.

We spotted that on the bus the men and the women sit separately, men at the front and women at the back.

Then we walked into Mechane Yehudah market which had all the shoppers in getting ready for Friday night.  It was really crowded and I felt that there were too many people in my face.  Mel took us down to the other end past fishmongers, spice shops, butchers and fruit and vegetable stalls.  We arrived at the restaurant section and all the girls had pasta. 

We went back to the hotel, had a shower and chilled before getting ready for Shabbat.

Mel guided us down to the Old City and gave us a quick tour of the different sections.  We walked through the Armenian Quarter and the Jewish Quarter before going to the Kotel. As it was Anna and Charlotte’s first time, we blindfolded them as we didn’t want them to see the Kotel until we were right there.  We took off their blindfolds as we approached the wall.

We walked to the front and out our ready-written notes into the wall and said the Shema.  After this we did some Israeli dancing and singing before going to a hotel to have Friday night dinner.  We were the loudest benchers there.

Just as we were leaving the hotel, in walked our third Rabbi of the week – Rabbi Dee with all the family.  After a chat with the Dees, we walked back to our hotel and had a well-earned sleep after another busy day.