Happy B-Day Rosie

Happy B-day Rosie-face! I wasn't quite sure if it was the 30th or the 31st so I covered it like this (it's the 31st here and the 30th there)!!

For Matt Funk

Hello Matthew,
This is to just rub this in your face just a little bit. I told you I wasn't going to find my wife here and I was correct, so HA (I think you owe me something because there isn't even an interest here). Anywho, sorry for that everyone else, I just had to get my B-in-law back a little (you know how brothers are:). Hope all is well!

Palm Sunday

Good day,
It really has been a fantastic day. As many of you know, it is La Semana Santa (Holy week ) and today was Palm Sunday. It has been one of the most wonderful days I've had here in Jerusalem. I've written before on how this city is a city of religious devotion and how that has touched me. Well, it happended again today. This morning I went to the Chuch of the Holy Seplecure to see the festivities. The church is shared between the Cotholics, the Greek Orthodox, the Armenian Orthodox, and the Coptic Christians from Egypt. That is jusht the main part of the church, there are also carious African churches/sects connected to it. So, imagine walking into a church that is shared byall of those different donominations and seeing them worship on one of their most holy days, and all in their own unique way. I was able to see people form all over the world, literally. It was so amazing to see the devotion of these people. I saw many people praying, many singing, and many people in tears. On thing tha impressed me was the 'Laying Stone.' In the church there is the traditional stone where they lay Christ body to prepare it for burial. The tradition is to kiss the stone, except on a day like today. Women (I only say women do this) anoint/wash the stone, as part of the process they use the scarves off of their own heads to wash the stone, they then kiss the stone and pray. it was here theat I saw the most tears, it was very touching for many of these women.
This afternoon wa got to participate in the Triumpful Entry. The percetional started over in the Bethany area and went up and over the hill into Lions Gate at Jerusalem and ended in St. Annes Church. THe percetional was incredible. There were literally thousands of people, and many of them were singing and praying in different languages. Yet again, it was good to see the devotion of these people. There were many pepole who had a difficult time walking because of injury or age, but they did the walk (and it was hot), it was incredible to see.
The day ended with a parade like thing that the local scouts did. I had no idea that there were scouts in Jerusalem. It was cool to see these kids wearing some of the same patches I wore.
To sum it up, it was a great day. Chau!

This is one shot of the street during the percetional.

This is a woman lighting candles at the Church of the Holy Secoecure. I saw this woman light many candles, this was a special time for her.

This is one of the African priests, I loved the contrast with scin and his robes.

The scouts played the bagpipes, it made me think of Jonny Ommet.

I love this picture. I tried all day to catch one of the scouts smiling and I got this one at the very end of the day, so this is my luck shot.

I'm back from the Galilee and it was great! I don't have tons of time to write right now but here are some pictures, I'll tell you all about it later.

This is some sort of fruit blossom in the water at Ceaseria Philipi

The Church has a small branch in Tiberias on the Galilee. The branch meets in a renovated home that is beautiful, this is the view you get from the chapel.

The Sea of Galilee (which is really a lake, Lake Pend Orielle is bigger) is wonderful and way fun.

This was taken up at Nimrods Castle. The castle is huge and really neat. While exploring I found the old cistern and it had over two feet of water in it, it was great!

This is a shot of the church on Mt. Tabor, the traditional site of the Transfiguration. I loved Tabor and this church, it is one of my favorites.

This is an old market place in Accor. Accor was the 'capitol' of the crusaders.

This is on Arbel, it's an overlook of Galilee. I'm standing on a cliff edge that was very pretty.

This is the old harbor at Accor.

If you ever get to go to Tel Dan, do it, this is what you find, streams, springs, and green, I loved it.

Crusader tunnels in Accor!

Corina studying and writing at Ceaseria Philipi.

This boat was on a rood in Accor, if y0u haven't noticed, Accor is very photographic.

Where the Jordan River leaves the Sea of Galilee there is a spot where people from all over the world come to be baptized. It was interesting to see how folks do it, but it was good to see peoples devotion.

This is Amanda, on of the other Idahoens (go Idaho!), we took this picture at En Gev, the kibbutz we stayed at.

Pictures of the Holy Land

Hello ya'all. I told Mum that I'd put some more pictures up today, so here are a few more.

Today I went down the Kidron again. There are a few really neat tombs there that I enjoyed climbing through. This opening is about 20 feet up and gave us a good view of the east side of the city.

This was taken on top of the Armenian hostel on the Via Dolorosa. I think that this picture really shows the diversity of Jerusalem. It is important to remember that Jerusalem is a holy city for Muslims (as we see with the Dome of the Rock in the back), Christians (with the closer dome), and for the Jews, this is what really makes Jerusalem a near place.

I returned back to the small cemetery in the Kidron, it's a neat place, I really like it.

This is the Dome of the Rock and the ___ Gate (I don't remember the name right now, but it's the gate that Christ is suppose to go through at the second coming).

Here's a picture looking up at the tomb I mentioned earlier.

The Western Wall is one of my favorite places in Jerusalem. The wall is the most holy spot for Jews. It is custom to fold prayers or requests and put them in the cracks. The papers are taken out every so often and stored, in Jewish tradition it is not right to burn or destroy anything with the name of God on it, so they have places all over the country where they store these papers. The wall is sacred because it is the closest thing they Jews have to the temple. So these are a couple of pictures of the prayers, it's a special place.

This is taken from the plaza in front of the Western Wall, like the photo above I love this because it shows the Western Wall (on the bottom right) and two Muslim places of worship.

Two love birds studying the scriptures at the center yesterday.

This is a church right inside of Lions Gate. This is considered the beginning of the Via Dolorosa.

This is also close to Lions Gate, the rest of that arch can actually be seen inside of the church on the left.

Neot Kedumim

Good Morning/evening,
I hope that all is well in the homeland. Today we were able to go to Neot Kedumim. Neot Kdumim is a garden/reserve for all of the plants and animals found in the Bible and Torah. We saw many flowers and herbs, herded sheep and goats (I watched that one and laughed most of the time, it was great!), built fires and cooked homemade pittas on it (I built and tended one of the fires, it was manly), and were able to see some really nice stuff. The reserve is about a hour south of Jerusalem in the hill country, so it was beautiful. So here are some pictures from the day:

This is a foot-powered water wheel. It was amazing how much water it could scoop up.

That is Katie Bourne you see the silohoutte of, she was powering the wheel when she got turned upside down.

Here's a normal picture of the wheel

This was a neat reflection of a small shed.

Washing dishes after the pitta.

The sheep and goats. As I said, it was fun to watch.

This is my whole class, we ground up oregano here and talked about it's significance in the scriptures (it's called hisip in the scriptures).

Here's another nice flower of the Holy Land, notice the bug in it.

This was a very nice wheat field (I think it's wheat).

This tree was neat, it looked nicer in real life, but it had long "leafs" of small yellow flowers.

Valleys

Ok, so today after class we all left. I spent the afternoon in the Kidron Valley and the Hinom Valley. It was a wonderful afternoon. It is spring here so much of the land is green, I love it. So here are a few pictures of where we went.

These are some weed flowers. I know that you're disappointed in me Mel, but I really liked these flowers.

Down on the south side of the Kidron (the valley actually runs to the dead sea, but south of me) by the Church of All Nations, there is a small abandoned cemetery hidden among the olive trees. The spot was very peaceful and beautiful, I would like to go back there. This is one of the headstones, most of them were broken.

This is Silwan (I'm sure I spelt that wrong). It sits opposite (east) of the City of David and is a political hot spot right now, but I really liked it.

This was taken in the Hinom Valley. The name actually means the Valley of Hell because it is the traditional site where Judah bought land and where he hung himself (not fun, I know). But in the valley there was a neat little monastery that had a bunch of catacombs in it, some even had the bones still hanging around. As we walked up the valley we explored other caves and catacombs and climbed big rocks, Ryan would have been proud!

These are three of my favorite people here at the JC. Going from left to right we have Brian Masterson (army extraordinaire and a redhead), Ali Goodfellow (energy and smiles), and Daniel Benson (all around good guy who can sing first tenor, and does for the BYU Mens Chorus). This show was taken on the way to a Scottish church we went to. We sang "Nearer my God to thee," "Lead Kindly Light," "Rejoice the Lord is King," and "Praise to the Lord the Almighty (#72)" in the chapel. The chapel had really nice acoustics and it was really fun.

Here is a millipede, they're nasty little buggers but really cool.

This is Corina. I liked this picture. This is by the cemetery in the Kidron Valley.

This is the entrance to one of the tombs in the Kidron Valley. I love all the stone work here in the Holy Land, it's much nicer than what we use in the States.

Sunrise

These are a couple of shots of a sunrise the other morning, it was great. This morning I headed to the zoo here in Jerusalem, it was nice to get out and about, we've been on a kind of lock-down for the past two weeks, nothing to worry about. Anywho, life is great!