Marhaba!

I can't believe I've only been here for less than 3 weeks. It feels like it has been so much longer.

On Saturday we went to the Garden Tomb and I had a great time. It's a very peaceful place. It's where they think Jesus was crucified and also where his tomb is. It's beautiful. All kinds of different tourist groups go through the garden and they sing songs. It's really neat to just listen to all the different languages singing the same praises. On Sunday we took taxi's to Tel Aviv to hang out on the Mediterranean beach all day! We played beach volleyball with some guys from Germany, floated in the salty water, got gelato and ate lunch!

Monday we had the most interesting day yet I think. We went to down to Jericho! Jericho is one of the few times we get to travel into the West bank. So that makes it even more of an adventure. Jericho is 850 feet below see level! So in about a 45 minute bus ride we descended about 2850 feet. We first stopped at a Byzantine cathedral honoring the good Samaritan. Then we went on to Jericho where we saw the oldest architecture ever found. It's a tower from the neolithic period. And we saw the remnants of the wall that fell down in the Book of Joshua. We also saw Elisha spring, the spring that the Elisha healed. Elisha spring is still Jericho's only water source. Some things never change. Even though Jericho is in the middle of the dessert Elisha Spring makes the city very tropical with lots of palm trees! We took our time on the way back to stop a few more times. First at the ruins of King Herod's winter home. Then again to look over the Judean Wilderness. The road we were on follows the Wadi Qelt which is more than likely the same road that Jacob, Joseph and all his brothers, then Moses and later Christ took back and forth between Jerusalem and Jericho. A lot of scenes from the bible took place in between Jerusalem and Jericho.

After Jericho a small group of us went to the Pool of Bethesda. Where Christ healed the paralytic man. I was so impressed with the ruins! They were by far, the best we've seen  yet. And there is a beautiful chapel there honoring Mary and Saint Ann, Mary's mother. Bethesda was a really nice place. It was gorgeous. The chapel is known for it's excellent acoustics and they encourage you to sing. So we sang How Great Thou Art  and as we were singing a group of people came in and started singing with us in their language. It was so neat!

This week we had a lot of classes and they are so interesting. I'm so lucky to be able to be taught here by such wonderful professors who know so much about where we are. Professor Muhlstein is actually an Egyptologist and he gave the most interesting lecture on pyramids to prepare us for Egypt! Last night we watched The Ten Commandments... which I will never do again. It was painfully long!

We leave for Egypt bright and early tomorrow! Were headed to Cairo on a bus, staying there a few nights, then flying to Luxor for a few more nights then back up to Cairo and home to Jerusalem! It's a packed week. I'm really excited!