I had the pleasure of spending roughly two months in Tel Aviv, Israel. It has become a city I love and cherish. I knew nothing if the country or city prior to my stay there except that Tel Aviv was allegedly the gay capital of the Middle East. I read this online sometime last summer, while I was in my air conditioned AirBnB room in Madrid.
I told myself then that I would try to see Tel Aviv’s gay pride in the 2016, and vula. I did it.
I’ve been asked many times why I was in Tel Aviv, seeing as I wasn’t Jewish, people were curious to learn why I decided to travel to their city. The truth was, at first, that I came on a whim. It was a city I knew I wanted to visit but knew nothing of. I was in Barcelona for two weeks prior to visiting Tel Aviv, attempting to do a Web programming bootcamp. That didn’t work for me, and I dropped out of there only incurring a loss of $800. The guy I was staying with in Barcelona had a lot going on and he needed me to leave. So I had to make a snap decision as to where I was going to go next.
I logged on to workaway.info, a website where one could work and travel in exchange for accommodations. And I looked around Spain to see where I could go, but felt I needed to leave the country and see something new. Enter Tel Aviv. It was on March 29 when I reached out to the Overstay Hostel to volunteer and three days later when I arrived, April 1st.
I met some amazing people and had a lot of fun during my time there. The first couple of weeks were rough though, mainly because I had invested so much of my time and hopes into the Web programming bootcamp that I was so lost and confused regarding what to do with my life. I wasn’t depressed but I sure was acting like it. My time in Tel Aviv was well spent.
I enjoyed my time there so much when I left for Budapest, I came back a week later. Though that was to celebrate gay pride, which I must say doesn’t meet the hype I was expecting. Gorgeous men, but nothing special.
I left this past Wednesday, in the early morning at 4am. When I purchased the ticket the day before , I thought it was for 4pm. It was probably for the best as there was a shooting that same day. It pains me to hear that something like this happened in Tel Aviv. Because I always felt safe at Tel Aviv. And I don’t think this act of violence is a characteristic of the city I’ve grown to love.
Been gone all of three days and I miss it.
Gio's Adventures 