Jaffa

Thursday and first on the agenda was Old Jaffa- it's a place not a person and the original port which Tel Aviv grew from. The history goes way back as every civilisation that visited Israel (as it is now, obviously) came through this place, beseiged it by land or sea and if they won, killed everybody. It's something that happened a lot in these parts and just about every city has a gory past of it's inhabitants being conquered, slain then somebody else coming along and doing the same to the new residents- who always numbered in tens of thousands by the time they had got things as they wanted them and sent for thier families.
Anyway, it's typically crowded backstreets make for entertaining driving and pleasant walking around a citadel converted from a fort to a prison and police station just after the crusades. It's exactly what you'd expect except for one thing. There are streets and streets of pokey shops spilling thier wares onto the streets and gnarly old men watching over the merchandise as potential customers wander by and look for what they want before entering into the obligatory haggle. But what do they sell??? Fish from the small harbour, nope. Fruit and veg from the Kibbutz farms a few miles inland- try again. Ceramics influenced by the Egyptians, Romans, Byzantines and Moors who all passed this way, nowhere near!


Used industrial kitchen stuff- and this was a small one, many had rows of cookers frezers and grills etc out on the street.






I met Dan for lunch and then killed some more time around Jaffa before heading back to my place, a nice day.