Dear Friends and Family,
Merry Christmas and happy New Year! It's been a long time since I have been able to write, but thanks be to God that I am able to do that now. Since the beginning of December I have been very busy with travels, internships, and returning to school. Now that I have gotten back to Jerusalem, and have settled into a regular routine once again, I am happy to have the time to fill you all in on what I have been doing in the past three or so months.
As you know, on December 6th, after all fall classes were complete, I was able to participate in an 8 day trip to Egypt. It was a wonderful trip. We left early in the morning and walked through the rain to the bus station to the bus stop just below campus. From there we traveled by bus to Eilat, Israel on the Red Sea and switched buses on the Egyptian boarder to begin our long journey across the Sinai. The Sinai Peninsula is as flat as the sea, with hardly a hill or even a bump. After 5 hours of this we crossed the Suez Canal and entered mainland Egypt. Cairo was only a short drive away. As we entered Cairo everyone was glued to their windows. I never realized how massive Cairo is, nor did I know how beautiful it was. Some of the mosques we saw there were the most beautiful buildings I had ever seen. It wasn't before long that we saw our first glimpse of the Great Pyramids at Giza silhouetted black against the pink desert sky. It was then that the excitement of being in Egypt finally began to set in. We were there!
Since darkness had already come, we spent the night getting settled into our 5-star hotel (tourism is way down, and the result is cheap lodging). I spent the first couple nights walking out into the city, taking strolls on the riverside drive beside the Nile and watching the boats skim across the water. Sometimes I would meet up with the locals and talk with them for an hour or two. Egyptians are probably the nicest people on earth, and despite some Western stereotypes of Arabs, were very open to talking about Christianity. Most of them even considered Christians to be their brothers. It was nice to see such warmth in an area that most think of as icy.
Before we took an all night sleeper-train to Aswan, which was a very strange experience, we visited the Cairo Museum. There I saw "many wonderful things," as the archeologist who found King Tut's treasure said. One of the most exciting things I saw there was the exhibit of King Tut's entire burial treasure. Seeing his burial mask in the pictures was impressive enough, even moreso in real life. That first day we also saw the Pyramids at Giza. The pictures don't have anything on them either, they're so enormous. We even got to go down inside the smallest of the three.
In Aswan there are many many temples, and we got to see most of them. The ones there tended to be smaller and less impressive than the ones farther north in Luxor, but since we hadn't seen those yet, they were amazing to look at nonetheless. Here we also got to go see the Aswan Dam and look across Lake Nasser into The Sudan. After staying the night in Aswan began making our way north by bus toward Luxor.
Luxor was definitely my favorite stretch of the trip. Everything that makes Egypt so impressive is from Luxor, the ancient city of Thebes. The Thebes West Bank, Kunaptra, Ramusseum, Valley of the Kings,and just about any other cool thing you can think of is there. This is where the Kings of Old tried to make a name for themselves, and 3,000 years later people from all over the world are still impressed by them. In a way you might say they succeeded. The columns of the temples they built were up to 8 or 9 feet in diameter. Of the 13 people we had on the trip, we tried to make a circle around one touching fingertip to fingertip, and evn then we couldn't reach all the way around. That was just one column, and in a temple of up to 60 or more columns each intricately painted and carved with reds, blues, greens and brilliant yellows, you can only imagine what it must have been like to be there. It was in Luxor that we also got to take a boat ride out on the Nile where we ran into Steven Spielburg making a film. Later on we took a camel ride out into the Sahara Desert to an old monastary. But sadly our time in Luxor had to come to an end.
That night we boarded the sleeper-train to go back north to Cairo. When we arrived we saw a few more sights, including Muhammed Ali's Mosque. It is one of the most impressive structure I have ever seen. It had twelve domes of silver, and on the inside you could look up and see each one. They werre all a differnet color. I took some pictures, but it was hard to capture all the beauty. Unfortunatly I didn't put any of them on my website (only a view of the exterior), but when I return I will have all of them with me. That night we slept before the long drive back to Jerusalem.
We arrived in Jerusalem at 6 in the evening, and by 2 the next morning on I was onboard a sherut to the airport to fly to Ireland. My sister picked me up at the airport, and we spent the rest of the day touring around Dublin. Dublin is a beautiful city with many rivers and bridges and old buildings. We stayed at a friend's house overnight, and then we made the 4 hour drive through the countryside of Ireland to my sister's hometown of Cork. Cork is equally impressive as Dublin, though not as big. Nearby are many castles and old fortresses, which my sister and her fiancee were more than happy to show me. We even got to go to Blarney Castle, where I just HAD to kiss the Blarney Stone. I'm not so sure I have the gift of gab yet, but maybe the stone has a gradual affect. We'll just have to see. If not, I'll be returning in May and June for Tammy's wedding so I can kiss it again, and maybe it will work this time.
I spent Christmas and the New Year's there in Cork, and enjoyed myself very much. It was especially nice to be in a land where there is so much green. I tend to miss that in Israel. I am looking forward to going back this summer, and maybe then it won't be so COLD!
After nearly 3 weeks in Ireland I flew back to Tel Aviv on January 1st. When I stopped in Zurich it was snowing, and when we touched down in Tel Aviv it was warm dry weather. It was nice to be back home, if only for a little while. I had a few nights to rest in Jerusalem before heading out again to do a 3 week internship in Ramallah for my Middle Eastern Studies major at Columbia International University.
Ramallah is only a 15 minute drive from Jerusalem, but it is a whole other world. It is the Seat of the West Bank where the Palestinian Authority has it's headquarters. A guy my age who is teaching English to the Palestinians at the university there allowed me to live in his apartment. It just happened to be right around the corner of Arafat's compound. This was too excititing! The excitement was soon to fade away as I began working among the people and realized what kind of situation they are living through. To make a long story short things are very bad for them right now, worse than anything I had imagined. It's hard when everything you thought you knew is wrong, that things aren't what they seem. It was a very faith-shaking situation for me. It's hard to learn that the "terrorists" that are killing themselves in restaraunts and buses in Jerusalem aren't dying for something so noble as a jihad but they are simply sick of life, sick of living, and are chosing to end their life bringing down as many of the "oppressors" or "terrorists" who have caused their lives to be the way they are.
While I was there I worked with a Palestinian guy who is also my age. We went out most every morning with a car-load of food, and would drive out to the area villages distributing food to the Muslim families. They were all so thankful for our service and would always invite us in for tea or coffee. We would usually spend about 1/2 hour at each house, and most of the time we would be able to share a little about our own Christian faith. Here, as in Egypt, they were very open about the faith, especially the women who would always beg for the Bibles we would bring along with us. The whole experience was a real blessing.
I also worked in the orphanage for boys at the Ramallah Local Church. It was a lot of fun. All the boys were between the ages of 10 and 16, and they were always trying to gang tackle me and overpower me. I think the home father was happy to have me around because by the time supper roled around the boys were already tired. I mostly played lot's of futbol (soccer) with them, as well as basketball. Sometimes I would tutor them in their English. It was a great time, and I was happy to have a good influence on the boys. Overall the trip was very eye-opening for me, but also very fruitful. I am so glad that the opportunity opened for me, that I was able to meet the great people that I did. I don't think there is anyone so kind as the common Arab you will meet on the street. Only talk to them for 10 minutes and you might find yourself sitting in their home drinking hot Arabic coffee, eating more food than is humanly possible (atleast so you thought), and being considered part of the family.
Soon the time came for me to return to Jerusalem to begin the spring semester, and that brings me to now. I have just gotten back into the swing of classes after a two month break. It's good to be back. I am taking Jewish Thought and Practice (taught by a rabbi), Islamic Thought and Practice, Cultural Backgrounds of the Bible, and History of the Holy Land from the Rise of Islam to the Creation of the Modern State of Israel (which has to be the longest title for a class in the history of education.) I am really enjoying the classes so far, as you can probably tell even by their titles are very interesting. I am also enjoying the new students who are here. I have already made great friends with them, and I'm sure we'll keep in contact for a while after we leave.
Well, I know already that this has been a very lengthy update, but it has been long past due. That is all for now. Please remember me in your prayers!
Much Love,
Stephen James Return to MtZion Jerusalem