Watching the sun peep from behind palm trees from my cosy seat at the Mount Carmel Golda Meir Institute in Haifa, I feel invulnerable—no deadlines to meet, no stories to deliver, no insistent peal of the cell phone. This is the Promised Land.

My brush with Haifa—ringed on three sides by the deep blue Mediterranean, it’s Israel’s third largest city after Tel Aviv and Jerusalem—began on the flight to Tel Aviv from Istanbul. Next to me was Kazakhstan’s Daniella, a student of Haifa University who spoke only Russian and Hebrew. We “connect” not “communicate”, carrying out the two-hour 50-minute journey in her broken English and my distorted Russian. “Look at the cluds. They look Indian actress.” Translated—the clouds were beautiful like an Indian actress. Bubbly as Preity Zinta.

Haifa is a three-tiered city: the lower section, built on the land recovered from the sea, is the commercial centre with a harbour; the middle level is an older residential area; and the top consists of modern neighbourhoods with tree-lined streets, parks and pine woods, overlooking the industrial zones. In 1918, the British took Haifa from the Turks and it has a large Arab population to this day.

More interesting encounters lay in store. The glimpse of Baha’i Gardens, for one. From the summit of Mount Carmel, 19 terrace gardens and more than 1,500 steps sweep down towards the Haifa port. The upper terraces offer a stirring view of the blue bay below. From Bahai we traipse to Shauly resto bar for a quick bite of cous cous and falafel with grilled chicken. Shauly’s owner smiles. “Shalom! You from Mexico?” He asks. “Well, shalom! No, I am from India, New Delhi.” He seems delighted, “Indian women very beautiful.” He does know his sales pitch.

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