Thoughts and #travel memories: #israel #telavivjaffa #jerusalem

Thoughts on a journey to TEL AVIV & JERUSALEM 

I just hate black and white. Not the movies, but the concept. And there's not only 1 type of grey, either: there are only shades - of all possible colors. Period.

That's why I wanted to come to Israel and see life here with my own eyes, ignoring the biased propaganda some European newspapers practice on a daily basis. Because I knew for a fact that the public policy of a state can seriously differ from the practicalities, its inhabitants and daily life in general. But one must experience that first hand. By traveling, observing, trying to grasp that microcosm. 

That's the reason I hadn't even try to imagine how a journey to Israel would be like - keeping in mind the tumultuous and controversial background of that territory, my own writings and interview/encounter with the Jewish Community in Berlin, I preferred to dive into that new reality, to become immersed… to observe and listen to what people had to say...

My first impression of Tel Aviv-Jaffa was of a cosmopolitan Western city, with all its advantages and disadvantages…

However, according to my acquaintances, residents of Israel for more than 20 years now (one of them originally from the Golan Heights), there is a certain hierarchy and various "casts" within the contemporary Israeli society...

It's difficult to see these differences with the bare eye - especially in a mixed and modern place like Tel Aviv-Jaffa, with a population of slightly more than 0,5 million and quite a background. It really lacks nothing a modern metropolis takes pride in. And personally, given the geographical location, the new town/old town dynamics, the sea and the colors in general, it reminded me a bit of Beirut... and the traffic, of Istanbul...

The beating heart of the city is thus split in 2: the new part of town is Tel Aviv and the old one, Jaffa. However, they do merge in the most natural of ways: I'd say, at the Shuk Ha'Carmel market, surrounded by small cafes and enlivened by countless street food vendors and customers. A sight I couldn't help but adore… Mountains of baklava, spices and fruit alternating with kebap skewers... the scents of the Middle East... and, naturally, the chaos that goes along with it... 

The Jaffa old town was definitely more spruced up: all around the Clock Tower, coffee shops, restaurants, sweets and pastry shops, smart souvenir stores, gentrified halls turned into vintage boutiques and cool folks - the same atmosphere I had discovered in the elegant Dizengof area of Tel Aviv, but with more historical charm to it - the impressive centennial buildings of the Jaffa old town and the port really do turn the place into a genuine Middle Eastern hotspot... it felt good to be in such an indescribable, culturally colorful spot, literally multi-cultural from all points of view... 

To be continued...