Israel: Part I (yes...just part one)

Our trip to Isreal was born of all wonderful things unplanned and unpredicatable.  We ended up buying our tickets on an impulse, because our Couchsurfing friend Suzana, who we were staying with in Slovenia, raved about it.  She didn't have to do much convincing before we were pulling out the laptop and the cards.  The whole thing was divinely meant to happen from the beginning.

To say we didn't have a CLUE what we were getting into when we arrived at the Ben Gurion Airport in Tel Aviv would be a gross understatement.  Over the course of the next 10 days, we would be slackjawed in awe, as we tried to concieve of this unparalleled place we had discovered. 

Being that our flight didn't get in until the delightfully uncomfortable 3am hour it seems most of the cheap flights like to, we spent our first hours in Isreal sleeping on the cold ground of the airport.  When we deemed it suitable to venture outside, we were stunned speachless at the heat.  At 8am, it was easily 70 degrees.  I was delirious with joy.  When we arrived at our hostel, much to our dismay, we found a whole outdoor deck full of hammocks we could have slept in.  We wasted no time making up for that mistake as we napped the rest of the morning away in the much welcome "Winter" sunshine.  I will hold to the claim that the nap there in the hammock, after the weather we had endured, was the best nap I have ever enjoyed.

Our next days in Tel Aviv, before we headed to Jerusalem, was spent wandering through the sun-drenched streets of Old Jaffa town.  This is the old district in Tel Aviv---and when I say "old," I mean OLD.  Beautiful, creamy white stones were what Jaffa was built with.  This would be a precursor to the beauty of Jerusalem which was and still is built strictly with these gracefully neutral "Jerusalem Stones."  Tel Aviv as a whole, outside of this little city within the city...in retrospect, feels like it's own country.  It doesn't quite fit in with the rest of the country I saw.  I don't know how to explain it, other than it just felt like it's own entitiy, in an incredibly distinct land.

As we discovered the money there was still the Sheckel, I had the pang of hope that the prices would be as outdatedly inexpensive as the currency sounded.  I was wrong...so...so wrong.  Tel Aviv was essentially our introduction to the art of being ripped off.  Now, ripped off isn't really a fair way to say it, as EVERYTHING is asoundingly expensive.  However, being that we were unmistakenly not from around there, I swear the prices increased at least 30% everytime they were quoted to us.  I just wanted to scream, "You don't seem to understand!!!  just because we are American, DOESN'T mean we have money!!!"  It was impossible to do Isreal on a shoestring.  Unless your body can subsist on the Falafel and the Falafel alone, you will fail at any budget attempts.  And once you've had a bad Falafel, there's no going back.  So now that the frustrating finances have been discussed, I can say I don't have anything else negative to say about this trip.

After 1 1/2 days in Tel Aviv, we got down to serious business.  We headed to the Holy Land.  I really have a hard time believing there is any place in the world that rivals Jerusalem for awe inspiring, jaw dropping, head spinning "stuff to do."  Let me try to be a little  more specific...

Our bus ride into Jerusalem got us into town about 1 or 2 in the afternoon.  I thought this would be MORE than enough time to drop our stuff off at our hostel and tackle this "Old Town" I had heard so much about.  Oh...was I ever wrong...we stood on the stoop of our Hashimi Hostel in the heart of the Muslim district of the old town, looked right, looked left, and realized we weren't in Kansas (Europe) anymore.  Prior to coming, we knew the old city was walled in, and there were some large gates to the city which let the masses in and out.  What we didn't know was that when you were a newcomer within the walls, it was like you were a brand new baby ant, in one of those huge ant farms I remember kids having in the 80's.  The kind where the ants were crawling all over each other, on top of each other, doing whatever they needed to do to get to where they were going.  We could not fathom what was going on.  We wandered, and wandered and wondered...does this labrynth of walls and alleyways and people and motorcycles nearly missing you ever end?  We had a map.  It didn't matter.  There is no map on earth that can guide one through that amazing chaos.  We knew there were different quarters to this ancient city within a city.  There was the Muslim quarter, which we could not seem to find the end to.  Then there was the "Christian quarter."  To a new comer, the Christian quarter looked a lot like the Muslim Quarter...there were Arabic stands everywhere, obviously Muslim shop owners...the lines were not as clear here as I had expected.  I will soon however get to why it is distinctly Christian.  Next there was the Jewish quarter, which we couldn't even dream to locate that first day on our own.  We did see Orthodox Jews everywhere, in varying degrees of decoram,  Some were just in the yamika, others were decked out with the long curlies hanging down from the heavy black hat.  There were also a lot of tassles involved.  Lastly, there was supposedly a very small Armenian Quarter.  This was the extent of our knowledge.  Oh, how much we had to learn...

Outside our gate...the Damascus Gate

Inside our gate

The next day we woke up early to tackle this place with an appropriate amount of effort.  We had both planned to get up at 6 to watch the sun rise over Jerusalem from the incredible view our hostel terrace offered.  My earplugs did too good a job, as I didn't hear my alarm go off and slept past it.  Cory got up and enjoyed the beginning of his first full day in this magical place appropriately.  I met him around 7:30am, and we headed out to the streets to experience the Via Dolorosa together.  This is the walk that Jesus walked on his way to being crucified.  There were multiple stations one could visit and contemplate on the way to the Church of the Sepalcure, which was where most people agree He was crucified, purified and buried.  Whoa.  We did not take this experience lightly.  We took our time in the silent, early morning haze of the walled city, to make this journey prayerfully and solemnly.  Each othe the different stations highlighted different portions of his trip to the cross, starting with where he was condemned to death, to where he meets His mother, to where he fell, and eventually to where he was nailed to the cross.  When we reached the Church of The Sepalcure, in the heart of the Christian Quarter, I wasn't prepared for what I would find inside. 

From the outside of the church, it didn't look extravagant or particulary special.  Just some more beige Jerusalem stones forming archways leading into a room.  What was waiting inside for us was more than I could have imagined.  Inside was unlike any church I have seen before.  Right as we entered there was a large slab of stone layed out under a string of beautiful silver lanterns.  This was the place where Jesus's body was purified after He was killed.  People were huddled around it, rubbing souveniers on it with oil.  We look around in wonderment thinking, what else is in this unassuming church?  It seems to be segmented off into many parts, so we head up the stairs to our right, not knowing what we'd find.  We soon discovered that to be the spot where Jesus was crucified.  Constantine's mother, Helena had built a church upon this spot...but when Jesus was killed, it was out of town, on a large rock.  We could actually kneel down and touch the rock where the cross was placed.  At this point I am thinking, "I really had no idea there was a place I could do this...this is unreal."  As Christians, this was an inredibly moving and momentous time for us.  We felt completly at peace in this place...totally surrounded by the Holy Spirit.  As we slowly took our time there, we wandered down the stairs to the next large chamber to find a dark, gigantic, ominous looking structure.  We then found out his tomb lied within this structure.  There was a long line to get in to see the actual tomb, so we immediatly took our place in line.  After about half an hour, we stooped down and entered this tiny room outside the actual tomb room.  There was a jovial, old Priest inside.  We were immediatly at ease with him.  He was far more lighthearted than I had imagined a priest working in Christ's tomb to be, but I also found it so wonderfully fitting.  He handed us some long candles which we then lit.  He asked with a laugh if Cory was Russian.  We all laughed as we told him we were American.  He just chuckled at himself and asked what we believed.  We said we believed in Jesus.  He smiled, laughed, and said, "That's all that matters" and told us to go in.  We stooped again to enter and the tomb was on our right.  We placed our candles, and quietly enjoyed our alloted moments there in prayer.  I was still just shocked and stunned I was doing what I was doing.  So was Cory.  We were just so happy to be there, at that place at that time.  There are really no words to describe the peace we felt within those walls. 

Ok, I thought I would be able to rotate this picture. Turns out not...so cock your head to the left and you will see the outer tomb of Jesus and the domed ceiling of the Church of the Sepalcure.  It

Above the rock Jesus was crucified on

After more quiet exploration, we eventually reentered the light of the outside world, with the hustle and bustle of reality, looked at each other and said..."Wow, that was way more than I expected."  It was then about 10am.  We had spent those couple precious hours in the most perfect way we could imagine.  Before the town woke up, we took the most memorable walk of our lives with our Lord.  It was a good morning. 

Via Dolorosa

At 11am, we knew there was a free walking tour leaving from the Jaffa Gate.  We found our way over there miraculously, and joined our tour.  Our tour guide was a wonderfully funny and knowledgable young guy named Dvir.  He took us on a wild walking ride throughout this complecated city. We had so much to learn, and he was our free ticket to understanding.  We were excited, to say the least.  He brought us to the Wailing Wall in the Jewish portion of the city.  We all had to have our bags searched and go through an metal detector.  Here we saw a completely different and important part of the patchwork of this place.  Jewish men and women, in seperate sections of a huge white wall, bowing and crying, wailing and praying.  This is the only portion of the second temple that is left.  These incredibly and admiringly devout people gather here daily, lamenting their tormented past, and praying for their messiah to come,  It was a sight I will not soon forget.  The passion and the sorrow I felt here was unlike anything I had known exist.  Cory covered his head with a yamika, and headed to the men's section as I headed down to the women's.  There is a tradition to write a prayer on a piece of paper and stick it in the cracks of the wall.  We both seperatly did so, and spent a few minutes in contemplation, trying to take it all in.  After we left the Western Wall, we headed to the roof of the Church of the Sepalcure, where we had been that morning.  What we didn't know before, that is on the roof of this precious church lives a small group of Christian Ethiopians.  They are part of what is called the Coptic Church, and that rooftop is the only small piece of real estate in the whole old town they lay claim to, so years ago, a group of them just moved in.  We saw an Ethiopan woman talking on her cell phone outside of her home, which appeared to be literally a hole in the wall.  He explained that there is such competition from the different denomenations of Christians surrounding that church, that there will be regular fights between priests of the different sects.  They all compete so heavily for control of that holiest Christian site, that years ago, control of opening and closing the church daily was given over to the only impartial party there was.  A Muslim family. 

This was the head spinning story we saw unfolding everywhere.  Groups of people that have learned to live together in what they all individually believe to be THEIR holy city.   Somehow it continues to kind of work, but it is a mystery to an impartial outsider how that logistically happens.  The tour brought us all around, and in the end we were infinitly more knowedgable, and infinitly more confused.  More facts opened up to more more questions...and so our time there continued to unfold.

Western Wall, Jewish Quarter

Ok, I could talk about this particular day for hours or pages or whatever...but I know when to stop...and that should have been a while ago.   Thanks for sticking with me on this one...I know it was dense, but I hope I could give you a feel for what our first real day in Jerusalem was like.  Next installment will include such highlights as "New Years:  Shabbat dinner with an orthodox Jewish family and a secular dance party."  Ahh, the wonderful contrasts...they never ceased.