little taste of Galilee

more to come...

ein karem

So before all the bomb prom stuffs happened, a group of us made our way to Ein Karem-a neighborhood in Jerusalem.
We saw the church of St. John the Baptist, got ice cream, and walked along the streets.

steps outside the church of St. John the Baptist

bomb prom

Yesterday was pretty interesting here at the JC.

After an afternoon at Ein Karem, sirens went off in the city. Having no idea what this meant, a few of us stood outside to find out what was going on. A few seconds later, we were called inside and into the bomb shelter {were the first ever student group to use it…yeah were pretty special}. We only stayed in there about a half hour after finding out what happened. Missiles were fired toward Jerusalem but landed a couple miles south of Bethlehem. We were told to resume normal, daily activities. So all is well here and we’re as safe as can be!

To celebrate, we decided to have a JC prom.

Since there are around 3 times as many girls as there are boys, we had polygadates {2 or 3 girls per guy-and we wonder why people think we’re weird}. The boys were given slips of paper with their dates names on them, and they were to ask the girls to prom that night.

So at dinner, after walking away from my plate for a second, I come back to a napkin over my food with my name on it. After I open it up, it says “Amy, will you go to Prom with me? –Jordan”. So of course I said yes…then helped him ask the other girl date-Rosie.

Rosie randomly found these old fashioned, somewhat hideous wedding dresses in the shek shack. We proudly wore them the whole night. It honestly looked like a man just married two women.

Quite the night, quite the night. 

recap

 best shwarma i've had in the Jewish quarter with my besties, katherine and em

 ramparts walk on a rainy Jerusalem day

 shopping with the one and only Jerusalem Malmrusalem (Allison)

 field trip to the Old City...gate where Christ would've left the temple.

 Rachel and I being all matchy-matchy at the Herodium.

rug lady

I found this lady on the street struggling to fold up her rug, 

so I helped her out for a minute.

soccer

After a long day in the city yesterday, Andrew invited Emily, Kate, Will and I out to play soccer with some Palestinian kids from the neighborhood. 

We walked across the street to some houses and met a few kids there. We then made our way around their neighborhood knocking on all their friends door trying to get them to come play. After rounding a few kids up, we made our way to the soccer field {a dirt field with 2 different sized goals without nets}.
I had THE best time playing with them. I even found out that most of them knew my cousin and best friend Cassidy Lang who came here winter semester. They kept raving on about her and how much they loved and missed her! So we exchanged names and numbers and plan on playing soccer again soon.

 Yezin, Achmed, me, and Raghad

it gets cold here?

I can’t believe I’m saying this, but it’s cold here! It’s raining and it’s freezing! I even wore a sweatshirt outside into the city! This is a memorable moment, ladies and gents.  

This morning, Emily, Allison, Kathryn and I walked to Joppa gate and did the ramparts walk for the second time, determined to finish both sides. When we got to the end at Dung Gate, we couldn’t find the entrance to the other ramparts walk. After asking some taxi drivers and getting very confused, we decided to forgo the second part of the walk and go shopping instead. So much for completing the whole thing. O well.

Throughout the whole day it was raining suuuper hard and the stones were extremely slippery. We finally made it through the rainstorm back to the wonderful JC. We then preceded to watch While You Were Sleeping and simultaneously fall asleep to it.

You could say it was a successful day.