Transit from Thailand to India to Turkey to Israel was long. Most of my time was spent watching movies and sleeping. I regret that now because I "suffered" pretty bad jet lag. 9 pm comes around and I'm out like a light. But I guess that is unavoidable when you travel several time zones over 48 hours. I'm getting better though. After so many airports, I now think that you can tell a lot about a country even if you have never left the airport. New Zealand's was surprisingly small, Thailand had a huge new airport (but everything was overpriced and somewhat disorganized). India's airport was terrible. Holes in the ground for a toilet with "bathroom attendants" who think that giving you a paper towel is somehow a service, people shouting over the PA announcing flights like every 10 seconds, uncomfortable waiting areas that kind of smelled like farm animals, and boarding the plane was chaotic. I almost got trampled. But the amazing thing is I still want to go back. Turkey was cold and no one smiled. But at least they were efficient. And finally Israel where they did a thorough check of my bag while I wasn't even there. I found half my bag contents spilled all over the carousel. And I got grilled about what my business in Israel was. But everything was at least rational and very well laid out. That helped me meet up with Sumi who was in her boot because she broke her foot from walking. But seriously, how do you break your foot from walking? Anyways, Sumi and I made our way to the hostel in Tel Aviv. We met Tom Owenby on the way, and American from Arizona. He looks like Clark Kent. He was there because he is a Ba'Hai which is a relatively new religion based in Haifa. I had never heard of this religion before but I really like it. Basically they believe in one God, all the prophets (Muhammad, Jesus, Abraham, etc) and the coming of a new prophet for each era, equality for men and women, tolerance, some other things I forget, and my favorite part you don't have to go to church. Sorry mom and dad. So anyways, we got on the train, then took the bus. Israelis are rude, but they like to help too. I think they are just happy people are still visiting their country. And most of them speak decent English so it's fairly easy to get around. So we got to the hostel-pretty nice place. Free breakfast, always a bonus. We ate schwarma for dinner. It feels so late here because it gets dark at like 6 whereas New Zealand was like 10. I'm so confused.

The next day we went sightseeing around the beach. It's warm for winter here. Alot of random Israelis come up and start talking to us. We met Itay who worked at the first aid place on the beach. He gave me his number on a band-aid. I didn't call him though. He obviously thinks of himself as a playa. I wouldn't call any guy who hits on me within 5 minutes of meeting him. He told us a joke though, that was nice. Then we found a cafe-our favorite pastime. Sumi attracts so much attention with her boot. It's such a good conversation piece. Israelis are mesmerized by it and they aren't shy about staring either. Then we went to the Carmel market. It had the standard made in china fare but it also had some of the best looking produce I've ever seen. The apples were the size of my head. We got strawberries and gummies. The rest of the day we just walked around. We thought about going out but Sumi and I just aren't party girls. We just have to face that.

Next day: We decided to go to Jaffa, the old part of Tel Aviv where some biblical things happened. Something about a whale. We walked along the beach. Sumi is pretty fast with her boot. She's like a robot. We had to stop several times though because we didn't have our coffee and we are addicts. I think it's just that New Zealand coffee was so strong, I definitely went though some withdrawal. So we walked around in Jaffa and it was really pretty. Then we started petting a dog, who belonged to an Israeli named Leo. He was there with his wife and was telling us how they wanted to move to Florida. He really wanted to show us the gated community he lives in so he gave us a tour. It was really nice, he must be loaded. Later we got gelato, then went to the gypsy market. So many gypsies. They all hound you too. They got me to buy a skirt that I didn't even really want. Later Sumi and I watched the sunset and had a "date night". Which is basically just a night where we eat out...which we do most nights, but this is more special. One thing I don't really like about Israelis is that they don't understand the word "no", and they are somewhat pushy. We refused dessert several times, but the waiter gave it to us anyway. And we had to pay for it. At least the food was really good. Israel has good hummus. Although now I'm all hummused out. More later...