Life in Israel--Week of October 18, 2010

Life in Israel continues to intrigue and challenge us at times. Each week seems to hold its own special adventures. It was so fun to see my sister Dorothy, and meet her friend, Dorothy Maurer from Roseville, CA. Larry and I enjoyed giving them our own personal tour of the Old City, several museums and special sites. We said good-bye to them on Monday and now they are safely back home but tired. We enjoyed several meals with them. We celebrated Dorothy's birthday at the lovely and historic American Colony Hotel in East Jerusalem. Their beef filet was delicious and what a treat for us to share this evening with Dorothy. Just before they left on Monday we had lunch together at another historic hotel--the King David. Sitting on the terrace and looking east across the Hinnom Valley, we had a perfect view of the walls of the Old City and we could see JUC's campus. It was a quiet refreshing time for us together.

We were soon back into our routines, if you can call it that, of laundry, work in the library (I'm making progress in cataloging the Lindsay Collection), reading, talking with students, etc. Larry found himself reading and grading about 26 mid-term exams from his Prophetic Landscape Class. I started reading Peter Hessler's book, River Town--Two Years on the Yangtze River. Peter was a Peace Corps English teacher in Fuling, China from 1996 to 1998. He won the Kuriyama Book Award and for those of you who want to understand China better I highly recommend his writing. He learned Chinese while he was there and it opened so many doors for him. He now lives in Beijing and writes for the New Yorker and has published another book, Oracle Bones. I feel like I have learned so much already about China and her people and I'm still not finished. This is one of our Reading Club books at Taylor for this year so I was delighted to find it here at JUC.

My saga with Annie, the artist, continues. We were scheduled to meet for breakfast but she did not show so I called her and she said she was in Galilee and that she just had to get out of Jerusalem because of her health. She told me she did not know yet if she would be back from Galilee in time for Shabbat dinner but feels since I don't leave until December we can still get together. She's an interesting woman!

On Thursday morning I visited the Israeli parliament, the Knesset, with one of our Taylor students, Esther Lang. We had to arrive early for an English tour but first we had to go through security and have our passports with us--a very tight security system. We could not bring anything into the Knesset building. Our bags were placed in another bag and a number assigned and this was in a separate security building away from the Knesset. The Knesset is very modern and sleek with a contemporary decor. On the way in we met an older couple from Sherman Oaks, California who sat next to me. The woman told me they had rented an apartment for a month to visit family here and to tour. They have been spending a lot of time in the Old City touring the museums to stay cool. What an interesting couple! He is a retired doctor from Nova Scotia but now lives in California and her brother had made aliya (meaning "going up" and the term used when one moves to Israel and becomes a citizen) and they wanted to see other relatives. She proceeded to tell me that her nephews have 12 and 13 children each and that their daughters are lovely and pure on the inside. She is troubled about her granddaughters in the US who have absorbed their culture in Southern California and do not dress modestly. What can I do she asked? As we were getting ready to start the tour, I just encouraged her to pray to God and ask for wisdom. It's amazing what people will tell you in a ten minute time period! They were very caring of each other and loved seeing everything.

Our tour guide was a young Israeli who took us into the plenary room where debates and laws are made and we saw a film explaining how the Israeli government functions. They have 120 members of the Knesset because after 586 BC there were 120 elders of Israel. How they form their coalition government is interesting and leads to all kinds of "problems." We saw three huge and very beautiful tapestries by Marc Chagall the famous Jewish artist. They had a very dreamlike quality to them and pictured the Jewish people in the past, important figures and events in Jewish history and then the future. He designed them then they were woven over a period of four years. I wish we could have had more time to examine them more closely. He also made mosaics for placement in the floor of the reception hall. He gave them as his gift to Israel. He did not speak Hebrew and never lived here but visited. The reception hall still held two beautiful vases of red roses from the tribute service held the day before to recognize the anniversary of the assasination of Yitzhak Rabin. Outside the Knessett is a huge beautiful Menorah given by Britain to Israel in 1956. On each branch of the candlelabra are carved biblical stories. The Menorah is the symbol of Israel. It was a very impressive tour and as we left here came a group of Israeli soldiers being given a tour. The military makes a point to educate their soldiers about their heritage by having them visit different locations in Israel and takes them to the Knesset.

Since we had taken a taxi to get to the Knesset, we decided to walk back to campus (about three miles). I'm getting my exercise and feel like my legs are stronger. If only my feet did not ache at the end of the day! We stopped and bought some freshly squeesed fruit juice along the way. Ahhh, how refreshing! These venders are all along the roads selling this wonderful fresh juice.

Last night we went back into the Old City for another organ concert but this one was not quite on par with our first concert with the organist from the Moscow Conservatory of Music. We heard several Bach fugues that were really very somber. Now we are back into travel mode today and packing and getting ready for our four-day trip to the Galilee. We look forward to exploring the area where Jesus called his disciples and wandered the hills of Galilee. We will be staying all three nights at a Kibbutz that operates a Guest House--Ein Gev at the base of the Golan Heights. Here we go again!