Week Three--Making friends at the Mosque

This is going to be brief because finals are starting this week (for the first module) and I have to find 40 sources for my supervision by Thursday.

Monday--I don't recall much, it wasn't that memorable of a day
Tuesday--I went to formal hall at pembroke. It was wonderful. I sat next to two fo the programme assistants, and across from a student of Pembroke. We spoke mostly about religion and the mentalities of different religions, the educational system in the UK, and how British people perceive the influx of Muslim immigrants. The student of Pembroke is a strong catholic, and I really wanted to get to know him better, but I didn't have the chance before the dinner was over. It would be wonderful to learn how he came to believe in Catholicism in such an atheistic environment.

Wednesday--Plenary lecture on translating books into film.

Thursday--my second supervision was in the morning. I showed her some of the things I had found, and that I had arranged a meeting with Kacem Idrissi who volunteers for Muslim Education and Outreach Cambridge. She was happy about it. There wasn't really much to talk about, so the meeting only lasted for about an hour. After class, which was excellent unsurprisingly, I went to the mosque with two friends, Annie and Katie, but was too late for the prayer. Afterward, Kacem came out and took us on a tour of the mosque. It is a house converted into a mosque, so it is not big enough for the local Muslim population. We sat up in the woman's section upstairs near the curtain, all of us wearing head scarves, and spoke for two and a half hours about my subject, Islam in the UK, and Islam in general. It was a great opportunity to learn a lot more about the Muslim faith. Another man joined us, Faisal, and both of them were extremely fluent in English and quite able to explain Islamic ideas in a clear and precise way. Their children ran all around the mosque, and kept coming over to eat some of the huge dish of samosas that Kacem had obtained for us. I met his wife and three children as well, they're some of the cutest kids I've ever seen. That took until dinner pretty much, and after dinner I think I intended to do some readings though I don't know that I actually did them.

Friday--I went back to the Mosque friday in time for the prayers. A friend of mine, Kate, came along (different from Katie) and we were there for the whole ordeal of fridays. Mohammed, the guy I spent time with in Edinburgh, came also, though we didn't see him during the sermon. We sat in the woman's section, obviously, upstairs and behind a curtain. There were a lot of women visiting that day from interfaith outreach programmes of Cambridge, which I would like to write more on later, so the women filled up the section entirely. We actually had to remove the curtain so there would be more room for the women, and when they opened it it was sort of a shocker because there were at least 200 men directly in front of it. We had listened to a sermon over the intercom, about giving your alms to Allah and not spending your money unwisely, before they did the actual prayers. Kate and I stood in the back trying not to stand out. People had, several times already, mistaken us for Muslims because we did a pretty legitimate job on our hijabs. So I think they were suprised when we didn't pray with them. I met at least 5 women who were converts to Islam and born in the UK. Afterwards, we met up with Mohammed and Kacem, and Kacem gave us another tour for Kate. We then sat up in the woman's section again, and this time for four hours spoke with Kacem, Mohammed, and Faisal about Islam They asked a lot of questions about our faith, and we were able to make many comparisons of our similarities and differences. We learned a lot of how they perceive justice and mercy, compared to how we perceive it, and how they justify the idea that there is not need for a redeemer. We were talking for so long, that Kacem disappeared to the store and returned with fruit juices and fried chicken and french fries. Arab hospitiality (Kacem is from Morocco, though he has hardly any accent) is remarkable. We finished the tour and so forth around 5.30 and were then back at Kings just in time for dinner, which turned out not to be there because of a party they were having. Consequently, Kate and I went down to Sainsbury (the local version of Vons) and bought some dinner for ourselves. We then went to another plenary lecture. This one, again in the Union Society room (which I love by the way) was on how language plays a part in law. The speaker is a linguist and he discussed how he, as a witness for multiple cases, has seen the syntax of the word "approximately" or "substantially" can have literally millions of dollars riding on it. It was, unsurprisingly, a fascinating lecture.

I spoke with Dr. Kerry and Annie, her husband, and Dr. Cope for a while, then returned to Kings. It was late by then, so I went to bed pretty soon.

Saturday--Amelia, Cherry and I went to Oxford. We took the train, which was a complex procedure because one of the lines was shut down, to King's Cross, then via subway to another station, then from there to Oxford. On the first train, about a 50 minute trip, I spoke with an aging Irish man who spent the majority of his life in South Africa. He told me how the crime in South Africa drove him out of the country, after being hijacked 5 times (5!), but how he loved the people, and had spent many years creating various items to help with sustainable energy. he had designed light fixtures for telephone boxes, he had used LED to create a cheap and sustainable way to light a home at night, and had even built his own airplane from nothing (a picture of which he showed me). He had an obvious love of his grandchildren, who he also showed me on his phone, and a deep connection to South Africa which, I could tell, he missed. We had to stand the whole way because the train was crowded, so talking to him made the trip seem much shorter. The rest of the ride was not that eventful, and when we arrived in Oxford, we bought tickets to a hop on hop off tour bus. That took us to Christ's Church College first, which we spent a while touring. It is where some of the first 2 harry potter films were filmed. We also spent a while in the cathedral there, the only cathedral in the world also to be a college chapel, and I spoke with the Priest for a while. He was a retired Anglican Priest, and he explained how they do not believe that there is any one church that has a monopoly on truth. In fact, he said the only reason to be anglican over some other similar denomination is preference. That was eye opening because I had always wondered how the Anglicans justified their founding. He was a very kind man, and he obviously loved to talk about his faith. We went to the bookstore after that, and I purchased a copy of Alice in Wonderland from their store because it was pretty and because this was the school Lewis Carol had taught at and written his books in. We then went to the castle, built 1000 ad, and took a tour there. It was part castle, part jail (a working jail from some obsenely early time until 1996), and the creators had worked really hard to make it a lucrative enterprise. The building is one of the oldest in England and has some fascinating tales associated with it. We took the bus to the book store, to a place called the Scriptum (which, if I ever have enough money, I want to buy everything inside... it was wonderful) and finally to the Eagle and Child Pub where we had dinner. It is the pub that CS Lewis and JRR Tolkien met for their discussions on their books--the Inklings was their group's name. We sat all the way in the back under a converted greenhouse. These two teenage boys stared at me awkwardly the whole time. I determined they thought I looked like someone famous. I ate a lot of french fries (chips) with vinegar, salt, ketchup, and mayonnaise. Yum. Finally, we were able to get back to Cambridge around midnight. It was a crazy train ride back, because most of the help desks were closed so we really just had to hope that people around us knew what they were talking about. In the taxi from the train station to Kings, the driver got talking to me (probably because it was so late, he didn't want to fall asleep) and I finally wheedled out of him that he was muslim. He was really redecient to tell me where he was from when I asked. it was obvious that he was afraid of my reaction. I even asked twice, and both times he said something vague like "all over, florida, mexico" though he had an obviously south east asian accent. Anyway, when he found out I was studying arabic, he got really excited and started to tell me about his habits as a pious muslim. When we arrived at Kings, he gave me several pamphlets on Islam. Now I have like 20 of them.

Sunday--I went to church, which was really wonderful because I feel spiritually deprived sometimes in the mayhem here. I sang in the choir, then took the bus home with a friend. We ate plums we picked from a roadside tree, mostly because neither of us had thought ahead to buy anything to eat on Sunday, and the dining hall would not be open for a while. I went to an interfaith meeting Kacem had told me of around 4. The meeting was about why we should read each other's scriptures, mostly the Bible and the Qur'an. I spoke with several people who were surprised to learn I was Mormon, and asked me more about it. One of them is in charge of this organization, Building Bridges, and he is someone I will hopefully speak with more about interfaith outreach here in Cambridge. I ran off to attend a mass in Latin at the Church of the Virgin Mary and the English Martyrs. A friend, Alison, met me for it. The mass was almost 2 hours long, and, unsurprisingly, most of it was largely incomprehensible (though I could discypher some of what was going on). We had a leaflet which told us when we were supposed to respond and what to say. Most of the people there knew what they were doing, so it made it easier. When we all greeted each other, instead of saying "Peace be unto you" we said "Pax Toum" or something of the sort. The incense in the air, the tall, beautiful building and stain glass, the soaring music, it made it all simply ethereal. I really felt that God loves these people--the Spirit was pretty powerful, my friend commented on it too. I hope to go back to speak with the Priest at some point, asking him about the ceremony and what he says and why they do certain things and what it means. After the mass, I went home and wasted time for a while on the computer. Then I spent a few hours with Alison, just talking. I went to bed around 11.

Second week--delving into classes

It has been a most wonderful week. Naturally. There is very little to complain of. Even my bad ankle turned out not to be a problem. Monday was good because I had both a seminar and a lecture by Dr. Kerry for my class on the birth of the modern. His class remains fascinating, even though it requires on average 5 hours of reading a day. I would really like to get caught up (I'm behind because I joined the class late) but it will be hard now that my supervision has begun. So today, I'm going to do just the readings to today, then I'm going to work on my supervision for the rest of the day. We had our first proper FHE which consisted of sitting up in a high, small room in kings, called the Munby room, singing, and having a lesson from one of the Mormon professors here on the subject of his book. Dr. Kerry also spoke, trying to encourage us to feel that though we're outside of our accustomed surroundings with people who know and understand Mormonism, we still have a community here we can rely on.

Tuesday was also class, naturally, I have class every day with Dr. Kerry which suits me just fine. I went with Amelia and Cherry to Antony and Cleopatra which was being performed at a sort of nearby college. It was not the best production of Shakespeare I have ever seen, but like all shakespeare plays, after a little while it was easy to see beyond the old language and the strange dialogue and into the play itself. It was cold evening, and the play was in the college gardens next to a lovely stream and under the shade of magnificent elms. We had not thought ahead to bring anything for the rain or cold, so we were simply lucky that it did not rain. But it was cold the whole time, and intermission was mostly an attempt to warm up.

The play had no set, and only 6 or so actors, so several actors played several parts. Perhaps the best bit was Cleopatra--she was well played. I had never seen this play before. It lasted for three hours, after which we all ran back to kings to keep warm. We considered going to buy hot chocolate, but every place we tried either had just closed their hot chocolate stand, or did not have any to offer. Consequently, we just went back to our rooms and fell asleep

Wednesday I had a good deal of reading which I like to do at the Pembroke Library. Pembroke is the college just down the street which we are affilitated with. it is not nearly as grand and epic as king with its tall stone buildings and striped green lawns. Instead, it is more quaint and comfortable, like a tea cozy. It has beautiful roses and lavender beds strewn throughout the brick college, and tall circular stone staircases, and a beautiful baroque chapel.

I go to that library to read because they have the book I need but I am not allowed to check out. Also, while King's library has a better view, Pembroke library is more beautiful and less inhabited. King's library seems almost like an afterthought, placed where it is over an arch overhang and with its long, rambling rooms stretching out toward the back. Pembroke on the other hand, was designed specifically for the library duty and therefore has abundant places to sit and tall, cherry book cases on each floor. The upper story has the most fantastically arched roof, pink and white walls, rows and rows of book cases that lead to a great old globe at the end and a bubbly glass bay window. That is where I sit, typically next to the bust of Prime Minister Pitt who was a graduate of Pembroke and the youngest prime minister in history. The windows are all opaque with stain glass and oldness, as they were made so long ago, the glass was not clear enough to see through. The library is also the bell tower, so every hour and half hour, there is a resounding, thunderous thud followed by the heavy ding of a gigantic bell. it is a good way to mark how many hours I have been sitting there trying to plow through the readings.

Wednesday evening, we had a lecture by Dr. Dearlove who is the ex-Mi6 president. He discussed what modern security threats there are in the world. We all sat, all 400 of us, in the great Union Hall Debating chamber which is, as you recall, designed to look like parliament. I sat in the balcony because I had been reading for a while and unfortunately lost track of time, thinking it was 6 instead of 7, and therefore arrived several minutes late. At the end they asked for questions, and said that we should say what school we attend and our names when we speak. Just for that reason, I knew I had to ask a question. I had to represent BYU of course. The first person to speak was a BYU student, but that was before he was told to say what school he attended so people didn't know he was BYU. The next was also BYU. Then there was one Berkeley student, then me. I stood at the balcony bar and sort of had to shout for them to hear my question. I asked if he thought it was possible for the idea of modern extremist islam to be replaced by a different dogma, and eventually, to become passe. This was prompted by some of the things he had said earlier that evening. It was quite frightening, speaking in front of that whole audience and the former leader of Mi6, but not too bad. He said he didn't know. Later, I ran into a group of BYU students who said they had been talking about me. I was wearing my purple jerusalem skirt, so they all said I looked like Juliet at the balcony and they had half expected me to start with "Romeo Romeo" they also said I looked superbly self confident. That just tells you how well you can fool people if you try.

The next two students to speak were from Berkeley, and one of them was super inflammatory in his remarks, to the point that it was ridiculous. He asked something like, "well, what about all the terrorism the US and the UK have been doing to the world for the past 200 years? How do we answer for that behavior?" Dr. Dearlove, naturally, didn't really know how to respond. He pretty much said that he didn't even agree with the premise of the question. So, of the 6 students who spoke, 3 were from BYU and 3 from Berkeley. I wonder if that means anything. Yale, which has the biggest population on the programme, was entirely silent.

On Thursday, I unfortunately missed a seminar given by Dr. Kerry because I didn't realize we were having another lecture that day. I instead went wandering around the gardens of Clare College. They are truly the most spectacularly beautiful gardens. It was a perfect, sunny, muggy day for a british summer, and the garden smelled heavenly. It was created in the romantic style, windy, slightly overgrown, and designed to have each corner reveal another delight.

There was a section of entirely white flowers, a section where the flowers graduated from dark red to bright yellow, sections of tropical plants of deep purple and green, fountains, patches of warm green grass, and all of this along the edge of the cam river where dozens of punters floated by. It was truly remarkable. I have to go back to draw something for my class, but I intentionally did not do it the first time just so I could have a reason to return. At one point, there was a fountain surrounding by tall bushes and roses, and sitting on a bench was a man reading a kindle, then across the fountain/pond lay a woman playing with her giggling 3 month old baby. It was the picture of peace.

That night was the last harry potter. We all went to the midnight showing at a local theater, having bought out tickets the previous week. I won't say much about it, other than that is was epic and it was really a striking thing for all of us, all of us who are children of the harry potter generation. There was a lot of proclaiming it the end of an era, a lot of people who cried through the whole of the second half of the film. I even felt surprised at my own shock and sadness for the end of this all... most people considered it the official conclusion of our childhoods. But it was good when it was over, because now we can start afresh with a new sort of magical adventure, if you can forgive the cheesiness of such a statement. I was glad to call Dad when he was available. It was sort of fortuitous that we were up so late afterall.

I was, unsurprisingly, upset when I realized I had missed the seminar the previous day. I attended the next lecture given by Dr. Kerry, then went to a cafe to do my readings. While up there, I realized that I was probably mistaken about the time that the Architecture class was going to the Cathedral in Ely, a place I really wanted to go.

I pulled out my schedule and realized they should be leaving any moment, then saw that Amelia had already called me twice. I called her back--they were already 10 minutes out on their way to the train station. I started to run to get to the train station on time. I thought I should have caught up with them, but did not see anyone after about 15 minutes. So I called Amelia and found out I had been running the absolute wrong direction. While we had both bothered to clarify what street the station was on, neither of us had thought to mention the direction to go and both had assumed the opposite way from the other.

I was too late to get to the train they were leaving on now, so I had to get my own. I was also now several miles from the station, so I needed to take a bus. The busses, unfortunately, cost more money than I had with me, so it took a good deal of time and the buying of some candy at what is the world's most extraordinary candy shop (two stories, floor to ceiling candy) to get to the station. I was superbly frustrated, but I refused to simply give up. When I finally arrived, I got a ticket for the train which left in only 10 minutes, then boarded. No one really knew if this was the train going to Ely, but there wasn't really time to find out so I just had to hope. I was phenomenally relieved when we finally arrived in Ely, just as I had hoped. The cathedral spires stand high above the city, so finding it wasn't a problem. It was not long before I had found amelia in the beautiful building and joined the tour. The cathedral was built over a period of 6 hundred years, as much of it had to be built and rebuilt and rebuilt time and again for various reasons. Therefore, it is a remarkable example of the changes in architectural styles through the ages. It is also the 5th largest cathedral in Europe, and looks like it. Your neck quickly hurts from looking up. The whole ceiling is decorated in medieval paintings of the life of Christ (or at least, they're supposed to look medieval, they're probably redone) and much of the building is still c. the 11th century. It goes on and on, and has a stunning lady chapel on the north side. I could spend forever simply describing the Cathedral of Ely, but it is the sort of thing you have to see for yourself.

After the tour, Amelia and I bought a picnic assortment and sat in front of the cathedral to eat. The rest of the group left on an earlier train. I did much of my reading while Amelia took pictures of the cathedral. We finally left around 7. Ely is a fabulously family friendly city. It is beautiful, picturesque with little meadows filled with ponies and horses, people walking their dogs, and families playing in the park. It seems like the perfect sort of place to raise a family. I think I saw more little children in Ely than anywhere else on this trip combined.

I forgot, before I went to Ely, I had my first supervision. My supervisor is a 3rd year PhD student from Canada studying criminology. She sort of wants me to do whatever I want and let her know. AKA, no direction whatsoever, which is sort of terrifying.

After Ely, we got home and I spent a while reading at the library. I left at about 10, then was utterly exhausted and wanted to sleep. Amelia called me to let me know she and Cherry were at the pub and that I should come so we could plan our next trips. I reluctantly made my way over, and ran into Dr. Kerry who was walking by. he said he had sent me an email that afternoon that he was redoing the lecture I had missed for several people who were interested in the subject, and that he wanted me to go. I was ecstatic because this lecture, on Mozart's Magic Flute, was perhaps the most incredible thing he had spoken of thusfar, according to the people who had attended. He has written an article on the subject, and is a well known scholar of the opera. I went to that with the two people who had wanted to hear the lecture, people who were interested but not in the course, and was enthralled the whole time. On the way, I twisted my ankle. We went through the entire opera with Dr. Kerry explaining. It was Mozart's last major work, other than the unfinished Requiem mass, and it was laden with masonic symbolism. One person there was a mason himself, so he and Dr. Kerry spent and long time discussing the masonic references in the play. But then toward the end of the second half, it becomes something more. Mozart adds a woman to what is all an allegory for the initiation of the masons, and the man and women enter a temple. They go through fire and water, they show particular symbols and signs with their hands, and they are at the end sealed by the god of the sun in a room that is symbolic of the sun. It was completely revolutionary at the time, and it is still unexplained today because there is no precedent for what Mozart wrote. No one can really explain it. It is totally worth seeing and reading Dr. Kerry's article about.

I didn't get to bed until really late again, and the next day we were going to london. Unfortuntaly, I couldn't go because of my ankle, so the trip Amelia and Cherry had planned was off. We went to a city named Norwich in East Anglia instead because has a beautiful cathedral and it involves a lot less walking. The cathedral was much like the one in Ely, though longer it seemed. They were having a performance of Romeo and Juliet in the cloister, but we did not attend because it was too expensive. I would have loved to have gone though. We ate lunch at a pub next to their little river, then took the train home. Unfortunately, I lost my ticket when I paid for the food, so I had to repurchase everyone's train ticket back because we had gotten a group rate. That was really lame. The sunset on the ride home was spectacular though, and that helped a lot.

Yesterday was church, for the first time in 3 weeks. I was really, really glad to go and recharge after all the craziness. I don't like being away from church for so long. We filled up the congregation, and the choir afterward. The sunday school teacher was fantastic, wonderfully funny, and quite educated. The relief society women were simply adorable and smilely. They were all, in particular the choir director, happy to have us for the next few weeks. I'll be serving in primary.

After church, I slept for 3 hours, then went to dinner then to FHE (which I know, is not normally on sunday. We just have to fit it in wherever it works). FHE was again sort of a discussion of adapting to this environment and so forth. I shared how we had been planning on going to Bath on saturday instead of London, but how the group we were going to go with didn't want us to come because we were mormon. We ended up not going because there was no accomodation, however. That was my first experience with people not accepting me because of my religion. And they didn't even know who I was.

I went to bed shortly after FHE, and am now ready to start all my readings for today. Things have been, as you can tell, interesting, challenging, and wonderful.

My First week in Cambridge and Edinburgh

What an amazing week this has been. I’ve been nigh overwhelmed with awesomeness. I made it to the UK safely on Sunday afternoon, then took the 2 and a half hour bus drive up to Cambridge from London. I was so ecstatic to be in the UK, that I was actually seeing the place I had so long dreamed of. I didn’t really sleep at all on the plane because I was sitting in the middle of the plane and I didn’t really have any way to stretch out or to get comfortable. I managed I think for a couple hours or less, but mostly it was an exercise in learning to be patient and uncomfortable for a long period of time.

There was a mother and daughter who sat next to me who were surprisingly unpleasant people. They taught me that people are people wherever you go, and whatever perception you may have of properness. They spent the first two hours on the plane pursuing gossip magazines which had far more pictures than text. They were really more stalker magazines than they were anything else because their photos were all grainy and candid, or at least for the most part. They spent the better part of those two hours saying that someone was hideous, or that she was much prettier than her parents, or that prince Harry could not be the child of Diana and Charles because he’s ginger and ginger people don’t just come out of non-ginger parents. Then finally, they quieted down until the turbulence began. The girl was so frightened, she started actually to cry and to yell at her mother to shut up any time her mother tried to calm her. It didn’t help that I had ordered salmon and apparently salmon has the most disgusting and horrible smell ever and it was making her sick. They really liked to cuss. I’m uncertain as to whether they knew any other adjectives than that and hideous and awful. They decidedly hated the airline and everything about it, and for the rest of the flight their discussion was of how horribly British Airlines were and what they would tell the president of the airline if they could.

Landing was a blessing in more than one way, because it meant I could get away from them. The excitement of being there soon eclipsed everything else. We waited for an hour and a half at the border to get through the questioning. The questions for me consisted solely of “how long will you be here?” and I was let through. I was surprised at how easy it was. It would have been much more difficult if I didn’t have the letter from Cambridge saying that I was in their program. That was really important apparently. Amelia walked quite a way underground to get to the coach station where we bought tickets for Cambridge. I was still enormously excited that everyone around me had wonderful accents. I tried to avoid looking too awed though because I didn’t want to stand out in any particular way. We took the last coach at 3 pm to Cambridge, and arrived just as dinner was about to begin.

Cambidge is absolutely the most perfect little city I could have conjured up in my mind. It is full of victorian, tudor, and every other sort of little building all connected to each other that line the narrow cobblestone streets. Brightly painted stores in blues and reds line the road with such names as “the haunted bookstore” and “the King’s store.” King’s College is about the most grand place imaginable. The chapel was built in 1500 by King Henry VIII (or at least it was finished by him) and it just stretches up so high into the sky it doesn’t seem like someone at that period could have possibly built it. It was apparently Oliver Cromwell’s head quarters during the civil war. The great hall where we have all our meals is a beautiful neo-gothic building, so perfect it could have been built during the gothic period.

It has thick stone walls, stain glass windows with the school crest and logos of the british crown in them, a high vaulted wooden ceiling, and candles on every table where you eat. Our first dinner there was a wonderful meal with all sorts of delicate foods. There were probably two waiters for every twenty five people. Meeting the students was certainly an adventure, and continues to be an adventure because there are over 340 students on this program. They’re generally from the Ivy Leagues or the UC system, though there are more than 30 from BYU which is nice. They’re all wonderfully inquisitive and pithy and fascinating to speak with. It is just the type of people I like to surround myself with because there is always some wonderfully fascinating discussion I can get into with someone. People are also incredibly friendly in the program.
Then of course there is my room. It is just as wonderful as I hoped it would be. I have a room and a study attached to each other in a beautiful gothic building with windows that come straight out of the middle ages. I’m on the ground floor, which is nice because it means I don’t have to transverse the rickety wooden stairs to get up to my room.

I have a view of the river, the Cam, from my window and the bridge over the cam. People punt by all the time. I also have on the opposite wall a view of a beautiful garden and courtyard. When I’m in my room, I open the window in the study and the room, and the flower laden breeze sweeps through beautifully. I have a double bed with a soft fluffy comforter, and a bedder who is a woman that comes in to empty my bins and clean the desk and vacuum and change my bedding every day or week. She is wonderfully kind, very caring—Veronica is her name. I love talking to her, and she loves talking. J Today was the first day her son was going to college and she says she didn’t sleep at all because she was so anxious about it. I have a sink in my room and a mirror, as well as wardrobe and dresser, and a desk right in front of the giant old window looking over the cam. I also have two fireplaces, though we’re not allowed to use them. You go through two doors to get into your room, I think because that means it keeps the sound of people in the echoey stairwell out.

I slept like a log the first night, literally because I don’t think I moved once. I was so exhausted, it was incredible. Because I didn’t sleep that day and only that night, I didn’t suffer from jet lag one bit past the first day. It was wonderful. Amelia did have some pretty bad jet lag though.

Our classes started the next day. I still don’t know what is going on with my supervision, which is frustrating, though I have pestered eh people in charge just about as much as I think I can without really irritating them about it. They say they’re working on it. So I only have one class to worry about.

Originally I was in Gothic Architecture which was excellent because I learned a lot about how gothic buildings are made and what their characteristics are. I can now with relative certainty point out what is a gothic buiding and when it was built compared to other eras. But after a couple of days I switched out of Gothic because it wasn’t that challenging and I thought that if I’m going to be here, I had better be challenged. Amelia is still in it though. I’m instead taking the class taught by Dr. Kerry which is on the birth of the Modern, or the Enlightenment. I am really excited about it because it is a political philosophy course and I love that sort of thing. I went to his lecture and it was the single best lecture I’ve ever attended in my life. I’m going to the next lecture in just an hour now and am really looking forward to it. Most of the people in my class are from Yale and none of them are from BYU which is why I think Dr. Kerry tried to hard to get me into his class. He talked to me about it and made copies of the reading for me to try and get me interested. Well, it worked because I read the readings and loved them.

The next few days mostly consisted of orientations and plenary lectures (which are wonderful) in the Cambridge Union Society. It is a building made to suggest the parliament, so there are two sides and they face each other to help in debating. I also did a lot of shopping for things like a phone so I could communicate with peole while I’m here in England. The phone was really cheap, like 30 dollars for everything, so I wasn’t too worried about getting it.
We went off to Edinburgh on Thursday. The drive took most of the day because we stopped so many times. We stopped in an adorable little northern town called Richmond.

I bought a rain coat there because I knew it was going to be important in Scotland and I was right. It was really wet in Scotland. We went up to the Castle of Richmond which was built by the Normans in the 1100’s and had a wonderful time looking around. It just kept going up and up and up. At the very top, I got out onto the tower right as a powerful rainstorm began. I stood behind a stone wall and watched as the huge, heavy raindrops pummeled the city far below. The whole of it was incredibly green, off in the distance, the hills, every bit of nature was as green as green can be. The city was wonderfully medieval. I had fish and chips for the first time, which were incredibly greasy, but fun to eat because of it. They don’t really put ketchup on their fries (or chips as they call them) but instead vinegar and salt. That was quite good, though not quite as flavorful as a lot of ketchup is.

We arrived in Edinburgh in time to wander around the city for a while before it became dark. We were living in the dorms of the University of Edinburgh. With Cherry and a girl named E-fan, Amelia and I wandered the city for several hours. The sky did not even get dark at all until after 11, so we had quite a while that we could safely wander around the city. We saw a monument to Sir Walter Scott which I got a picture in front of because he is one of my ancestors after all. My heavens, Edinburgh is a beautiful city. It was exhausting to walk it all, but we managed it rather well. It didn’t rain at all that first evening while we were walking around. We actually saw the other monument to Scott, which is even more elaborate. There was also a man wearing a kilt, horns on his head, and walking on short stilts that were designed to look like the back legs of a goat. He was playing the bagpipe for the tourists. It was quite the sight. And he played the bagpipe at light lightning speed as well. It was rather amazing.

The next day, we got up at like 8.30 so we could climb up Arthur’s seat. I’m still not sure which Arthur it is supposed to be, but apparently it is not the famed King Arthur it is named after. Anyway, it is up on this knoll that overlooks the city and is rather high up. It took a lot of energy to climb, and was really difficult for Amelia, but we made it in the end. I spent most of the time speaking to the Programme Assistant Tom, so that made the time pass better. At the top you could see the whole city of Edinburgh as well as the ocean in the distance. There are a ton of sea gulls in Edinburgh because of the ocean. It gives it a strangely grandiose feel.
We went to the parliament after that. I was really excited about parliament but we weren’t able to get on the tour because there weren’t enough spaces on it. So we conducted a self tour of the place by wandering around the very modern and very different building until we felt we had seen everything we could. Unfortunately, there were places we could not go without being on a tour. I bought a simple bracelet, which was the only thing I bought in Edinburgh. I tried to find a good drum, but didn’t have the time.

Amelia and I spent the rest of the day just going around the city, going to the museum where we had a guided tour by a PA who is a Dr. in Medieval Scottish history, and then getting lunch at the End of the World Pub which was absolutely perfect for Scotland. We finally went back to the Dorms and had a rest.

Then was the most intense bit of the day. We had a Kaylie which is a sort of traditional Scottish dance. It was awesome, because they taught us all of these really intense dances that took a lot of exertion to do. They were so much fun and everyone was joining and laughing and dancing. They were really long songs too, so I got to where I was completely overheated and exhausted. It was amazingly fun. Everyone loved it, though the majority of the people were also getting drunk so that was interesting. I wish we did dances like that more frequently.
Afterward, I almost went out with a group of people to go up Arthur’s seat again and to visit a club. I didn’t because I was already getting tired and I didn’t think it would be as much fun as it was billed as. I happened to run into a Saudi man and a man from the program who were speaking Arabic. I naturally went up to them and started talking and so we spoke mostly in Arabic for an hour and a half until it was nearly 1 and I had to go to bed. We agreed to meet the next evening for coffee to talk more about Arabic and the Arab world.

The next day was the epic hike in the Highlands. I hadn’t had much sleep when I had to go, so I was certain that this was going to be quite something. It didn’t help that I had exerted myself so much the day before. It was a two hour drive up to the highlands, and we stopped to buy lunch at one point. The place we hiked is called the Trossacks and is a national park. It was utterly spectacular. There were craggy mountains we climbed through, speckled with gray stone, covered in heather and wild blueberries, the lochs were a wonderful glassy silver, and the trees windswept and twisted. It was 2 miles in and a 600 foot elevation gain with most of it being gained at the end. I spent most of the time talking to our hike leader, named Mahmet, about Turkish and then talking to a Chinese guy about Chinese. I would certainly live in the highlands if I could.

It touched my soul, really, in a way I had not anticipated. Or I had, but I hadn’t expected it to be as wonderful as it was. We ate lunch on the top of a tall mountain so we could see four or five lochs below us and the mountains stretching off into the distance. Unfortunately, it was really boggy in a lot of parts, so my feet were entirely soaked and uncomfortable to walk in. When I finally returned to Edinburgh, I could hardly walk because my feet were so raw and swollen. It is still a little difficult to walk so two days later. It didn’t rain on us once while we were up there, though when we returned to Edinburgh, it was pouring like Noah’s flood. We had experienced that a little the day before, and it was so extreme that Amelia was laughing the whole time. Neither of us had thought it even possible to have it rain that hard. It was difficult to even hold up the umbrella. You know, grass in Edinburgh is so green, it actually seems blue. I’ve never seen that before either.

That evening, I met up with my Arab friends at a popular Indian restaurant to have Mango Lassie. We spoke mainly in Arabic, and the Saudi man, his name is Anas, had me read in Arabic a letter he received from a prince that said that he could get pursue his education further in France to learn French.

I went to bed after that, and the next morning got up late and rushed to breakfast, then went off on the bus. We stopped at the Fountain Abbey which is a gorgeous ruin of an Abbey in northern England. One of the PA’s explained how the whole thing worked, and what each of the rooms originally were to me. I had a quick lunch and a wonderful time looking around there. Finally, we got home late enough last night that we were almost too late to dinner. We ate, and I washed my shoes that were so destroyed from the adventure, then went to sleep at 9.45. I was so tired, I didn’t get up until 8.30 today.

It was a perfect beginning to the semeseter.

Since Jerusalem

Life has been a madhouse since Jerusalem. I could quantify it in lists perhaps, classes taken, dates I've gone on, jobs I've had, illnesses and injuries, etc. Or perhaps things less quantifiable: relationships built, relationships forgotten, sins forgiven, silent moments, vibrant seconds so bright they outshine a week, sorrows or victories. I don't really know how I could describe my life since then. I can sense within myself a change of the whole. Like the herbs and vegetables I watched grow so through my untrained, youthful cultivation, I am (with the exception of God) the most intimate observer of my own genesis. It is a fascinating, difficult, and sometimes terrifying transformation to observe. I only hope to God above that it is in the right direction. I can only thank Him for the opportunities I've had.

And now, as I'm preparing to go studying in Cambridge for the summer, I will be restarting my frequent use of this blog. So look out for it.

The rest of Galilee

Day 4: This was a fabulous day: following in the footsteps of Christ.
We left early in the morning to sail on the Sea of Galilee. The sky was full of those perfect little clouds, with a stiff wind pulling the cold through all of us. We trundled onto a large wooden motor boat which rode us against the wind into the middle of the sea where the captain cut out the motor and let us bob around. There we had a brief devotional—three of the students were called on to discuss the different happenings of the Lord on the Sea of Galilee such has when he calmed the waves during the storm, when he walked on the water and Peter came out towards him. I feel like I’ve learned so much more about the personalities of the different apostles, Peter in particular. He was always doing one more thing than was required of him. He is full of fire, with an innocent, brazen desire to be with the Lord and to do as He would have him do. Peter walking on the water is just one example of this—another time, when he saw Jesus on the shore, he was too impatient to wait for the boat to come to the shore so instead, he swam over to Him. When Christ washed his feet at the last supper and explained that if He didn’t, Peter could have no part in Him, Peter asked that He wash his hands and head as well. He truly was an amazing person, called later to be the head of the church which Christ established here. Peter was one of the three who were allowed to be with Christ on the Mount of Transfiguration as well as during the suffering in Gethsemane.

After our devotional, we motored to the other side of the sea and saw a 2,000 year old fishing boat, from the time Christ would have been here. It is truly remarkable that the boat has survived—it was saved by the marshy water in which it had sunk, and the way they excavated it without it crumbling into nothing was incredible. Now it sits in a museum, its body filled with resin with which they slowly replaced the water which had inundated it during its 2,000 year old stint in the mud. From there we were off to what is possibly my favorite part of our time in Galilee—the Mount of Beatitudes. It is a beautiful little hill, looking over the Galilee, and landscaped with fragrant jasmine, colorful bougainvillea and leafy, low hanging trees. There is a relatively small circular Catholic church on the hilltop, and numerous places designed for large groups of pilgrims to sit and discuss the Sermon on the Mount which was supposed to have taken place there. I was assigned to discuss one or more of the beatitudes along with two other girls from our group who did their own outlines of the beatitudes. I chose, “Blessed are the poor in spirit, for theirs is the kingdom of heaven,” and “Blessed are the pure in heart, for they shall see God.” I discussed what the ambiguous term “poor in spirit” means as well as what it likely means to see God. The other girls spoke on different verses, and their insights were greatly helpful to my understanding of this incredible sermon, called by many the most wonderful sermon ever preached on the earth. The LDS District President of Israel, President Brown, then spoke for a while, and we sang several hymns. What I remember of that place is that the sunlight streamed right through the bougainvillea all around us, casting a golden, rosy glow on our group, that the breeze was just enough to make the air feel fresh and clean, and that the day was neither hot nor cold--just right in fact. After our little meeting, we had about a half an hour for contemplation and scripture reading, which I latched onto gratefully. I wandered around the grounds, explored the church, and stood by a pine tree, looking out over the sea and wondered if this was what heaven will be like. It was truly paradisiacal, and I felt such peace and joy in my heart. Knowing that God is a good God, and that He truly does love me and know who I am, that brought such comfort to me.

When we left, we walked down the hillside to the church at the bottom where it is said that Christ fed the five thousand—the place is called Tabgha and it has a beautiful, very famous, mosaic floor. It is run by the Benedictine monks.
From there we headed to a beautiful seaside church called Saint Peter’s Primacy where Peter jumped off the boat and swam to Jesus and where Jesus essentially promised him the role of the leader of the Church. The beautiful stone and stained glass church echoed incredibly well so we sang to our hearts content, entertaining the other tour groups passing through. That place was also wonderfully peaceful and pleasant. From there we went to Capernaum, the city where Peter lived and the city Christ lived in after being rejected in Nazareth. There he met the believing centurion whose son he healed from a distance and there he did much of his preaching and many healings and casting out of devils. It is an interesting little city—eventually it was cursed by Christ, along with two other cities, because the people stopped listening to him and they would not repent. It is now just ruins, no one has built on it almost since the 1st Century A.D. There, there is the synagogue in which Christ preached (I’ve stood exactly where he would have) and there, also, was Peter’s house which many hold to be the first church ever. The entire city is made out of basalt stone, a type of black volcanic rock. I should think it would be rather depressing to live in this city because of how dark it can be with the buildings so close to each other and so dark. But it was built right along the shore where we watched the sunset from the shoreline. It was particularly spectacular that evening—all reds and oranges and yellows. Once we returned to the kibbutz and after we had dinner, we enjoyed a two hour lecture on Ancient Near East, and then I was off to bed.

Day 5: This was a difficult day for me—the beginning of two days of absolute misery. At breakfast I didn’t feel that fabulous, so I ate a lot to compensate (brilliant, I know) and during our four hour class that morning, I felt more and more ill. By that evening, (we had no fieldtrips that day) I was downright sick with a dreadful twenty four hour flu which sent my insides into convulsions and after the initial period of actually beneficial vomiting, left me dry heaving for the next 22 hours. Half of our class was already out, many of them left during class, and there was even someone’s breakfast in the hallway as a testament of that. The whole experience was utter agony, the room I lived in was dark, tiny, and my roommate left it for another so she would not catch the flu from me. There was nothing to do or to think about other than hoping that the next wave of nausea would end soon. While the worst of it was over by two in the morning or so, I tossed and turned all night, my head filled with dreams of churches competing over shoreline on the Galilee. I was the middle man trying to adjust the placement of the shore line to meet their ever changing needs. It was chaotic and upsetting, a perfect reflection of the state of my stomach. Later, when we were on our way back to Jerusalem, Professor Manscill asked how many people had not become ill in Galilee. Out of forty students on our bus, nine raised their hands.

Day 6: Fortunately, we did not have church until 2:00 in the afternoon the next day. I did not get out of bed until twelve, and I could eat nothing at all at lunch. Though I had to walk at the speed of an exhausted slug, I was able to attend church in Tiberius and I greatly enjoyed it. Like the Jerusalem Center, the Tiberius Branch has a spectacular view, but of the Sea of Galilee. Church was also only one hour (another blessing) and when we returned, I was able to rest and talk to friends for a while before going to bed.

Day 7: We were back on the road the next day with stops at two very interesting sites and an afternoon all to ourselves. I was feeling much more alive than before, but was still really weak. Our first stop was at a place called Gamla. It is a very interesting and depressing site which I’m surprised I’d never heard of before. In the middle of some rolling grasslands, filled with Stone Age tombs, there is a very deep, steep valley with a knife thin ridge rising up in the center of it. There was a city of Jews at the time of Christ. Much like the Kingdom of Rohan in Lord of the Rings, they built their city on the hillside with houses cascading down the hill and a huge keep at the top. Idiotically, after the time of Christ, they rebelled against the Roman Empire and were sieged because of it. There are different Roman siege weapons and ancient cannon balls from catapults lying around because of this. All the people gathered to the keep to protect themselves when the situation became dire. As the Romans broke in and started climbing upwards, the people pushed each other farther and farther back in the keep until some people started falling to their death on the backside of it. Soon people were jumping and eventually, thousands of people had either accidentally or intentionally fallen to their deaths,leaving the Romans with control over this crucial city. We climbed all the way down the valley then all the way up the thin hill to the ancient city. It took me an extremely long time to get to the summit, as weak as I was, so I stood at the top of the keep looking down the cliff for quite a while. In spite of the horrible things that happened there, it was a beautiful place, much like something you could expect to see out of Lord of the Rings. But I was greatly saddened, realizing that so many had died in such a horrible way from the very spot where I stood. The Jewish historian, Josephus is essentially the only reason the modern world knows of these grave occurrences. I wondered how many other stories there are like this in the world that no one remembers… It gave me solace to realize that while we here may not recall them, God does.

As I walked down the hill, everyone else passed me and I soon began to worry that I would not make it to the bus on time. Going up the canyon then back to the flat plains was torturous—I was so out of breath, I had to stop every few feet. Finally, one of the boys in our group kindly stayed behind to encourage me along. Had he not, it may have taken me much longer to reach the top. It was certainly one of the most difficult things I have done this entire trip, and I felt a great sense of victory when I stood at the top of the cliff, gasping for breath. We walked just as slowly back to the bus where in jest they started driving away, but when they realized from my countenance that I was not doing well, they stopped and let us on. I also determined not to go up or down any hills on our next stop.

The next site was a place named Qazin—an ancient Jewish village of which bits and pieces have been restored. It was once a center for the study of the Talmud, and therefore has remained famous. When we arrived, we watched, in a large room with screens on every side, the oddest movie I think I have ever seen. I don’t even know if I could describe it because it was about a story from the Mishnah (Jewish oral law since put into writing). I had never heard of it before and had no context for the points it was making. It certainly made for some fabulous quotes though, such as “Music, Orchard Music!” said by the narrator and so forth. I know, that makes absolutely no sense. Well, it didn’t make any more sense to us either.

From there, we went to the ancient synagogue much of which has been restored, then to a house completely restored and outfitted with items which would have been in a house two thousand years ago. Because the stone was black, it was incredibly dark inside in spite of the light from the oil lamps, and it was surprisingly small though it did have a second story. It was not long until we left from Qazin and returned to the kibbutz for lunch. There was a rafting trip planned for those who wanted to go, down the Jordan River after lunch. I debated going—after my escapade that morning at Gamla, I didn’t know if I had enough energy, and, we had a major test in New Testament the next day from the hardest teacher we have here. Though I can’t recall my thought processes which led me to this conclusion--I eventually decided to go rafting. We drove to a typical outfitting place for rafters on the shady edge of the Jordan river, and there received our life jackets, instructions and five person inflatable boats to take down the river. They also gave us the most unwieldy paddles imaginable. They were too short to be used by one person effectively on both sides of the boat, and too long to really control well. Not only this, but the actual paddle was small and made out of thick plywood. Because of its unwieldiness, when the person in front of me in the boat started to enthusiastically use it (determined as we were to beat all the other boats) the side of the paddle she wasn’t using smacked into my nose like a baseball bat. Immediately, blood streamed down my face in copious amounts. I am sure I looked raving mad, sitting there in this floating concoction with four other crazy girls, and laughing about the blood gushing from my nose. It didn’t take too long to clean it off and get it under control, and we were soon able to concentrate on our sea battles with the other ships (though it was a full time job just trying to keep out of the voluminous bushes on either side of the river). Soon we had beaten and splashed all the boats ahead of us but one—they succeeded in thwarting us in the end. When we reached the point where they pulled our boats out of the water, we determined to go back in and swim, then splash the other boats as they arrived. I went out with the best of them, right to the forefront of the battle, and, in my vigorous attempts to douse my opponents, had another paddle slammed into my left eye, leaving it bloody and blackening. It really wasn’t my day. When we headed back, one of the boys was kind enough to piggy back my surprisingly heavy weight over the gravel trail as I had left my shoes on the bus.

That evening, we had a dinner of Saint Peter’s fish at a fancy restaurant, and ice cream across the lake in Tiberius. The dinner was fabulous—when they came out with the fish, there was no way you could mistake it for anything but a creature which recently had been happily swimming in the sea right next to us. They fried it with everything on—head, eyes, tail, and even little dorsal fins. It stared at me on the plate. Being at a table of some of my more ridiculous friends, there was soon a chorus of singing, dancing fish, picked up by their respective eaters and made to look as though they were swimming around while their mouth was being moved in a convincing way as they sang “Tell me how I’m gonna breath with no air” and “Under the sea!” It goes without saying that it was an eventful evening. I managed to eat exactly two bites of my fish, and part of a sherbet they gave us. Dessert in Tiberius was fun, though the only eventful part was that I had to find an ATM which accepted my card, and it seemed that all the people we asked had conspired to tell us to go in different directions to find one. Eventually, just before we had to leave, we succeeded and I was able to get money to pay off my debts. I was very glad to get to bed that night, but the thought of the test the next day loomed over everything else.

Day 8: I spent the entire day studying and feeling crummy still because of the lingering effects of my illness. The test in the afternoon went alright and when I received got my score it was better than I had hoped for. There are six people in our class of forty who failed it though. That evening we had a bonfire and my class, exhausted as we were from our two hour test, made it into a festival of ridiculosity. We had stories, boisterous campfire songs and fiddlers playing hoedowns. The people here are exceptionally talented. Sometimes I wonder if I’ve come to live at a music conservatory. Sitting up on the sixth floor of the Jerusalem Center is frequently like sitting in an orchestra pit, which I love.

Day 9: Only two days before we were leaving Galilee, and I was feeling surprisingly ready to go. Though it was beautiful and peaceful there, I had been in far less pain in Jerusalem. Our first stop was at one of the two traditional sites of the Mount of Transfiguration, and, in my teacher’s estimation, the more convincing of the two. Mount Tabor fulfills the requirements that it be a mountain “set apart,” and, in the Jezreel valley where it sits, it is completely separate from all the other mountains. It is also much more local than Mount Hazor which is way up north, and therefore would have been easier for Jesus to travel to with Peter, James and John. We took taxi vans up to the top—they rocketed up the one way switchbacks, pulling over to the side just in time for vans going the other direction to scoot by right next to us. At the top is a beautiful Catholic church with some of the most stunning mosaics I’ve seen. We held a devotional outside of it, discussing the transfiguration and its implications in our theology, on which I took copious notes in my little notebook. (Right now I’m looking over Jerusalem from my balcony, watching the city as the sun first hits it this morning. It turns the entire city this most attractive shade of light pink, and some of the windows are reflecting golden in the sunlight. As always, the Dome of the Rock is radiant right now, and the Church of the Holy Sepulcher stands out with its harsh gray domes turned soft in the morning light. It is truly beautiful).

Afterwards we were free to wander and look at the view over the Jezreel valley. On the way back down, I sat next to a kindly Catholic woman from Great Britain and we discussed (while holding on to our seats for dear life) topics from gardening in England to respecting the priests during mass. The next place we stopped was a tiny village named Nain where Christ raised the widow’s son from the dead. There is a tiny, seldom visited church there with a shrine dedicated to Christ’s miracle. The discussion regarding that miracle was surprisingly touching. Christ would have had to walk through the night to get to Nain in time for the funeral procession of the widow’s son, and, in raising him from the dead, Christ saved the widow who had no other family or any way of making a living after her son’s death. It is a beautiful illustration of how He knows and cares about even the least of all. We then went to a place which had the mosaic of an ancient synagogue from around 500 A.D. It took us about 20 minutes to get in because the woman in charge insisted not only on seeing the National Park cards that the Jerusalem Center program purchased for each of us, but identification which few of us brought along. Eventually she was so frustrated with our lack of ID that she had gave up and let us in anyway. There we watched yet another cheesy movie, this one about the creation of the mosaic. It is a fascinating thing because, against Jewish law, it depicts the sacrifice of Isaac by Abraham using human forms (observant Jews believe that the law not to have any graven image extends to not having any form of re-creation of the human body or of animals even) as well as a zodiac wheel with each of the constellations of the zodiac in a circle around a depiction of the pagan god Helios. There is also a depiction of the temple, shofars, menorahs and so forth.

From Beit Alpha, we went to a swimming hole called Gan Ha-Shelosha which was a beautiful, giant, natural pool of mineral blue water with a little waterfall off to the side. I had completely forgotten my swimming suit, and so went in clothed, having a change of clothes from friends that I wore the rest of the day. There were tiny fish in the swimming pool which would suck at your toes in a way that was incredibly ticklish. There was as well as a little cave. The waterfall did a magnificent job of massaging me, and, though it started to rain while we were there, the whole experience was surprisingly warm and enjoyable. From Gan Ha-Shelosha, we went to an abandoned Roman city named Beit Shean. During its Israelite days, this city had been the place where Saul and Jonathan had been killed and where their bodies had been hung on the wall as an example. Though David had been alternately running from and fighting Saul, he had some of his men retrieve the bodies so they could be buried. It had also once been under the control of Egypt, as attested by the Egyptian idols found there. But the main city was completely Roman—with a colonnade, ancient pillars and mosaic streets, bath houses, market places and all. We were given a cursory introduction to the place, though the rain was coming down more heavily and it was beginning to get dark. I went all the way up to the top of the ancient tel where the Israelite city had been, and on the way down, I slipped in the mud and slammed my side into some extremely sharp basalt rocks on the ground. I could hardly sit down in the bus on the way back as a consequence. Now I have a nice array of puncture wounds, scrapes and bruises on my hip. We had dinner at the Kibbutz and class that evening again.

Day 10: This was our Thanksgiving Day, the kibbutz planned out a banquet-like meal for us that evening for which we were all very excited. First though, we were off to the beautiful city on the sea of Akko, also called Acre, or Acka or any other derivative of that root you can think of. Its heyday was during the Crusades where it was the home base of both the Templar Knights and the Hospitallers. Built right on the sea, it is everything you could ever want from a medieval city—there are tunnels used during sieges, ancient sea towers knocked over by the Muslims during their sea battles, sea walls with slots for shooting arrows, old fortresses and Venetian market places, left just as they were during the time of the Crusades. I was practically giddy being there—call me a geek, but I have a particularly strong love of the Middle Ages and all of its eccentricities. We watched a movie about Akko in the ancient dungeons of the fortress, then we were taken on a tour of the feasting hall, cloisteries and so forth. The most amazing thing was learning about the Templars and Hospitallers. They were essentially monk warriors—living most of the time as any monk should, studying and praying, but spending the rest of their time out battling whom they called the infidels for control of the holy sites. We explored all of the ancient, vaulted halls, some of them partially restored, most of them original, and then were taken to a beautiful 18th century mosque in which we walked around, exploring, before we realized we weren’t actually supposed to be in there.

We were then given free time to wander or to go with our professor of Ancient Near East as he visited the three famous marketplaces where the rich Italian traders did much of their work. Akko was, for centuries, the center of international trade and goods would literally come in from all over the world. He also showed us the Tower of the Flies, the sea tower I alluded to earlier, which had been successful in protecting Akko’s harbor from invading ships until it was finally destroyed. The story of one battle is particularly interesting: the people who were fighting, I can’t recall who--probably the Muslims, decided that the best way to attack this tower was through making one of their own. They therefore tied two ships together (which is, let me tell you, a feat in itself) and outfitted the mast with enough wood to make an effective tower. With this, they sailed up to the Tower of the Flies and were able to shoot at those defending the tower. But, those on the tower soon got savvy and they shot fire into the boats, burning them into char that was sifted away by the ocean. After our tour, we were free to wander and my group went and bought some of the best falafel I’ve had here. We then saw the templar’s tower which was entirely destroyed by the attackers, and where thousands of people who were packed in there were killed when the tower collapsed. All that is left now are wave-washed foundation stones, serving as tide pools for the Mediterranean life. I wondered how many people who came to Akko knew of that story, and how many just saw it for what it is now. Things like that should not be forgotten. On our way back to the kibbutz for Thanksgiving and our parting bonfire, we stopped at a place called Beth Shearim. Though it was once a city, now all that is left and is accessible from its heyday are the rock cut tombs. These tombs were built for the wealthy and are quite extensive cave systems. The reason people wanted to be buried there is that one of the most famous Rabbis, Rabbi Ben Jacob, is buried there and was revered enough that people wanted to be near his tomb in their death. The caves are full of ancient white sepulchers, some decorated with Jewish designs, some with carvings of pagan gods. We actually had an assignment to identify symbols from each culture.

When we got back to the Kibbutz, we were practically giddy for thanksgiving. When they opened the doors to the dining hall, everything was dark, but people took enough pictures with flash that we could see that it was set up like several ancient banquet halls with tables on three sides. They turned the lights on and we cheered, then, after we sat, they brought out our meal in courses. Considering that they weren’t actually American, they did an amazingly good job of replicating what we expect from Thanksgiving, though they did have the hall decked out in red, white and blue instead of the traditional fall colors. They also brought out the turkeys with sparklers stuck in them when the lights off. It was a very bizarre mixture of Fourth of July, birthdays and Thanksgiving, and it was rather entertaining. The food was fabulous and we discussed things we were grateful for. Afterwards, we had a big bonfire which I was assigned to lead. Since it was our last night in Galilee, we kept it spiritual and made the theme gratitude. We were going to have two bonfires going simultaneously, but one of them would not start so we kept it down to one. It is a good thing we did—everyone pretty much had something they wanted to say and the meeting went on for a good three hours, the wood from the second bonfire serving to replenish the first. The fishermen of the sea came out while we were out there, and the reverberating sound of them throwing in their nets sounded like heartbeats. The moon was waxing and it shone silver over the water, a spectacular site. I wanted to make sure that everyone had their chance to testify what they would on the shores of the Galilee, so, it wasn’t until 10 that I finally closed the meeting with “How Great Thou Art” and a prayer. I went to bed utterly exhausted that evening.

Day 11: that morning was the first morning in Galilee I woke early enough to go down by the shore and watch the sunrise over the mountains. I did that, reading my scriptures and so forth, for a couple hours, then finally went back inside to get dressed and pack. Having inevitably lost our room key, I paid for a replacement, and we were on our way. I must say I was glad to be going back to Jerusalem as I missed it terribly while gone on this trip. Being in the Galilee changed my attitude towards the city of Jerusalem—I want nothing more now than to spend all my time wandering around in the city, whereas before I would often flake out because I was too tired or had too much school work to do. Our first stop on the way back was at a place called Sephoris or Zippora, depending on with whom you talk. It is an ancient tel four miles from Jerusalem, and it was once another center of Talmudic studies. It is also the place scholars suggest that Joseph and Jesus would have worked as he was growing up. The word in Greek which is translated “carpenter” really just means “craftsman,” leading scholars to believe that Joseph was essentially a jack of all trades (also, there is very little wood to work in the Holy Land, making stone work much more likely). Zippora was a city of the wealthy and scholarly, and therefore was a place with much demand for craftsmen. It is likely that a few of the things we looked at could have been created by Christ. There we saw some of Israel’s most beautiful mosaics, there was the floor of a wealthy man’s house, as well as the most famous and beautiful of all the mosaics in Israel with the face of a beautiful woman as part of the decoration. It is truly a stunning mosaic—the craftsmanship is far superior to most of what we had seen so far. Brother Brown told a story of when he went there about eight years ago, there were a few Brethren of the church with him. When one man looked at the picture of the beautiful woman, he said, “My wife is better looking than that.” Another then said, “My wife is much better looking than that,” and the third spiritedly declared, “My wife is much, much better looking than that.” A man next to them who was not part of the group turned to them in amazement, “I’ve never heard anyone talk about their wives that way before,” he said, astounded at their devotion. That story made me happy for the family-oriented nature of the church.

From there we went to a Crusader keep in Acre, a very important location because it is where the generals of the Crusaders decided to fight a battle for which they were unprepared against Saladin, the leader of the Muslims, that lead to the defeat of the Crusaders and the end of the Crusades. From the top we could see much of Israel, and, once inside the twenty foot thick walls at the bottom of the keep, we sang the song “Onward Christian Soldiers,” because of its obvious Crusader connotations (not to say that we were or were not advocating their actions, BTW). We also went to another synagogue which had a zodiac in the floor there, and then proceeded to our next stop on the way back to Jerusalem.

That was Mount Carmel where Elijah defeated the priest of Baal and proved that Jehovah is the one true God of Israel. We sat at the very top of the mountain (the mountain is actually an astounding fourteen miles long, leading all the way to the shore of Haifa) at a monastery, and we read the story of Elijah and the Priests and discussed it for a while. We were admonished to figure out what in our lives were idols we worshiped and to remove them from us. I certainly have plenty of those to work on. There is also a fabulous statue of Elijah killing the priests of Baal after their failure to call the rain which he called after praying to God for only a few moments. Also, the fire from heaven which consumed the alter, the stones of it, the calf on that, and the water they had doused the whole thing in, is pretty awesome. It isn’t still there of course, but I love the thought of it.

Our next stop was an interesting one: the city of Haifa, the most important port city in all of Israel and is the capital of the Baha’i faith. They basically believe that God continually gives revelation through different prophets, including almost every prophet of every religion which ever lived. In effect, they believe that all religions are true. But they also have a theology of their own and their own temples, and for them, Haifa is the most sacred of all cities. Most famous are their gardens—they cascade down a hillside to their temple and each of the large terraces are landscaped symmetrically relative to themselves, as well as identically to the one above and below it. We weren’t allowed into the main body of the gardens without a tour, and we didn’t have time for it, so we just stopped there and looked down at the gardens from above. I would love to learn more about the Baha’i if I get the chance. From there we went to a cemetery which no one but the occasional family and the Mormons ever go to because to most people it is highly unremarkable. But there are buried the first Mormon missionaries who came to preach in Israel before the ban on proselyting. They died of the horrible fever which swept through Israel during the late 19th century. We learned about the missionaries lives from two of their descendents—we were just lucky to have had their descendents along on our trip! Afterwards, we all bought falafel and ice cream then took the final leg of the journey back to Jerusalem, arriving well after dark. I was overjoyed to see the center and the beautiful city. What a place this is.

Galilee--the first three days

Day 1: We left Jerusalem early in the morning again, unsurprisingly. But I was really excited for where we were going: Caesarea is a beautiful city from the time of Herod the Great all the way until the end of the Crusades. It sits right on the sea shore, so the waters crash against the fortress walls, and there the palace where Paul was housed before he was shipped off to Rome to be killed has survived. We wandered around in the ancient theater and the palace, stopping in a room where it is absolutely certain that Paul would have stood to deliver his speech to the leader of the city who declared, “Almost thou hast convinced me to be a Christian.” It is really rare to go somewhere we are certain that one of the New Testament figures would have stood. This is one of them. The port, of which only about a fourth is left, is stunning because it was built by Herod the Great completely from scratch and it remained a prominent port for the next several hundred years. The Crusaders used this as a major base of operation and consequently they had an awesome triple gate and even a real, honest to goodness moat! I was practically giddy on seeing the moat… originally; guess how you had to cross it? Yup, a draw bridge.

From there we stopped at something which was equally awesome, though it didn’t sound like it. It was an aqueduct. And lest you think of a pipe running below or on top of the ground, know that it is actually a seventy mile long wall of beautiful arches which carried the water along the top. It ran right along the sea shore too, and let me tell you, it was the perfect place for a photo shoot, well, and for being ridiculous in general. The day was cloudy and the landscape the striking twin of California’s prime agricultural/orchard land. It started to get colder and colder, and this lent itself well to our next stop… Armageddon.

Yes ladies and gentlemen, we went to the place which the great battle which is supposed to end the world will take place. The valley, the Jezreel valley, is beautiful and flat, stretching up towards Nazareth and the mount of Transfiguration. The city which Armageddon is named for is now just a tel, called Megiddo. We learned all sorts of awesome stuff about the history of the place, but the coolest thing by far was sitting on the ridge of the ancient city and looking over the valley, the wind cutting right through our jackets, and reading about the end of time. Cool? I think so.

The day just kept getting better and better because our next stop was Nazareth. The city is almost exclusively Palestinian now, and it is chock full of churches dedicated to Mary or Joseph or Jesus. Interestingly, on the outside of the “Church of the Visitation” where the angel was supposed to appeared to tell Mary she was chosen to give birth to Christ, there are large banners in English and Arabic which say something to the effect of (quoting the Qu’uran) “God never was and never will be begotten, nor does he beget,” and, “Islam is the only truth, those who reject it will be thrust down to hell.” It reminded me of other such propaganda I’d seen in the U.S., propagated by a different faith against another. It was a good reminder that people are the same no matter where you go. We blazed through the “Church of the Visitation” and the place where Mary and Joseph may have lived then ran up to see the alternate “Church of the Visitation” which is run by the Greek Orthodox Church. Having two churches dedicated to the same occurrence, both claiming to have the actual location of occurrence, is far from unusual in the Middle East.

We arrived at Galilee that night, late enough that I was utterly exhausted and was glad to crash in the bungalows which four of us shared. The Kibbutz where we stayed is right on the shore of the Sea of Galilee; I would see it out my window were it not for the other bungalow in the way. Despite my exhaustion, I had to wander along the shore for a while, just soaking in the fact that I was now in the place Jesus loved. While he certainly spent a fair amount of time in Jerusalem, and the most important occurrences happened there, the Galilee is where he wanted to be. The moon was barely a crescent that evening, and a bunch of us waded out into the water, standing so we could look out over the sea. What a beautiful place that is.

Day 2: The first place we went was not that memorable, or in other words, I have little recollection of it past the fact that it had a palace which was constructed almost identically to Herod the Great’s temple. The other place we went that morning was quite something. In the Old Testament, whenever they’re referring to the whole of Israel, they say “From Dan to Beersheba.” We’ve already been to Beersheba, so this was our chance to go all the way to the top of the ancient kingdom of Israel. Dan was named for the tribe who was given the land after they were pushed out of their original lot by the Philistines. It is stunning because there are three different springs which gush out of the mountain and make the place a virtual rainforest. We wandered through it for a while until we got to the original city where the idiotic Old Testament King of Israel after the end of Solomon’s reign, decided it would be a good idea to create golden calves and put them in Dan and another city named Bethel so the people of Israel wouldn’t go down to Judea, the rival kingdom, to make pilgrimage to Jerusalem. This sin was the main problem which plagued Israel for the next few hundred years until it was destroyed by The Assyrians. We saw the foundations of the temple they built there.

The next place, Caesarea Philippi, is the place where Christ told the Bread of Life sermon. A famous spring comes directly from the mountain there and a temple was built right on top of it a few thousand years ago, a pagan temple dedicated to the God pan. It’s gone now though, but the spring is still pouring out water. We headed from there to the coolest castle I’ve ever been to. It was stunning, built high on a mountainside overlooking a valley, and had been used by the Crusaders then the Arabs after the defeat of the Crusaders. It is one of the best preserved castles in all of Israel, the walls at least ten feet thick, and the whole place large enough to hold several thousand people if needed. It is called Nimrod’s castle because the local population said that it was such an impressive castle that only the biblical figure Nimrod, the great hunter would have been able to build it. I loved being there; I could have stayed there for hours more. A few hundred years ago, there was an earthquake and, awesomely, it rocked the castle walls so that the keystone of a hall of arches started to slip out, but then the walls rocked back, trapping the keystones again. So there is the is long stone hall you can walk along where the keystones of all the arches have slipped out exactly the same amount almost as though it were planned. From it, you can see the exact actions of the earthquake. How cool is that? We stopped briefly after this in the Golan Heights, one of the most contested pieces of land in the world. We parked near mine fields so we could take pictures near the signs which say, “Danger, Mine Field,” in English, Arabic and Hebrew. It is a sad reminder of the hate between these peoples and the problems which continue today in this area. Later that night we had a bonfire right on the beach of the Galilee. It was a wonderful event, we just stood up and sang or told stories if we felt like it. The group of students here is the most incredibly talented group I’ve ever been in. My talents are positively dwarfed by theirs and we’re always kept entertained by someone. The bonfires we enjoyed while there were some of the most memorable things we did, though it was mighty cold outside of the influence of the fire’s warmth.

Day 3: We had New Testament for three and a half hours straight in the morning of this day, and then studying for the rest of the day.