The home city of our guest Tal, Tel Aviv, is 101 years old and its name literally means "hill of spring" (Aviv or Abib = spring, in Hebrew). Tel Aviv is the first all-Jewish city in modern history, first founded by some 60 families as a Jewish neighborhood near Jaffa.

A part of Tel Aviv is known as The White City, a reference to the many Bauhaus/International style buildings built in the city in the 1930s by German Jewish architects. As a result, there are more Bauhaus buildings in Tel Aviv than any other city in the world (Germany included). Whole neighborhoods were built in this style - a total of around 4,000 buildings, of which only about a quarter have been renovated. Tal tells us that many of them are dilapidated and you wouldn't think they're a part of some architectural site of interest. But not this one, I guess...
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Yes, it's been a while, but we were CS-less for 2 weeks! During this time, we traveled a bit ourselves (not too far, just to our house in the mountains and for a weekend visiting old friends and colleagues in Thessaloniki). While in Thessaloniki, I managed to catch up with Linn and Daan, a Dutch couchsurfing couple spending a student exchange year in Thessaloniki. When they stayed with us in Skopje during the winter, they came on the absolutely most disgusting day of all winter - there was muddy slush all over the city and they were wearing very summery shoes. The sight still gives me shivers dispite them saying that they're used to that kind of weather.
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One unusually warm and sunny day in February, we were anxiously awaiting Dominique. And I should tell you, Dominique was not just any couchsurfing guest. He is, to our great delight, a very talented illustrator from Montpellier, France.

Dom came to Skopje via Sofia after a long trip that went all the way to Armenia....and was going to continue traveling around the Balkans only to end up in Romania, sometime in March, to live and work on a Wwoof farm.

Its so amazing when a) guests arrive on Friday afternoons b) they are extremely talented and c) the weather is great all weekend. Having guests during the work week is always accompanied by a somewhat bitter taste when they leave - there's often simply not enough time to do stuff together...but on weekends...and when global warming gives us a spectacularly gorgeous day in February, just perfect for long walks and outdoor coffees...life is plain awesome. .
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