After a brief reconnoitering with my
group, we decided that if I were to remedy
my dire situation, we needed to hit up a
flea market.
Tel Aviv’s notorious flea market, lovingly
known in Tel Aviv as Shuk Hapishpushim,
or literally, “a market of fleas,” consists of
rows and rows of kiosks stuffed to their
brims with
hamsa
ornaments, antique
furniture, bulk-ordered stacks of women’s
clothing, dusty Arabic pottery, locally
made pots, pans, and dishes, and every
other knick-knack imaginable. As I walked
around, it was easy to tell that none of it —
not the gigantic rug, not the bronze lamp,
not the heavy antique desk the lamp was
sitting on — would do. I needed
something petite, light, and cheap. I
needed somebody’s old jewelry.
I had everybody else covered, of course:
I’d bought Dead Sea mud scrub for my
mom and sister, Bibles glued to beautiful
hand-carved wooden covers for my
in-laws and my parents, and some books
on ancient Israeli culture for my history
buff of a husband. I was about to leave a
foreign country and had purchased
absolutely nothing for myself, and, once
again, I’d spent almost all of my money
already. There was a measly 60 shekels left
jingling around at the bottom of my purse,
which at the time was the equivalent of
about US$15, but that wouldn’t buy a
whole lot in a country like Israel and I
wasn’t about to go take more money out of
anATM.
t was a hot, sticky Tel
Aviv afternoon when I
r e a l i z e d I ’ d bough t
something for everyone
in my family except me.
This is normal, actually, and while I like to
think it suggested something about my
meritorious nature, it really just indicates
that I forgot, again, to add myself to the list
of people in my journal for whom I’d be
shopping. We’d just finished up our tour of
Carmel Market, a mile-long outdoor
market next to the trendy neighborhood of
Neve Tzedek, when the thought occurred
to me. I looked at all of the fresh foods
around me and realized that I could take
absolutely
none
of it home with me. A
pomegranate? Um, no. That confection of
sesame paste over there? Nope. Wouldn’t
get through customs. How about falafel
balls?
I
Souvenir
BY KRISTIN WINET ILLUSTRATIONS BY I YING YEH
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d
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Stories
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