Saturday Shabbat in Tel Aviv

After our delicious and filling breakfast, Yael and I decided to walk to the Tel Aviv Art Museum. 

The walk was an incredible experience of Shabbat.  All the hustle and bustle of yesterday was gone.  The streets were relatively empty and most of the stores and restaurants were closed.  For the first time I truly appreciated the concept of Shabbat.  As we strolled the quiet streets, I was able to observe some real urban wonders. First, there are beautiful flowers in front of people's residences. While there is some garbage in the streets, there are numerous places to recycle bottles.  Because there are so many cars, people will park wherever they think they can find a space, even if there isn't one. And, I got to sit in one of the many Sukkahs left open for anyone. 

It took us about 1/2 hour to walk to the museum but it was well worth it.  The museum has an eclectic collection --- Picasso, Renoir, Matisse as well as Chagall can be found in the many rooms. We bought some souvenirs -- an unusual picture viewer of a Chagall painting, a 2009 Israeli calendar and an artistic salt and pepper shaker for Yael's cousins.  We had fun posing our stuffed moose, Gunter, on various sculptures.  Note... Gunter will be appearing in places throughout this blog, so keep watching! 

When we got back, we decided to go to the beach.  The sand was smooth, the water was warm and the view was soothing.  We rented a couple of lounge chairs and just gazed out on the Mediterranean Sea.  Yael spotted a couple of women sunbathing in the nude. What a country! A young Arab boy came by to sell delicious, fresh pretzels. We watched another sunset. A great way to celebrate Shabbat.

After a quick shower, we arranged for a taxi to take us to Yael's cousin, Izzy who lives in Ashdod.  We learned a traveler's lesson.... we didn't negotiate the price nor ask for a receipt so we paid about 60 NIS more than we should have.  We had a short visit because Izzy had to go to work at the Sheraton near the diamond center.  We took a train back to Tel Aviv (only 34 NIS) and then grabbed a taxi (35 NIS) back to our hotel.  Because Shabbat was over, the train was quite crowded.  There were many young soldiers.  I watched two soldiers, one male and female, no more than 19 years old, try to clear his machine gun which has gotten jammed with dust.  They were giggling as they were pulling at the hopefully unloaded gun as if it were a toy.  When we arrived at the station, they were joined by scores of their fellow soldiers. 

It was nine o'clock and we hadn't eaten dinner yet.  We had heard good things from Yehudah about Mike's Place, a restaurant near the American Embassy.  As we walked by the Embassy, we noticed a lot of security.  Mike's Place was like being in a US restaurant.  I ordered a hamburger and a Maccabee beer while listening to live jazz music.

The  Mediterranean Sea could be seen and heard across the street.  So ends night two.