Day 2

I took a bunch of notes during our drive today. Nothing overly with a sense of order, but some interesting facts



First we drove through a few Kibbutz ( colonies of people often European immigrants wanting to live together). We learned a little bit about everyday live including the fact that the school children start learning English in first grade, and boys and girls must serve in the army at 18. Girls have to serve two years, unless they are promoted to a higher position, and boys must serve three years.



Every tree in Isreal is hand planted, often by immigrants who had no jobs. They used pine trees from Spain, but the trees couldn't endure the weather, so they all died. The biggest forest in Israel is right up against the desert, and every tree is individually watered through a complex irrigation system.



There were many events that the Jewish people consider miracles that occured during the wars. One such story was when they faced the Egyptians, who had a much larger, more organized army. The Israli people flew two planes, that had just been finished that morning, and dropped bombs that didn't go off. The Egyptians though they had an entire air force, and stopped their attack.



A constant problem in Isreal is the conflicts between the Jewish and the Arab peoples. Although there are many areas that they live peacefully together. You can tell the different areas where they live by two things. Israeli people have red roofs, and live higher on the mountains, which the Arabs prefer to live in the valleys, and their housese are built by layers, each layer representing another generation. In many of the areas, the hot water tanks are on the roofs of houses, painted black to keep pressure, and manyof the houses are only solar powered.



Although the Bedoins live in small, crumbeling houses, they have their own schools. A problem in these schools is that the girls often drop out at 13 in order to be married at 15. Although many people see Bedoins as nomadic people, they are developing entire citites. Keep in mind, however, that if they ever heard you calling them 'city people' you would have to learn how to run across a desert very quickly.



The Israli people are very interested in learning how to cultivate the desert land, and spend lots of money towards research into complex irrigation systems. One of the quickest ways to get water is during the few days of rain that they get in the desert. Unlike other areas, the water does not soak into the land, and even an hour of rain could close roads and cause major flooding. In fact, five minutes of rain shuts down the city of Tel-Aviv, as we learned yesterday. They would pull over to the side of the road in order to avoid driving in the rain.



After driving through the beautiful desert area, we spent a few hours at the Dead Sea area. First we went to an area called Massada. This was an enormous fortress built by Herod in 67 AD. The Jews that were living there were under attack from the Roman people during that time, and this castle was a safe place to be. Until the Romans started using captives from Jerusalem to begin building ramps up to the walls. When the Jews started shooting arrows at the workers, they realized they were shooting at their own people, and called a cease-fire. Unfortunately, the ramps continued to be built, and the 15,000 man Roman army was much larger than the 1,000 men, woman and children that resided in Masada. They were now faced with the dilema of whether or not to let themselves be captured and become prostitues, and gladiators in the areanas or to kill themselves, which was stricly forbidden. Deciding that living among the Roman people was a far worse end to their lives, every family drew lots. One person had to ensure that the whole family killed themselves, and that everything was burned. They were not to make a fuss, but they had to die quietly on their beds. Once morning came, the Roman soldiers came up to the city to conquer the people. When they saw what had happened, they marveled at the strength and courage of the Jews, and even though they had finally won after seven years of fighting, there are stories from the people who expierenced it that recal sad, mourful faces. Even now, the Israeli people say that never again shall Massada be conquered, and that remains a symbol of hope for them in all their struggels.



The Dead Sea was an amazing expierence. You walk a little ways out on the very hard, salty bottom, then sit and lift your legs up and float. Any cut or imperfection on your body will suddenly begin to sting, as the very salty water cleanses your pores, and heals the cuts. There are no living things in that water, as it is 13% salt. That may not seem like much, but most salt water bodies are only 3% salt. Sadly, however, the Dead Sea is shrinking by an alarming couple meters a year. The governments are trying their best to figure out ways of slowing, and eventually stopping the shrinking of the Dead Sea, in order to preserve much of the prosperity of the people around that area.





Some of the more humorous things that happned today:

Our tour guide, who served many years in the army, told us that one day they got a call that there was an Arab with a large gun that was walking around Masada. Naturally, they drove all their Jeeps out there, and got ready for a showdown. It turned out it was a Japanese tourist with a large amount of camera equipment. Glad I didn't bring my tripod....

At dinner tonight, when my mom and Janelle were being served desert, the waiter asked us where to put it, and my mom pointed out a spot between her and Janelle. The waiter's responce to this was " Always listen to the missus". This seems to be a popular idea around here. As our tour guide said " Every woman around here can operate a M16...you don't mess with them. If your wife tells you to take out the garbage....you're taking out the garbage".



Today was a very busy, very hot day. Although the locals say it was a cool day, as it was only 30 degrees. Apparently they usually get 40-50 degrees, especially in the desert areas.





That's all I've got for today! Tomorrow's journal log will be much of the same thing, as we are going to be touring around with a guide, and I like taking notes about facts so that I can remember them as we go along.

Day 1

Flights from Calgary to Germany.
No sleep was to be had on this flight, although I spent much of the flight in a bit of a musical daze. Thank goodness for iPods to drown out snoring. Listening to music is a lovely way to spend hours and hours of plane rides. A not so good way to spend one’s time is listening to your seatmate jabber on about this and that, and how horrid her last pedicure was, and how awful her hair must look right now. I felt quite sorry for the poor man who got to suffer through this ordeal for nine hours. Although, to be fair, it did ensure that the man exited the aircraft very swiftly, allowing all the passengers behind to exit more quickly.
Note to self…people who work in German airports do not like it when you attempt to race them down hallways, no matter how much caffeine you have had in the last hour. What they do like, however, is when you are asked to take off your sweater, revealing a small tank top. Especially if it is five am local time, and they are rather old gentleman. I have never been so thankful to get through security before.

Right now I am sitting in a lounge surrounded by people a language I do not know. An alarm is going off in the background, and there is a short Jewish man wrapping himself in leather straps, and what looks like a hand made shawl. He is deep in prayer, swaying back and forth, and tears are rolling down his face, He has Bible verses in the small square box strapped to his head as well as on the leather straps that now cover his arm. His hands are clutched to a small book in his hand, and he is quietly reciting the words over and over. No one is paying him much attention; they are more focused on the noisy alarm that is still going off.

We found out later that the alarm was not caused by the Jewish man being behind barriers; it was, in fact, Dad’s alarm that he did not notice because he was watching a movie.

Flight from Frankfurt to Tel-Aviv was uneventful at best, and I got a total of one hour of sleep the whole way here. Once in the airport, we were rushed through customs by a man who works for the tour guide company, and then we were escorted to our ‘buses. In Canada these would be called mini-vans, but here they are enormous inconvenient vehicles, no bigger than the Beast.

After we unpacked a bit at the hotel we ran..yes ran to the beach to dip our toes in the Mediterranean Sea. It’s amazing how much more energy we had when we saw the beach. We had dinner at a small, albeit fancy, restaurant. The atmosphere was lovely, between yummy seafood, the beach, and SEVERAL stray cats…apparently these are a common problem here.
After dining we strolled on the beach back to the hotel, where we decided we needed ice cream. So it was back to the beach where we stuffed ourselves with various sugar filled, creamy, delicious, ice cream.
Finally it is time to crash. Good night world.

Israel Trip

So over the next week I will be putting up a different kind of blog post. While I was here in Israel, I had a notebook on be at all times. A trait, I have learned, is particularly useful when people watching.



I am going to be typing up my blog posts and putting them up here, maybe with some pictures, depending on how much time I have to put it all together! :)



A lot of the journal entries for the days are just filled with facts, but they're things that I wanted to remember, things that I wanted to be able to tell people when I got home.



It's been a truely life changing expierence. I know that's a bit cliche, but it's so true. There's an inexplainable feeling inside that is excited, terrified, confident, unsure, trusting, thankful, happy, sad.



That being said, these journal entries will not be filled with what some might call 'sentimental crap'.



So bear with me, I'm excited to start sharing my trip! :)

More Fall. And Waterfalls!

Me and a really good friend decided to take our cameras out for two hours. We found some lovely fall colours as well as some lovely fall-ing water!

Fall Colors

I took my camera out today....homework had to wait on account of the beautiful colors outside my window. More are coming as I have an upcoming photoshoot with a friend! But I couldn't resist taking some today :)

Craaaaaaaazy enhanced color..

Spark

I found this poem in my devotional book, and I thought it was something awesome I had to share :)

I know that some people laugh at me idealism-
At my effort to be a "light of the world",
At my eager, though often meager attempt to
Shine a ray of brightness into an otherwise
Dark, dank world.

There are times when I understand why people laugh and ridicule.
I mean, how dumb can I possibly be
To think my life really matters amidst
Four billion other people on this cinder speck of a planet
In this distant corner of the spinning, reeling universe.

Dear God, sometimes my light seems no brighter
Than the lambent glow of a single lightening bug
On a very cold,black night-
Barely a flicker, just a quick spark
Amidst darkness deeper than shade of a shadow.

Yet a spark, just a solitary spark is all it takes
To get a bonfire flashing and flaming, burning and blazing.

So, dear God, help me to realize my life does matter,
That being a Christian matters,
That telling others about Your great light matters.

Teach me the secret of high voltage living
So that I might be Your light in my world,
Beginning at home and spreading
To everyone within my circle of influence.

Dear God, renew in me Your Holy Spirit power-
That heavenly charge that enables mere lightening bugs
To flame bright as lightening bolts.



But you will recieve power when the Holy Spirit comes on you; and you will be my witnesses in Jerusalem, and in all Judea and Samaria, and to the ends of the earth. Acts 1:8

Birthday Paintings

For my friends birthday we decided to fill balloons with paint and shoot darts at them....this created amazing art that my camera decided it would take only fuzzy pictures of. Sadly this is the only decent photo of the awesomeness that ensued.

Robin Hood shot!!!!!