Shabbat and the City (Tel Aviv, part 2)

Tel Aviv certainly is "cool."  There's a vibe about the place unlike Haifa or Jerusalem.   The Friday markets are crowded and fun.  Everything is on display for the public.  It is a place to see and be seen.  Hip stores vie for attention on the boulevards while farmers hawk piles of cherries in the plaza.  It is a kaleidoscope of color.  Restaurants (at least the ones we tried) are extremely good.  However, like all of Israel, it suffers from the tyranny of Shabbat.

Everything that was exciting and cool--the markets, the restaurants, the trendy shops--everything like that, is completely gone by Saturday morning.  Some restaurants and coffee shops are open which is a small mercy, but the majority of the city is closed.  Plazas are devoid of life.  Large boulevards have no traffic.  Shops are shuttered or display their wares in windows with one light on, as if to mock and say "come back later."  It's like a war-zone and everyone has gone to ground.  The city is empty.

Everyone is at the beach, and I do mean everyone.  The entire city lives by the "shop on Friday, beach on Saturday" cycle also common in Haifa. From an American point of view, this is just too much conformity.  I can go to the beach and enjoy it on Friday while the people are elsewhere, but I can't go shopping on Saturday to avoid the beach crowds.  Silly … 

Beach on Friday

Beach on Saturday

There is also no public transportation from Friday afternoon until Saturday night.  Come to Tel Aviv on the train on Friday and you're stuck until 9:10 p.m. on Saturday.  This might work if you can crash with family or friends, but a night in a Tel Aviv hotel is not cheap ($200+).  It seems like the rules have been made to benefit the natives or the tourists.  Tel Aviv works well if you live there, like to party all night on Friday and sleep on a beach chair, or don't work a normal week. 

Still, it was good to see the city and to be able to stay over on Thursday and Friday nights.  The restaurants were the best in Israel which made it worth it to have two dinners in the city.  We were too tired to take in the fabled night-life scene but given what I've seen in Haifa and Jerusalem, Tel Aviv is the only place you can go out for a "night on the town" in the entire country, so any bar would be like New York crossed with Miami crossed with Vegas.  We overheard one person at the beach saying that he got to sleep around 5:30 a.m. on Saturday morning.  No wonder Shabbat is so quiet--everyone not at the beach is sleeping off a hangover.  Tel Aviv ranks high on my list of Israel experiences, but I still think Haifa with its natural beauty and pleasant beach is definitely the best place to live!