Shabbat in Rehovot

Weekdays in Israel are from Sunday till Thursday. Friday and Saturday are the weekend. On Fridays, shops are open until the afternoon. Shabbat begins before sunset on Friday and ends on Saturday evening. During that period, there is no public transportation. Busses and trains stop their service, but sherut (large taxis/minibusses) drive along the official bus routes and offer their service even on shabbat.

At our arrival on Thursday evening, there was quite a lot of traffic on our street. This became significantly more quiet during shabbat! We also noticed a big contrast on the main street of Rehovot with all the restaurants, bars and shops. On Thursday evening we had a falafel there and many people were out on the street. When we just went for a small evening walk on Saturday evening (after the temperature had finally cooled down a bit...), Rehovot seemed to be rather empty. Only few bars were open. Tonight, we saw how shops were re-opening after shabbat. Many people were walking around, eating in restaurants and buying lots of fresh bread in a bakery. A European Sunday evening would look more empty...

While we hardly saw any people wearing a kippa on shabbat, they were again outside tonight, as well as orthodox Jews with traditional clothing, such as a black hat, and sidelocks.