Israel Is Tov

Here it is, friends, the long-awaited account of my sojourn to the land of many things that are sacred to many people. Israel, incidentally, is also home to many things which are sacred to me, such as hummous, falafel, and delicious cucumber salad. I arrived at about 3:00 am in Tel Aviv on Tuesday, June 5th. Natalie graciously collected me from the Airport and brought me back to her apartment for a beer and a shower and some good old fashioned talk, followed by a nice sleep. I got up around 12:30 pm and we set off to meet up with Rebecca, who joined us on our bus to Yaffo.

In Yaffo, we headed first to a restaurant called Dr. Shokshouka. Shokshouka, you see, is a delicious dish made of egg and tomato and spicy goodness (as well as some other vegetables) and I would like to let the record show that Natalie was correct in her assertion that the Dr. worked hard to earn his PhD. The food was de-lish, as you can see from our clean, clean skillets.


After lunch, we took a walk around Yaffo, in all its medieval-style glory, and Natalie showed us the rocks where Andromeda was tied before she headed off to class. Rebecca and I continued exploring the city's narrow corridorish streets and visited a few little shops.


We then headed back to Tel Aviv on foot along the Mediterranean. Here is a nice little view of Tel Aviv. We spent our walk catching up, and then headed for Tel Aviv's major market (the name of which escapes me), where I was bombarded by trinkets and delicious looking fruits and veggies and breads, and where I tried my first piece of Halva, a tasty candy made from ground sesame seeds and love. We then did some shopping, checked out a flea market, and basically continued our walk up into northern Tel Aviv. Later that night, we met Natalie for drinks at a bar that could easily have been in Brooklyn, if it weren't for all of the Hebrew being spoken.

The next day we got up and went for breakfast with Natalie's friend Ori at a nice cafe by the sea. The food was once again awesome (I ate a loaf of bread, literally). We then hopped on a bus and headed for Jerusalem, where Rebecca's cousins picked us up and took us to her Aunt Miriam's house. The house is on a hill with a fantastic view, and everyone there was really nice to me. Miriam showed up while we were on our way out, but still (as warned) managed to push some food at me. We eventually made our way to the old city.


Here I am, cramming my note to god into the wailing wall. The old city of Jerusalem is amazing and unlike anything I have ever seen. The markets all run down narrow cobblestone streets which are on a relatively steep incline. We arrived too late to visit the mosque, but we went to the Jewish quarter and the Church of the Holy Sepulchre. This is definitely one of the coolest churches I have ever seen (as well it should be). Mass was going on while we were there, so I didn't get to go into Jesus' tomb, but I did see the place where he died, some of his blood stains on rocks, the ninth station of the cross, a Coptic monk with a kickin' beard in the coolest monk outfit I've ever seen, and I got to sing in a cistern. Good stuff. We then went through the Muslim markets and Natalie used her fabulous ghetto-sense (she is convinced that her super power is to lead people into the ghetto (or "the wrong side of the tracks," for those of you not up on the current lingo that the kids are using) when exploring relatively unknown territory) to lead us straight into the ghetto. Luckily, we were able to find a cab, and we headed for Ben Yehuda street.


A friend and coworker (boss, really) of mine here in Korea has a friend called Lior who lives in Jerusalem and owns an interesting little shop on Ben Yehuda street (I'll leave it to you to imagine what his wares might be) and we had arranged to meet up with him and say hello. He showed us around his store and then we all headed to a cafe for some drinks. Lior, as it turns out, is one of the most ridiculous people I have ever met. Among other things, he claims not to have washed a dish or done laundry in years, because he does favors for friends (such as putting down flooring in their apartments or doing electrical wiring) and gets them to do these things in return... hmmm... Anyhow, he was friendly and definitely interesting. We met Rebecca's cousin for a hummousful dinner and then went out to an Irish pub for some more drinks before heading back to Miriam's.


The following morning, Rebecca and I went to pick up our rental car, and after a few navigation snafus, we gave a ride down a hill to a random girl and headed south and east to the Dead Sea. We stopped at a place called Ein Gedi, where we took a 30 minute hike in the hot, hot sun and then enjoyed a nice swim in one of the lovely waterfall pools, as well as the really funky vegetation. We gave a ride down the road to an Australian couple who had left their tour bus, yet refused to take public transport (way to go, geniuses). We then continued south to Masada, only to find that no one was allowed to hike it after 10:00am due to the heat. Slightly dejected, we headed back north to the Kibbutz where we had reserved a room for the night.


We checked in and headed for the Qumran, where the Dead Sea Scrolls were found. You can see the very cave in which they were found above. It was a pretty cool little site, with quite a few ritual bath ruins. I guess I can understand why you'd need to take lots of baths in heat like that...

We went back to our charming little room at the Kibbutz, where Natalie met us. We then went for a quick dip in the pool and then had dinner. Having gathered that there was to be a Bar Mitzvah at the pool that night, we decided to crash. Sadly, our shenanigans lasted a mere 15 minutes before one of the women from the reception recognized us and kindly requested that we take a hike. We had nothing left to do but search out the Kibbutz bar. This bar ended up being incredibly hard to find. Above you can see Natalie Rebecca in a barn full of hay, which we found while looking for the bar. Eventually we did find it, and we had a nice night of beer, talking and playing pool, in spite of the fact that we were the only three people in bar that night.


In the morning, Rebecca and I left Natalie to sleep in and drove back to Masada to get our hike on. Masada is where Herod's palaces were, and was also a stronghold for some Jewish rebels who ended up committing mass suicide when they realized that there was no other escape from the Romans. It's pretty freakin' cool, as evidenced above. We did our fair share of exploring and were lucky enough to overhear a classic American tourist quote: "This is the crappiest palace I've ever seen!"

We returned to Kibbutz Qalya only to realize that we had made a mistake regarding our checkout time and found Natalie sitting in the lobby with all of our stuff. Way to suck, us and way to be awesome and pack up everything in a flurry, Natalie!


We spent the rest of the day at the Dead Sea, which is a wonderous, wonderous thing. You float practically on top of the water and you can float vertically without treading water. The water doesn't feel like water at all but like a big sea of oil. The mud at the bottom is the definition of squishy and is full of minerals that are good for the skin. We covered ourselves in mud and baked in the sun and then washed it off (except for our faces, which can be seen above). After some good old beach reading, we headed north.

The drive was really beautiful. We got to watch the desert turn into something much more lush and treeful. We drove up into the mountains and found the tiny town where we'd planned to stay at a bed a breakfast. We attempted to find said bed and breakfast for about an hour by asking people and driving around and asking more people and driving around more. The fact that it was Shabbat complicated things a bit. We ended up opting for a different bed and breakfast in the same town, that we found in the process of looking for the one we'd reserved. The woman there was really kind and our room was lovely (it had a Jacuzzi bathtub!). We went to a tasty chocolate restaurant in a nearby town called Rosh Pinna. The town was settled by Hungarian Jews in the 1800 (I think...) and thus has a pretty European feel. I had some artichokes breaded and covered with cheese and some cheese with a side of cheese. We then shared a dessert of great chocolatiness and magnitude. Natalie and I ordered cocktails from the cocktail menu. Our waitress looked like a deer caught in the headlights, and then required that we change our drink orders several times because they were out of some things. In the end, they brought Natalie a weird "cosmopolitan" which was not pink, and me a glass of some kind of something that was filled to the brim with lemon slices and mint (it was supposed to be a capirina). Way to go, guys.


We woke up the following morning and enjoyed a scrumptious Israeli breakfast before driving down to the Kinneret, the lake where Jesus is said to have walked on water. The water was great, the waves were fun, and Natalie found a watermelon rind on the bottom (score!) We read, swam, worked on our suntans and headed back toward Tel Aviv.

We stopped in Nazareth to look around and have some falafel and some truly intense Arabic pastries and made it back to Tel Aviv in the evening.


Here I am, driving Dorcas, our rental car. I wanted the car to have a biblical name, and let's face it, Dorcas is hilarious (shut up, I am not a 10-year-old boy.). As it turns out, Dorcas was an early Christian woman who made clothing for poor people and stuff. Go Dorcas!


That night, my last full night in Tel Aviv, was spent at a bar that Libby, Rebecca's roommate was reviewing for a publication. Someone there must have caught wind of her assignment, because suddenly the bar owner was coming up to us, asking what kind of music we wanted to listen to and offering us free drinks. Oh, the star treatment. Natalie and I ended up staying until closing and then having a ridiculously long night, which needed to happen. The next day, we were in bad shape, but thanks to Rebecca and jaknun, the miraculous hangover food of greasy goodness, we survived. The heat was oppressive (as Natalie said, it felt like it was being vented from somewhere, but no, it was just the air), so Rebecca and I went to have an Iced Coffee (yet another foodish item that is GREAT in Israel) and then I did some shopping for gifts and clothes (as they actually have clothing in Israel that fits me) and went to dinner with Natalie at her favorite restaurant. The food was great (a theme emerges), as was the conversation. I went back to Natalie's to shower and pack, and before I knew it was time to catch my flight to K-land via a lengthy layover in Frankfurt. I had the chance to eat some spaetzle, take a cruise on the Main, buy some chocolate, and speak some German before heading back in earnest.

I had an amazing trip on many levels. For being roughly the size of New Jersey, Israel is an amazing country topographically. It is beautiful, and the people were very friendly and direct. It's soooooooooo historically and culturally significant as well. I know it helped me tons to have friends there (and not just any friends, at that), but I really think that anyone who likes to travel would enjoy themselves in Israel. Seriously guys, stop freaking out about it and go!

P.S.
And now for something completely different:
It seems I find myself quite attached to a British gentleman of Welsh heritage these days. As he's asked that his true identity remain under wraps, we'll just call him Dylan Thomas for now. I met him shortly before leaving for Israel. He lives on the outskirts of Seoul, not too far from me. If you are very good, I may post a picture of him here soon. [insert obnoxious noise of girlish glee]