McCall's Travels ב ירושלים (in Jerusalem)

So a little confusing, but the Sabbath, the day we have our church services here, is on a Saturday, not Sunday, because it’s the Sabbath in Judaism. It’s funny though, even though we’re doing things kind of backwards by going to church on Saturday and then playing on Sunday, the Sabbath feels exactly the same as it does at home when I go on Sunday. Highlight of the day was definitely going to the Garden of Gethsemane where Christ suffered the Atonement. It was about a 20 minute walk from the Jerusalem Center, which is so cool to be able to just stroll on down there at our leisure to visit and feel of the spirit that’s there. Definitely a cool experience.

In the Garden of Gethsemane

Sunday was a free day, so naturally it was spent in the city. There’s a huge wall surrounding the Old City that you can walk on top of to see all around the inside and outside of the city called the Rampart’s Walk. There’s 4 quarters to the Old City, the Jewish, Arab, Christian, and Armenian quarters. It’s so interesting to walk on around above the city seeing how very different each quarter is. Stars of David representing the Jewish quarter, tons of Arabic writing all over to distinguish the Arab quarter, and crucifixes all over the Christian quarter (didn’t make it to the Armenian quarter, too hot and sweaty at that point...). It’s incredibly diverse. Then the best part of the day: finding the absolute best hummus and falafel known to mankind. Whatever maybe I’m exaggerating seeing as it was my first time eating both of the Near Eastern cuisines, but it was SO GOOD. Pretty sure it’ll be hopeless finding anything that glorious back home. Sad. Guess that means I’m staying here forever #sorrynotsorry. After that, we roamed around the shops checking out the local merchandise, and of course, indulged in my first souvenir purchase of the trip: harem pants. You know, the kind that Aladdin wears. A solid investment and end to a day in the city I’d like to think.

East Jerusalem

Love 'em

Rampart's Walk

Best hummus

Best falafel

Monday’s are field trip days, so we spent the majority of the day visiting different sites around the Jerusalem area that had the most gorgeous overlooks over the city, and other surrounding areas like the West Bank, Bethlehem, and a few others. I still can’t get over how incredibly gorgeous it is here. I really don’t know what it is about this place, well, yeah I do it’s Israel so it’s amazing, but it never gets old. It’s kind of bizarre to be looking out over Bethlehem while reading from Luke about the birth of Christ; not something you do everyday. Well, except for here. But ok, as glorious as all these places are to visit, it. is. so. hot. the worst part is that this is probably pretty mild temperature wise right now. We haven’t even hit summer yet. I’m dead.

Nabi Samwil

Bethlehem

Tuesday was awful. I (and everyone else here) studied all day for a test/ had readings up the wazoo to finish for my classes. So yeah. College is hard.

After a night of very little sleep and the completion of our first test of the semester, it was time to head back to the city today. We went to this cool place outside the walls of the Old City called Zedekiah’s Cave. Huge and seemingly never ending caves that just kept going deeper and deeper. To be honest all there really was to see in there was rocks, but we made it pretty entertaining with some photo shoots and dancing. Pretty sure we might not have done anything to boost the American reputation, but it was a good time. After that we spent a while searching for a supposedly top notch shwarma restaurant, which we finally found. I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again, the food here is divine. We enjoyed our lunch and then found a local shop owner, Jimmy, who is close with the Jerusalem Center, and he welcomed us into his shop to enjoy some shade, and pretty much just to show us around his place and get us to buy his stuff. He’s the sweetest guy, and it was fun to have him chatter on about all the olive tree wood carvings they have there. If you’re ever in the area, hit up Jimmy’s Bazaar.