The Savior's Last Days

Yesterday and today we followed the path that the Savior walked the last days of His life, from Bethany to Jerusalem and in Jerusalem from the upper room where He had the last supper to the Garden Tomb where He rose from the dead. It has been a couple of impactful spiritual days. Yesterday we started at Bethany where the Savior stayed at the house of Mary, Martha, and Lazarus. This is one of the places I have most looked forward to visiting. I'll post more later tonight.

-Jecia-

Senses Overload!

So, for the viewing pleasure of all of you out there who look forward to hearing about our experiences, but wish we would post more often (mom), we have began an operation I like to call senses overload, since we obviously have nothing better to do with all our free days, and no longer having any classes. Enjoy!

-Jecia-

Palm Sunday

This was a few weeks ago, but here we are at the beginning of the procession. We followed the procession from the top of the Mt. of Olives to Dunn Gate. There were lots of people, lots of churches, lots of filming crews, and lots of palm fronds.

-Jecia-

YMCA bell tower

This is our experience ringing the bells at the YMCA for tens of thousands of passerbys. I love Sister Squire's expression as we ascend the elevator to the bell tower. We may have exceeded the passenger limit a bit.

-Jecia-

Talent Show

Eliza and her group did "I Won't Say I'm in Love" from Hercules. Aside from their fabulous costumes, their performance was phenomenal!

-Jecia-

The naval of the world

This is an old mural map based on old perceptions of the people of Isreal. Apparently they felt like Jerusalem was the center of the world, and everything was just an offshoot of it. You'll notice that America isn't even attached.

-Jecia-

The eye of a needle

This is "the eye of a needle" as spoken of in the bible. I have a feeling this is one of the smaller ones, but it gives more meaning to the scripture that says "And again I say unto you, It is easier for a camel to go through the eye of a needle, than for a rich man to enter into the kingdom of God. " Matt 14:24 They had these next to the gates of the city. For some reason people and animals would occasionally have to pass through these entrances when the gate was closed.

-Jecia-

The Dead Sea!

Here we are floating in the Dead Sea. It's about 33% salt, whereas the ocean is about 8% salt. It felt pretty strange to float so easily. It was way cool!

After we floated, we covered ourselves in some exfoliating Dead Sea mud. Later I even covered my hair and spiked it. One of my favorited trips thus far.

-Jecia-

Eliza will have to tell you the story.

Random Chat

A couple of nights ago Eliza and I and the whole Jerusalem Center were working on a paper for our Near Eastern Studies class, so while Eliza and I sat at neighboring computers, this is the Google Chat conversation we had.

me: Hi, this is the first time I've chatted with you

eliza.hut: that makes two of us wait that didn't really make sense

me: That makes three of us, soon to be the two of us And you're one of those two

eliza.hut: It is really easy to keep a secret between two people when one of them is dead or Krunk

me: ayup

eliza.hut: so what ya working on

me: me paper
I'm writting the very first sentence as we speak.

eliza.hut: Congratulations
Hey are you the person that is feeding mom information from Henderson?

me: I don't know if anyone told you, but I'm not in henderson right now.

eliza.hut: What?!? and you didn't tell me?!?!?!

me: I was sure mom wrote it in the family memo.

eliza.hut: WHAT there's a family letter? where?

me: Oh, I thought you were at the family council meeting where we discussed instituting a family letter. From my minutes I also noted that Caleb petitioned for later cerfew and cellular phone privilleges and Ethan made a motion to be crowed commander-for-life

eliza.hut: I hope that both of the boys motions were either squashed quickly or tabled until forever

me: there was a gavel war that ended with a couple of smashed appendages and I think you were held for contempt of court

eliza.hut: wow that gavel must have hit me harder than the court thought. it was probably you that hit me... wasn't it. for old times sake?!? Hmmmm...

me: the council artist drew a sketch of the event, I think I might have it here

eliza.hut: do you now... I may have to see this said picture

me: onlookers were baffled by the gavel hit. A new rule was motioned and aproved that all who stand to speak must also wear the official helmet of justice

eliza.hut: I would support that motion... but I don't know if Ethan would aprove. It would require him to remove his crown. I don't see that going well.

me: Ethan did appeal the motion, and after a couple three reconvening a compromise was reached that he would have to remove his crown, but he could continue to hold his

eliza.hut: I think the sceptor would prove to be more dangerous thatn the gavel, especially in his hands My question is... who is the normal holder of the gavel?

me: Well you see we decided upon a rather liberal democratic council system where whomsoever is standing on the floor gets to hold the gavel. It's a new system and has some kinks to smooth out, but thus far there have only been a handfull of incidents and I hear dad's eye is healing nicely.

eliza.hut: So does that mean that every member of the council now has to wear a helmet of justice, just in case a stray gavel should fly in their direction. If that motion has not already been made i plan to bring it to the floor with utmost haste.

me: The incident concerned dad's eye was due to a gavel malfunction. And since our top engineer was incapacitated, our engineer reserve reasembled the said gavel with duct tape and staples.

Though most understood the unlikelyhood of the event reoccuring, there was another motion made for all council members to have to wear gogles of hope durring the durration of any meeting.
Hope for a better future and hope that it never happens again

eliza.hut: Who is in the er- engineer reserves

me: Ah, a most austere and ingenious council member. One well liked and respected among the community and all mankind in general. Most feel that the improved gavel should become imortalized in a monument so as all can bask in this symbol of courage and determination

Galilee continues

Here's some more pictures from Galilee.

This was our New Testament classroom. Sitting on the shore of the Sea of Galilee (which actually has no salt and is really a lake)

This is me studying my scriptures on the beach at Ein Gev where we stayed. PS this is the same beach as is in the above picture.

-Jecia-

Galillee ... Galilah

Here we are rafting down the Jordon River. Sadly, we lost Matt to a tree just after this photo was taken.

Our rafting crew. Matt, Eliza, me and Amy

This is my good friend Theopholis. I call him Theo for short.

Shout out!

Eliza and I have been wondering who actually reads our blog, so if your perusing or here by our parents recomendation, whether we know you or not, we'd love to get a comment from you, so drop a note!

-Jecia-

Eliza's monthly update

Can I just begin by saying that I absolutely love living here. Last week I was in Galilee and then the day we got back I went to Eliot to go snorkeling and play on the beach. The days that have followed have been wonderful. On Saturday I went to the Garden tomb and the Garden of Gethsemane. Usually Gethsemane is over crowded and touristy, but I went right before they locked the place up and asked if I could stay in the garden after closing. It was just me and about 6 other people in the whole garden and I knew 4 of them. It was beautiful, the solitude was all I could have asked for.

This is me in front of the garden tomb, it is one of my favorite things to do in the holy land- to go to the gardens and study my scriptures and write in my journal.

Today I got to play the bells at the YMCA in West Jerusalem. Brother and Sister Squires go every Sunday to play the bells. Bro. Squires informs me that a mere 100,000 people were listening. eight years of piano really came in handy today as a played my while 4 notes over and over again.

Today was palm Sunday, so i went to the church of the holy sepulcher and waved my palm leaf with the best of them. I got to watch a procession among other things and got glared at by two different churches, three monks and a random group of elderly women... it was a blast.

This is the sunset over the sea of Galilee.

P.S. I am officially 21.

-Eliza

Gamla

So this may be the most picturesque place I have ever been to. Fortunate for us we got to be here when it was all in bloom and green, which only happens for a few months, then it's all brown again.

Home from Galilee

So it's been a while since we posted. Mostly because we've been in Galileefor the last 10 or so days, but now we're back, and I'm gonna put some updates from Galilee as well as pre-Galilee, so enjoy!

-Jecia-

Nimrod's Castle

Now this day we went to Nimrod's castle, which, as far as I can remember has no biblical significance to it, but it was a way cool castle and the ruins were quite lovely to jaunt around. It is an Arabic fortress built in the middle ages and named after the mighty hunter Nimrod, King of Shinar and great-grandson of Noah. Here he was punished by Allah, who put a mosquito in his head which drove him mad. I love these sites that are so rich in history. I felt it appropriate to take all of my photos here in sepia.

A view of most of the fortress

Check out this sweet Gothic stairwell. A lovely nun showed us how to get the best photo here.

Those abyss's have a way of sneaking up on you.

-Jecia-

Migiddo

Now begins our trip in Galilee. One of our first stops was to the top of the famous Mount Megiddo, which is also known as Armageddon. I think it's had somewhere around 17 cities built and destroyed on top of it, now there's just ruins and a lovely gift shop. It's been conquered by pharohs, Thutmose III, Ramses II, Shishak, and Necho as well as Tiglath-Pileser III, Alexander the Great and Napoleon, to name a few. Acording to Revelations 16:14-21 a final confrontation will occur here. Sure it looks peaceful now...

Eliza, Amy, me

-Jecia-

Bethlehem

So this fieldtrip occured on St. Patricks day, and I made sure to anounce that it was mom's birthday. There were much well wishes from the JC crew. We began by visiting Bethlehem University where Dr. Musalem, our Paelistinian studies teacher, is a dean. We got to meet many of the students there and ask them questions about what they do and such. The school is a Christian school, but they admit both Christians and Musslims. They told us how much they would like to talk to the Israelis about the conflict but since Bethlehem is in the West Bank, it's nearly imposible to get into Jerusalem. They have to apply months ahead and they would only be able to visit for one day if at all. It was really neat to hear the Paelstinian perspective from student our own age.



We also went to the Church of the Nativity. The Greek Orthodox are mostly in charge of this church, but it is shared by the Armenians and Cathlolic? The Greek Orthodox do not like it when you laugh. Believe me, I know.


Eliza and I outside ot the church of the Nativity



That evening we went out to a Shepherds field and read the story of Christ's birth in the book of Luke and sang hymns and bore testimony. It was a beautiful night, and this was one of my favorite things we've done here in isreal. I could invision the shepherds watching their flock on a night similar to this night then being visited by an angel who proclaimed "For unto you is born this day in the city of David a Saviour, which is Christ the Lord." The shepherds are my favorite part of the story of Christ's birth. It was a lovely way to end our trip to Bethlehem.

-Jecia-

Purim

Today we celebrated Purim, which is a feast dedicated to Esther and her saving the Israelites. Now it's become something of a Mardi Gras/Halloween. The kids dress up in costumes all week long and get candy, and on the evening of the feast, adults dress up and go out and party. Be went to west jerusalem to Joffa street and round abouts area. There were some street performers and dancers and lots of costumes.

Here's a pictures of a large amount of our group at one of our favorite bakeries off of Joffa street. I'm the one dressed as Harry Potter.

-Jecia-