Paying one's fare, in New York City and in Jerusalem

[daveklepper]

About forty years ago, time more accurately determined by the subway and bus fare being one dollar even, I was on my way by foot late Friday evening from 70th Street and Central Park West to my apartment at 16th Street and Third Avenue.  All of a sudden the Heavens opened with a drenching downpore.  I was near an entrance to the Broadway and 57th Street Subway Station and entered to take cover.  Then I realized the downpore was going to continue.  But I had no money on my person.  I note that I was the only other person on the particular mexxanine other than the change clerk, so I decided to plead my case, and was successful, with a promise to send a check to the Transit Authority, and received permission to enter via the exit gate.  The first southbound train to Union Square and the 14th Street - Canarsie Line "L" to Third Avene brought me close to my apartment and a change to dry pajamas.  Within a few days I sent a check for two dollars to the TA with a thank-you note but did not mention the specific station entered.

Friday, 15 December, I planned to catch the 10:15AM route 48 bus from the Egged stop nearest the Yeshiva (actually requiring a walk past the “Mormon University”), to connect with the Light Rail, but either the bus came earlier than usual or I was a few minutes late.  (Next and last for Friday at 1:15PM)  So I retraced my steps, descended the stairs past some neighbors’ homes, and waited seated at the bus-stop shelter near the Papal Nuncio’s mansion, for a route 275 to Damascus Gate.  My monthly pass, good on Egged and Light Rail, is not accepted on 275.  I had a 100 Sheckle note on me but only one Sheckle in small change.  So I intended to hand the driver the 100, say “kabir” to indicate a senior citizen, and if he would sell me a multi-ride and give change for that, OK; or if he just made change for a single ride, also OK.

I was joined on the bench by an elderly Arab, who returned my “sab’al aher with the usual “sab’al anoor.”  We waited.  What looked like a taxi came, and being impatient, we both hailed.  It turned out it was a shared-ride taxi, a “sherute,” with five passengers already on board.  One exited, the elderly bus-stop companion boarded and motioned for me to take the last vacant seat, for my second-time ride in an Arab shared-ride taxi.  (1^st was in 1995, Jericho-Jerusalem.) The other boarding passenger handed a twenty to the driver and received change.  I handed him the hundred.  After rounding the corner near the Rockefeller Museum the driver returned the 100 to me to indicate he did not have change and I could ride for free.  I showed the hundred to the other passengers, but all indicated they did not have change by sidewise head motions.  So, of course I gave the driver the one Sheckle I had, and he thanked me with a “Shukran.”

The sherute discharged us a few blocks short of the 275’s end-point, but I did not mind the slight additional walk to the Damascus Gate Light Rail station, since everything was peaceful and normal despite what some leaders appeared to wish in response to the President's embassy statement.

And the following Monday evening I used a regular Arab taxi from Damascus Gate to the back door of the Yeshiva.  The usual Mid-eastern transaction:  Handed the driver a 20 (approximately what a meter would have shown).  He said thirty.  Handed him five coin, and we shook hands.

 

[daveklepper]

Not either politics or religion, but the News Item regarding Israeli Transportation Minister Katz naming an underground Israel Railways Station near the Western Wall connected to the new Jerusalem - Tel Aviv railway line, I can state the following facts:

The locaton of an underground station near the Western Wall is NOT a definit, funded, planned item.  Many people believe the "Downtown" station should be located at the intersection of Ben Yehuda and King George Streeta, where there is qn underground shopping  plaza in place already, so the underground station's entrances would not change the architeture of the city, whereas even an undrground statoin near the Western Wall would do so.

2.  Tel Aviv was never intended to be the post WWII Capitol of Israel, anymore than Philadelpia for the USA.  Tel Aviv is the commercial center, much as New York is for the USA,  (Philadelphia was in that position for the USA at the time of the USA's War for Independence, and it is interesting to speculate on why New York surpassed it.  Better harbor?  Construction of the Erie Canal and then parallel railroads before Pennsylvania's canal and portage railroad?)  As soon as facilities were available, the Israeli Government moved to its second temporary quarters in Jerusalem, with permanent buildings following years later.

3.  For local comment on the issue of naming an Israeli station after Trump, I recommend the www, jpost.com website for the Jerusalem Post's On-Line Edtion (open acess, no charge).

[Miningman]

Well as we all know the first rule of government spending is why build one when you can build two for twice the price. So build 'em both!

Thinking I would be rather paranoid taking a subway to the Wailing Wall. Maybe in another 2,000 years or so, unfortunately. 

 

[daveklepper]

Since Jerusalem's reunification, most Jews and nearly all Israeli Jews call it the "Western Wall," and not the "Wailing Wall."