Me and m' girl Melia.
Me and Stephanie on Sinai. Before the sunrise....so we may as well be in our hotel room...and maybe we are.
This was supposed to be a cool picture of me getting on an airplane, but to take all the coolness out of it, let me explain: This airplane had stairs coming straight out of it! I felt like a movie star getting on and off. Even with the fanny pack.
Sunrise at Sinai with the best JC roommates ever (minus Meredith). Seriously, these girls are golden.
Muhammad Ali Mosque. Nope, not that one, I asked. But one of the most beautiful buildings I've ever seen.
So many hands, so few honey bunches. Airport in Luxor.
Missed the "kissing the sphinx" memo. Yum.
Inside the water system at Tel Sheva.
Me and Lisa pullin' a Troy and Gabriella at the Khafre Pyramid.
I'm not Charlize Theron, but they still let me use their bathroom...for a dollar.
Kibbutz Ketura! Home of the first ever semi-annual underwater cheer-off.
1. Shakira can heal the world. Our class has made a goal to do the Waka Waka dance at every location possible. We’re all convinced that this song not only has immense healing powers, but also will stand the test of time, thus we are all willing to make this our legacy. Unfortunately, we didn’t always know which sites were totally appropriate for “waka”ing. Turns out, Temple of Hatshepsut wasn’t one of them. We wired our radios to play it in everyone’s headsets and did our thing. The security guards didn’t like it very much, so they came running down the stairs to talk to our guide and confiscate the footage. Our wonderful guide, Islam, politely agreed to show them the footage and insisted that it was harmless. But, it’s pretty rare that people accept the excuse of “we’re just stupid Americans who love to dance”. Islam took the video to the security guard to show him and the guard just stared. He stopped, looked and Islam, and said, “That…is….awesome”. As my friend Brandt says, “Waka waka healed that security guards heart”. It was epic. You can be expecting a Waka Waka video montage sometime in the near future.
2. Merchants of Egypt are relentless. Not only are they the worst hasslers of the Middle East, but they NEVER miss an opportunity. I was under the impression that the hike up to Sinai would be relatively peaceful. Just me and the mountain. Not only were there shops every few hundred yards, but an entire Bedouin Shopping Mall rested conveniently at the top. Not at all what I expected, but still a marvelous experience.
3. Fanny packs are awesome. Guess who didn’t get anything stolen for a whole week? This moi. I also learned a little about the bartering world. Rule number 1, “If they don’t give you a price that is less than a third of the original price, just waka wak away”.
1. My friend Stephanie is brilliant. She says everything I’m always trying to say. Today, we talked about how people put so much emphasis on things that can be measured. We like to define ourselves in a very “letter of the law” sense and we lose sight of what “goodness” really is. That becomes increasingly apparent when I meet so many good people that don’t have the same beliefs that I do.
2. God is merciful. Yesterday we went to the Western Wall. It’s was the second day of Rosh Hashanah and so there were thousands of people there. It was also the Sabbath, so the rules were especially foreign to us. We couldn’t bring cameras, we couldn’t write anything down, and our dress had to be very conservative. I went and touched the wall. I squeezed through the crowds to touch a wall that, truthfully, I didn’t understand was I was touching for. The woman next to me was weeping and rocking back and forth chanting scriptures for over an hour. I heard so much desperation in her cries. I realized that people everywhere are just as helpless and pathetic as I am in searching for God. To her, God was in that wall. I realized that just because this woman is a Jew doesn’t mean that she won’t know her God when she meets him. Jerusalem is awesome.
3. A discussion in my Modern Near Eastern Studies Judaism class taught by the brilliant Orthodox Jew and Boston-ite Ophir Yarden made for some exciting table talk. A classmate of mine noted that after the temple was destroyed on Mt. Moriah, the Rabbis didn’t try to rebuild the temple anywhere else. They believed they could only build on Mt. Moriah because it was chosen by God. But, the power to perform the ordinances was taken away from them and, thus, they didn’t know how they could build another temple where they could perform the same ordinances. Now, if you look at Joseph Smith, when he was forced to leave Ohio, he was able to build a temple somewhere else because he had the power and was ordained of God to perform those sacred ordinances anywhere. I mean, we can’t talk about any of this in class, but it always leads to our most interesting dinner discussions.
So I recognize this blog is a total snooze-fest without any pictures. So, I’m going to try and condense my experiences into three different things I learned for every post. Here goes.
1. Happy New Year! Today is the first day of the two-day Jewish New Year because they just can’t fit that much celebration into one day. And as Dr. Chadwick said, “Tonight is the craziest night of the year and they probably have you scheduled to be in some forum…I would never do that to you guys.” We do have a forum, but fortunately, the forum is optional. I think we’ll all being celebrating tonight. It is also the last day of the Islamic Ramadan. The streets are absolutely wild. For Ramadan, the prayer in the morning is especially long. Like, 15 minutes of Surah Al-Fatihah blasted at 4 in the morning. Sometimes it doesn’t surprise me at all that no two religions can make peace here because so many of religious traditions are so intrusive. But that’s also what makes Jerusalem the miraculous mosaic of culture that it is. It just comes at a price.
2. Jerusalem Pomegranates in September are divine.
3. The secret to Jerusalem at night is Ben-Yehuda Street. As soon as the sun goes down, they turn on all the lights, blast the music, and everything comes to life. It’s just nuts down there.
I don’t have a chance to post every day, but whatever isn’t written here is recorded in pictures and likely far more interesting.
Alright, now that I’ve been here for a total of three days, I’m feeling like quite the savvy traveler. I already know how to say good morning in Hebrew, politely decline an Olive Wood carving, and enjoy the simple pleasure of not knowing the contents of a stuffed pepper. Yesterday, we toured Jerusalem. We first spent a few hours in the Old City. They warned us about some of the risks of being Americans (assault, being robbed, looking stupid), so we were all emotionally prepared to be a little harassed by the locals. Apart from being incredible sneaky, they are also incredible charming. With pick-up lines like, “you have beautiful blue eyes” and “your hair looks very soft”, it was difficult to resist, but I think I’ll make it home without an Arab husband.
For the last two days, I’ve woken up at 4 in the morning. 30% because of jetlag and 70% because of the megaphone outside of our window that plays the call to prayer. Everything here is beautiful. I mean, no picture I’ve seen of Jerusalem has done it any justice. Especially with Ramadan ending this week, by sundown, the city is glowing with strings of lights and the sound of people celebrating in the streets is captivating. So far, I’ve eaten every meal and done all my reading assignments outside looking over the city. I don’t think I’ll ever get tired of looking out and seeing golden domes, limestone arches, the bustle of people, and brightly colored linens hanging over every balcony. I want to live here forever. Ilhamdulilah!
Today is officially my first day in the Holy Land. Everything here is perfect. This truly is a mini Zion. I get along so well with everyone here, the teachers and staff are so friendly, but most of all, the city is spectacular. When I walked into the building, I thought, “this is the most beautiful building I’ve ever been in…and I get to live here”. I can’t wait to do everything here. Before the orientation meeting, Brother Ohman was playing the organ, and as he was playing, the blinds in the auditorium open to reveal the nightscape of Jerusalem. It is truly the most beautiful city I’ve ever seen. And being in the center is like living in a museum. It’s better than I ever could have anticipated. I’m trying to absorb all the sights and sounds. One of the first things we heard when we got here was the call to prayer. Then we heard the cannon which invited everyone to eat (iftar) since it was sundown. We all just stood on our balconies and watched all the Christmas lights light up all the balconies in the city. It is simply spectacular.
