If you meet a stranger, make a friend

Today was a great day. Tuesdays are usually good days because they are my days to explore downtown and go to the Shuk (HaKarmel) but today was a great day. My class was canceled this week because the teacher was in another country so instead of having class at 4, I had no class (the first good thing.) On the bus ride I saw a few places that I would have to visit, including this really cool study cafe, Chadar Avodah (work room) and a gourmet shop, called Gourmet Shop, I saw lots of cheeses in the window just calling out to me. Walking from the bus stop to the Shuk I see a sign that must have been crafted by the heavens, "Falafel 6.90 nis". I haven't had falafel yet and I've been here for three weeks now, needless to say I pounce on the opportunity and devour that delicious and cheap falafel. So satisfying.
I got to the Shuk and started my New York stroll (totally patented) aka weaving in and out of the crowd and 'gently' bumping into anyone standing still in the middle of the walkway. My inner aggressive New Yorker really gets to come out when I'm in Tel Aviv, it's dangerous. I'm dangerous... (feel free to laugh at that) Any who, I do my shopping, carrots, peppers, pita and peanuts. As I'm walking back to the entrance out of the corner of my eye on one of the side streets I see a sign, "Beer Bazzar" and I take a closer look, Israeli craft beer and a few seats at the kiosk/bar. The bartender was super friendly and helpful, even told me about another pub with 50 beers on tap, Porter&Sons. Another thing to add to my list of places to visit. I had two beers, not amazing but pretty dam good, especially compared to goldstar. There were two others at the bar when I came and we had a good conversation going. One of the people there was an American from West Virginia doing graduate work in Finland, it's free there!!!! She was visiting (Israel) for a few days with a Finnish friend who was at a conference for desalinization technology.  I ended up hanging out with her for the rest of the day.

We walked to the beach, about a half hour, through a really nice, tourist free neighborhood. Plenty of cool but prohibitively expensive stores. We talked about everything from agriculture to whats wrong with America to Rick Perry giving a talk at a conference about clean water/desalinization technologies which I will get back to a little later. We spent a lot of time just soaking in the beach and talking, it was really refreshing and there were so many cute dogs everywhere, unfortunately they all had their own agenda, not involving me... We also walked around Jaffa, doing a nice loop although we just missed the 'flea market'. We took a taxi back to the apartment she was staying at right by the Dizengoff mall, waiting for her friend to get back from the conference for dinner. It was what I guess you would call a roomy studio apartment and owned by an actor/writer guy, so lots of odd artwork but he did have two great coffee table books, All My Friends Are Dead and All My Friends Are Still Dead, so bonus points for that. He gave us a few recommendations for where to go for dinner and we settled on North Abraxass. We walked over along Rothschild and saw sooo many dogs and cyclists and a few cyclists with dogs. I had to ask about Rick Perry and what he could have possibly talked about in regards to clean water technology. I was not surprised, absolutely nothing. He was just pushing his own agenda and talking about how a free market economy can fix everything. I am still in shock that he was even invited to speak at this conference. Whatever. Our directions were not very clear so I am very glad I can read hebrew and know a decent amount of words because we would have walked right past it otherwise. It seemed like the kind of place that you dress up a bit and need to make reservations for, we were given less than an hour to eat our meal because there was only one open table with a reservation for 9:30...

The tables were covered in two strips of butcher paper, making a cross and the appetizers came just in a bowl of parchment paper. There was a huge emphasis on just sharing everything, to hell with a clean table. Our first appetizers arrived, a delicious head of roasted cauliflower and Jericho beans with olive oil, garlic and lemon and then the waitress, seemingly out of nowhere just threw a huge pinch of salt on the table. Both super simple and both amazing. I got the sardine fillets at the advice of the waitress, it was great advice. Some of the best fish at a restaurant I've ever had. Unfortunately I was in a bit of a rush, trying to catch the bus at 9 instead of 10, luckily we finished dinner rather quickly, I put in what was deemed a fair share of the bill, said bye and booked it out of there, running to the bus stop. I'm glad I did, I made it with about 30 seconds to spare. I got back to the dorms with just enough time to finish the homework for my online class. Such a great day. Have some more pictures. PS. this is why I left the North trip post unfinished, I decided to just stop writing and start my day which turned into this. The part 2 for that post will come soon.

Such a majestic creature