DAY 106 - TEL AVIV 2
SYNOPSIS:A visit to the Tel Aviv Museum of Art and a stroll through Neve Tzedek.David and I had a full day touring the Tel Aviv Museum of Art, and the neighborhood known as Neve Tzedek. But to make a long blog out of it would be quite boring, so it will be short.The Museum of Art is a typical western art museum ranging from a wing full of old masters to several wings filled with Impressionists and 20th century avant-garde art. It is housed in a complex combining the opera house and the city library into a culture hub.We did a lot of walking from there; all the way back to Jaffa, through the first Jewish neighborhood of Tel Aviv dating from the 1880’s: Neve Tzedek. Funny, how today, where Tel Aviv is filled with Bauhaus architecture and modern skyscrapers people again seek out the old and irregular. The Bauhaus mansions were “in” during the early 20th century and Neve Tzedek was almost abandoned and left to the poor among them. Now the trend is reversed: Out of the crumbling Bauhaus “mansions” people move to the trendy, artsy little enclave between the skyscrapers and Jaffa. Coffee shops, ice cream parlors, fashion shops and funky homes create a homey ambiance. Young couples walk around with their strollers and the pace of the town has slowed down along with the traffic noise. It’s almost like stepping out of Tel Aviv. We had fun wandering.Back in Jaffa we went to one of the restored Ottoman mansions, now an Arab-operated restaurant. We ordered one dish – as we usually do, to share. If we don’t want to forfeit our ice cream snack, we just can’t handle much more than that. Would you believe it? The entrée came with 15 – we counted, yes, 15! – small salad dishes and pita bread. Of course we had to eat our way through all these delights. But who on earth and in their right mind can eat that much food by themselves?!Bon appétit and good night.