In the hotel room where I’m spending the night, I can pick up someone’s wi-fi signal from the neighboring apartment; two weeks of dial-up was a great reminder that the internet really only changes your life when it’s always on, and moving at high speeds. No wonder AOL and Prodigy sucked.

That said, a few things I’ve noticed here in the past few days:
– Coca Cola is vastly better in glass bottles than in plastic ones.
– Israeli toilets have two levers, the smaller of which uses the lesser volume of water needed to clear out a ‘number 1.’ Growing up in similarly drought-ridden California, where the water-saving alternative was simply not flushing (as we learned in summer camp, “if it’s yellow, let it mellow; if it’s brown, flush it down), the Israeli approach seems a bit more appealing.
– While nearly ever restaurant takes credit cards, you can’t tip by card – you have to do so with cash. Presumably that’s to save waiters from paying taxes. If so, I’d happily boost up my tip by Israeli income tax’s 17%, because when most of the meals you’re paying for involve a whole documentary crew of people, having enough cash on hand to tip is a real pain in the ass.
– Also, it seems sushi bars have yet to catch on in Israel. Having recently eaten at one of the few in Tel Aviv, I’m pretty clear on why.