Dateline Jerusalem – Every once in awhile I need to get away. Yesterday was the perfect opportunity to travel from Rehovot to Tel Aviv. The weather was warm, the sun was shining, and the cloudless sky was a perfect blue, not like the smoggy haze of Tel Aviv.  Usually it is 30 minutes by car or train. A couple friends and I decided to make a day of it. We took the almost hour-long trip by bus via the cities of Ness Ziona and Rishon LeZion. Although not exactly a scenic route, it gives a view of how Israelis really live. Transportation costs for the entire day were extremely affordable. As a senior citizen, bus rates are half price. Round trip between Rehovot and Tel Aviv was less than $4.25. Within Tel Aviv, the bus fare was only one dollar.

Our destination was the Carmel Market, also known as Ha Carmel Shuk or Allenby Shuk.  A shuk is an open-air marketplace or bazaar that sells food, fresh fruits, vegetables, baked goods, cheeses, nuts, spices, flowers, home accessories, textiles, clothes, jewelery, art, crafts, Judaica and souvenirs.  It is a major tourist attraction in Tel Aviv, but in no way compares to the magnificent world-famous Mahane Yehuda Shuk in Jerusalem. 

Years ago, before making aliyah (moving to Israel), I would spend all day at the Carmel Shuk buying gifts to take home to family and friends, and purchasing Judaica items. When I would shop in Judaica stores in the U.S., an item marked $25 was 25 shekels in Israel, $7.14! For a shopaholic like me, no trip to Israel could be without a visit to the shuk. However, since moving to Israel, the shuk has not been that great of a shopping delight. Items are just as inexpensive at the local shops in Rehovot. I surprised my myself and my friends by not buying one item at the shuk yesterday. We overheard a woman commenting that she brought 700 shekels ($200) to spend at the shuk and she had only spent 200 shekels ($58). The best part about the shuk seemed to be the live entertainment at the entrance.

Before our trek to the shuk, we stopped at a bank in Tel Aviv. I do not think I have ever been in such a luxurious place. Marble steps and floors at the entrance.  Inside, it was like walking into an exclusive hotel lobby, so elegant.  The bank was circular in shape, tellers' stations lining the walls.  The floors were thickly carpeted, and in the center of the bank there was a bank (no pun intended) of comfortable pinkish-red velvety sofas curved outward to face the tellers.  In the area in the center of the circle of sofas was a gigantic round table of plants and flowers.  

How could I make a trip to Tel Aviv without describing the unique architecture of the city?  Tel Aviv is known as the White City for its German modernist Bauhaus style of architecture. Jewish architects from Germany fled here in the 1930s to escape the Nazis. In 1994, UNESCO made the White City of Tel Aviv a World Heritage site. There is more to Tel Aviv than Bauhaus.  The buildings surrounding the entrance to the Carmel Shuk have a distinctive French flavor with their colorful wooden shutters flanking the windows and their matching painted wrought iron enclosed balconies, reminding me of New Orleans.

Tel Aviv is also known for its unique high rise buildings.  One reminds me of the Leaning Tower of Pisa. It was built to look as if it were leaning on one side, ready to tip over. I have often described the Azrieli Towers with its three geometric shaped buildings, circular, triangular and square, connected by a four-story shopping mall at its base. The giant champagne glass-shaped structures sitting atop the roofs of some of the skyscrapers are helicopter pads. 

My favorite architecture in Tel Aviv is on a busy boulevard in the center of the city, a group of vacant old bungalow-style buildings one-story high, with what looks like heavy wooden doors and thick shutters covering their windows.  Again, New Orleans-style. What makes them unique is that these doors and shuttered windows are fake. They are realistically painted pictures nailed onto large slats of wood boards attached to the windowless exteriors of the bungalows. Only upon close inspection is their true nature revealed. I was told the bungalows once housed government offices. Windowless walls were for blackout purposes, concealing the secret work going on inside. 

L'hitraot.  Shachar