Masada, Dead Sea

June 10, 2007
Today we went on a field trip with the students to Masada, the Dead Sea, and Qumran. Masada is perched on top of a very high, flat mountain top in barren desert land. In its day, it could support close to 1,000 people. Water came exclusively from rainfall collected in enormous cisterns. They had plenty of food/grains to last for years up there. The Jews living on top built very thick walls around their “city” to protect themselves from the Romans who were camped below in 8 different camp areas all around the base of this mountain. Eventually, the Romans were able to get a battering ram up the mountainside to hit the wall down. The Jews could see the end was near and decided to commit suicide rather than live in slavery to the Romans. (this picture shows a clay model of the real Masada palace built on at least 3 levels)

We then went to the Dead Sea. This has about 33% salt and as you walk out into the water, the salt forces your legs and feet up to float. You can see the people floating on their stomachs with their feet up. I didn’t go in, but did take off my sandals and stood in the warm, salty water. The students had fun making people formations in the water – they formed the letters BYU, etc. I bought a cute orange stripe hat and silky pumpkin-colored pants that are cool and not so hot as what I brought.

On the way home we stopped at Qumran where the Dead Sea scrolls were found around 1947. As young shepherd boys were looking for their lost sheep, they tossed a rock into a cave to force the animals out, when they heard crashing sounds. When they climbed in, they found broken pottery jars holding the scrolls, some of which were wrapped in cloths. The caves are pictured here.

1st Youth Activity

June 8, 2007
Today was our first YM/YW (youth) district activity since I was asked to accept this calling when we arrived in Jerusalem. It was a swim party and barbeque in a member’s backyard in Caesarea. They have a pool that is just over the hill from the Mediterranean Sea. Bob and I took Besan Quffa (just graduated from High School and on her way to BYU) from Jerusalem our branch, and there were leaders and youth from Tiberius and Tel-Aviv. We had a successful evening with about 20 people (youth and leaders). It was fun to watch the 3 girls (Brita, Besan and Maria in picture to the left) get to know each other as they walked along the beach, and traded names and phone numbers/e-mail addresses with each other before they returned home. It had been a long time since the youth had been together and I think they enjoyed it. We plan to get together again soon.

Kibbutz, Hezekiah's Tunnel

May 23, 2007
Today 5 of the service couples left the Center early to see the Festival of the Harvest in a Kibbutz about 1 hour away from Jerusalem. Again, the drive there thru the country was one of very pretty farm fields. Once there, we sat on the hillside to await the little program. There was a band playing music, girls dancing typical Israeli dances - each with a basket representing the harvest, little children dressed as animals or ducks, groups of people carrying young animals – turkey, goat, etc., older people singing folk songs, and then towards the end the 7 families with brand new babies born since last year’s festival all came on stage with their children. As the last folk song finished, the children let go of their brightly colored balloons which traveled quickly up into the sky – it was almost like fireworks.

We noticed how family-oriented the people were, and friendly. There was no smoking or drinking there – it felt almost like one of our ward parties.

May 27, 2007
Today we went with the students on a half-day field trip to the City of David, where the main attraction is walking thru Hezekiah’s tunnel. He built this tunnel to carry their water supply away from the main source into the Pool of Shiloam in case they were attacked by enemies who would cut off their water supply. It is a very long, narrow path thru solid bedrock, dark, sometimes quite low to the ground, and still today has water from the underground spring running thru it. The water then ends up in the Pool of Shiloam (spelling?), which was just discovered in 2004. The students had a great time walking thru in the dark with only a few flashlights, and all came out wet. I didn’t want to get wet so Bob and I went thru the dry tunnel – an almost parallel tunnel that has no water, is narrow, but slightly lit.

The students went back to school at Noon, but we and another service couple went to the Archeological Park just on the edge of the Western Wall and the Temple Mount. It was fascinating. We watched a virtual tour of what the Temple looked like (very interesting and helpful), then we walked all thru and around the ruins. There are still some steps remaining that people would take to get up to the temple. Instead of being regular distances from each other, there is a short step, followed by a deeper step (so you have to take 2 steps on this landing before you can reach the next step up). The reason for this was so that people would walk slower, could gather their robes and/or children, causing them to look down with bowed heads on their way up to the Temple. We saw where the markets stalls were right out the Temple wall, etc. It was a place we could go back to again.

That night we had a marvelous concert at the Center, a piano trio – 2 from Israel and 1 from Russia (all between 22-25 years of age). They were out of this world – very wonderful musicians. When the pianist played a Chopin piece, he made the piano “talk”. It was one of the best concerts so far.

Carillon Bells and Tiberius

May 13, 2007
Today is Sunday (Mother’s Day). Bob and I decided to see if we could find our way to the Carillon bells and practice. We found them and practiced a few pieces we can play together. Then we found our way to the big Shopping Mall. We felt lucky to have found it by actually using the map, and not get lost!

Shabat (Saturday, May 19)

Bob and I were asked to visit the LDS Branch in Tiberius (also known as the Galilee area). We left this morning at 7:30 AM, armed with a map and directions of how to pick up members along the way. The drive was very pretty - taking us west and close to the Mediterranean Sea, thru farmlands and small towns. Tall trees covered in purple flowers and large plants along the highway full of deep pink flowers were a welcome sight after seeing mostly stone buildings and curving, narrow roads in Jerusalem. The 3 people we picked up all spoke Russian and very little English, but they knew the way to church. At one turnoff the roads were blocked everywhere because of a cycling event taking place. All the cars were stopped as we waited for an hour before they opened the roads again. I called ahead to let the members in Tiberius know we would be late and they decided to start with Sunday School until we arrived. The Branch has existed for sometime but had not had a building to meet in until last March, when Elder Holland dedicated it for their use. It actually was an old, run-down, 12-room villa the church bought and beautifully renovated, with a nice apartment for a service couple to live in. The meeting area feels more like a large living room, and has a balcony that looks right out onto the beautiful, blue Sea of Galilee. It is a gorgeous setting!! (picture of Sea of Galilee above is out the Branch patio)

Because of our callings, Bob and I were the speakers, and also played a musical number in their Sacrament meeting. As the talks are given, other members are quietly translating your talk into other languages for members who are Russian, Hebrew or Spanish. Afterwards there was a potluck downstairs for everyone.

After arriving home about 5:00 PM, we grabbed dinner and went to a Fireside in the Center, to hear Blair Van Dyke speak of early "pioneer" stories of converts as they learned of the gospel in this area long ago and helped it to flourish. It was very interesting.