just like normal

so today i had four things on my list to do - check the mail, get rachel a sim card, get jason's phone fixed, and get rachel a cell phone. no big deal right? i mean, that should all take an hour tops. riiiight.

so rachel, hiba, and i got in the car to run the errands. first we went to the cell phone store in bethlehem that had been recommended to us. only it was closed, because it's sunday and the owners are christian. so then we drove around looking for other cell phone stores, but apparently all the people who sell phones in bethlehem are christian. so no luck on that.

next we headed to the post office, which is in jerusalem. traffic wasn't too bad, so it only took about 30 minutes. i think i hit every red light on the way there because whoever is in charge of the stoplights don't know how to time them. the post office was actually relatively successful - in and out, we actually had mail, and rachel could just wait in the car so i didn't have to find a parking spot.

by this time, hiba was hot and cranky so we decided to find somewhere to eat. we found a little cafe in the mall outside the old city that actually had places to eat inside and enjoyed a meal of pesto ravioli, salad, and bread. hiba also had cheerios. so again, successful, except that it just added an extra hour to our trip.

so then we packed back into the car and headed out to find the orange cell phone store to get rachel a sim card and see why jason's phone isn't working. after driving around for about an hour in the hot, hot car with hiba alternating between crying and dozing off to sleep, i am convinced that this store doesn't exist. so we came home.

so after four hours we checked the mail, did not get a phone, did not get a sim card, did not get jason's phone fixed, but we did have a pretty good lunch.