Busy and Busier - Happy Easter!!!

Me sitting on a tomb.

So the last time I updated the blog was two weeks ago. The time has been flying by and I am just getting busier and busier, with all of my research papers and final field studies for classes. And looking at the calendar we only have ten days of regular class time then the rest is field studies. 


Well, lets see what I did the last two weeks: I had a field study for Second Temple class around the Judean Hill Country, then we celebrated palm Sunday by going to church service at the Christ Church in the Old City, then in the afternoon we trekked up to the Mount of Olives and marched with thousands of Christians down the mount to Lions Gate/ St. Stephans Gate. This was a awesome gathering of Christians from all corners of the globe. I remember seeing flags from Bulgaria, Russa, Spain, Italy, Brazil. Mexico, Croatia, and many more. There were music and prayers and people signing Hosanna and Jerusalem songs while waving palm fronds which made the Triumphal Entry of our Lord Christ Jesus even more real and alive for me. 

Sam and I during the Triumphal Entry march.

Then on Monday my mother came to visit me during Holy Week!
She got into Israel around 2:30 am but came to JUC around 6ish where she slept while I was in class for the day. That afternoon I took her to Abraham Hostel in New City and walked back to JUC for dinner.


Then on Tuesday after my Islamic Thought class I took mom all over the Old City - starting in Zion Gate in the Jewish Quater we walked to the Western Wall (wailing wall) and saw the Temple Mount, visited the Robinson's Arch and the eastern Steps, where Jesus preached the 10,000 and they got baptized, from there we went to have lunch and during lunch mom witnessed her first Bar Mitzvah while eating falafel. We toured the Jaffa Gate square and visited JUC's Old City friend, Shaban, then hiked it to Church of the Redeemer for a horizon lookout of the city then back down to the Church of the Holy Sepulchre which when we visited it made mom cry a couple of times. This day was a very emotional day for her, praying at the Western Wall, seeing the tomb of Christ (traditional site).

Mom praying at the Western Wall.

On Wednesday, after Cultural Backgrounds I dragged mom along quickly around the southern edge of the Old City then walked down the Kidron Valley stopping at the Abasolm's Pillar for pictures and onward to the Church of All nations (traditional site of the Garden of Gethsemane). This church was beautiful and was so moving in ways only a personal visit one could understand. Mom cried again, and then we walked up to the Church of Mary Magdalene Russian Orthodox Church, but it was closed so we walked further up the Mount of Olives and gave mom some time to take skyline photos of the City of David - Jerusalem.


Maundy Thursday, I had class then I with my classmates and mom went to the Rockefeller Museum in East Jerusalem for a research paper on two archaeological objects that were used in everyday instances. Afterwards we had lunch in the Muslim section and took the tram to the Holocaust Memorial Museum, Yad Vashem. This was my second time here and both, mom and I had a hardt time in the Children's Memorial and the whole thing was just somber and very saddening. I just hope that if anything  like this happens while I am around on this earth. i will hel the helpless, the dying and do the right thing.


Good Friday, it was sleep in day for me which I needed it. And I had to set up for my Cultural Backgrounds class Last Supper/ Passover Meal which we did in a first century style. where we reclined ont he floor with mattresses and ate laying down all while dressed in Greco-Roman fashion/togas. It was really cool learning how the Triclinium, as it was called worked and how Jesus and his disciples would've had the Last Supper in this kind of fashion. But mom and I didn't stay for the whole thing because we were invited to a Jewish Seder meal by one of mom's friends brother who lives in German Colony (Old Kataom) in Jerusalem. We got there and it was clearly a Jewish family event, but we were greeted with open arms and it was truly great leaning about the passover and reading through the entire Haggadah was a real experience. which lasted till midnight. I will never forget this night and the endless praise to god about the deliverance of the Jewish people from egypt, and also the great food and lots of wine.


Tomorrow is Easter for the Western Church (Catholic and Protestant). Mom and I are going to the Garden Tomb where there will be four services and so we'll go to the English one at 9:30 and then back to JUC for Easter BBQ and  Egg hunt.


HAPPY EASTER!
HE IS RISEN!!!