The Pilgrimage

For centuries, people of the Christian, Muslim, and Jewish faiths have traveled to the Jerusalem in order to pay respect to this magnificent city. These trips are normally called "pilgrimages," and although my laptop's dictionary makes no mention of this, they normally have some sort of degree of hardship associated with the journey. My trip to the Holy Land was no different.

In order to make travel to Israel easier, the Jerusalem Center had about eight or nine different groups traveling on different planes and airlines. My own wonderful group of six people met at 5 AM to travel to Detroit, meet up with another group of 10 kids, travel to the JFK airport in New York City, and then travel to Tel Aviv that night and arrive at the center the next afternoon. Our trip to Detroit was just fine and dandy, but then... Trouble struck in NYC. As I'm sure some of you know, there were severe storms up and down the east coast, meaning that we couldn't land at JFK. Meaning that our flight was delayed. Meaning that we couldn't go on our connecting flight to Tel Aviv. Meaning... the trip I've been waiting for the last five years was postponed indefinitely. Our group of the stalwart sixteen was unbelievable--I don't think I've ever felt like I was the most sad member of a large group of people, but that might've been the case. We first found out that we probably wouldn't get a flight to Tel Aviv until Friday or Saturday (!!!), but after talking to agent after agent (including an Austrian guy named Greg and a New Yorker named Flo), we finally found out that our group of original six could fly to Tel Aviv the next night, and the remaining ten could get standby tickets. We were on the bottom floor by this point and weren't going to be able to get back up to the terminals, so our friend Flo gave us some airport blankets, pillows, drinks from the flight attendants, and some food  vouchers for $12 worth or airport food, and then sent us on our merry way.

So cute. And so tired.

...Cement airport floors are much harder than I expected. And colder. So much so that when half of the group decided to go out into the city during the day, I decided to stay back with the other group and sleep. Lame, I know, but I was able to do this:

Almost as comfortable as a bed... Almost.

Yes, my eye covering does say "Sweet Dreams," and yes, I never really expected to wear it in a very public place. Now it's on the internet, which is one of the most public places in the world, but no big deal. Sleep was wonderful. Plus I've been to NYC before and it was cold and rainy that day, so I wasn't too bummed that I missed out.

Our plane was delayed another three hours, but we FINALLY got on board a double-decker 747! It was pretty neat. And even though we were having dinner around the time that people in Jerusalem were having breakfast, our stomachs got on at least a somewhat regular meal schedule, which was pretty nice. Customs wasn't that bad (except that a few members of our group got trapped in the interrogation room), but we finally made it back to the Jerusalem Center right before dinner. I can think of few times that I was happier than I was at that moment. Everyone else was pretty happy as well... Check it out:

They even made a little tunnel for us to go through--I took a video of it, but it's too large of a file to upload here...

The fun hasn't stopped since then! Sabbath here is on Saturdays, so we had a lovely church service overlooking the city and the dome of the rock while we sang hymns (accompanied by none other than President Ohman himself!). While we sang and he played some stirring (and unexpected) chord progressions, I really felt like there were few things in the world that compare to this. I also got assigned to be the music leader for the little kids in the congregation--there are about 20 of them, and they might be a bit of a handful. I'm so excited, though.

Here are some highlights from Sunday through Tuesday:

-Getting various awesome views of the city: honestly, this city is so pretty. Its sense of timelessness creates a kind of beauty that I haven't ever seen before (the most comparable feeling was probably when I went to a large grove of redwood trees with my dad a few years ago). The Center is gorgeous as well--there are windows everywhere, and each room even has a balcony with a bed of roses and a perfect view of the city. Here's one of my favorite pictures of the dome of the rock that I took on Sabbath:

I actually struggled to take pictures of things OTHER THAN the dome of the rock for a little bit--it's so captivating that it's hard to focus on anything else!

-Making new friends. As cheesy as it sounds, I really love the people here already. It seems like we're all united in our reasons in being here (I doubt too many people come to the Holy Land to party it up like crazy), so it's wonderful to have people like me around in that regard... Does that sound incredibly narcissistic? Anyway, here are some pictures of my friends (just to prove that I have some):

Kayla and me behind Navi Samuel and in front of the city of Gibeon

My friend Tyson outside of King Hussein's palace

-Traveling to new places! So far, I've been to the city a few times, where we've explored all of the quarters, made friends with some of the merchants, visited the Western Wall along with other important historical sites in the Old City, and walked along the wall around the boundaries of the Southern part of the city.

The Western Wall - the white in the cracks of the wall is actually thousands of prayers written on pieces of paper.

Frankincense and other wonderful smells (along with some that aren't so wonderful) fill the streets. 

-I also had my first field trip on Monday, where we became more acquainted with Jerusalem and its surroundings.

-Here are a few pictures of the Auguste Victoria Lutheran Church of the Ascension--it was so beautiful, and the acoustics were amazing. There's a pretty good chance I'll actually be able to play my violin in there! I'll be sure to keep you posted. Anyway, here are some of my favorites:

The outside of the building

The apse, or the front (and most sacred) part of the building

The altar in the center of the chapel. The lamb is called the Agnus Dei.

Part of the ceiling (sorry that I didn't edit very many of these photos!)

Center portion of the apse mosaic

Center part of the ceiling painting

 -We were able to visit the deserted palace of King Hussein, which was built on top of the ruins of King Saul's palace. A lot happened here in the city of Gibeah - you can read about it in 1 Samuel chapters 13, 14, and 15.

Inside the palace walls

-I went to Navi Samuel, the place where Samuel the prophet was supposedly buried (recent archeological findings have proved otherwise, however). There's a mosque on top, and then a synagogue below, since both the religions of Islam and Judaism believe that Samuel was a prophet.

This picture, along with showing Navi Samuel and the ruins of the crusader building around it, also gives proof that I'm actually here and not just stealing pictures from the internet.

-Behind Navi Samuel is the small city of Gibeon (you can read about it in Joshua 10, I believe?). Anyway, this was the place where Joshua commanded the sun to stand still so that the Israelites could defeat the Amorites in battle. Here's our class commanding the sun to stand still (it didn't work, by the way):

"SUN, STAND STILL!"

-And lastly, here are some pictures from some of the lookouts we went to:

Some bunkers from the 1967 war overlooking Shepherds' Fields and the town of Bethlehem

I had to do it.

Pretty awesome, eh? I'll try to take some pictures of some of the food I'm eating this week (the food everywhere is outstanding), but I also don't want to be shunned for being socially awkward for randomly taking pictures of food on my plate... We'll see how it goes. I love it here in Jerusalem! I hope you can see how much I've been able to do in only one week. Next post: Garden Tomb, Western Wall some more, and Tomb of Kings (a secret corridor my friend found out about that leads to a bunch of tombs). Until next week!

Shalom,
Becca