Yesh Matsav

During the month of August days are better spent inside. But at night, when the heat dies down a bit, Jerusalem is lovely. Devorah and I walked from her place on Mendele Mocher Sefarim Street (where I have been staying on and off for the last two weeks) to the German Colony, and on our way back we came in from the backside of the hotel that sits right across the street from her apartment. From the back it looked as if the hotel might have a pool, which tempted us to peek inside. We decided to investigate, but something about us must have looked suspicious, cause we immediately caught the attention of the security outside the hotel. (It may have been because we were the only ones “immodestly” dressed—everyone staying there looked religious as sadly most of this city has become). Inside we went snooping. We took the elevator up and down determined to find a pool that maybe we could sneak in to.

When Devorah moved in to her apartment on Mendele Street, her grandmother was pleased. “It’s good that you are near all the hotels, that way if you need to use the bathroom you can always go,” she said. Why Devorah would need to use a hotel bathroom when her apartment is right there, Devorah didn’t quite understand. But when our snooping landed us in the hotel’s bathroom, Devorah decided to nonetheless try it out, just in case. On our way back up, a hotel employee joined us in the elevator. Our snooping hadn’t resulted in any discoveries, so we decided to flat out ask her whether the hotel has a pool. “No,” she said. “But I see you are already wearing a bathing suit,” she smirked, pointing at me very suspiciously. As some of you know I have been wearing a bikini top as a bra on and off for the last few months. This happened to be the wrong night to be wearing it. I awkwardly tried to explain that I was wearing it as a bra, but given that we were looking for a pool and clearly weren’t guests, I don’t think she quite bought it. For now it seems Devorah will have to stick to her own bathroom after all, and I don’t quite see swimming in her near future.