“Ah, I can see you are still in shock. Take your time, when you’re ready we’ll have coffee.”

Our AirBNB host had correctly read our confused faces. How was it possible to fit so many pieces of art on the walls? Did he buy the 15 sets of mugs at the same flea market, or over a period of many years? The apartment — a century-old Arab house with modern appliances and plumbing — would be our home for the night in the city of Acre, in northern Israel. We had arrived moments earlier after a bus and two trains from Jerusalem.  Our host, a friendly man with a face tattoo, is an artist and has been living in this house for over a decade. As he told us poetically over our coffees later that morning, “I love to find new life in old and forgotten objects. I love to make old things new again.” He uses broken and discarded tiles to create mosiacs on tables and wall-hangings. Beyond this, I noticed many other creative projects in the apartment. For example, a dinner plate as a portal window in the bathroom door.

The apartment was a five minute walk from the Old City of Acre, a port city dating back thousands of years. As one of the oldest continuously-inhabited cities in the region, it has a rich history which we enjoyed learning about as we ambled around the old market and toured the mosque and town hamam. It has seen British rulers, Egyptian kings, Ottoman rulers come and go, with subsequent modern day ethnic diversity. Some of the streets were slightly dirty, causing pedestrians to hop single file over the puddles – even though it had not rained for weeks. One highlight of our walk was the templar’s tunnel, an underground passageway used by knights during the Crusade era to access the port from the city palace. This tunnel, surprisingly, was not discovered until 1994, and opened to the public in 1999.

We were lucky enough to come to Acre during its fringe theater festival, and as a result were treated to some interesting street performances including a skeleton dancing to reggaeton (!) and a couple standing and embracing in an elastic cube with a few holes cut out for spectators. There were also dozens of street vendors hawking their wares, with shouts of “crepe, crepe, creeeeepe!” and “kanafe kanafe kanafeeeeeee!” adding to the festive atmosphere.

The next morning we woke up in the eclectic apartment and packed our bags to head farther up the coast. Despite our initial impressions of sheer randomness, after one day in the apartment it started to make more sense. Similar to the old city next door, this apartment had been continuously-inhabited for many years, with each tenant adding his or her own personal flair. It fit the neighborhood perfectly, and our artist host, who was now a friend, had chosen the perfect place to live to make old things new again. Acre, despite it’s old age and somewhat run down alleyways, was a beautiful place.