I'm Back!

My, this has been quite a long absence. After spending awhile looking through other people's blogs today, I got to contemplating on the status of my own blog, and I decided that just because I let my Jerusalem blog fizzle out, that wasn't any reason for the whole blog to suffer an ignominious death. So, though I'll probably never get around to finishing Jerusalem, I am back to blogging (and if it makes you feel any better, as soon as I get home again I'm going to get my Jerusalem pictures on to some picture sharing site, like Photobucket or Flickr, and you can view them there if you feel so inclined. I'm pretty sure the pictures were your favorite part, anyway).

Kind of a lot's happened since my last post in April, the biggest thing probably being the part where I got married. Chris and I have since settled into our cozy lil' basement, gotten everything unpacked, and even fixed up the yard to look semi-presentable (it was kind of an overgrown nightmare when we first moved in). Chris also had himself a birthday last month, and I made him his very own German chocolate cake in celebration.

Sad to say, most of this lovely masterpiece went uneaten, since I don't really like cake and Chris can only eat so much cake. I got to tease him about needing two boxes of candles for his advanced age, though, so it was all worth it.

I made a particularly good-tasting dinner today, if I do say so myself (and Chris has affirmed this statement, so I feel pretty confident in making it). Because church starts absurdly late, meaning we don't get home until about 6 pm when I have no desire to start on dinner, I have declared Sundays to be "Crockpot Day". However, I really only have so many crockpot recipes in my cookbook, and even though I got a Crockpot recipe book from a friend at a bridal shower that's been rather helpful, I've kind of been scrounging around for ideas. Today, I decided to try out a copycat recipe for Cafe Rio's Pork Barbacoa.

Yeah, this isn't a very good picture--the silly camera kept wanting to focus on the Dr. Pepper can. It was a really good burrito, though. Really good. I don't know that it tasted exactly like Cafe Rio's, but it was still really good. I ended up using this recipe that I found on someone's blog, and I pretty much followed their advice for cooking the rice and beans, as well. The key is to cook the pork loin all day in Dr. Pepper, though I've heard Coke works pretty well, too. Then you stir in some brown sugar and green chilies and various other stuff, and that's pretty much it. I also used those tortillas that you can buy from Walmart that you cook yourself. It is an extra step, but it's soo worth it. All other tortillas will seem lacking after you use these tortillas... so maybe you don't want to try them after all. I've spoiled myself, it seems :P

This week I really want to try a recipe I saw recently for strawberry shortcake, so I'll have to get back to you on how that goes. I have this craving for lemon bars, too... but I can't eat them all by myself, and Chris apparently does not like lemon bars. He's not a huge fan of sunshine, happiness, or the sound of children's laughter, either (I love you, Chris!). Maybe I'll make them when I go home for the day on Tuesday.

Oh, and guess what? The lady who did our wedding cake posted about it on her blog! I don't entirely know why my tiny little sketch of how I wanted the cake to look caused her to praise my artistic abilities, but I thought it was cool how she put it on her blog.

(Almost) The Rest of Galilee

This post'll be pretty heavy on the pictures, but I'm pretty sure you prefer it that way anyway. Honestly, that first field trip was the best one we went on, and even though all of the other ones were awesome, they just didn't really compare. We did see some very pretty places, though! So, here we go!

Day 4: Class, napping, relaxation, fish dinner
The highlight of this day was definitely going to the kibbutz for a fish dinner.

This is my fish:

This is my fish after I finished with it:

It was pretty good, with salt.

Day 5: Gamla and Qazrin

See those ancient ruins on the left side of that hill? That's Gamla:

By the way, my picture's so much cooler and prettier than the one on Wikipedia. It makes me so glad that we came during the spring! Anyway, it's in the Golan Heights, and the name comes from the word gamal, which means "camel" (see it's shape?). Now, I could've walked down to see the ruins, but there was also the option to go hike to a waterfall, and (is this horrible of me?) I've seen a lot of ancient ruins recently, so I chose the waterfall route. I'm really glad I did, too--spring was in full bloom, and the wildflowers were so pretty!

See? Beautiful.

A GQ photo.

Me sitting in the pretty flowers.

I don't have any good pictures of the waterfall, though.

Next we went to Qazrin, and it was okay. Not as fun as Gamla, though. There were some ancient ruins there, and we saw a really cheesy movie about a rabbi-turned-apostate who came riding into town on a horse, on shabbat which is like a rabbi driving to synagogue (both of which are really really bad). That was pretty much it. It was quite the movie. I don't know if it's just Israel or if all tourist movies are like this, but I've never seen so many horrible, cheesy movies in my life. It's great :)

Day 6: Shabbat at Tiberias
Did you know there's a branch at Tiberias? It's tiny--and I really mean tiny--but it exists. That's where we went for church on Sunday. It's held in this Italian-style villa place (and I've been kicking myself over the fact that I didn't think to bring my camera), and the room where they hold Sacrament Meeting overlooks the Sea of Galilee. We didn't stay for Sunday School or Relief Society because that would've really strained the branch's capability (10+80=a lot more than they're used to!), but I really enjoyed Sacrament Meeting. You know those wooden things that hold the hymn numbers? Those were pretty cool, because they had four of them--one for each language spoken in the branch (English, Russian, Spanish, and Hebrew). There actually weren't numbers in the Hebrew one, since there isn't actually a Hebrew hymnbook yet, but they still had the wooden number-holder up there (what are those things called, anyway?).

On our way back from Tiberias, we stopped at Yardenit, which is a traditional Christian site of the baptism of Christ, and where most people who are baptized in the Jordan River nowadays go. I don't know how I'd feel about being baptized there--I mean, it'd be cool, but there are some massive fish! Bro. Huff baptized his daughter there years ago, and said that he almost forgot what he was saying in the middle of it because the fish were nibbling at him.

Oh, so they had all of these signs hanging up with Mark 1:9-11 translated into different languages, and this was by far my favorite one:

I guess this is a real language, and I have to wonder--is there a bible translated into Pidgen? Because I want it!

Day 7: Class, naptime, more relaxation :) (these days were awesome!)

Day 8: Jezreel Valley Field Trip

Okay, actually, I lied--this really was a cool field trip. It started with us going to Mt. Tabor, which is probably the Mount of Transfiguration (the other possibility is Mt. Hermon, but it's out of the way and really tall and covered in snow, and I just think Mt. Tabor is more likely). There was a church there that we went to that had little chapels to Moses and Elijah on the sides, and we talked and sang hymns there and had a little contemplation time. The taxi drivers who drove us up and down were insane, though! The road that goes up the mountain is really zig-zaggy with all of these hairpin turns, and the taxi drivers have driven that same route so many times that they like to see how fast they can take the turns. The first taxi driver even had sound effects and hand-actions--I kind of wanted to tell him to put his hands back on the wheel, though I guess he knew what he was doing.

A cool stained-glass window.

Whitney, contemplating.

This sign was next to a cafe near the church. I really liked it :)

Next we went to Nain, which is where Christ healed the widow's son. I wish I'd taken some pictures there--I don't know why I didn't. Nain is a smaller, out-of-the-way town, and it's kind of a smaller church which is kept by a Palestinian family. If you ever want to have a good discussion on spiritual insights to be gained from the miracle at Nain, talk to me. It's such a great story of Christ having compassion on the "little person" who maybe doesn't feel like they have a big or important place in the world.

After Nain we went to Beth Shean, which also used to be known as Scythopolis. It was a very Hellenized town, and though it's not quite as big as Jerash was in Jordan, it still has some cool Roman ruins--you know, columns, theater, bathhouse. The works.

Gan Ha-Shelosha was up next. I don't think it has any historical significance, but it did have a SWIMMING HOLE! It was a little bit windy, so I guess it wasn't the best swimming weather, but at least the water was relatively warm. There were these tiny fish that would swim around and kind of suck on your toes (which I didn't really mind, though I couldn't keep myself from kicking them away whenever they did it--it felt so weird!), and there was a waterfall that we sat under for awhile that felt kind of like a back massage. There were also way too many local guys wearing speedos, or just plain underwear. Is this an international thing, or do U.S. guys wear Speedos all the time, too? Because I've never seen so many Speedos in my life--Gan Ha-Shelosha, Tel Aviv, Eilat, the Dead Sea... anywhere where we've been swimming, guys have been wearing speedos. It's just gross! :P

Finally, we went to our last stop, which was the Bet Alpha Synagogue. There, we watched another cheesy movie and looked at the mosaic inside (which is kind of different because it has the zodiac sign and pictures of people on it, which show a mixing of Jewish and Greco-Roman culture--technically, synagogues should NOT have pictures of people or pagan symbols inside). Afterwards, we finally got back to Ein Gev.

Oh, and I can't remember exactly which day this happened on, but I bought a two-hour internet card to use while I was there, and on one of these days I checked my email and found out that I GOT INTO THE ILLUSTRATION PROGRAM!!! (I was excited about it, in case you couldn't tell.) So, fall semester I officially start my art classes! It makes the prospect of going back to classes in the fall again a lot easier to handle!

I was originally going to post all of Galilee on this post, but I've had it UP TO HERE with Blogger and stupid formatting problems, so I'll be back soon with another post. I don't know whether it'll be before or after I get home, though (which happens this Thursday!), since I'll probably be keeping myself busy this week fitting in everything I want to do before I go. Then I guess I'll have to catch up on everything that happened after Galilee--snorkeling in Eilat, Palm Sunday, floating in the Dead Sea... shoot, there's still a lot left! Oh well, I'll catch up eventually ;)

Galilee--Days 2 and 3

Let's dive right in, shall we?

The first full day at Galilee was very nice. We kind of had an every-other-day schedule worked out with our field trips in Galilee, so half of the students would go to class one day while the other half went on a field trip, and then we'd switch the next day. My group had class the first day, so after going to New Testament that morning, we pretty much had the whole afternoon free to nap (which I definitely did! I was so tired!), play around in the water, walk along the beach, and basically just relax. It feels like we've been on the go so much this semester with field trips and classes and exploring the city, so this free time was a much appreciated novelty for us.

The next day, we went on the best field trip ever! It was packed, but it was sooo good! Basically it went down like this:

Sea of Galilee
The first thing we did was go out on a boat into the Sea of Galilee. There, we talked about Jesus walking on the water, and Jesus calming the storm, and we sang "Jesus, Savior, Pilot Me" and "Master, the Tempest is Raging". The Sea of Galilee is so interesting to ponder about. It bore witness to so many beautiful miracles during Jesus' life and was the source of several of the apostles' livelihood, but at the same time it was also the source of trials and terror for the Lord's anointed. Sometimes I wonder what the apostles thought as they looked out over the Sea of Galilee, and what it might have represented to them. Anyway, it was a great opportunity to think about Christ, and the challenges in my own life, and how looking to Him can help me overcome them.

Mt. of Beatitudes
There was a beautiful spirit to this place--almost like a temple. Some members of our class put together thoughts on some of the beatitudes, and one of them particularly stuck out to me for some reason: "Blessed are they who hunger and thirst after righteousness, for they shall be filled." It's probably because my desire to learn more about the Gospel has become more of a hunger and thirst-type feeling as I've been here, and when I've gone searching for it, I really have been filled. I don't know, that's what was on my mind while we explored this beautiful place.

Tabgha
This was a pretty short stop, but it was the location of the loaves and fishes miracle, and it has this mosaic there that's featured in souvenirs all around the Holy Land--mugs, coasters, wall hangings, you name it. So we talked about that miracle, and then we took pictures of the mosaics, and then I took pictures of the candles because I'm weird like that. Moving on.

St. Peter's Primacy
This was a church dedicated to Peter, though I can't quite remember the significance of its geographical location--maybe you can Google it. Anyway, the acoustics of the church were great, and we sang several hymns there, including "Abide With Me", "We Thank Thee, Oh God, For A Prophet", and "How Great Thou Art". An older couple came in while we were singing "How Great Thou Art," and I guess they knew the hymn because they started singing with us. I wanted to stay there longer, but too soon we were moving on...

Capernaum
...to Capernaum. And it turns out that Capernaum was my favorite place we've ever been to, ever, so I was okay with that. It's interesting, because it visually wasn't that distinct from anywhere else we've been--Capernaum's not inhabited anymore, so pretty much there were a lot of old rocks, and I'm afraid that by this point old rocks have kind of lost their charm. But I just remember us sitting in that ancient synagogue where Jesus gave his "Bread of Life" sermon, and imagining the scene in my head as my teacher described it to us. Just the day before, Christ had fed the large multitude with only a small number of loaves and fishes, and I'm sure he and his message had never before been so popular and well-received. However, he soon perceived that many of them were following him for the wrong reason--they wanted him to be around to take care of their physical needs, and he was sent to fulfill a much higher purpose. He must have known how hard the next day would be, when he would have to disappoint them and let them know that he brought spiritual relief, not temporal--he spent much of that night in prayer. The next day, he taught them. He taught them in that very same synagogue in which I sat of how he was the Bread of Life, sent from heaven to bring everlasting life to all who would believe on his name... and they rejected him. One by one, they got up and left the synagogue, because they were looking for a physical Messiah, not a spiritual one, and they couldn't handle his words. In the end, only a small group was left. I imagine Jesus must have felt somewhat despondent
when, in the end, he turned to the twelve and said, "Will ye also go away?" Then Peter--faithful Peter--answered him, "Lord, to whom shall we go? Thou hast the words of eternal life."

Capernaum made me ponder, because really, his question is addressed to all of us: "Will ye also go away?" Something about that story just tugs at my heart, and makes me want to be a little bit better in my life, so someday I may be among the ones who didn't abandon him. The experience I had at Capernaum is one of those that I'll be able to look back on and draw strength from for the rest of my life, and I'm so grateful to have been there.

Leaving for Galilee

*sigh* This has nothing to do with Galilee, but as I'm sitting here typing on my blog I can smell the food being cooked for Ramadan dinner tonight, and it smells reallllllly good. I mean, I just ate my sack lunch, and it was pretty good (though I'm wondering how many more things they can stuff into our tuna--corn, onions, green peppers, red peppers, cucumber, random unidentifiable stuff, and I think I detected carrots today). Still, if the JC smells like this all afternoon... it's going to feel like a long time until dinner :P

DAWN OF THE FIRST DAY

We left the Jerusalem Center at MUCH too early an hour (breakfast was at 5:30, and I definitely didn't make it to that!). Thankfully, we had a couple of hours to sleep on the bus (theoretically, at least--those busses are quite uncomfortable) before stopping at Caesarea Maritina. The port was a major building project of one of the Herod's (I think Herod the Great, but there were kind of a lot of Herods so I'm not entirely sure), and it's where Agrippa said that "almost" Paul persuaded him to be a Christian, and where Paul set off on a boat to go to Rome. There were some cool ruins there, including a rather large theater, though I think most of it was actually a reconstruction. We had some ponder-time by the Mediterranean Sea, and then we were on the bus again.

Our next stop was Megiddo. I'm not sure if all of you know the significance of Megiddo, so let's see if this helps: Megiddo is the same as Har Megiddo, which means "Mount Megiddo" in Hebrew, and Har Megiddo gave rise to the term Armageddon. So Megiddo's where everything's gonna go down. The weirdest thing is, you can really see how it could happen! Surrounding the small mountain are acres and acres of flat, fertile fields, and even though they're beautiful and green right now, you can see how the armies of the world would have room to eventually battle it out. Definitely a depressing thought, especially considering how pretty the area was.

Soon we were on the bus once more and headed to Nazareth. Nazareth, as my religion teacher puts it, was a "tiny little podunk hick-town" in the days of Jesus, and most people were so poor that they actually lived in caves. In fact, we saw one of those excavated cave-homes while we were there, and it was certainly a humble little dwelling, giving new meaning to the words "Can anything good come out of Nazareth?" We first went to a church called... well, I can't really remember what it was called. Church of the Anunciation, maybe? Anyway, it had pictures of the Virgin Mary and Jesus that came from countries all around the world, and those were cool. The one from the U.S. was... interesting. It was more of a sculpture, really... I don't know, I'll put up the picture. We also went to the Synagogue Church, so named because it's built on the spot where the ancient synagogue stood where Jesus read messianic scriptures from Isaiah and claimed that they had been fulfilled to his neighbors, and they rejected him and tried to kill him. We sang "Jesus of Nazareth" and "Jesus, Once of Humble Birth" there, and then we were on the bus again (I hate busses) and finally on our way to Ein Gev.

Ein Gev is a kibbutz located right up against the Sea of Galilee. The water was glass-smooth when we arrived--deceptive, really, because I never saw it that way again for the next two weeks. Very pretty, though, and perfect for rock-skipping for those so inclined. To our relief, we found dinner at the kibbutz to be exceptionally good, especially the soup. The little bungalow-things we stayed in were pretty cool, too, even though I pretty much slept in a closet. I mean, not literally, but I roomed with Sharon and she would agree that it was tiny. My other two roommates got there first, so they picked the beds in the big room with the better view. I can't blame them, really, and I hung out there often enough that it didn't really matter. I would've slept in a cardboard box, as long as it was next to the Sea of Galilee.

Ne'ot Kedumim and a Pizza Party

Place names around here are so weird, and I really can't spell them that well. Anyway, the day before we left for Galilee we had a field trip to Ne'ot Kedumim. It was a cool field trip, though I feel like it might have been appreciated more if the timing had been better--we all had a ton of stuff to do to get ready for Galilee! It was still fun, though. It kind of reminded me of elementary school field trips--there was a guide who took us from station to station, and we did things or learned about things that were relevant to daily life in Bible times. For example, we herded sheep! That was really fun, though really hard, because sheep can be pretty stupid sometimes. We were divided into three groups and had to make the sheep perform certain tasks. We all had to take them around a circle of stones that represented a watering hole without letting them into the "water" (all of our sheep drowned). Then our group and another group had to try to separate the sheep and the goats. Our group never quite figured that one out, so I don't know how the other group managed it. Their's was a short-lived victory, though, because they couldn't figure out how to make the sheep to move. Somebody yelled out that "you have to whack 'em!", so first tentatively, then with greater vigour, they began hitting the sheep with sticks (don't worry, no sheep were seriously harmed during this field trip). Well, the sheep moved--in fact, they started running, right past the "watering hole" and down to the edge of the field, with students running after them, yelling for them to come back. That may be one of my favorite memories of this trip :)

There were also some other stations. In one of them, we ground up some spices that we picked from trees growing in the area. Later on, we made pita bread, and sprinkled the spices on the bread. We also drew water from a well and discussed the implications of Rebekah's offer to draw water for the servant and the camels (because that would have been a TON of work!), and we met with a Torah scribe. We also saw pomegranate and fig trees, and discussed something about wheat and barley (I can't remember what--I was really tired), and I think they advertised burnt wheat or something as a really good snack? Anyway, it was a cool field trip, but like I said, the timing could have been better.

Most of us were exhausted by the time we got back to the JC, but I (and many others) still hadn't withdrawn money for the Galilee trip, so up to Jerusalem we went. Then some friends of mine mentioned that they were going to Shabban's to buy some Jesus sandals, and that sounded like a good idea, so I wandered around the city a little longer. Then, when I was well and truly exhausted, Mike said, "Do you want to go to West tonight to celebrate Matt's birthday?" and I said "Of course!" A few seconds later, I wondered why I'd said that, because all I really wanted to do was eat dinner, put on P.J.s, and curl up on a chair in the computer room, maybe making a popcorn run at the Shekel Shack sometime that night. I'm glad I went, though. Matt, Mike, Eliza and I went to a pizza place, and I haven't had good pizza (or any pizza at all, really) in a long, long time, so it was amazing. I mean, I'll be happy when I'm back in the U.S. and can order non-Kosher pizza again (pepperoni pizza is definitely not a hot item or even an option on pizza menus here), but it was still good. So was the mac and cheese. Then we went to a gelato place, where we hung out, talked, listened to the music playing in the store, and ate gelato (though I assumed the last one was implied). Of course, I eventually came back to the Center and realized that I still wasn't packed and my laundry wasn't done and my religion paper wasn't written, but apparently I made it through okay, so it was worth it.

A Green Christmas

Last... Tuesday, I believe, is when we went to Bethlehem. It also happened to be St. Patrick's Day, which is why my right ring fingernail is currently painted a lovely shade of green--my green shirt was dirty, and I had to celebrate somehow. I didn't think to bring nail polish remover, though, so that nail might still be green by the time I get back home :)

Bethlehem was probably one of my favorite field trips up to this point. We went to Bethlehem University in the morning and watched a documentary on some Palestinian settlements that the Israelis wiped out during one of the wars they fought, creating hundreds of refugees (really a drop in the bucket to all of the Palestinian refugees out there, but there were still some sad stories), and then we got to talk to a panel of students who go there about how their life as a university student differs from ours. Then, after lunch (which was pretty typical of Middle Eastern restaurants we've been to so far--pitas, hummus, babaganoush, grilled chicken--but was still really good), we went to the Church of the Nativity. The good news about this church is that even my teachers are pretty positive that it's located on the actual place. The bad news? They covered it up with marble and fabric and paintings, so you really can't even tell what it looked like :P I'll never understand why other churches feel the need to do those things--wouldn't it be preferable to leave the place relatively preserved, even if you're going to stick a big fat church on top of it? Luckily, there was more good news--the cave that you go down into that's the nativity cave has a wall that divides it in half, and a different church owns the other half, and it's relatively well preserved. So, even though "they" (whoever "they" is) think that Jesus was born on the other side of the cave, it's really still the same cave, and the Spirit can be felt more in the second half of the cave. The priests are nicer there, anyways--the priests in the highly-decorated half are kind of rude and pushy, but the priests on the simpler half are more gentle.

We sang a few hymns there, and then we went out and looked around Manger Square a bit, where they had some touristy olive wood shops. Afterwards, we drove back out of Bethlehem to eat dinner in the shepherds' fields, where we had a small program in our religion classes as the stars began to appear in the sky. It was a little chilly by the end, but so peaceful that I really didn't want to leave. We sang some Christmas songs and talked about the various people involved in the nativity, and imagined that the angels were in the skies above us, singing good tidings of great joy.

The next day we had a final to study for... so of course I went to Ein Karem instead. I was sitting in class debating whether to sign up, and the person sitting next to me asked if I'd been yet and I told her no, so she told me to go. So I did. I give in really easily to peer pressure, I think :P I was so glad that I decided to go, though! Ein Karem is the birthplace of John the Baptist, and it's just a quite, peaceful town that almost looks like a European town (or at least, that's what some other girls were saying--aside from the Vienna airport, I haven't been to Europe yet). We walked around to a couple of churches in the area (the Church of the Visitation, dedicated to Mary Magdalene, and the church that's dedicated to John the Baptist), and they were all very pretty. Afterwards, we just kind of walked around. We stopped in a small art gallery, bought some fruit and nuts for lunch, and I took about a million pictures of flowers--the weather was so perfect, and the town was just so beautiful! After lunch we hiked over to the hospital, where twelve stained-glass windows made by a famous Jewish artist (Chagall, I think) were on display. Each of them was made to represent one of the sons of Jacob, and it was really interesting--there was a cassette they played that described the symbolism behind the windows, and they each symbolized some part of the tribe's history, or the blessings that Jacob gave his sons before he died. Unfortunately, cameras weren't allowed, and by the time we got out the gift shop was closed so I couldn't buy the postcards. They were really cool, though.

In other news, I'm wearing a beautiful new dress today :) I'm not really a dress-wearing individual, but if I had enough of these flowy Old City dresses that sell for $6-$10 each, I'd probably wear a dress every day for the rest of my life. I also finished up Ophir and Musallam's classes this week! I know that I did okay on Ophir's final, and as for Musallam's... well, he told me that I drew a beautiful map of Israel, and he was being pretty critical of people's maps, so that's something, I guess. Honestly, I think most people didn't do very well on his exam, so all I can do is hope. At least I filled in all the questions with a general sort of idea of what I was talking about, and from conversations I've had with others, that's more than a lot of people could say :P On the plus side, it's done! We only have New Testament and Ancient Near East History for the rest of the semester (which is actually only 34 more days!!!), and those are my favorite classes, so I really don't mind. We're also about to leave for Galilee next week, and I can't tell you how excited I am for that--while the Old Testament was interesting and is a great set up to the New Testament, I really came here to learn about the life of Christ, and I imagine I'll never have this type of a unique opportunity to do so again. By the way, I'm sorry to say that you probably shouldn't expect another blog post for about two weeks since we'll be in Galilee for awhile, and it sounds like internet isn't readily available. I'll try to make my post more like Jordan's than Egypt's, though, in terms of punctuality. Once I'm back, I'll only have about three weeks left here! It's the weirdest feeling! I mean, I'll probably be less sad than some people to leave, but I'll still miss it here. Maybe I can make it back again someday...

Finals Week :P

I changed my mind. If I had to live anywhere in the Middle East that I've visited so far, it would be Tel Aviv. Jerusalem's cool, but let's face it--right now, it's a city of tension. There are things you can't do, places you can't go, and you just can't walk around on your own. Tel Aviv's different, though. At least in the time I was there, it seemed safer, more relaxed, and definitely more modernized. In a lot of ways it reminds me of an American city, only with Hebrew writing everywhere instead of English, and if I really were to move to the Middle East, I think I'd prefer that. Plus it's on the coast of the Mediterranean Sea--does it get better than that??

In Tel Aviv, we first went to a Jewish culture/history museum, which was pretty cool. I remember my favorite exhibit was this room with these huge models of Jewish synagogues from all around the world. The guide explained a few of them, and some of them had fascinating backstory behind them. There was one synagogue that was built in a ghetto, but obviously it couldn't look like a synagogue, so it looks just like an apartment building on the outside. They also made a reconstruction of the Warsaw synagogue that was destroyed in the Warsaw ghetto uprising, and that was actually a really impressive building. I guess anti-semitism must not have been too big in that area before the Nazis, either, because it even had Jewish symbols like menorahs on the outside, and a lot of synagogues tried to avoid doing that so they wouldn't obviously look like synagogues. Of course, I just had to look at those models and wonder who on earth put those together, because it must have taken forever! They were so big, but the detailing was so intricate and tiny. Ha ha, I thought they were cool :)

Afterwards we were inundated with propaganda in Independence Hall, and finally we got to walk around the city. Even though we didn't bring our swimsuits and couldn't really get down into the water, I spent most of my time at the beach collecting seashells and broken glass that the water and sand has turned smooth. I also found this lady selling the coolest hair clips I've ever seen! They used such random things, like pasta and colored pencils and dried bananas and candy, so I bought one that I think used Sprees. One of the girls got the lady's website, too, so I'll probably be getting more eventually. I guess you'd just have to see them--they're really cute!

We've finally moved into studying the New Testament, and on Monday (I think) we went on a field trip to sites in Herodian Jerusalem. Definitely the best part of that was going to the Jerusalem Archaeological Park, where they've uncovered some steps that were definitely around during the time of Christ, and that Christ would definitely have walked on. Not only that, but they're right by the Temple Mount, which means they're the steps he would have ascended on his way to the temple. Climbing up those steps was one of those feelings that you can't really describe, but I can now say that I have, in reality, walked where Jesus walked, which seems almost surreal, but definitely cool. We also went to this Jewish mansion in the Upper City that a family of priests would have lived in, and that was destroyed by the Romans when they destroyed the temple. It was really a huge house, with mosaics and baths everywhere--those Sadducees definitely had a lot of money.

Purim was last Tuesday night, too. It's a Jewish holiday celebrating the story of Esther, where Jewish kids dress up in costumes and get candy during the day, and Jewish adults dress up in costumes and get drunk during the night. I haven't quite figured out what that has to do with Esther, though there is a religious element to the celebrations--the night of Purim (before they get drunk), they go to synagogue all dressed up in their costumes and with noisemakers, and they listen to the Scroll of Esther being read. Whenever Haman, the villain of the story, is mentioned, they all use their noisemakers to drown out his name. Our own Purim celebrations were kind of anticlimatic--we dressed up and went into the city, only to realize that everybody was still in synagogue, and wouldn't be out for a few hours :P Because we had finals this week, most of us didn't have a few hours to spare, so after getting pastries, most of us taxied back. We did watch some guys juggle fire, though, and that was cool.

Because of finals, there's really not much more to report about this week. I think I did okay on them--I was at least in the A- range, and that's fine with me. We still have three finals left to take this week, so I might be a little slow on the posting again (though, again, there probably won't be much to say). After this week, it's off to Galilee for 10 days! That's really where most of the New Testament takes place, and I can't even say how much I've been looking forward to this part of the trip. Oh yeah, you know how our auditorium where we have church looks out over the city? Well, apparently the Tiberias chapel has huge windows looking out over the Sea of Galilee. I am not looking forward to going back to plain brick walls when I get home!

Some of you asked questions, so here are my efforts to answer:

Jackie--Yep, Pizza Hut in Jordan was a lot like a nice, sit-down restaurant, which seemed even weirder because it was right in the mall's food court. It was good :)

Suzanne--Americans in Jordan can't actively proselyte to Jordanians, though things aren't as strict there as they are in Israel--they can talk and explain about the church, but not really invite them to meetings or anything. Jordanians can proselyte to other Jordanians, though it's been a slow process. I know they said something about having 4 new converts in the past year, though, so it's going. I guess Jordan doesn't technically recognize us as a church--the chapel in Amman is labeled a "cultural center". I don't exactly know what that means, though the branch president there told us this random story about a Jordanian prince who liked falconry, but his birds were getting sick and nobody could make them better, so this bird expert from USU was invited to come and heal them, and he managed to make them better. I guess the prince offered to give him a gift for healing his birds, and the USU guy asked him to recognize his church, so that led to that prince's small section of Jordan recognizing the LDS church... I don't know. I really don't know how things work in Jordan, and it would be interesting to learn more. It sounds like things are moving forward, though, however slowly.

Future parents-in-law: There are actually two branches in Jordan, I think :) It's about 50/50 Americans from the Embassy and local Jordanians. Oh, remind me sometime to tell you about Iraq. I'm almost positive that there's not a branch there, but some of the Kurdish people know all about the Mormons from the Utah National Guard coming in, and they love us. It's really interesting how many places the Church has touched, in however small a way, that could lead to greater things in the future.