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Much as I have no wish to go see him myself, I know that there are some poor souls out there for whom life will not be complete if they do not grasp the opportunity. So, as a “public service”, I am helping broadcast the news that, according to the show’s producers, ticket sales for Leonard Cohen’s September concert in Israel will begin Saturday night August 1 at the “Lean Ticket Office”. Estimates are that ticket prices will range between NIS 400-500 and more.
Now, if you really cannot wait another day, I understand that there is a backdoor presale arrangement for members of the Official Leonard Cohen Forum and tickets went on sale this morning for the chosen few. It looks as if this is where you need to go to get more information..
Rumour has it that this will be a sell out so, if this is what you really want to see, you better get your tickets before they are all gone and the Box Office closes (Just trying to help the old man pay his taxes)!
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A cautionary tale for those of you planning to take a trip abroad this summer.
If you follow my ramblings, you will remember that my eldest daughter announced that she will be getting married this autumn. The wedding to be held in Napa Valley, California.
As soon as the venue was confirmed, we rushed to find flight tickets to San Francisco. Given that Rosh HaShanah is about the same time, we figured we needed to get something booked post haste, before the flights filled up and/or the prices followed suit. Perish the thought that the father of the bride couldn’t make it to the wedding because he couldn’t get a flight.
Regrettably, the emotion of the moment over ruled common sense and, instead of doing our homework properly, we headed straight for the El AL site and quickly booked five tickets at what we thought were reasonable prices.
A few weeks passed then, yesterday morning, I was reading some blog entries about trans-atlantic flying and El AL in particular. I found an entry complaining about El AL’s pricing policies and referencing the fact that the writer had found Delta to be considerably cheaper.
Know what? They damn well are!
A quick check of the Delta website showed that I could get Tel Aviv to San Francisco for US$450 less per ticket! Whats more Delta would fly us all the way via Atlanta, Georgia in less time and without having to deal with a code share change of terminal to American Airlines at Kennedy (a well known nightmare). And, for reassurance, I also checked a few other airlines and even British Airways were US$300 cheaper than El Al!
We called El Al to check the cancellation fees – US$640 total for all five of us. Of course, they weren’t interested in trying to keep us. They could pocket the cancellation fee and resell the tickets at a higher price. So, we booked ourselves onto Delta and waved El AL goodbye.
Total saving US$1,500 even after paying off El Al.
If only we had looked before we leaped!!
And, a final note for the employers of all of you who are still allowed to enjoy the perks of Business Class Travel. British Airways has just slashed many of their Business Class fares by up to 40%.
Moral of the story: Just because you live in Israel, never book on El Al without first checking out the other airlines. If you do, you could well end up paying way too much for your flights.
Never having really been a Depeche Mode fan, I have not been able to share the excitement (yawn!) that comes to a head tonight when an expected audience in excess of 50,000 will watch them kick off a World Tour with a concert in Tel Aviv’s Ramat Gan Stadium.
In all honesty, they have always seemed more than a little wierd to me. Sure, you can say the same thing about many pop idols past and present but you have to wonder about a band that requests the production crew prepare an on stage juice machine and peeled carrots for them together with honey, vitamin C tablets, vodka, wine and beer. Only thing missing is a vegetarian Vindaloo.
Whatever!
Perhaps more interesting to an “Israel Watcher” are some other aspects of the concert logistics. 50,000 is a whole lot of people in one place for this little country and the traffic congestion will be phenomenal. So the police have put together and published a plan of road closures and diversions.
The best part of this is their recommendation that concert-goers forgo their motor vehicles and get to the concert by taking the train to Tel Aviv University or Bnei Brak, the two closest train stations.
Someone forgot to tell them that these stations will be closed by the time the performance gets out!
“That’s all right”, said my wife, “We can get them at the Duty Free next month when we fly to London”.
As a matter of fact, she was talking about two new telephones that we want to buy but that simple statement could have applied to almost any electrical appliance.
The Duty Free stores at Tel Aviv’s Ben Gurion Airport offer a 24 hour pandoras box of opportunities to spend more than you intended. Apart from the normal duty free fare of Cigarettes, Alcohol, Jewelry, Watches and Cosmetics, the Tel Aviv Duty Free stores also offer a 1,000 sq m area which claims to carry more than 10,000 electronic items including Cameras, Computers, Telephones, Plasma Televisions, Sound Systems, DVD Players, Hobs, Ovens, Food Mixers, Washing Machines and Dryers.
And, most importantly of all, Israel is probably the only country in the world where all these items can be purchased when you are leaving the country. Then, when you return, you pick them up on the other side of immigration and just wheel them through the Customs Green Channel.
In this respect, Israel is no different from any other country in the world. Beating the Duty Free Allowances is like filling in your annual tax return.
When Jewish friends and relatives from Europe land at Tel Aviv, they can only stare bemusedly at the sight of their Israeli cousins pushing luggage trolleys piled high with Duty Free items. For them, the opportunity for Duty Free shopping, when travelling within the EU member states, was taken away a long time ago.
And that is why, no matter what the government of Israel may long for, the man in the street here will never actually support a campaign to gain membership of the European Union.
So What If I Am Goy? 