End of the trip

Today was the last day of the trip :-( The morning was spent listening to the last few lectures, but after that we had more free time. For the afternoon I began an impossible mission: I was looking for a restaurant that was on a street corner in the market area. The last time I was in Israel I went to said restaurant and the food was amazing - amazing enough to go looking for it only remembering it was on a street corner. Believe it or not I did not find the restaurant, however, I did manage to pick up some fruits that I saved for the next few days. I also stumbled upon the bakery that my sister had told me to go to. I picked up some food from there, which definitely made the long trek a success.

After the semi-successful mission, I was back at the hotel waiting to head off to the final banquet dinner. With the itinerary coming to the end, I still had another 3 days before I had to go back to Toronto, where the group was heading to the airport after the dinner. I was excited to have some time on my own, however I had not made ANY plans for the next 3 days. No accommodations, no sightseeing plans, NOTHING!

I was kind of hoping that some people on my trip, or a different trip would be doing the same thing as me, and that we would do some traveling together, however those plans didn't pan out.
I also got in touch with the Israeli soldiers that I had met on my last trip to Israel, however plans to meet up with them didn't work out either. I got in contact with some relatives, and they were more than happy to host me for a few days. phew.

We headed off to the final banquet, and after that we all said our goodbyes. Everyone was sad that the trip was over, however I was ecstatic to be staying another 3 days. I had one final night in Jerusalem before I would go to my second cousin's house in Rechovot the next evening. A few other people from the trip were also staying so we decided to head out for another night of partying in Jerusalem.

It was 9 oclock, but before we could go out, I had to find a place to stay for the night. Not a problem, so I was told. One of the guys that was on the trip, Cory took me to a hostel that he said would have availability. Great! We get there, and they said that the last room had just been taken. However the lady said that there was still one room available on the roof. After the accommodation nightmares on the trip, I knew I was going to regret asking for more details about this room. The lady showed me a picture of the rooftop bungalow - it was advertised as "cheap and romantic". With my options very limited, I hesitantly took the bungalow. The "cheap and romantic" rooftop bungalow

As you can see, the rooftop bungalow is a shed. And yes, you have to duck to get inside it. Inside the shed there are 2 beds, a window, a light, and a personal space heater because it gets cold as hell. We get up to the "room" and I meet the neighbours. After about 15 minutes of laughing hystarically about the "room" we all go out for drinks. I definitely did not luck out in the accommodation depatment on this trip. It was hard to believe the accommodations could have gotten worse and worse, yet the worse it got the funnier it was.