Tel Aviv: The City that never stops

I work in Ramat Gan, at the edge of Tel Aviv. Despite my proximity to Tel Aviv, and being there five days a week for the past 9 years, I hardly ever have an opportunity to meander through Tel Aviv and see it.

So when I had the opportunity to participate in the Benjamin Netanyahu press conference on Education Reform, I also considered it an opportunity to stroll through Tel Aviv. Metzudat Ze'ev, the Likud HQ named after Ze'ev Jabotinsky, is not too far from where I work, so I chose to walk much of the way and see the sights.

Tel Aviv has always gotten a bad rap as a city. "They" call it dirty, crowded, congested, polluted, etc. I, see a different Tel Aviv. One the few occasions I have had to stroll through, I have taken a liking to it. I am a "city boy". I like the big city. I like Tel Aviv, despite its being overcrowded and polluted. I think it has been cleaned up and modernized in recent years, and the flair of it is amazing.

Here are some of the sights I saw on my 15 minute walk to Metzudat Ze'ev.

A beautiful, tree-lined pedestrian and bicycle street with a quaint atmosphere

The entrance to the famous Dizengoff Square

The Historic building "Metzudat Ze'ev" that serves as Likud HQ.

I passed right by the parking spot of the embassy of Bosnia and Herzegovina. Who knew they even had an embassy here?

Right next door to Metzudat Ze'ev is this "Comic Book" store. I stopped collecting Comic Books when I was about 11, so I did not bother going in, but I did not even know such stores exist in Israel! What is even funnier is that, from the name of it you can see, it is a comics store and a vegetable store. All in one.

And here is a sight you can see in just about every large city... I hope your eyes don't burn out of your head..

I passed right by the large army base known as "The Kirya" which also houses the main offices of the Defense Ministry. The base has been renamed "Rabin Base" in memory of Yitzhak Rabin. After I tool the picture I saw the sign on the other side of the fence that says photographs are prohibited as it is a military zone. Oh well. As you can see from the large sign above the name of the military base, they are having an amnesty program for soldiers who "mistakenly" took home army equipment. They can, for one month, give ti all back anonymously and not face any legal problems because of it.

So there you have it. Another view of Tel Aviv. A beautiful city, even if it is crowded and congested. A city that has character and atmosphere. The city that never stops.