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Published: September 8th 2006
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first group photo at the jerusalem promenade overlooking the city Well, this past sunday, I finally started my program. We started in Jerusalem, so I took the bus there sunday evening. We stayed in Jerusalem for 4 days in a really nice hostel. The first week was just gtting to know each other, orientation about the program, tours around Jerusalem, and then one day in Tel Aviv about Jewish identity. So far, the program has been going really well. Its a very small group, only 12 participants, and it is a very international group. There are 5 americans, including me, 3 french girls, 3 russians, and 1 british guy. To say there is a language barrier would be an understatement. The french and the russians know very little english, and of course all our tours and discussions have been in english, so its been a real challenge getting everyone to understand each other. And I think the most ironic part of it all, is that almost nobody understands the British guy, cuz of his accent. Its really funny to hear us all talking. I have been spending most of the time "translating" so to speak... basically explaining things in simple english to the french and the russians, and at the same
time teaching the english, and whatever Hebrew I know. but it has really been a whole lot of fun, we all laugh with each other a lot, because, really what else can you do sometimes right?! the russians and french have complemented me on how I explain things to them and think I should be an english teacher.... people always think I shuold be a teacher, but I don't wanna! haha. no, but I just don't like being a teacher in the traditional sense of being in a classroom. A lot of what I've done when working with kids could be considered teaching I guess. But so everyone in the group is really great so far, and we have been having a lot of fun.
Here's some of the stuff we did in Jerusalem. We started our tour at this promenade that is in the south edge of the city, that overlooks all of Jerusalem, with a gorgeous view. Then we went to this "elevator of time" simulator ride, going over the history of Jerusalem for the last 3000 years or so. It was a bit cheesy, but fun, and I had not been there before, so that was
good. From there we went to the old city, and walked on top of the old city walls which are about 500 or so years old. When walking along the walls, you get a real sense of what old Jerusalem must have been like, and how history is very much alive in the city in so many ways. Then we walked into the old city, went to King David's tomb, which is right outside the old city walls, which there are stories of whether this was a mistake or on purpose from the King who built it, or his architects. So from 1948- 1967, when Jerusalem was still part of Jordan and not yet part of Israel, Jews could not visit Jerusalem, the old city and all its holy places, including King David's tomb (king David being the favorite ancient King of the Jews and of Israel who killed the giant Goliath). So the place where David's tomb is located is in the downstairs so to speak of a building, after which a church was built on top of it because the christians there believe that this is the location where Jesus had his last supper, a Passover seder. On top of that, the Muslims built a mosque, which is no longer in use. This is sooo typical of everything in Israel, but Jerusalem especially, a muslim site on top of a christian site, on top of a Jewish site. And people wonder why everyone fights over Jerusalem! And when you go to the roof of the building you get another great view of the city. So then we went into the old city to walk around, and went to the Kotel (the Western Wailing Wall), which is the only remaining wall of the ancient temple. It is the holiest site for the Jewish people in the whole world. Around the Western wall, they are doing archeological excavation, digging further and further down, revealing more of the past and more of the original temple. You can actually see the destruction that the Romans caused when they destroyed the temple, with the side walks and ramps collapsed on the ground. Its really cool. Then we went to the tunnels, which run underground along the western wall of the temple. It was kind of a storage area, and there are underground pools for water to be used in the city, because there is no natural water flow into Jerusalem. In the evening we went to the Tower of David, which is part of the old city walls, but a big tower. Today, it is a museum on the history of Jerusalem. But at night, they had this music exhibition of huge musical instruments that played by themselves, and there were pretty lights and colors and it was really awesome and relaxing. This was all in one day, and it was exhausting.
One the second day, we went to Yad Vashem, which is the Israel Holocaust Museum. They opened a huge new exhibit of the history of the holocaust last year, which I went to twice last summer when I was in Israel. We also went to Mt Herzl which is where Theodore Herzl, the founder of Zionism is buried, as well as most of the Israeli prime ministers and presidents, and then all the fallen soldiers in all the wars of Israel. Sadly this cemetery has recently seen too much activity from the recent war. They also had a new museum with it on the personal history of Theodore Herzl and how he founded zionism.
Most of these places, I have been to before at least once, especially because they are more "touristy" type places that every major tour takes you to. So pretty much everywhere I went I was reminded of the past times I had been there, special moments with the special people I was on those trips with who I mostly don't keep in contact with. It was very interesting. And it was also nice that even thought I had been to these places, I could still learn and experience new things there. As always, its magical to be in Jerusalem, and almost surreal when you really sit and think about it.
So thursday, we went to tel aviv for a day long seminar on our Jewish identities. It was very interesting, but by far the most mentally exhausting day because of the language barriers, and trying to explain everything in english to the french and russians. We also were with another small group program of kids who are studying music, they had a few europeans and a few south americans, adding even more to our international community. This group will be joining us for the 4 weeks of our intense hebrew language course which starts next week. They were also a great group of people and we all fit really well together, so I think it will be fun.
Thursday night was one of our group members birthday's so we all went out. Friday, we were set free for the weekend, so a bunch of us went to the beach together and had lunch. Now I am back at my cousins house for the weekend, and plan to sleep a lot since I didn't do much of that this week, and had to get used to waking up at 8am or earlier again. yuck. hehe.
Anyway, so everything is going great so far. As I said, next week we start the hebrew classes which will be great, and that will be for the next 4 weeks. I'm really looking forward to it.
Alright all, thats it for now. I'll try to post some pics for this blog entry later. For now, I'm very tired, goodnight!!
Love,
Leah
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N-Dogg
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sweet
Hearing you talk about Jerusalem is often invigorating--I remember being in England and seeing all of teh things I had read about my whole life and just being inawe that I was actually seeing and or touching whatever it was (Tower of London, ANYTHING in Oxford and Cambridge, Queen's Jewels, etc.) It is always so amazing to me that, especially in certain countries like England and Jerusalem, there is so much living history that you can literally walk all over and around it and it's no big deal. D.C. is almost the same way, but not in the living history part. The work ten minutes walking from the most powerful city on Earth and I take it for granted most of the time. Kind of puts things in perspective, yes? Glad to know you are having a great time and are being of good use. Keep it up Champ!