Sometimes an idle comment hits the mark more accurately than a careful analysis. Marcia and I have now lived in Jerusalem for over a year. Marcia and Penn_E have friends. I have a driver’s license. (The licensing process here makes traditional American red tape look like a shot down a water slide but that’s another story.) We have discount cards at the nearest super market, know our way to the post office and are unafraid to ride the bus (except when we’ve drawn a certain mad operator on Line 17 with a kippa, a death wish and a union card). But it has sometimes been difficult to accurately and concisely answer the simple question, “What’s it like there?” from our perspective and in general.
But something clarifying snapped into focus recently thanks to someone we met at the King David Hotel.