Tel Aviv

There are youth hostels along Ben Yahuda street, near the sea and also on nearby Allenby. For about 50 shekels a night ($12) you can find a dorm bed. Double that for a single room. There’s also a youth hostel in Jaffa.

The big news in Tel Aviv is that the French have arrived. After the far-right grew in power in France, there was a mass exodus of French Jews who realised that apartments by the Mediterranean could be bought for a snap in Tel Aviv. The result is that rent has gone through the roof in Tel Aviv and there are often queues to see apartments that come up for rent.

If you plan to live here you have two options:

1. Go and see the agencies who will find you a place to live for a fee of about 1000 shekels and save yourself a bunch of time.

2. Alternatively, you can get a friend to help you with the Hebrew ads. There is a site called www.homeless.co.il which has new ads each day for room mates or apartments in Tel Aviv in all areas and prices.

Otherwise you can also walk through neighbourhoods that you like and write down the numbers of the ads posted on message boards and posts. Just learn to recognize the Hebrew for ‘apartment’ and ‘rent’ and you’ll be okay.

When you make a deal with a landlord take care he doesn’t screw you. Israelis are great people but can be completely unscrupulous in business. Go with your feelings but don’t be surprised if you have trouble getting in touch with your landlord when something breaks.

The cheapest places to live are usually in Florentin or Jaffa – in the latter you can get apartments for the price of a room in Tel Aviv. But then you have a greater risk of thieves and it’s a bit further away. Good if you have a car.

Also check how noisy the place is by going during the day. If it’s next to a main road then you may have the buses thundering past and screeching their brakes all day long.

Then, of course, there’s the car and burglar alarms that go off all night for hours on end but everyone has to suffer that. Road Junky has the theory that some businessmen cornered the market for alarms and bought all the factory rejects from China. Mention noise pollution to an Israeli and they’ll just laugh.

Want to meet other road junkies?
Come to the Road Junky Sahara Retreat Feb 6-11 2012 to hang out with 30 other travelers to meditate, make yoga, tell stories and dance under the full moon in the desert.

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