The Adventures of Brooke and Natalie in Jerusalem: March 2010

Wednesday, March 31, 2010

Palm Sunday

It's Holy Week and it all started with Palm Sunday (this past Sunday)!!! Sunday morning is our free day and at breakfast I sat with President and Sister Brown and found out that the Church of the Holy Sepulcher is the hot spot for Palm Sunday, so I tagged along with them to the church. It was PACKED! The Church of the Holy Sepulcher is the traditional sight for crucifixion and burial place of Christ and there are five different church denominations housed inside the church with two others next to the church competing for attention. The Greek Orthodox Church is the head honchos at the church and they have the main gathering hall in the church so on Sunday that's where I headed. I stood squeezed inside the hall for what felt like an eternity, the worship service is in Latin so I didn't understand a single bit of it and all the people were pushing and shoving to get a glimpse of the patriarch and to be involved in Palm Sunday. Eventually the moment I was wanting for came! The procession began! The banner boys and deacons led the way outside the hall into the center area of the church. At the center of the church is a monstrosity of a structure over Christ's tomb. The procession is suppose to walk around the structure 7 times (they only did it 3 times though). Anyways it was such a cool experience, as soon as the procession began the old nuns became extremely aggressive! Don't mess with nuns, that's for sure! They wanted to be right behind the patriarch just like I did so I fell right in line and pushed my way throughout the procession, it was lots of fun to be so involved in the celebration! The church was backed and as I walked in step with the procession it was so fun to be able to look around the church and see all my JC friends scattered throughout the church! As the procession was ending and the patriarch was headed to their worship hall, I followed our New Testament teacher Brother Manscill to the back entrance to the where the sacraments are prepared, basically their most sacred area, well we snuck in there. I didn't last too long though, the shouts "No Woman, No Woman" was good enough for me to clear out. But nonetheless it was pretty cool! After the Greek Orthodox procession ended the Armenians and Coptic's (Egyptian Christians) took their turns in doing their own processions. It was so cool to see all the different traditions and ways to celebrate.
Later on Sunday as a program we walked to the top of the Mount of Olives and did the traditional Palm Sunday walk all the way down through Lion's Gate into St. Anne's Church with the Roman Catholics. I thought the masses at the Church of the Holy Sepulcher was big but this was even bigger! Everyone had their palm leaves and were singing hymns of worship.
Palm Sunday was so much fun, maybe one of my most favorite days here! It only gets better!!! :)
-Brooke

Saturday, March 27, 2010

GALILEE

Brooke and Natalie would like to welcome you to their fabtab 12 days in Galilee...but first we had to make a few pit stops along the way including our first one at Caesarea.

Emma, Anna, Lindsey, Natalie, and Mary at the Med.

Armageddon- where the final battle will be fought...just sayin'

Brooke and Natalie travel by horse and chariot to Galilee. Natalie drove naturally. "what is that suppose to mean?"-Brooke (Tel Megiddo)

Okay, these pictures are out of order right now cause you should be looking at a picture of the Galilee right now so you can scroll down to find it or just wait. This is the Mt. of Beatitudes. One of the best places we went on this trip. We had a great lesson on the mount, sang songs, and then were able to have an hour of personal study. It was a great time of meditation, so peaceful and lovely.

Church at the Mt. of Beatitudes

The groupie at the overlook of the Galilee at the Mt. of Beatitudes

Church of the Loaves and Fishes (Tabgha)

Aren't we cute and tan? -"Yes! we got tan! Best day ever!"-Brooke

We made a stop at Capernaum, Peter's home town and this happens to be Peter's house. They built a "monstrasity" of a structure over it for protection. It was weird but the building was really pretty.

In the synagogue at Capernaum.

Welcome to the Town of Capernaum

We sailed the Sea of Galilee

Sweet boat we rode

friends

Then Brooke and I went on a hike to a freezing cold waterfall. Naturally we didn't go swimming cause we liked to be warm unlike all the other brave idiots that went in.

Kelsea, Natalie and Brooke

Brooke and Aaron got to stick there gum on the Gum Rock...sick.

The fish I ate. Yes, even Brooke ate it. I was so proud of her! (It tasted way better than it looks! The key was to just close your eyes and eat)

Fishy Face!

Picture Perfect Galilee!

Sunset driving home from one of our many field trips in Galilee

River Jordan. At this place people could come and be baptized. It was really weird to see these people in white baptismal clothes being baptized. -We were given the option to pay ten dollars to rent a white robe and be baptized, we passed.

Jordan River

Church in Tiberias and overlook of the Sea of Galilee, the Church is a fixed up old hostel, it was so beautiful with the best overlook. The branch of Tiberias is made up of many immigrants including large Russian and Spanish groups.

This is usually what goes down on Field Trips. Anytime we stop this is what happens...haha

From the Castle of Nimrod

Natalie dancing on the top of the castle...figures

Just the usual jumpin picture taken at Tel Dan where Jeroboam set up an altar for the Northern Kingdom

We had to make a toliet stop (these were ancient public bathrooms found at Tel Shearim) Poor Brooke...must have been a hard one. -"Natalie!!!"

Haha....this is our Professor Hamblin....hahaha, we love him he teaches our Ancient Near East Class

Brooke at Caesarea Philippi...this is where Peter testified of Christ. Really really pretty place.

Ancient "Jesus Fisherman" boat that they dug up on the shoreline of the Sea of Galilee

As said by one of the service couples here, "oh well, another tel, what the hell" About now, it's kinda how we feel. But don't worry Mom and Dad, I still do appreciate them. (Tel Shearim)

"Bless My Soul Herc was on a Roll..."

Just doing some acting at the theatre. "Dearest Brooklyn, how fairest thou art"

In Akko/Acre (a crusader town and prosperous ancient port) at a Al-Jazzar Mosque

We love the sack lunches we get every day! hmmm...sweaty cheese!

Yep, we still love each other :) (behind us is an ancient structure that may have been what an "inn" would have looked like at the time of Joseph and Mary)

Akko on the Meditterenean Sea, the ruins behind us are from the Knights Templar (for you Julia)

An ancient archway/entry way dated to the time of Abraham

Mt. Arbel...beautiful overlook of the Sea of Galilee

Galilee

The Bahai Gardens. Interesting fact: the Bahia religion is a huge religious group with 7 million members. They believe in EVERYTHING! and this is their headquarters in Haifa. Beautiful Garden! (I had to sneak in with my gum hehe-Brooke)

Lush green fields of the Galilee

Oh freak! Mines! Watch out! The Golan Heights still has land mines laying around all over the place so half the land is untouchable because you never know where they are. Kinda sad but a good way to perserve the beauty of the area.

Well that was our wonderful trip to the Galilee. It was one of our favorite places and we will definitely be back. We also suggest that you put Galilee as one of your must see places. We miss you all and are still safe despite the news reports you may be hearing. Love You!

Friday, March 12, 2010

THE PAST FEW WEEKS...sorry we're lame bloggers

SLUMBER PARTY ON OUR BALCONY!!! Yeah! so fun and such nice weather...sorry all you provo folk stuck in the snow :)

Gorgeous sunset

Even Orthodox Jewish kids misbehave

Muslims praying in the Old City, the Palestinians weren't allowed into the Old City this last Friday

Church of the Ascension at Ein Karem-village commemorating John the Baptist's birth

Chagall Windows 12 windows one for each son of Jacob, this one is Joseph's

Partying with the Jews on their Holiday called Purim...its like our Halloween

Natalie and Aaron getting their dance moves on

Oh you know just a day in Tel Aviv swimming in the Meditteranean Sea

Hanging out on the Beach with Kelesea

Natalie loves being out and about!

Shoppin in the market

The group at the beach

We went bike riding along the water on the board walk!

So funny story about these next few photos and the events that transpired henceforth... So we ride out on this pier and thought it was really pretty so we wanted to take a picture with the waves crushing on the rocks behind us...So we waited a few times for the waves and each time they were getting bigger and bigger...

We stupidy waited for a super big one which was followed by another really big one and came and surrounded us and had so much force and water that...

BAM! it knocked us over. Brooke luckily backed away in time to escape the crash...unfortunately Natalie got the brunt of the wave so Jordan who was next to her went down, Aaron got knocked down too, almost lost his shoe, Natalie got smashed by both of their bikes, including her own and got a huge gash on her foot (we did document that but thought that it was too bloody and that those who have weak stomachs could not handle it so we refrained from putting that up) :) It's funny looking back on the experience because as we were riding up the local fishermen told us no, no too dangerous...but did we listen to them? Of course not we are young invincible Americans!

Tel Aviv at Night

Posing with the Lego Man grafitti

A traditional Bedowin Lunch in a tent!

Visiting Bethlehem

Our Islam professor: Adnan. This picture is mostly for you Brittany :) "Listen to me, Listen to ME!" snapping fingers!

Bethlehem

synogogue at the University

Welcome to Bethlehem University

The "actual" birth place of Jesus.

Inside the Manger in Bethlehem...for those of you who are really confused right now, a manger actually means a cave so it is likely that Jesus was born in a cave. And like most sites here in Jerusalem, the Catholics or some other religious domination have built a church around the sacred site.

The Church of the Nativity

Absolam's Pillar

Just checkin out some sweet caves

This is a cool shot because where the grey dome in the background is, is where the Temple would have been at the time of Christ.

Inside the Church of Gallicantu

Church of Gallicantu aka The Church commemorating where Peter denied Christ three times, underneath is where Christ was imprisoned for a night, and also where John and Peter were imprisoned.

The Scottish Church in commemoration of Natalie's ancestors (oh my freak whatever!-Brooke, this is where Scottish WWII soliders are commemorated for dying while fighting in Palestine)