Trains and meals

The last few days have been very hectic, not really affording me the small amount of time necessary to write a few words here. Next week is going to be even worse: one evening, I will be the 'duty driver' for the kibbutz, from 5-10pm, and three evenings I will be attending lectures in Project Management, courtesy of a guest lecturer from the home university.

I am known as a vocal supporter of the Israeli train system; most of the time it's very good, but occasionally there are problems. On Wednesday I was due to make the familiar trip to Haifa Bay; when I went to buy the ticket, the station had mysteriously disappeared from the list of destinations available from the automatic ticket machine. When I bought my ticket from a human cashier, I was told that there were no trains north of Haifa. This happens for a few days every now and then, but this time I hadn't noticed and hadn't bothered to plan my trip for a day when there is no maintenance being performed on the line. Although this news disappointed me, I wasn't totally upset as this meant that I could catch an earlier train from Tel Aviv to Haifa and thus save twenty minutes which would be devoted to the problem of catching a bus from Haifa to the bay (normally this is two buses).

After buying a return ticket to Haifa and passing through the turnstiles, I prepared to wait the ten minutes until the train to Tel Aviv was due to arrive. I hadn't been there for more than a minute before an announcement came over the tannoy that the train was twenty minutes late. Everybody groaned. Whilst this wasn't much of a set-back to me (the train should arrive in Tel Aviv in time to make my normal connection), it was a problem for those who have to be at work by a certain time.

Eventually the train arrived and off we went. By the time we arrived at Lod, so many people had come aboard that the train operator had to make several announcements asking people to disembark as the train was too heavy and could not move. There are trains every few minutes from Lod to Tel Aviv so there was no real reason for people to get on our train, but even so it took about another ten minutes before sufficient people disembarked and the train could continue its journey.

A few minutes after arriving in Tel Aviv, a train arrived which took me to Haifa. This train was one of the modern design with electrical sockets distributed generously; as the train was barely occupied, this was an excellent opportunity to get some work done. I had barely set a foot outside the train station in Haifa when I noticed a minibus waiting for passengers to take further North. Whilst I had to wait a while for the minibus to fill, it took me reasonably quickly to within 400 metres of my destination - although traversing the packed streets of Haifa made me remember how much easier the train makes this trip.

I arrived at my destination about 25 minutes later than I would have arrived normally. Not too bad considering the disturbances.

Returning home, I left the office a bit early, but again was fortunate to arrive at the main road just in time for a minibus to stop and pick me up. Whilst this bus went back to Haifa, it did not go to the train station but rather what's called the 'upper city' (Haifa is built on the side of a hill), so I had to walk for about 15 minutes before arriving at the train station, just in time for a train back to Tel Aviv. Fortunately I knew where I was in Haifa, so it wasn't difficult to find my way to the station.

I decided a few days ago that today I would cook chicken drumsticks and prunes in the slow cooker. I literally jumped out of bed at 6:30am; put the drumsticks in the slow cooker, covered them with about a litre of coca cola, added a cup and a bit of rice, then added diced raw onion and diced prunes. I put the slow cooker on 'high' for two hours then lowered the heat to 'low' for another three.

I knew that the chicken would be ok but I wasn't sure how the rice would be. I had checked a recipe for slow cooked rice the day before with proportions 1:1 (ie one cup of rice/one cup of water) whereas normally I use 1:2. Here I was using a proportion of about 1:5! The result was fine: the rice was indeed more like a pudding than distinct grains, but that doesn't bother us. The onion and prunes weren't particularly evident, and the chicken was cooked to perfection. My wife gave it the thumbs up, and it's much easier cooking this dish in the slow cooker than in the oven. Another recipe for the book.