A Comment on Contrasts

Today on the bike ride into Jerusalem, I was thinking that contrasts is one of the things that is so fascinating in Israel, and one perfect example is dressing for a bike ride. I left the house at about 6:20am, it was just getting light and still pretty cold. My ride starts off with a long downhill so I have gloves, scarf, wind jacket, and earmuffs to keep me from freezing and then at the bottom, I start a 6km (4mile) climb and within 10 minutes, I am so warm that even with a Gore-Tex jacket, I need to pull off layers. Of course, the contrasts here in Israel are not just about the weather; another example is people using carts and donkeys to move merchandise in Tel Aviv right near some hi-tech centers where state of the art software is being developed for global consumption.

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