Oscar Night

Sorry that my blog posts have been getting farther and farther apart, but we have been in Galilee for the past 10 days and I am still trying to catch up on things before we left.

Anyways, about 2-3 weeks ago we had a "Night at the Oscars" where we all had a chance to display our movie making abilities. I personally was able to contribute to quite a few of the movies and it was great to see it all come together and to see the creativity displayed by others as well.

Me and Jenna
Paulie and Juno!
Russell
Me and Chadwick with our Oscars
Mason and Russell, stars of "Tearin' Up My Heart"
Katie Coop!

Herodian Field Trip

This Thursday we went down to the Jewish Quarter of the Old City and took a tour of the Herodian remains of the city. It was really interesting to actually see and visualize how the temple mount looked during the time of Christ.

This is a model of the temple mount during Herod's time

This is another model of the temple mount and city
Southwestern corner of the temple mount

Red Sea and Bethlehem

First of all I apologize for not blogging the past few weeks. I have been kind of busy, but not too bad so I have no good excuse.

Anyways, about a week ago most of our group headed down to the Red Sea on our free day to go snorkeling. I have never been snorkeling before and it was so much fun!

We had about a 4 hour bus ride down to the Red Sea and the AC on our bus was broken so this is our "look how you feel" pic for the ride down
Chilling on the beach and getting fried. My legs got so sun burned.


After snorkeling at coral beach, we headed to another beach in Elat and spent more time hanging out there
Emily was trying to flip gelatto into my mouth.

The Day after we got back from the Red Sea, our entire group took a field trip to Bethlehem. We spent some time at Bethlehem University, the Applied Research Institute of Jerusalem, and the Church of the Nativity. On this trip we were exposed a little more to the Palestinian view of the Palestinian-Israeli conflict and it was interesting to hear how they perceive the problems that exist in the state of Israel. I have realized that the more I learn and understand about the Palestinian-Israeli conflict, the more I am drawn to the middle. I have heard many differing opinions and view points on this subject and I have slowly been able to form my own take on this conflict, but surprisingly it doesn't favor either side at the moment. Before coming to Jerusalem, I understood little about the reality of this problem. I have now seen with my own eyes how this reality penetrates every aspect of daily life in this land and I am so glad that my ignorance is slowly disappearing.

In the church at Bethlehem University.
Karyn, Jenna, Amy and Me at lunch

Manger Square and The Church of the Nativity

Dan, Me and Amy
Church of the Nativity
Inside the Church of the Nativity

Katie, Me and Jenna


Inside the cave that is the traditional site of Jesus' birth. The cave is inside the church in the basement.







Milk Grotto Church

Finals Frenzy

Ok this came from Lisa, but this is a great description of the chaos that we call finals week!

This post is pictureless, because these words will paint the picture at the Center that a camera could never capture. Imagine this: (but don't close your eyes, because you need to keep reading...)79 highly intelligent people (or at least 60) all in the same building, all competing for grades in the same classes, all taking 5 finals in one week- finals which are not like normal hard tests where success is possible if you study long and hard, but the kind where you have no idea what is going to be on the test and it will be impossible no matter how long you study, but you study anyway, for hours, because you have to keep your grades up for Med school or Law school or because your parents still care or because you need to get into the nursing program or because you're a perfectionist or whatever.In this situation there are several ways to react, and we've seen everything.
There are people bartering study guides based on how long it took them to make it, with vows to not share it with anyone.
There are people singing hymns at the top of their lungs in the study rooms, and people outside of the study rooms getting angry.
There are people crying like I've never seen before.
There has been a lot of hypervenilating.
Everyone is gaining weight because the intake of pita and peanut butter has at least doubled.
Some girls made a music video in the midst of all the studiers.
A list of countries bordering the Red Sea, Dead Sea, and Persain Gulf was erased from the board when we walked in with the explanation "I'm not allowed to share that with anyone; I got it from someone else and she'll kill me if I share it."
At the Old Testament review the tear filled question was asked "IS IT ACTUALLY POSSIBLE TO SUCCEED?"
Russell turned 25 today and is begging everyone to go get gelato with him, but no one will.
Ilike2learn.com is the most visited website of the week as everyone tries to learn the countries and capitals of the Middle East by playing matching games.
The dinner conversation is: "Tell me the 2 mountain ranges in Iran." "No. I'm not talking about that right now." "Okay, then let me tell you a joke... What's the capital of Lebanon?" "That's not a joke Brent!"
The tension in the building is escalating by the minute. Anyone who is not stressed out is shunned and yelled at for being happy. Jokes have to be used very sparingly and only with other non-stressed individuals when not in the presence of the temporary psycho-paths.

Jordan

Finally my post for Jordan is ready! The past few days have been crazy because we have all been studying for finals, but I finally got it done.

Jordan was great! We visited Petra, Jarash, the Jordan River, a crusader castle, Amman and saw some amazing things! The people were great and I loved the cities that we stayed in. I didn't quite know what to expect on this trip because I didn't know very much about Jordan previous to going there, but now I am a huge fan and would love to go back.

Me and Rachel at Mt. Nebo. This is where Moses saw a view of the Holy Land although he would never make it there. This is also where many people believe Moses was buried. Of course we know that's not true...
Greek Orthodox Church of Madaba with a mosaic floor map
Shobak Crusader Castle


Treasury at Petra! So Amazing!

Petra Monastery
The View of the End of the world!
This is the Ancient Roman city of Jarash. This street is called the cardot.




It was pretty hot at Jarash so we took turns soaking each other.
WE LOVE JORDAN!
Royal Automobile Museum

Waiting outside the museum. Whenever we have free time and a camera, there are inevitably a lot of random pictures.

Cool mosque we found while wandering around Amman

We visited the King Hussein mosque in Amman and all the girls had to put these robes on to cover our heads and arms.



Jordan River
Kristi and Me in the Jordan