I have no idea what the hell Matkot is, but I do know for a fact that Israel is home to more museums per capita than anywhere else in the world. And when a country has so many museums, of course a few will end up being a bit random, like the Matkot Museum. Amnon Nissim is a Matkot professional, in other words, Israel’s Matkot guru. The 67-year-old has been playing the game (a sort of beach racquet ball thingie) three times a day for the last fifty years. He has turned his entire house, located in the trendy Neveh Tzedek neighborhood of Tel Aviv, into the world’s only Matkot Museum. It’s a shrine to the sport with some 350 paddles in every shape, colour and size covering the walls; various wall clocks and table tops in the shape of rackets; as well as dozens of trophies and photos of Nisim in action (What can I say? The man was a stud!). Interspersed among the Matkot items are large paintings of northern European forest scenes so popular among people who live in hot countries like Israel, which you can see in this picture here. One visitor to the museum, Tel Aviv Mayor Ron Huldai, wrote in Nisim’s museum guestbook that he’s “a colorful Tel Aviv asset.” But fair warning…the museum is only open whenever Nisim is home. So just give the man a call at (03)517-4908 or go find him down at the beach playing Matkot…and I’m sure he’ll be happy to show you his collection.
Matkot Museum, Israel
