Try to have whomever you are there for meet you at the airport. Otherwise arrange a car through the hotel. I chose the Holiday Inn purely for the points, but it is a decent hotel and centrally located.

I believe what happened is the front desk manager sent his brother out to pick me up. When I went into my currency wallet to pay him in dinar, he saw all the euros, pounds and dollars I had in it and I think he talked his brother into giving him a key to my room so he could rob me. He didn't take anything else though.

Next to the HI is a shopping mall with some nice restaurants, but the best restaurants are in and around the town. I don't know what the "old" city is. It all seems old to me. There is clearly a Christian side and a Muslim side though.