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In all the previous countries, they unexpectedly had all the important signs in both Arabic and English. Yes, even in Iraq, Syria etc. For some reason, that's not the case in Israel. The signs are in Hebrew, Hebrew and Hebrew, really rarely also in Arabic and sometimes in English. Also the bus stops signs..<p>So, we tried to take a bus from the main bus station to the old town, and 20 minutes later we found ourself in middle of nowhere, on the other end of the bus line we were supposed to be using. Some swearwords, changing to the other side of the road and riding the same bus line back the way we came from.. This time managing to pass by the old town and the possible location of hostels in here.<p>Once more we took the same bus to another direction, and this time actually managed to jump out the bus on the right place. Using Wikitravel as our guide, we found a dirt cheap hotel in a perfect location, and the hotel was actually feeling pretty nice. For our disappointment they had a curfew though, the doors would close at midnight which was kind of not what we were hoping for.<p>We had been planning on going out in Jerusalem today, but the curfew kinda prevented staying there for long. On the other hand, today was a some kind of religious festival day, which meant all the bars were closed so.. No much damage done. We just visited the only open bar we found for a beer and walked back to the hotel. Tomorrow it's time to see Jerusalem a bit..<p>We found a few bottles of Palestinian beer, and I have to say it is really good. I just have to take one of this bottles home for my collection.<p>As my first impressions of Israel I have to say two things. First, this is a one expensive country after all the others we have been in. The price level is really close to Finland, and some things are actually even more expensive.<p>The second thing is that I'm really sorry we have to leave the country so soon. I definitely have to come back to Israel at some point. So far all the people have been really nice and the country is looking great. Only Jerusalem would probably be worth of spending at least a week in here, not to mention the other cities which we don't have any time to even briefly visit.<p>It's also warming to be a bit closer to our own culture after a few weeks in the Arab world, not that the Arab culture would have been that bad either but.. :)<p>By the way, the "Middle east is too small" problem still continues to occur. On the street I suddenly hear some Finnish words, and there were a few Finnish guys behind us. Obviously the guys had been driving by car to here through Syria and Jordan, staying in the same hotel in Damascus as we did, at the same time. I heard some Finnish in there also.. :)
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