Laila Levan in Tel Aviv

Last night was Laila Levan (White Nights) in Tel Aviv, a night-long celebration that started when Tel Aviv was dedicated as a UNESCO site for all the white Bau Haus architecture. Its important because its the only place in the world, outside of Miami Beach, where there is still pure Bau Haus architecture because the rest was destroyed in the world wars. In light of this, there is a festival going on all night in Tel Aviv, with museums open all night and tons of concerts out in the streets all over the city.

We started the day with our program at 8am on a bus to the Jaffa port, reminiscent of birthright.

 Our tourguide Stav was not your typical Israeli, but what I'm learning more and more on this trip is that there is no typical Israeli. He was very very tall, with  long brown hair in a pony tail down his back, and very Austrian/Germanic features. We were speculating about whether or not he was Jewish based on his all too deep knowledge of the New Testament.

He told us about Jaffa and basically took us to the shops...that's basically all he did all day, including during our "tour" of Tel Aviv.
Me and the girls (Lindsay, Claire and Julia) at the Jaffa port:

The most memorable thing about our time in the Jaffo port was the lunch we had at Cafe Jaffa where an Israeli Palestinian girl who spoke PERFECT English served us an amazing breakfast - I love Israeli breakfast. Since this was probably the first Palestinian most of us had encountered on our trip, we started bombarding her with questions about her politics and feelings about being an "Israeli Palestinian". Her main point was that, there, in Jaffa, a mixed city, it just "wasn't a thing". Arabs and Jews lived and worked side by side, and that's simply how it was. It makes you wonder, though, the attitudes of an Arab living and working there, knowing that in the eyes of the government they are still inferior, and are, at the same time, considered traitors and abandoned by their own people and government.

From Jaffo, we took the bus to Tel Aviv to continue our "tour" during which all we saw was a museum of Tel Aviv, the Carmel Shuk (Market) and one of the Bau Haus buildings. I hope our "tour" of Jerusalem is better because there are actually things I want to know about there!

We spent quite a bit of time at the Shuk, and most of our afternoon wandering and shopping in the exhausting heat with our blue, matching,  super-cool "Oranim Israel Adventures" backpacks. Oh yeah.

Thanks to Chanita, I was staying in Tel Aviv that night with her friend Daniel who has an apartment blocks from the beach. I think this is the most striking thing about Israel - perfect strangers are perfectly happy and willing to take you into their home, feed you, and give you a place to sleep, for no other reason than you're a jew visiting Eretz Israel. Anyway, Daniel picked up me and Lindsay from the Tel Aviv boardwalk at a point where we were really too dead to keep walking. He took us home to his (mostly) air conditioned apartment, and then we hit the town, starting with dinner at a delicious fish restaurant. Once again, my favorite part about eating out in Israel is that within moments of sitting down, they put food in front of you!!! Not just bread and butter, but salads, vegetables, dips! I love it.

Then we met up with Daniel's friend Shai to experience a little of the Laila Levan. During our stroll down the boulevards, we saw Argentinian dancing, Brazillian music, Spanish dancing, Russian dancing, some church-like signing, and an African congo drum show.

 At that point our energy ran out and we hung out at Shai's place where he "babysat" us until Daniel was done studying for his MBA tests. All in all, a great night!

Friday we woke up late and had another AWESOME Israeli breakfast and went back out to wander Tel Aviv some more, this time coming home with a manicure. I then once again successfuly got myeslf home to Ashdod, getting us both to the Central Bus Station "Tahena Markazit" (By the way, my Hebrew vocabulary is improving at a steady rate. In the last 4 days its gone up from 3 to at least 30 words!) , and then onto the bus to Ashdod, and from the Ashdod bus station home! I'm starting to feel a little more human. Once I can read, I'll feel more or less normal.

Now I'm sitting on the balcony of my "villa" in Ashdod, and all of my roomates are asleep. Its Friday night, so its Shabbos in the land of Israel. Everything closed slowly this evening, and I missed the last buses from the bus station and had to walk home. All the stores are closed, and there was a peace and quiet descending onto the already quiet streets in the early evening. There is nowhere for any Israeli to be this evening except at home with their friends and family, enjoying each other and the Shabbos. My roomates and I even created our own little Shabbos meal, go to know each other a little better, and spent the evening talking and laughing.

I have no religious attachments to any of this, but from the perspective of culture and values, this is the unique thing about Israel. This country almost FORCES you to embrace those family values, and strives to remind you on a regular basis the things that are truly important - not work, not your social life, not material possessions you can go out and buy, but family, conversation, stopping and enjoying the moment. Because really, from Friday night to Saturday night here in Israel, you're not left with much of a choice!