First Impressions of Tel Aviv

Misha, Mochi and I arrived safe and sound in Tel Aviv just before President’s Day Weekend. The timing couldn’t have worked out any better. Our first full day here was spent at the Embassy Branch Office receiving briefings, but we then had three days to relax and overcome the jet lag over the long weekend.

One nice thing about working abroad for the US government is we still get federal holidays in addition to some local ones. Two weeks from now, Misha has another long weekend due to local elections and the Tel Aviv marathon. This will give us our first opportunity to explore Tel Aviv (and beyond)!

Tel Aviv rests on the eastern shores of the Mediterranean Sea, and it’s on these beaches we’ve spent most of our first week. In that time, I’ve made a handful of knee-jerk observations about the lifestyle here that I wanted to share:

1. For the first time in my life, I am a member of the 1%. Unfortunately, I’m not talking financially... I’m talking about body fat. This city is incredibly healthy. I heard this before arriving, but it is something else to witness. As we walk up and down the beach, almost everyone we see, regardless of age, is in great shape and exercising. Tel Aviv is a very flat city, so running is easy and common. Additionally, the beautiful, sunny weather makes you want get outside and make the most of the day.
   
2. Going along with the exercise theme, people LOVE their games! Footvolley, a hybrid of soccer and volleyball, is played all hours of the day. It takes an incredibly limber body to get a foot above the net and still be able to spike it. The players do this frequently, and it’s damn impressive.
   
   Additionally, people love Matkot, which makes much less sense to me. If you are unfamiliar, it’s like beach tennis without a net. Instead of having any sort of lines or borders, players stand facing each other and smack the ball as hard as they can until someone misses. Then they start over again. I hear that once the weather warms up, there is hardly a square foot in the sand not occupied by a Matkot player.
   
3. Apparently some taxi companies do well here, because at least one company has a fleet of brand new, white Mercedes-Benz’s shuttling people around.
   
4. Anyone who’s ever met me knows I’m no fashion expert. I do, however, find it odd that a lot of people wear shirts here with either American brands or bizarre English phrases such as “Happy Smiley Day”, “OK” and “Yes! Thanks!!”.
   
5. Lastly, a few notes on the flight over. Aside from some added security at the gate, getting from airport to airport was actually pretty easy. Before flying, a lot was made of the fact that Orthodox Jewish men don’t like to sit next to women on a plane and therefore switch seats a lot. But, we didn’t actually see any of that. The weirdest part of the journey in my mind was the bizarre hours the flight staff served food: first at 1:30 AM, and then again 45 minutes before landing, which seemed like an unnecessary chore for the flight staff so close to landing.

We’ll have more to post about once we get a chance to spend more time inside the city. I plan on posting more pictures when that happens as well. Until then, לְהִתְרָאוֹת