Passover. Synagogue. Israeli Dancing.

 Passover 

We were able to celebrate Passover, even though it was early. Passover is a Jewish spring festival that celebrates the deliverance of the Israelites from Egyptian bondage. It is held through the 15th to the 22nd of the Hebrew month of Nissan. It is suppose to remind them of what their ancestors went through, and how much God has done for them. It was super interesting.  They had a very specific layout of when you eat, drink, sing, say certain passages, etc.

Ophir, our Israel teacher, reading a passage.  He is holding Matzo bread. The Matzo bread symbolizes the hurried flight of the children of Israel. They left so early they did not have time to have their bread rise.  It also could symbolize pride and not being puffed up. This is just one example of an item of food that has lots of symbolism in the meal. 

More symbolic food items. For example we dipped the parsley in a bowl of salt water to symbolize the tears of their ancestors. 

We volunteered to sing "Dayenu." It is in Hebrew and it is super upbeat. It was so fun. It basically means that the Lord has given them so much. They would have been good with so much less then the Lord gave them, yet he continued to bless them. 

Synagogue

 Every student gets the opportunity to go to a synagogue with Ophir, our Israel teacher, once during the semester.  It was so interesting.  We went to a liberal orthodox synagogue which is actually one Ophir goes to a lot. I went on a Friday night for us, but to them it is really Saturday evening which is their Sabbath.   They usually pray three times a day;evening, morning, and afternoon. The evening prayer is the first one.We went to the overlap session of Friday afternoon and Saturday evening.   We watched them welcome their Shabbat, their day of rest.

Ophir gave an interesting little riddle.  He personified the Sabbath day. Sabbath went to God and told him that he felt very left out.  Sunday had Monday, Tuesday had Wednesday, Thursday had Friday, but Sabbath had no one.  God then told Sabbath that he could have the children of Israel.  This was a mutual commitment by the Children of Israel.

Jews generally treat the Sabbath with a ton of respect and excitement.  They look forward to it each week.  They also have strict rules.  For example they can't drive a car.  This is why Ophir and his kids walked home from the synagogue after the service.  They generally try not to do any work.  They don't write, use electronics, some people don't even use lights (use candles instead), etc.  Most all of the woman's hair was wet there. Probably because they didn't use a blow dryer.

The actual service was interesting. They sang prayers in Hebrew the whole time.  The prayer book I was using had the English translation next to it. I tried to follow along but it was kind of hard. But the prayers were super tender.  All of them were praising God and saying how thankful they were to Him.  At one point during the service they had a man come up and give like a five minute sermon. Ophir told us that he was talking about Purim, a Jewish Holiday that celebrates Ester.  Essentially from what I have heard it sounds kind of like Halloween.   For the Holiday they dress up and read the story of Ester.

Because of Purim, they tried to mix things up in the service .  They did this by allowing people to dress up if they want and by switching the sides the men and women sit on. Ophir's son, who is darling, was wearing a skeleton sweatsuit.

On Monday and Thursday mornings they read the Torah. Shabbat service is generally always the same where they sing the same prayers. The other services are usually shorter, like 15 minutes.  The Shabbat service was like an hour in a half. .

Israeli Dancing

Unfortunately, I don't have a picture. But this week we also had an Israeli dance class. An instructor came and taught us a handful of dances. It was way fun.  

Basically this week I had a lot of first hand experiences learning about Jews and Jewish traditions.  They really are incredible people. 

Sunday the Fun Day- It's the "Is"real thing.

 Sundays are especially fun because they are, are free days. So essentially we can do whatever we want. 

Jenessa and I in our twiner outfits..( pink tops, and stripped maxi skirts.)This picture was actually taken on Valentine's Day. 

There are stands everywhere selling these huge bagel-like things. They come with an assortment of mixed green spices.  

 The Average Free Day Agenda

This is outside of the Al-Aqsa Mosque. We are not allowed to go in, but it is considered the third holiest sight in Islam.  It is right across from the Dome of the Rock. 

Dome of the Rock with the girls. 

I will never get over how beautiful the Dome of the Rock is. 

The Western Wall. This is actually on a Monday.  Because we had a field trip on Sunday our free day was moved back a day. But on Mondays they read the Torah.  They have multiple Torah's there that people are reading. 

This is in the boys section right next to the wall.  Notice the black boxes on some of their heads.  This holds the Shema, a Jewish prayer that is usually recited morning and night.  It is Deuteronomy 6:4-9. 

We became friends with two girl soldiers   Generally you see boy soldiers walking around.  But at the Western Wall we saw two girls.  In Israel it is required to do two years of military service after high school. They were super nice and they both spoke pretty good English,  especially the one furthest to the right. Lizzy got one of their emails because she asked her to send her the picture.... And yes, I am aware that I look like a giant next to them.  

Lunch! We discovered a gem in the Old City.  There is a little falafel and shawarma place.  The falefal is 10 shekels and the shawarma is 20 shekels.(One dollar is equivalent to around 4 shekels.)  However he decided from here on out he will give us a 10% discount.    The food is SO good, and it has a quaint little step up. 

Postcards. "It's the Isreal thing", and falafel. Got to love it!

Russian Church of Mary Magdalene

This is the Russian Church of Mary Magdalene. However it is more commonly called the golden spires church, or the golden onions. But it was beautiful.  Inside there were paintings of Mary Magdalene. They were beautiful.  I just sat down and looked at them.  They had one big one of Mary asking Pilate for Christ's body.  

 I was trying so hard to take this picture without the man on the right in it.  However I felt bad asking him to move so we just took a few and worked around him. But of course as soon as I walk away he moves. It is just one of the simple funny stories in life I guess. Maybe before I leave this study abroad I will become a pro  at taking pictures and working around tourists. 

Russian Orthodox Church of the Ascension

Russian Orthodox Church of the Ascension.This is where some people believe that Christ ascended into heaven.

Me and my beautiful roommate Jenessa. She is wonderful in every sense of the word. 

They had two chapels on the grounds. One of them was dedicated to John the Baptist. 

This is where they believe John the Baptist's head was found. 

So call me a girly girl, but they had the prettiest flowers.  There are not a lot of flowers everywhere, so when you see them it is a beautiful sight!

YES! This is exactly what you think it is... a PEACOCK!! This little guy was just roaming around on the grounds.  Who would have thought there would be wild peacocks running around in Jerusalem?

The Jewish Market..a.k.a. the Shuk

The Jewish Market is so cool.  It is in West Jerusalem.  Something interesting about the markets here, especially the Jewish Market, is the food always just sits out. No one is worried at all about germs or touching things with their bare hands.  It is so funny. Everything felt very authentic there. 

Yad Vashem

Another wonderful educational opportunity I got was to go to Yad Vashem, a memorial for the six million Jews that were murdered during the Holocaust.  The words Yad Vashem literally mean “a name and a memorial.” These are taken from a passage in Isaiah.  The passage is talking to righteous individuals who had no posterity to remember them by.  The passage states “I will give them in my house and within my walls, a monument and a name better than sons or daughters.  I will give them an everlasting name(Yad Vashem)  which shall not perish.” (Isaiah 56:5).

So I know you probably don’t want a history lesson, but what I learned was TOO interesting not to share.    I feel very privileged to have had Ophir, my Israel teacher who is Jewish, talk about the site with us.  I have learned about the Holocaust all throughout school.  You would think because of this I would at least have heard most of the main concepts about the Holocaust.  However, Ophir gave me an insight into something I had never heard before.  It was so fascinating.  He focused on the Holocaust from an Israeli perspective and what the view of the Holocaust was like after.  If you can imagine, people surprisingly did not talk about the Holocaust after it happened.  It was not discussed, children were not educated on it, and survivors weren’t necessarily recognized.  He taught us the reasons for this in two reliefs that they had on the grounds.  

As you look at what is depicted in this first relief, you see the overall theme is sorrow.  You notice in the middle a Rabbi holding the Torah scroll.  You see women and children crying forced by the Nazis ( soldiers in the back) into Ghettos, and thus ultimately to most of their deaths.   The people are all looking down  with an expression of defeat.  People say they were “like sheep going to the slaughter.” There were many Jews who did not fight back. 

This relief has a different mood to it.  This depicts the revolt in the Warsaw Ghetto. Moods of hope and determination are shown in their faces.  They are holding weapons about to fight back.  Most all of these people were killed.  However they were Jews who went down fighting.  They were considered heroes. 

So there was this overall perception and connotation of the word hero as being someone who fought back. Well everyone who fought back was most likely killed, so that would mean the survivors would have been people who did not fight back.  This more or less, added to why people did not speak of the Holocaust.  People who survived were not being recognized as heroes.

There is a lot of background and events that could add to this perception as well.  Take for example the War of Independence.   If, for example, they had not fought back then they would never have gotten the state of Israel.  This adds to heroism being defined as fighting back.

However in 1961 and 1962 Adolf Eichmann who was over the logistics of the Final Solution, the “annihilation of the Jews in Europe”, was found and put on trial. This trial was broadcasted which ultimately led the story of the Holocaust to go from not being talked about at all, to being studied, talked about,  and listened to. Schools would even go and listen in on the hearing.  Things talked about began to be in the school curriculum and high schools began to memorize things he said.  This began to evolve.

Now there are many more things that helped the views people held about the Holocaust to evolve.  One catalyst Ophir talked about was the Munich Olympics in 1972. The Israeli wresting team was kidnapped and killed.  Here were these people that were the epitome of ultimate athletes.  Yet the wrestling team did not fight back and they were all killed.  Israeli’s generally thought that fighting back was the right way.  However this Olympic catastrophe was one event that helped led to the change of ideology.  What denoted a hero was not so judgmental, and the views became more elastic. Perhaps heroism doesn't necessarily have to involve fighting back after all, which is contrary to the views of many people.

The view of the holocaust has been a dynamic evolving perception. Survivors as well as people who were killed are considered heroes.  The Holocaust is talked about, and remembered.  Heroism is now not only defined as fighting back, but it encompasses so much more than that.  It is especially recognizes  those who maintained the Jewish life.  One Rabbi said that just living Jewish life is heroism.  It is a spiritual resistance, not just a physical one. 

This tree(the little one) symbolizes this idea perfectly.  There was a Jewish woman who was over an orphanage.  She, on the Jewish tree planting Holiday, took the children behind the orphanage she worked at to a plant a maple tree.  She risked her life to maintain the Jewish life. 

Out of the six million Jews that died a quarter of them were children.  Above many other reasons, a lot of children were killed if they were below a certain age.  They built a beautiful memorial for them.  Unfortunately I don’t have any pictures due to the no flash photography rule.  However I will try to describe it as best I can.  As soon as you walked in there were these huge pictures of children hanging with reflector type things positioned in certain ways between them.   This made it look like there were tons of pictures of children, when in reality there was only around ten.  In the next room over it was pitch dark. They had vast numbers of candles all over.  They also had mirrors everywhere to reflect the light from the candles.  This created the illusion of a starry night sky.  It was incredible. One of my favorite parts.

The museum itself was very fascinating as well.  Immediately when walking in they had belongings of things found in Jewish people’s pockets that had been killed.  There were a lot of pictures of family members and captured events that took place in these people’s lives.  It made me think, if I were them, what would I have carried in my pocket?

I could have literally spent days in the museum.  There were rooms and rooms filled with facts, stories, movies, personal accounts, and personal belongings ( the museum has 2500 personal items donated by survivors.)  I unfortunately only had 2 hours allotted to look through.  I wish I had a longer time. 

The last room was very significant I thought.   It had a lot of pictures of Jews who were killed that lined a hollow cylinder that went up in the sky.  Then they had shelves, and shelves filled with books.  These books hold people’s names that were killed.  Anyone is allowed to submit names of people who were killed during the Holocaust. 

Yarnish Chrota(I am sure I spelled his name wrong) is a famous children’s teacher.  He was over an orphanage.  All of the children were being sent off to get killed, but because of his high reputation he was allowed to live.  Despite this he saw it as his responsibility to go with the children in his orphanage to comfort and watch over them. He voluntarily died.  He is recognized as a hero.   

The Hall of Remembrance has the names of 21 Nazi death camps engraved on black basalt paving stones. The center has a casket of ashes from the cremation ovens taken from the concentration camps.  There is also what they call an “eternal flame.”  This flame signifies that those who died in the Holocaust will never be forgotten.

  

There are tree planted all over the property.  They plant tress in memory of the people who saved Jews during the Holocaust.

Elias Feihzilberg- A Holocaust Survivor

Every Wednesday night at the Jerusalem Center we get the opportunity to attend forums. This past Wednesday we had the wonderful opportunity to listen to Elias Feihzilberg, a survivor of the Holocaust. As I have progressed in school, I have always learned about the Holocaust.  But this was the first time I have heard an account of the Holocaust from a first person perspective.

As soon as he walked into the room, my heart swelled with such love for him.  He has this sweet countenance about him.  He is also one of the most cheerful 95 year old men I have ever met.  He did not speak English. He spoke Spanish, which is actually his third language.  His native language is Yiddish.  His second language is German, and then his third language is Spanish.  When he spoke to us we had two students translate for the rest of the group.  (That in itself was a cool experience.  I love how there are so many young people who are cultured, and who can speak various languages.  It is incredible. )

I do not like to dwell on the bad, but I think Elias’ story is inspiring. Elias grew up in Poland.  He is the oldest of seven children.  Near the beginning of the war, he “volunteered” to go and work.  The work they had the Jewish people do was very hard, strenuous, and intense. He started out by building a road. They did long assembly lines from Germany to Poland to pass off heavy supplies for the road.  He eventually left and worked on a ship transporting cargo off the ship.  He recounts how every time they were almost done with one ship, another full one would show up.  Eventually he got so sick there because his feet where so swollen they permitted him to leave. He was able to go and stop at his village and see his house.  However when he got there his whole family was gone.  He found out his father had died of starvation and his family had died in gas chambers.  The agony he must have felt is unfathomable.

From there he moved around working. He even went to Auschwitz. He remembers there being two lines.  He didn’t know where they both led.  One was a working line though.  Initially when he went up they turned him away because he looked too sick.  But he left the line and tried to get color into his cheeks by hitting them.  When he went back they took him and he began working again. He worked in the mines which was very dangerous.  However, he later learned that the other line was a death line and the people in that line were killed.

Elias is one of millions who faced these horrific experiences.  He survived 9 concentration camps.  He expresses how he does not know how he survived.  However he did survive, and he continued on with his life.

He met his wife in the kitchen that cooked food for the survivors.  She cut the potatoes. They got married and moved to Guatamala.  Later they would move to Jerusalem.  He gives all of his thanks to God.  He told us that it was hard to leave Hell, and it is also hard to look back.  But as he talked I sat there thinking.  Here is this man before me, who literally survived a Hell. Yet I hear about his life now and he has done so much with it.

He had no control over these things that happened to him.   He was the participant in a very cruel and unfair, hate filled war.  Yet he sat before me and when he talked about his present life he was so cheerful.     He goes to a concentration camp survivor group every day.  He lives for his family- children, grandchildren, and great-grandchildren.  Elias is an incredible man.  He is a hero in every sense of the word that can teach us so much.  We control how we are going to live, and respond to things in life.

“I am the master of my fate, I am the captain of my soul.” –Invictus

  

How you Know You are Living In Jerusalem

So living here in the Holy Land, there are many things that are different than an average day back in Utah, or America for that matter.  I have been thinking about these differences and wondered what are some specific things that make it different here.   So I have made a list of five things that are different, most of them being silly.  But nonetheless these are things that I love.  I decided to title my list as  How You Know You Are Living in  Jerusalem.

1.  You know you are living in Jerusalem when frequently throughout the day a man’s voice blasts on an intercom( Call to Prayer/Quran recitations) and it does not seem weird or alarming in the slightest.  If anything it becomes to feel natural.
2. You know you are living in Jerusalem when you are embedded in a huge crowd and people still look at you and say “mormons” and you know they are talking to you.  Everyone at the Jerusalem Center got renamed once entering Jerusalem.  We now respond to “mormon.”
3. You know you are living in Jerusalem when you are constantly asking yourself if you should go get ANOTHER chocolate pita.  The Jerusalem Center’s Oasis, cafeteria, has these wonderful chocolate pitas.  You can toast pitas and then put this chocolate spread on it…it is divine.  When people gain weight here it is probably because of the amount of pitas one consumes per day. You can have a chocolate pita, honey pita, peanut butter pita, cinnamon sugar pita…the list goes on and on.
4. You know you are living in Jerusalem when one of your most frequent thoughts is, “is this real life?”  You are constantly surrounded by significant sights and people.  Many places that surround you hold significance because something in the Bible took place there.  And if it doesn’t hold significant to you, it often holds significance to a different religion or group of people. 
5. To conclude the list, you know you are living in Jerusalem when you are surrounded with 81 other students, plus faculty, that are all great friends.  Everyone here at the Jerusalem Center is such great friends.  For example, I can go up to dinner by myself, get my food, and not fear that I won’t have someone to sit with.  You can sit at any table that has an open spot and feel welcome.  Or you could start your new table that will be full in seconds. Everyone here is wonderful.  I am sure by the time I leave here I will have 81 new members to add to my family!

Fun Facts About the City of David

This valley is probably where,or near where, Nephi, Lehi, and their family lived before they left Jerusalem. 

This is the "millo" that is mentioned in the scriptures a lot.  It acted as a reinforcement wall. It probably supported the ground near a large building.  Later on People built homes on the side of it.  This is why you can see the outlines of old houses. 

This is an actual excavation. People really want to dig in the City of David because a lot of historical events happened in this area.  However it is extremely controversial because there are Palestinian homes all over the land people want to excavate on.  So there are some people who are trying to excavate, while there are people who are trying to live in their homes that people are trying to dig under.  This obvious creates a problem.  In the above picture on the left you see armed guards.  These guards are actually there for the excavators protection...just in case. I don't know how they are going to resolve this.  I definitely see both sides of the argument. 

Trekin' Through Hezekiah's Tunnel

The Gihon Spring was Jerusalem’s main original water supply.  Jerusalem had the Siloam Channel which would take water from the Gihon spring to the south where it would enter a pool that was used for irrigation.  However, it was possible that people could have entered the Siloam Channel which passed under the city wall to be able to enter the city.  This is what many people believe 2 Samuel 5:8 talks about when Joab and his men could “getteth up to the gutter and smiteth the Jebusites.”

The ability to do this obviously created a problem.  There were also other problems Hezekiah faced with it during 701 BC when the Assyrians were laying siege on the city.  Some of these other problems include  the excess water that could be followed up to the Siloam Channel and be traced back to its source.  The water source could also be blocked or poisoned.

This has been the common perception of why Hezekiah built the tunnel that brought the water from the Gihon spring “straight to the west side of the City of David.” However due to recent excavations, watch towers were discovered.  This makes it seem that the water had been fortified pretty well.  This led some people to believe that perhaps Hezekiah built the tunnel to bring water to the west side of the city so they didn’t have to travel so far to get water two or three times a day. 

They let people walk through Hezekiah’s tunnel which still has water in it.  This is one of the fun adventures the Jerusalem Study Abroad program lets you do. The tunnel is not very wide or high.  It makes sense considering how it was hand carved. In fact, they had a group of people start at one end of where the tunnel should be(southwest end), and a group start at the spring.  They then dug towards each other and met in the middle. That is incredible to me that they could meet in the middle.  The diggers followed the “fissure”, or crack, from the spring that had some water leaking through. 

The tunnel is about 1/3 of a mile.  It is pitch dark.  That is why we got to wear head lamps in it.  I don’t know if it is just me or what, but you feel so official when wearing a head lamp.  I loved it. The water wasn’t as cold as I thought it would be.  The depth of the water varied.  Sometimes it was just around the calves, and others it was mid thigh.   We went through the tunnel single file and it was a blast.  My fellow JC students around me sung Les Miserable and Shania Twain.  It doesn’t get much better than that!

When we came out of Hezekiah’s tunnel there was the Siloam pool.  I loved this pool and the story that goes along with it.  In the Bible, John 9:1-7, it talks about Jesus healing a blind man at this pool.  He used old clay and the dirty water from the pool.  Christ did not use any fancy oil, or pure water.  Perhaps Christ was showing to the people that it was him that healed the man, and not some special remedy.

I love getting principles out of the stories that can apply to me today.  This is the principle I learned from this story. There are many times in our lives when the world can seem to “blind” us spiritually.  However if we seek Christ and believe in him, He can heal our spiritual blindness so that we can see.  The man that was healed said  “Lord, I belive” (John 9: 38.) He believed in the Lord.  We must believe also so that we can spiritually see. 

Essentially that is why I am here in Jerusalem. I am away from my family, my friends, and everything that is familiar to me.  I have traveled thousands of miles away from my home not to see cool sights, not to go on fun field trips, and not to live in a unique culture. All of those things are wonderful and I am so grateful I get to do them. But when it comes down to it I am here to help me open my eyes spiritually.  I want to see.  I want to learn more about the Savior’s life.  I want to be the one who can yell at the top of my lungs “Lord, I believe” and to be able to SEE with an eternal perspective.  This trip is not something that is mandatory in order for this to happen.  It can happen anywhere.  So I challenge all of us to have our eyes spiritually opened, so we can believe and see beyond just this mortal realm. 

Arab Culture Night

At the Jerusalem Center we had an Arab Culture Night. It was so much fun.  We had two Imam's come (people who say the Call to Prayer). It was so cool.  One of them said he started working at the Call to Prayer since he was seven years old. They said the Call to Prayer, recited parts off the Quran for us, which took one of them about five years to memorize, and demonstrated how they pray.  After this we had a huge feast.  I say feast because there was SO much food. It was all authentic and wonderful.  I definitely ate too much.  The night was completed by having people come and teach us some traditional Arab dancing. I LOVED it!

The buffet table.  The Jerusalem Center has such good cooks. 

My plate of food!  I got a stuffed zucchini,carrot, and chicken breast. I got shawarma, and lamb.  And we cannot forget about the pita and hummus. Yummmmm.