I shared a coed dorm-style room with a guy named Sam (from California) and two young women. Sandy, from Germany, and a young Russian girls whose name escapes me at the moment. For Sam, it was his first trip abroad and almost every experience was new to him. He’d already gained a good set of interesting travel stories: almost being robbed, someone trying to sell him cocaine, a girl randomly making out with him.

Above: Sam shows Sandy a few magic tricks

Sam is the only high school traveler I’ve met who seemed like an adult and not an American idiot with a passport. He and I hung out quite a bit. And he is the only magician I’ve ever known or met. He had great tricks and was always eager to find the card you’d thought of or make something disappear or reappear. A young David Copperfield without the super model ex-girlfriend.

Above: Sandy showing the albums she’d picked up at a local music store.

Sandy was shy, but not introverted, and gave the immediate impression of someone you wanted to know. She was the first person I met at the hostel, and if I remember correctly, she was a lion tamer from Detroit who’d fled north to Canada and then swam across the Atlantic to take political refuge in Germany from the Salvation Army or she was born and raised in Germany, had some rough spots here and there, and was now trying to finish university while she worked as a stylist.

Above: The Russian girl. Sophie?

She always had some place to go and always extended an invitation.

Now that you’ve got the setup. First, I’m always finding new people to hang out with. And I made good friends with two girls from the states named Claire and Lisa. I spent New Year’s Eve day exploring Tel-Aviv, and then I met up with Claire and Lisa to visit some bars along the beach, during which time a friend and I faked being their boyfriend’s in a completely platonic fashion (both girls have nice, real boyfriends, but wanted a way to fend of advances). Then I met my wonderful friend Mor, rang in the New Year with her, and retired for the night.

The morning of January 1st…

I woke up in the morning to the odd colors of the room. We’d all made it back to our beds from our various New Year’s outings.

After getting ready, I went downstairs and ate breakfast with Sam….

And Sandy.

Breakfast consisted of toast with butter followed by two more rounds of toast with butter, and of course no bacon. Delicious. And for Sandy it also consisted of a few cups of coffee. Perhaps more coffee than toast – Europeans tend to eat many meals that way. It was Sandy’s last day of travel. Not having any plans, She and I decided to wander the local market and explore until she needed to head for the airport.

From here, the day was idyllic. We bought fresh fruit drinks in the market, and watched the vendor cut and juice the pomegranates and oranges, we wandered around the markets, had a few small conversations (but we were almost silent the entire time), and the rest of the time we each took in the sights and sounds and cool breeze on our own.

Above: Near the start of the market, Sandy stopped for a cigarette.

She had cigarettes – a brand I’d never heard of – made from a kibbutz (maybe jsolberg can let me know what brand). The cigarettes were inexpensive, which wasn’t the point. Rather the point was to partake in something local. I’m not a smoker by any means, but I had one as well, and she snapped the following photograph of me.

Above: Me looking at the book Sandy had on Buddhism called “The Way Things Are”

Remember, you shouldn’t smoke. Or smoke and hold a flammable item. Something about smoking while holding a book on Buddhism is comical to me.

Above: Sandy asked these two men if she could photograph them, while I robbed them. Except for the robbery part.

Above: This is one of the photographs of the two men she photographed while I photographed her. A solid impression of Audrey Hepburn.

I should have taken more photographs in the market. For some reason I didn’t take any, which is very unusual for me especially given all of the interesting fruits, colors, textures, and items that you find in a market. But we spent an hour or two wandering through.

The photograph above is of a car mechanics. I’m not sure why I photographed this and not the market. But that is the way things are, and am I fine with it. Although the place was an interesting rag-tag collection of items. It seemed more like an abandoned warehouse and less like a auto shop.

Above: At some point during our morning, I found this. I am an avid fan of Banksy – it is the right theme and style, but something about it seems more like a copy-cat than an original.

Eventually we made our way to the beach. We walked along it for a ways, stopped once or twice to talk, and then we said goodbye. She headed back to the hostel and then to Germany, and I headed to the train station to go meet Solberg (a story for another post).

Above: Sandy photographing the sand. Amazingly she still has some of the delicious fruit drink from much earlier in the market.

Above: More of the beach.

Above: Taken from the same vantage point as the previous image, but with my 10x optical zoom. I took this in case you’d never seen orange chairs up close before. It appeared to be a chair convention.

Above: Another self-portrait snap shot. I must have more of these than anyone on the planet.

That is the other thing I love about travel. You meet wonderful people, enjoy their company immensely, and then each go a separate way. You don’t need to stay in touch with everyone you’ve ever met (although I do exchange contact information with almost everyone I meet, but it is mostly a formality). What more can you ask for than an excellent friendship, even if it is only for a day or two?

Me: “What are we doing Saturday?”
Laura: “Going to the Samurai Exhibit.”
Me: “Why?”
Laura: “Because Samurai are Awesome.”

You won’t be surprised to learn that Saturday morning we headed to the Asian Art Museum to see the exhibit on Samurai. The exhibit was good, but these exhibits always miss the mark. By that I mean, if you’re going to take the time to have an exhibit, then take the time to explain what we should be appreciating. Putting a katana in a case and saying “Here is a Katana from 1550″ isn’t worthwhile.

If I see a katana on display, I know what I’m looking at. But it is the museum’s job to tell my why I should appreciate it, and they always fail. For instance, the following video clip explains everything you need to know about katanas if you’re going to such an exhibit. And not one sentence of this was covered in the entire exhibit.

The thing I love the most about Japanese culture is that everything is raised to an art form. And every task in a process is divided up, and each task has a master.

The guy who smelts melt for katanas is a a master smelter whose family has smelted for hundreds of years.

The guy who crafts the blade is a master swordsmith whose family has crafted blades for hundreds of years.

The guy who sharpens and polishes the sword is a master sharpener whose family has sharpened blades for hundreds of years.

Its like the song “There is a hole in the middle of the sea.” Except in this hole is some master craftsman, and on top of him is another craftsman. This stacking-of-people experience is why they were able to create the most technologically advanced blade the history has probably ever seen.

And that doesn’t go just for crafting swords. For example, Samurai loved tea. A lot. Apparently being awesome makes you thirsty. They loved tea as much as they enjoyed defending their honor. When they weren’t busy fighting and killing, they were busy drinking tea and talking about fighting and killing. Tea wasn’t just something you did, it was an entire experience.

There is an art to serving tea, and there are tea serving masters. And you didn’t just serve tea in anything, you had special tea sets. And each piece of the tea set had a history and a name. “Welcome to my tea party! Today you’ll be drinking from Fred, the tea cup, who is filled by Frank the tea kettle.” The lengths to which they carry this is almost absurd. But I’m serious. I saw teacups that have histories that can be traced back 800 years.

If you broke a tea cup, you might have it repaired. And a repaired teacup is more previous and valuable than one that isn’t because it symbolized that the cup meant enough for you to spend time and money having it repaired. And of course not just anyone repaired it. A master teacup repair guy fixed it. And he didn’t use any old adhesive, he used gold. And when your guests came to drink tea, they could ponder why you named your tea pot “Steamy McSteamMuffins”, how you might have broken him last time, and whether anyone had invented the roofie yet.

That man is a loon. A very brilliant loon.

I think Robin’s earliest material is his best. To be honest, I don’t think I’ve ever listened to his new material and laughed hard. I enjoy his material, but at this point people go to see Robin just because he is Robin. His material and performance are good, but you know exactly what you’re going to see before you get there. And that is fine. I know what Picasso’s art will look like before I flip through a book, but I still love the art.

I thought the funniest moment of the night was when Robin bashed his own performance in “Bicentennial man”.

Then last weekend, thanks again to Barbara, I got see Arj Barker from Flight of the Conchords. A great show. And he was on stage forever. And I almost go to meet him (a friend of a friend grew up with Arj and was at the show too).

On the other hand, I’m not sure that meeting Arj Barker would have added anything meaningful to my life.

I tried to write about several other things tonight, but wow – am I out of the habit of.