Markets: Flea and Farmer's

I've always had a thing for markets.  I remember being a little girl tagging along to go grocery shopping with my mom.  In college, I loved walking to the nearby Farmer's Market to buy my produce, and I absolutely adore going to Salt Lake City's huge market on Saturday mornings in the summer.  It's a cool fascination with the sites, people watching, the crafts...and the variety of pastry that accompany the outdoor market.  Okay, so mostly it's the pastry. To my joyful discovery, this holds true on an international scale.  Sunday brought the fantastic chance to skip off on some homework and take a short bus ride to the Mediterranean coast and spend the day in Tel Aviv.  What a gorgeous coastal city.  A small group of us decided to explore before hitting the waves, which was a fantastic decision.  Old Jaffa houses a really neat bohemian artist district that led to lots cool discoveries in little galleries.  We saw a Yemenite jeweler demonstration and a gallery centered around advertising in Israel to highlight a couple.  I found the French influence in advertising really interesting.  My  Humanities professors would be proud of that little detour I think.

This is mostly to make you jealous of two things
1: My sick awesome Genie Pants (See previous post)
2: The gorgeous shot of the Mediterranean.

 Alright, onto the markets.   When I say flea market, expand your mental definition to include a Mediterranean breeze, Turkish rugs, Moroccan furniture and African influenced art.  Along with random street side vendors that sold everything from q-tips to Sherlock Holmes style pipes.  Cool.  The winding myriad of pathways housed stacks of rugs, crisp white linen shirts, glittering necklaces, ancient leather camera cases, dishes, pots, pans and used postcards.  (Is that legal?)  Some storefronts were so jammed packed you couldn't walk inside. It's quite the sensory overload once the food comes into play.  Around the corner, spits of shawarma, rows of baked breads and baklava and slushy pomegranate chillers tempt your palate.  Needless to say, there was quite the sampling.  It's all part of the sensory experience, right?

The hot and sweaty atmosphere paid off when I hit the beach.  I played around in the waves and then just sat and chatted in the shallows after taking a long walk along the beach.  Watching the sunset demanded gelato, and that ended our day in Tel Aviv.  Needless to say, I'll be going back again before this little trip is over.




Highlight of the coolest aspect of the market in my
opinion.

Market number two.  September is a wonderful time to be in Jerusalem for many reasons.  One particular reason is the number of Jewish holidays housed in this month.  Today officially begins the start of Sukkot, just five days after Yom Kippur.  Our Jewish professor suggested all the things we could go see in celebration of the 8 day holiday.  One in particular was to see the temporary huts built in remembrance of the exodus from Egypt. Naturally, we had to see that after class on Wednesday.  Some families eat, sleep and drink in their sukkhas for the extent of the holiday.  Obviously some sukkahs are more temporary than others, depending on the use. In West Jerusalem we saw many sukkahs being built, but we found the highlight of the holiday in the market just around the corner from Yafo street.

This has to be one of the coolest markets I've ever been to.  Fish, melons, dozens of types of candies, citron fruits, nut mixes, pastry, cheeses, figs, dates in various states of drying, bouquets of flowers, oranges, sushi, pistachios, cinnamon, dried fruits like mangoes and kiwis, currants, cardamom, saffron provided an myriad of colors and smells to the narrow street. Each vendor had his wares in a gorgeous spread to tempt the crowd of shoppers.  It was very busy, given the eve of the holiday.  This had to be one the coolest things I've seen in Jerusalem to date. The only downfall was that we were unsuccessful in our hunt for (you guessed it) coconut baklava.  I plan on becoming quite the connoisseur before returning to the States.

Like Tel Aviv, this won't be my last visit to that market.  I'm a firm believer that food is a reflection of a culture, and what is a better sampling of that culture than a market?
.

While we didn't find coconut baklava, we did find God.
I think that counts for something.