Drinking in the atmosphere

Bottoms up! Bar culture comes to Jerusalem’s storied Mahaneh Yehuda Market.

By SETH J. FRANTZMAN
casino de paris shuk bar 521 (photo credit: Seth J. Frantzman )
casino de paris shuk bar 521
(photo credit: Seth J. Frantzman )
A waiter in black jeans and a tank top circulates, offering chasers of arak on the house. Around 25 people, mostly Hebrew University students, have managed to find seating on a combination of rickety metal chairs and plastic crates that have been set up in one of the mains streets of Jerusalem’s storied Mahaneh Yehuda market, otherwise known as the shuk. The rest are standing and trying to chat over the noise. A few women are dancing. It’s a typical early Thursday night at the 5th of May bar. By late evening the entire street will be packed, the music will make it hard to hear people next to you and a few dozen people will be dancing.
Hebrew University student Noa Singerman is part of a growing group of students and Jerusalemites who have discovered the burgeoning bar culture of the shuk.
“I would like to see more bars in the market – it could really be a cool place for nightlife. [There] should be a strip of bars there,” she says, bubbly and enthusiastic as she prepares to call it a night at the 5th of May.
“I [come] out here every other day, whenever I go to do my shopping. There’s no chance I wouldn’t stop for a drink and to say hi. And if it is at night I want to go to have a beer near my place,” she adds.
In the past year or so, several new bars have opened in or next to the shuk. They have had to carve out a niche for themselves in the dank streets that make up the market and find a way to coexist with the people who work and live there. 5th of May was the first to pioneer the idea.
“We opened in August of last year and have seen nothing but success since then,” says owner Amir Brunner, 26. The bar was founded by Brunner and his friend Gilad Allon, along with support from several other friends. The two men, both personable and welcoming, complement each other; Brunner is the culinary expert and Allon handles the bar.
“I used to work at Topolino, the Italian restaurant at the corner of Agrippas and the shuk. I took away from my work several skills and an interest in food,” says Brunner. For instance, the bar offers delectable sardines on toast that Brunner prepares himself. The bar also offers a salmon carpaccio that Brunner specially prepares by curing the salmon in salt, sugar and coriander.
One of the bars in the shuk that has generated some buzz is the recently opened Casino de Paris, named after an establishment that existed in the market during the British Mandate.
The original Casino de Paris was reputed to have been a British officers’ club and sometimes brothel, but by 1940 it had been transformed into a kollel, or Jewish house of prayer and study.
When Eli Mizrahi decided to open a place with the same name he was already building upon a long string of successful businesses he had established in the shuk.
“I was born in 1951 in Jerusalem. I have been in the shuk a long time, this isn’t the first business I’ve had [here], I also have the Café Mizrahi. This was missing though, there aren’t many bars in the city,” he says.
Mizrahi partnered with well-known celebrity Sha’anan Street of the band Hadag Nahash.
“I came to my partner, we began discussing this idea three years ago. He had heard of the historic place and he asked me if I knew about it and I said yes. No one else knew about it, so two years ago we began looking for a place to open it. After a month of looking we gave up, and then later the people who had this place where the bar currently is, which was being used as a place to sell kitchen utensils, they came to me and offered it to me.”
Mizrahi built a beautiful bar inside the former shop and designed it so patrons would approach it from inside the shuk in a maze of alleyways called the “Georgian Market.”
The Casino has a classy feel, with a good selection of whiskeys and other drinks along one wall. Below the bar is a large selection of spices, salted fish and other goodies. The wait staff is young and cheerful, and the patrons tend to range from the late 20s through mid-40s. This is not a bar for students.
Customers flow out onto the back patio, which is actually a small courtyard the city renovated recently.
Twenty-something Jennifer and her three friends have come to the bar on a Thursday night. They are a mix of Americans and Europeans in the country as part of some sort of work with an international NGO.
“I can’t recall how we found out about this place, I think through a friend, but it was hell to find it. Now that we are here we love the ambience. There is this bakery behind us that is still making bread and that is nice, to see the work going on and be able to sit at a bar at the same time,” says Jennifer.
Mark, an immigrant from Germany, is more pessimistic.
“One problem you have with all these bars, here or at the 5th of May, is the feeling that there are rats running past your feet, or somewhere in the vicinity.”
AT THE Armadillo bar at the other end of the shuk, owner Uriah Cohen is sitting next to a chessboard wearing what seems to be his trademark Bob Marley T-shirt. He comes across as a free spirit.
“I did woodcarving. I studied it in India four years ago near Dal lake, near Dharamsala. I love nature, I was there three times for several months each, I used the skills to carve the bar.”
The Armadillo is a small place just off Agrippas Street on Shiloh Street. It has two tables on the street and several more inside. It also has an oddly situated loft above the bar that is perfect for a group of patrons or a couple that wants some privacy. Privacy in this case is supplied by several hundred books customers have donated over time and that have been stacked up to form a wall in front of the loft.
“I never had experience with a bar. I had experience going to bars. I believed in the place; something simple, not fancy. What you see is what you get,” says Cohen.
The name Armadillo came from a crossword puzzle, he says.
Turning the site into a bar was no easy task.
“This place was a storage room, it belongs to my brother-in-law. I saw that there was potential and it had been closed up for eight years. I did the renovations; there was a lot of earth in here.”
Cohen cleared out the earth by himself. The area where the bar currently is was actually once underground, so to speak. Over the year he’s been open he has been slowly adding things, like a cappuccino machine, a door to the bathroom (it was once just a curtain), a banister for the stairs, and other accoutrements.
The punters at Armadillo form a small group of regulars supplemented by newcomers who stop in. One of the regulars is Sam, a melancholy young man who often comes and sits with a book.
“I love this place, it is like a haven to me. It’s a cruel world out there.”
Many evenings some of the waiters from Topolino stop by for a drink after work. Depending on the night, there is sometimes live music on offer as well.
At the 5th of May on a recent Thursday, a DJ blasts some sort of techno music. Amir says that they have DJs on Monday, Wednesday and Thursday.
“We like to have different types of music. The DJs come with their computer or CDs and we have the music equipment and speakers here.”
Singerman, the Hebrew University student, is happy with the culture at the bar.
“I like the DJs, it adds something cool to the atmosphere.
I don’t go to dance though, I come here for the friendly vibe and because it’s not pretentious. It feels like a home. No, honestly! The way they treat you and what they serve and the atmosphere, I like it.”
One thing that differentiates the bars is the owners’ choice of beer to have on tap.
Brunner and Allon took their selection seriously, traveling all the way to the UK and Ireland to taste Oyster Stout. They also discovered Gösser beer in Austria. They rounded out these two selections with Kasteel Rouge, a sweeter beer that has a high alcohol content.
Cohen also put some thought into his choices for the Armadillo.
“I chose Becks because it is a great beer, a good German beer.
Goldstar gave me a lot of problems so I got rid of it and picked Staropramen, a Czech beer. In another four months I’ll choose something else.”
Mizrahi, by contrast, is most excited by his excellent cocktails. One, named after Yitzhak Rabin, includes whiskey and soda, and another, called “The German Colony,” includes beer and a shot of Jagermeister.
THE BARS are all closed on Shabbat, but only Casino de Paris has a kashrut certificate.
“I didn’t want to spend NIS 1,500 to get a kashrut certificate, it’s not my style, but the food is kosher. I didn’t think about being open on Shabbat, it wasn’t something that really crossed my mind,” says Cohen. The 5th of May does not have a kashrut certificate but the owners assure me the food is kosher.
Nevertheless they never considered opening on Shabbat. One of the waitresses leans over to whisper in my ear.
“Because of the religious pressure, you can’t be open on Shabbat in the shuk, it is an unwritten law.”
Although all the bars are closed on Shabbat, the noise from the bars does bother some of the residents of the shuk during the week. Police drop by regularly to request that the music be turned down, and the Casino de Paris’s owners have even paid for new sound-proof windows for one of the neighbors.
While many customers think the bars represent the development of a new culture in the shuk, one that will bring more people to the area and offer a contrast to the hustle and bustle of the market, not everyone is convinced.
Yehuda Ohayon cradles eggs gently as he prepares a case of them for a customer.
“I’ve run this business for 20 years,” he says, “I was born in Jerusalem. All these new businesses, it’s really bad. First of all they replace places that sold what people want in the shuk: vegetables, nuts and other staples. It just isn’t good, full stop.”
Ohayon’s neighbor is the newly renovated Casino de Paris.
Casino, despite being open from noon, does not open its door onto the main street of the shuk and its facade therefore remains that of a closed shop, with a heavy metal gate lowered to obscure it from the public. Ohayon gestures toward it.
“Sure, he’s my neighbor, I know him, but it is closed, and like the other bars they are closed during the day so that makes the shuk look closed.”
Other shop owners I spoke with disagreed.
The Eliahu family has been in the shuk 50 years and their shop currently consists of candy, sauces and other miscellaneous items. Shmuel and his wife, whose shop is up the street from the 5th of May, are upbeat about the bars.
“It brings a lot of new people and new types of people, especially people from out of town. Look, down the street you see a new shoe shop and other boutique-type places. It’s making the shuk lively and different. It helps out business too.”
His wife agrees with his analysis.
“I married him and in doing so I married the shuk, so, sure it is better.”
But the bar crowd doesn’t bring them much tangible business, since they close at 7 p.m. In fact very few shuk establishments remain open when the bar crowd gets going. Several new establishments, such as Mifgash Hasheikh, a burekas joint, have opened recently to take advantage of the bar culture, but none of the veteran businesses I spoke with saw this as an opportunity.
Nevertheless, people are upbeat. The fruit salesman at Mountain of Fruit down the street from the 5th of May, which has been in business since the 1970s, and which is also not far from the Armadillo, raises his hands and smiles.
“Sure, the changes are good.”
CUSTOMERS ARE also upbeat about the changes. Nadine, who lives in Nahlaot with her family and is newly religious, likes to come to the shuk because of the new diversity in products.
“I like all the boutique stores, the art and clothing and the new restaurants.”
But she isn’t as interested in the bars.
“I don’t really go out in the shuk, it doesn’t seem the place to go out to.”
At the end of the open part of the shuk four elderly women whose faces reveal a lifetime of hardship have gathered with their large bags from a morning of shopping. Rachel, who lives on Jaffa Road just above the shuk, is indifferent to the changes.
“This or that, both are good. I live above the shuk and I don’t notice these bars or the new types of stores. If it’s good for business, great, but for me, it’s just fine, the typical changes one sees in the city.”
Her friends agree.
“Are you talking about the train? No? Well, that’s probably more of an issue than the new stores or the noise from the bars.”
Three Arab women that seem to be a grandmother, mother and daughter are shopping for olives in the open shuk and also have no interest in the changes.
“My cousin has worked here for many years. I just come because of him. I don’t know anything about these changes,” says one of the women. It seems obvious from interviews that the new boutique stores, restaurants and bars, are mostly of interest to the younger crowd.
Casino de Paris owner Mizrahi points his finger intently, as if to give a lesson.
“The shuk was dying 10 years ago, it was in a bad shape, there were no people here 10 years ago... but I don’t think it is becoming more fancy or gentrified... all the new businesses are just 10 percent of the market, less than that even. They make it seem different, but the market still deals with fresh food, the new places came in place of closed businesses. I don’t know if there will be long-term changes... I still think the nature of the market has not changed. these new things just add a new attitude to the market. This was the purpose.”