13/3/98

No Right Turn

To get from Point A to Point B, somehow I always end up at Point Z. 

    I am cursed with a logical mind. My wife says it's just a bad sense of direction.
    I better explain.
    To get from Point A to Point B should be easy if you (1) ask for directions, (b) consult a road map, and (iii) follow the road signs. Which is what I always do.
    Why I always get lost I don't understand. But I do know this: it's never my fault.
    Every time I try to drive back to Jerusalem from Tel Aviv, I end up in Holon. Even if I slavishly obey (1), (b) and (iii), I end up in Holon. And in Holon, I always end up at the same gas station, where by now they know I haven't come for gas.
    Once, I actually had to go to Holon, so naturally, blessed with this logical mind, I figured the surest way of getting there was to drive to Tel Aviv and then attempt to get back to Jerusalem. It worked perfectly.
    If I put blind faith in a series of road signs that say "To Ayalon South," and continue past the point where there should be a sign saying "Turn left here for Ayalon South or you'll end up in Holon," am I an idiot?
    We don't have the same problem in Jerusalem, for two reasons: (1) we don't need signs that say "To Jerusalem," and (b) our sign people understand that if we don't have "To Tel Aviv" signs posted all over the place, out-of-towners trying to get out of town are liable to end up in either an unfriendly Arab neighborhood, or an unfriendly Jewish neighborhood, with a fair chance of getting killed.
    Fact is, Jerusalem has a nutty road system. Consider:

* Somehow, most streets can be both parallel and perpendicular to most other streets; 

* It is impossible to get comprehensible directions in the Arnona neighborhood, because even Arnona residents can't help you (the reason: Arnona's main drag suddenly ends at the front door of a shul, and then continues from the back door);

* Jaffa Street, the major downtown artery, is two-way for the first two blocks, then one-way going north, then two-way, then one-way going south for one block, then two-way until it finally gives up in embarrassment and changes its name to Shlomzion Hamalka for the last two blocks (though making a left turn will unexpectedly keep you on Jaffa, which continues to change from one-way to two-way three more times in its final stretch) -- and the entire road is maybe two kilometers long;

* It takes a decade to learn the one-ways and no-left-turns -- and they change every eight months;

* Roads routinely change names every few blocks. Like, check this out: if Point A is the beginning of Golomb in the far-west neighborhood of Kiryat Yovel, and Point B is, for whatever suicidal reason you may have, the city of Ramallah, which is north of Jerusalem, just go straight -- yashar, yashar. Along the way, Golomb changes its name to Herzog, then Aza, Ben-Maimon, Agron, Shlomo Hamelech, Paratroopers Road, Cheil Handasa, Derech Hashalom, Nablus Road, Shuafat Road, Beit Hanina Road, Ramallah Road. Is that insane or what? (On the other hand, to get to Bethlehem, don't take Bethlehem Road, take Hebron Road.)

* There are still some neighborhoods here stuck in the good old days, when the city was like a big kibbutz. You ever try to find someone on a kibbutz? No street signs, no numbers on the houses (but big, vicious dogs everywhere, letting you know you've got the wrong place). It is assumed that all Jerusalemites know where all other Jerusalemites live, and you are expected to ask, so who needs signs? To be fair, there are some signs -- little signs, with little letters, affixed high up on the buildings so that you have to get out of the car, trudge up two or three flights of stairs and stick your head out of someone's bedroom window to read it. Not that I'm complaining or anything.

    I have to doff my streimel to our cabbies. They're truly amazing. Pull up next to a taxi driver in Givat Shaul just as the light is turning green and ask how to get to Aristoboulus, and in the time it takes for him to shift his foot from the brake to the gas pedal, he'll tell you -- and he'll ask you what number on Aristobulous, as if it makes all the difference.
    I love it when Haifaites get lost in Jerusalem, because it serves them right. Once, and only once, did I find my way unerringly in Haifa; having learned my lesson -- that logic is useless in Haifa's spiral road system -- on my last trip there I got to the entrance of the city, stopped the car, got out and hailed a taxi. I gave him the address, got back into my car, followed him, and duly paid him when we arrived.
    My dad, who lives in Petah Tikva, is absolutely amazing at road navigation. (Call him anytime; he's listed in the phone book.) If a new street is paved in Afula or Metulla, he's the first to know.
    But I never call him for help: I always end up feeling so ... stupid. "Pinchuk? Simple!" And then he gives me directions so precise that if one tree along the way has been chopped down without him being told, I'm lost.
    Know why he didn't vote Labor in the last election? Didn't like their policies: "They widened the roads and narrowed the country." It's not so easy anymore for my dad to keep tabs on road changes in Gaza. 
    I had to go to Ashdod one day recently, and if you've never been there, let me tell you, New York it's not. In New York even I can manage: "Go straight up this street, past 33rd, 34th, 35th, 36th; make a right and keep going dead straight until 104th, or if you prefer, go thataway to 104th and turn left until 36th. Can't miss it."
    Ashdod is different. What follows is a real set of directions I got from a lady who lives there: "You'll see a sign 'To Ashdod.' Ignore it. At the second light turn left onto, uh, B'nai B'rith, or something Jewish like that, and keep going until the building site. Turn right onto Yitzhak Rabin Boulevard and go to the first junction. The sea is straight ahead; you turn left. Go past the Four Mothers Road. You'll get to a circle with a giant teapot, you can't miss it, even though there's no Mad Hatter. Turn right to Beethoven. No, that's a street name. On the left is da Vinci, on the right, M. Angelo. No one's really sure -- either it's short for Michaelangelo or Moti Angelo. I'm on Angelo, #7. You'll know you're lost if you see rabbi street-names."
    What Beethoven, Van Gogh, Brahms and Rembrandt have done to merit honor in Ashdod I have no idea.
    More fittingly, Abbott and Costello are honored by Greater Tel Aviv. I don't think it was on purpose, though. Some of the city's street names are straight out of the comedians' "Who's-on-first, What's-on-second" routine.
    Picture Abbott as a cabbie, and Costello, as his fare, asking to go to Le'an Street...
    "Le'an? (Where to?)"
    "Le'an."
    "Yeah, that's right, where to?"
    "I told you. Where to."
    "Look, pal, if you don't tell me where to, I'll let you off right here."
    "Ma zeh? (What's this?)"
    "You want to go to Mazeh?"
    "Where to?"
    "Maybe you should ask for help (ezra)."
    "I don't want Ezra, I want Where To."
    "Where to?"
    "That's what I said."
    "I'll tell you where to, hamor (ass)."
    "Why would I want to go to Hamor?"
    "Enough already! Stop!"
    "Stop? I live on Stop."
    "Stop?"
    "It's in Ramat Gan."
    "See here, buddy, for the last time, where to?"
    "No. Now it's too late to go to Where To. Go to Stop."
    "You want me to go?"
    "Yes. To Stop."