The tiny streets inside the Old City

Philip and I in a wading pool in the middle of the desert.

One of the religious sects in the Holy Seplechure Church

Well we have made it back from Israel and Palestine. It was a once in a lifetime experience. I don’t even know where to start. One of the really interesting experiences that we had was listening to several different people come and talk to us about what life was like for them being Palestinian and Israeli. Now for those of you who don’t know the conflict that is going on among these to countries and cultures you really need to read up on your current events because I will not go into that. After listening to the speakers I wanted to write to my congressman(because that is the only thing that you can do) and tell them that we need to send aid to these people and we should be able to do something about this. I felt very lucky to be living in America. One of the coolest things that we saw was all the different religious sects that coexist with one another. Our first night that we were there we went to the Western Wall which is where they recovered the wall from King Herod's Temple (hopefully you guys know about biblical history). There were several members of the Jewish faith that were praying against the wall. Everyone was united and when the sun went down they all started dancing and singing together. They were all wearing their traditional clothing and it was just an amazing site to see. When walking down the tiny crowded streets of the old city you could see so many different cultures. There would be traditional Muslims intertwined with Russian Orthodox Catholics, Jews and then the European tourists who don’t know the meaning of the word modest. We walked in the traditional steps where Jesus walked. We were on the mount of olives then we were at the crucifixtion site followed by the garden tomb. It was so surreal that I still don’t feel like I was ever there. Have you ever read some crazy story in your history books and felt like it didn’t really happen? That is kind of what I felt – just in the sense that it all took place so long ago that there is no way that these artifacts would still be around today. I won’t go into a lot of detail about the trip because I know that Philip wants to write his own entry on Jerusalem but just know that we would highly recommend this adventure to all of you. There was so much to see and talk about. My only recommendation is that you make sure you go during winter. Summer out here is like a death trap. Love you all and see you soon- can you believe that we have been gone for around 2 months?