6th

Our first full day in Tel aviv and our last day together, we started it off with a nice sit on the beach, then a stroll through the busy market place. Rhys bought some gifts for his family and i tried not to get into too much trouble with the sellers who are very aggressive with their tactics. We pottered around for quite a while, had some bread for morning tea, then got ome fantastic felafel (yup we ate alot of it!). We covered alot of the city then ambled back to our hostel along the beach. Rhys got his stuff together and made his way to the airport. He had made a great travelling companion, we talked about big issues that affect the world and small issues that barely affect us. Long distance bus rides were thought of as a time to cover another important topic, not as a time to listen to an ipod and wait to reach a destination. Rhsy wanted experiences more than seeing sites and meeting people more than looking at things, as i did and we both didn't mind how cheap and nasty the place was that we slept at. But what made Rhys such a super travel buddy was how he viewed things that happened good or bad as an experience, and stayed up beat, such as when someone stold 600 shekals from him in Jerusalem or when we needlessly changed our sheckels in to $US instead of Jordan Dinas.

So it was a bit odd when he left. I opted for the great loner chiche of walking along the beach by myself and got pleasently lost in thoughts. Upon walking back down the beach i passed a girl that i had already walked by so i smiled at her and said 'how's it goin?' She smiled back, stopped and we started talking. Her hair was dyed bright red, she came up to about my shoulder and she spoke with a pretty strong Israeli accent. We walked for a bit and she told me about her life and i did about mine, but to a lesser extent. When we were sitting on a bench she told me about her singing ambitions and sung me a verse from American Pie by 'Madonna' after building up enough courage. I told her her voice was reat and she seemed really happy. Madonna she said started singing Karaoke and despite being knocked back many times she has succeeded. So she has looked into a Karaoke bar in Tel aviv and will become a singer just like her. We then went for dinner and i waled her to her bus stop. Another interesting thing that she said to me was when she was talking about her english skills and how she struggles with her grammar, but that it isn't a major concern of hers as musicians don't follow the grammar laws. "Do you know the Rolling Stones?" she said "The song 'i can't get no satisfaction' should actually be i can't get any satisfaction". She said she was twenty two and had just been a year out of the army, but she would have passed for 16. When she spoke she seemed so innocent and naive, but every now ad then she would swear or say something unexpected - certainly coming from someone i had only just met that would make her seem older. Ashley was her name, and we swapped email addresses and she said she asked if i'd meet up with her if she was ever in Australia. She hasn't left the country before but would liked to go to the US or Britain because she thinks they are nicer than Israeli's.
So that filled on of the only gaps that i had found in this trip - that of not actually meeting many Israeli's as the Couchsurfing fell through. But talking to her and Jael and Daniel in Jordan all for solid lengths of time have given me at least a taste of the Israeli mindset.