Negev

Bedouin Wool in the Negev

Wool drying after being dyed

Rug in progress!

Our next field trip was to the Negev, which is a desert area in southern Israel. Even the name means “dry.” We were able to visit Beersheba and a Bedouin rug making business where they employ nomadic Arabs so they can help support their families and gain social status. The rug making was really incredible to see. They make rugs, pillow covers, bags, and other similar items out of wool that they dye there in their shop. It was impressive to see the amount of work that goes into their trade. 

Gate of Beersheba

Ninja Posing in Beersheba

We also went to Beersheba, which used to be a regional market town where herdsmen came to exchange wool and other animal products for manufactured goods. Abraham, Isaac, and Jacob lived in this city or region. There is a complex water system that runs underneath the city in large cisterns making them very self-sustainable when under attack.

This is most of the city of Beersheba

Scuba Steve in the Cistern

We also visited Tel Arad. A tel is basically a hill that is created by building on top of previous civilizations that have gone before, aka a cake with lots of layers. So the further down in the tel/hill you dig the older the civilizations are that you find.

 Chillin in the Cistern

Falafel with Nahla

Steve Wirthlin, Hannah Tempest, and myself went out wandering in the city to see if we could play soccer with kids and maybe meet some people in the Palestinian neighborhood around the Jerusalem Center. After playing soccer with some kids for 30 minutes or so we met a woman named Nahla.

She was joking about how we need to get the kids playing in the park instead of just the road where there are a lot of cars. She offered us a drink of juice. Steve asked if we could help her make it and she invited us in. We made a new friend squeezing lemon juice in her kitchen. It was amazing how sweet and kind she was. The Palestinians have such an amazing culture when it comes to hospitality. They don’t have much as a people but they are incredible givers. Short story short she kindly invited us back to teach us how to make falafel.

This form just can't be taught.. Nahla's favorite apprentice! and for good reason!

We went back a week or so later and we, Paris included this time, and learned to make falafel. Nahla guided us through the process and had us help at each part. Nahla was incredibly kind and loved having us there.

"I just model with the food.. I don't actually prepare it." - Phillip Varner,  second generation male supermodel.

People really do love the Jerusalem Center and it has an awesome reputation in the area. After we ate we sat and talked to Nahla about her faith. She shared a few things that were really insightful for us to hear. It gave me a much better perspective to understand the Islamic faith. She talked about how she doesn’t hurt even ants because all things are here to bear witness of God so she doesn’t want to destroy a witness of God, no matter how small the animal or bug.

King Steven the XXIII preparing falafel for his subjects! 

She stressed her belief that if what someone is doing is good or the religion in which they place their faith leads them to do good then it is of God and that we should let them stay in that path. The last thing she said that was really cool was that religion does something really strange to men in that they become prideful in their beliefs and it ends up hurting them if they don’t have balance in their lives.

In short it was refreshing to see her perspective on what they believe instead of what I saw and learned in school back in Utah. I saw them as super radical and unreasonable before I came. Now I am beginning to see how they look to God in almost every part of their lives/days. This same attitude can be seen in almost everyone we meet here in the City. I’m so blessed to be here in this city meeting such amazing people! There is definitely a lot for me to learn from many people who are just like Nahla. Nahla didn’t feel comfortable taking any pictures because she was not wearing her head covering. Maybe in the future when we go back we can get one of her with her head cover on. Below is the recipe/ingredients for falafel that we used(I took this from Paris’s blog!)


Ingredients:
-       2 cups dry chickpeas (soak overnight)

-       1 small onion, chopped
-       3 cloves garlic (or you could do less… we went a bit crazy with the garlic)
-      1 head of cayenne pepper
-      1/4 cup chopped fresh parsley (Nahla says pick leaves that feel soft/limp)
-       2 tsp. cumin
-       ¼ tsp. black pepper
-       Almost two tsp. salt
-       2 tsp. of baking soda
-       1 tbsp. of water
-       Optional: 1 ¼ cup flour
-       Grapeseed oil for frying

Western Wall

If you zoom in you can see the little papers stuffed in the cracks that people have written their prayers on. Mine is somewhere amongst them! 

The Western Wall was an incredible experience. The Wall is not sacred to the Jews, it’s simply the closest place that they can be to the temple mount and also know that they are not over the old holy of holy s which they still consider sacred.

It was fun seeing how the Jewish people look forward to the Sabbath Day with such excitement. Up until sundown there is a rush of Jewish people all scurrying through all the quarters of the old city to get to the western wall. When you arrive you are greeted by hundreds of cheerful people singing and dancing to their hymns and scripture. They pray often aloud putting their written prayers in the  wall. They sway forwards and backwards to emphasize there excitement to speak with God.

It is a pretty cool experience in that there are all types of Jewish belief worshiping at the  wall. They view it as being front row seat in the great  synagogue that is the world (Jewish synagogues all face the  temple mount). It was incredible to see them welcome in the  Sabbath.

I definitely have a lot of holy envy when it comes to some of their more practical traditions such as singing and dancing and general excitement for the Sabbath. That attitude is something I want to better adopt into my own life. 

First Little Bit in Jeru

Our first field trip here in the Holy Land was to a few locations round about the city of Jerusalem. The first was a church built at a location believed to be the place where Jesus ascended into heaven. It’s a beautiful church built just at the start of the 20^th century at the top of the Mount of Olives. It was built to mimic a lot of older styles of cathedrals. There was a great view from this church.

From there we went to two different overlooks of Jerusalem. One of which was over the top of a huge cemetery. This cemetery just east of Jerusalem is where the Jewish tradition holds that Christ will return so they want to be buried here for mainly two reasons. They will resurrect right where Christ will be and they want to not have their bodies dragged for miles and miles up to the Mount of Olives in order to be resurrected (trying to avoid pain on this one I think).  After these overlooks we went to a place where we could see Bethlehem. It was a beautiful looking building. The cities here are white because of the limestone that is used and they look very stunning when you see them from a distance. Here we saw a lot of olive trees and shepherds working to move their sheep. It was amazing to see and think of how much the Holy Land has changed in the last 2,000 years and also how a lot of simple things stay the same. Bethlehem sits behind the division wall that the Israeli government has put up to separate the Palestinian land from Israel. They did this for probably a lot of reasons but the political one which actually did work effectively was to reduce the amount of attempted bombings on the Israeli territory. It is quite the controversy between the two sides. It has been one of my goals to better see the reality of this situation and the rights and wrongs of both sides. Lastly on our tour we saw an overlook of the land of Ephraim and Manasseh. All I have to say is that there is plenty of room there for all of us Ephraimites to come and settle (joking).