The last four days have been the coolest, most intense days of my life. Because we're trying to fit an entire semester's worth of class in one month we are RUNNING through Israel on crazy field days. We stayed in Palestinian Christian familys' homes for two nights in Bethlehem which was awesome, Laurel and I stayed with Hifa and Adeeb who were very kind and welcoming! They made us yummy food and we bonded over Britney Spears (everyone knows Britney Spears) and Justin Beiber, they told us how they met and how what kinds of rice you put yogurt on and how to dip pita in olive oil and then zaatar for breakfast in the morning. :)
We spent a couple hours in the Mediterranean, all 43 of us jumping with the swells and diving into the waves of clear blue-green water still perfectly warm from the summer of sunshine! It was so FUN, and afterward Pappa Ken treated us all to Magnum bars!
Every day we pile in our huge bus, driven by dedicated Omar, and trek to Tels to see ancient cities from the Bible and look at the incredible geography of "the land between"--named this because of its unique location between powerful Egypt and Mesopotamia and the Mediterranean and the desert to the east. I love it here and I learn so much everyday!! I wish I could tell you everything, hopefully I'll have time soon.
Seeing as We have dinner soon and we have to walk back from the cafe to the the hostel, I'll post some pictures and post my impression report from yesterday where we had dinner with a bedouin tribe (we had breakfast with them this morning too), served by the top sheikh of the region!
Impression Report from 11/14/11
CAMEL!
**also, i just noticed all my pictures had to do with food, and the camel is chewing, so heres another one:
Me in my "rockin" hard hat :D about to go into the cistern
Today was the best day, I loved everything about it! We started at the Tel Beersheba, where we were given hard hats just in case we hit our heads in the tunnel at the end, but the majority of people wore them for the first hour while we were sitting and talking anyways, the forest green plastic perched on their heads as though it wanted to take off and float above their heads on its own. We learned about how Abraham planted a Tamarisk tree (Gen 21) at the well, and we were able to walk up to an original iron age well outside the city and drop a rock and hear it splash with a faraway “thunk” 180 feet below. I was especially struck with the parallels in Deuteronomy 2, where God tells the Israelites to avoid taking the land and fighting the Edomites because that is the land that he has saved for them. I was so thankful that God showed care for another nation other than Israel because it shows how he cares for all people. It also applies to the current conflict because people have been saying that maybe it’s possible that God wants the palestinians to be pushed out in this way because it’s happened before in the Old Testament. This always sounded so unlike God to me, and I thought this was a good example in the Old Testament showing God’s loves for everyone.
I also loved climbing the canyon, everyone’s bright shirts stadnding out against the creamy, layered rock with smooth black ribbons showing through. Cyndi was right, the hike was over before I was ready for it to end; it was so beautiful! Afterwards we drove through the desert, the winds picking up dust and making the sunset light purple in the haze that hung over the superbowl crater that we overlooked as we read Psalm 90. This was so cool. Looking out over the expanse of dust, crater, sky, and fading sunlight we talked about how we are invited to be part of an eternal story that God is writing to have a lasting effect. Our purpose is so much bigger than ourselves! When I pray, “God my life is yours” that really means that I am giving him my life as one more small narrative that makes up the grander story of what he is doing to save this world. God is so good! Also, how many class periods are there where ibex come up to the group with curious eyes?? The sunset was beautiful, the light turning orange, then purple, then gray as the wind whipped our hair into our faces and picked up so much dust there was a fine layer on my map as we labeled Nezarite (?) cities. Coolest class of my life, November 2011.
This finished our class day and we walked quickly back to our big blue bus to have shelter against the wind, we were ready to set our stuff down at the hostel in get some food! We set off for Arad as the sun set, and were still driving two hours later, having made a wrong turn back towards Be’er Sheva. Whiney moans begin to issue from hungry, grumpy, tired people, “when’s the foooood??” and Eric starts reciting his cannibal poem. Then Cyndi gets on the microphone and everyone starts relaxing, finally, we’re going to be there soon! She speaks into the mic, “We’re driving on this dirt road because we’re eating with the Bedouins tonight. Silence. “…are you joking?” someone yells from the back. “Nope” intones the microphone. Then Eric pipes in again, holding onto his last shred of hope for a comfortable meal, “See, it’s funny because we think you are.” And then we were told that there was about a 65% chance that we weren’t going to be having camel meat. (Which was a legitamate concern, as we saw a skinned camel with it’s furry, decapitated head hanging in front of a meat shop in Bethlehem.)
Personally, I was loving this, I have heard from a family friend who knows Bedouins in Lebanon (?) about their hospitality and have been so intrigued by these people who live in shacks of scrap metal and plastic, coaxing life from their shepherding and maybe some trade! So our bus pulled up to a (respectively) fairly large shack and as rain spitted down on us we shuffled from the dark into the harsh light of a single electricity-saver light bulb lighting up a room divided in two, one half had cushy mats for us to sit on for our dinner, the other had a sheet full of olives laying out. The sheik himself laid out our food (which his wife had cooked) on two tables: four huge bowls of rice, a creamy, oily soup to pour on the rice and chicken that was stuffed with herbs, the cucumber/tomato/parsley salad we’ve come to expect everywhere and big floppy flatbread that was thinner and bigger than a tortilla called "laban". Though Aaron and Tiff were both pretty sick, the rest of us sat on the cushons on the floor and ate our meal which felt so good! Everything was pretty much finger food, we had small plastic spoons for the rice but that was it. As I pulled ample meat off the bone, I realized that the chicken I was eating had probably been killed recently, even today. It was so good to eat something not drenched in oil! After dinner the sheikh personally handed out tea, which tasted like rosemary and mint with ample sugar and Bedouin coffee, which he poured in small ceramic cups, about the size of my play tea cups from when I was a kid. It tasted a bit like coffee and more like something strong and even with some spice, but I couldn’t describe it to you if I tried. Then we received a short introduction of the sheikh to taught us to say, “Thank you, Dad” in Arabic and then told us he had twenty children, fourteen with one wife and nine with another before her! He wore a brown emboroidered on the hem smock with a matching jacket on top and a white kifa. He had a long white mustache and happy eyes. I wish I could speak Arabic and tell him how much I loved coming and eating with them! I’m glad we will go back for breakfast tomorrow, what a treat to be with them! I pray we might show them love, tomorrow.
Now there are thirteen of us girls, Laura, Laura, Tay J, Sydney, Laurel, Anne, Hannah, Nif, Alex, Jess, Lauren and I who are sleeping all together in a big open room, it’s not the hostel we were expecting but I feel so comfortable with these girls I love, adventuring and doing things that are unexpected. Thank you Lord for this wonderful, wonderful day in the desert! I pray you may teach us more tomorrow and that we will love Cyndi and show her our appreciation for all that she’s doing for us. Lord you are so Good!
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