Jerusalem Judds

Monday, June 20, 2011

Still Loving the Shephelah

Last Monday we joined the students on a field trip to the Shephelah or low hills area to the west of Jerusalem. If this sounds familiar, it's because we've visited this area several times. It's a fun area to visit, and we've been two other times with friends and family. Besides being fun, we are able to see firsthand how the ancient inhabitants of the land dealt with everyday challenges, like heat, hunger, thirst, war, and death.

Megan and Carrie didn't come along this time because they were swimming and playing tennis with other LDS youth from Tel Aviv, Haifa, and Galilee.

The first place we went was Tel es-Safit or Gath. This is in an area of soft, chalky limestone caves, such as this one behind Emily.

The hike to the top of Tel es-Safit was enjoyable because of the cool breeze blowing up the hill. Emily, Tashara, Sabrina, and Amanda stopped in the hollow of this rock.

At the top, we could see the excavation site where Jeff Chadwick spends his summers. Gath means press, as in Gethsemane, which means press of richness or oil. This was the hometown of Goliath, and David later found refuge here from King Saul. This tel is a good example of multiple layers of civilization built up the side of a hill on top of earlier structures. The crusaders built a tower on top, as well. Click here for a site where you can learn more about Gath.

A signpost points the way to the 4 other major cities in the Philistine pentapolis: Gaza, Ashkelon, Ashdod, and Ekron. In general, the cities on the west of the five main valleys were originally under Philistine control, and the cities on the east were controlled by the Israelites, and these two jockeyed for position until the Assyrians and Babylonians swept through. I had always seen mountains as a symbol of strength and communion with the divine, and certainly back home mountains are a place of recreation. But here in the holy land, I think it's fair to say that throughout history, mountains have primarily represented military might. A community could flourish under the protection of a strong defense.

On the way down from the summit, the sun was out in full strength. By June, this area is pretty dry, but the thistles are still in bloom.

The cacti are also happy this time of year. Amanda is worried because I asked everyone to pose closer to the cactus patch.

The occasional shade tree was also a welcome relief. This one grew nearly parallel to the ground.

After Gath, we were happy to find a cool underground hang-out, like this columbarium, or dove-cote in Mareshah. The dove's holes are up above. It's hard to get great photos in this dark, mossy, cruciform cave.

Troy Terry wanted to get a dove's eye view. Centuries ago, the doves raised here were useful for food, for producing fertilizer, and for export to Jerusalem for sacrifices.

The brightness of the outside world made a good contrast with the dim cave.

Emily finds another refuge from the sun.

Here in another cave, students learn about the olive press.

Emily measures the compressive and tensile strength of the limestone. She enlarged a natural hole and played with the dust.

Carrie gets bonus points for sharing her hat with Amanda.

Emily loves posing with students. Jamie is wearing the traveling orange shirt that gets worn by a different student every day.

Jarrett and Emily hit it off in the bus, with Emily taking pictures of Jarrett's silly faces.

This cistern would have collected runoff water for the community around the olive press. Centuries ago, it was discovered that boiling the soft limestone in water would yield a waterproof stucco with which they could coat the inside of a cistern. But as Jeremiah 2:13 points out, cistern water was always second rate compared to spring water. This is a powerful lesson about the importance of always partaking of the living word of God. Especially as we get older and our minds become more like a leaky cistern.

The house behind the trees covers the dual entrances to a huge cistern complex. There was storage for enough runoff water to support a very large community. If the winter rainy season was very wet, the larger cisterns would mean farmers could keep their plants producing longer into the summer season.

Do we ever have seasons of overflowing spiritual experiences, followed by times of trial? What do we do find and capture the Living Water?

Mareshah has a nice gift shop with cold treats. We learned that the taller the ice cream bar, the harder it is of the child when it breaks and falls.

Inside this cave, people were buried in niches along the walls. Emily loved these little holes and filled her hair with chalk as she explored. This is a Hellenistic style burial tomb, with paintings of animals and people.

Drew and Amanda pause at the shady entrance to the tomb.

Emily plays hide and seek with Jefferson.

Lisa was feeling cool in the shade.

At the Bell Caves, a hole in the hard limestone ceiling made a spotlight below.

Emily said this spot reminded her of the Holy Ghost.

Amanda says, "It's like you're in the light and all around you is the darkness."

After singing several hymns in the bell-shaped caves, the students made the most of the lighting, posing as Joseph Smith receiving the First Vision.

Lisa describes this photo, "I feel alive!"

And this one below is captioned, "The aliens are taking away my hat!"

After Maresha, we went to Lachish, where Israelites in 586 B.C. watch the Babylonian troops come closer to Jerusalem. Letters on potsherds found here reveal that guards were watching the signal fires at Azekah, and when the signal fires stopped, they knew they were next to be conquered.

Not even the tall walls or thick doors of Lachish could save them from the invasion. Emily poses near the threshhold of the gate.

At the Valley of Elah, Emily filled my pockets with rocks, and Lisa and Amanda practiced slinging.

Amanda was the star of the reenactment of David and Goliath, playing the role of Goliath's head. Scott Rowley played the rest of Goliath. Amanda said she loved being taller than everyone.

Lisa enjoyed the part when David (Julie Rencher) held up Goliath's head (Amanda).

After a long day on the bus and in the sun, we were tired but grateful for the chance to drive and climb and walk through biblical history.

Thursday, June 2, 2011

A Day in the Life of the Judds

Hello, dear friends!

What do the Judds do on a typical day in Jerusalem? I thought you'd never ask. Let me tell you about today, Thursday, June 2 (that's 2-5-11 to us Middle-Easterners.).  I woke the kids up around 6:15 am (except Megan, who gets up early by herself) and we ate eggs for breakfast. Megan, Carrie, Lisa, and Amanda put the finishing touches on their lunches. Amanda made sure to get five kisses on each palm before she left.

Then they headed up three flights of stairs to the upper gate, where a taxi shuttle van carries them and three Muhlesteins to the Anglican International School in West Jerusalem. While the kids wait, they usually chase each other or the stray cats. They are under strict orders not to touch the cats.  But today the van was waiting for us, and I waved goodbye after reminding them to wear their seatbelts and say "Shukran" to Hassan, their usual driver.

Frank usually teaches at 8 am, but today was special because his students took the first midterm. To help those who may need more than the allotted hour of class time, he offered an optional 7:30 test time. The students did pretty well, and while many were wishing they had stayed awake more during class time, at least one student finished before 8 am. Frank spent the morning correcting exams, then put the score slips in student's mailboxes right before lunch. He fed Emily lunch (probably pita sandwiches), put her down for a nap, then followed her example. He spent the afternoon emailing colleagues in Provo about his preexisting committee assignment, preparing for class on Friday, and getting ready for the field trip on Sunday (since Saturday is our Sabbath, Sunday is our P-day). He also met with students who wanted to know why their midterm scores were so low.

Emily spent the morning listening to songs, drawing with markers, flipping through Calvin and Hobbes books, and begging to watch Jim Jam, the BBC educational television station.  Our days often include a trip to the playground on level 1, or the "secret library," or the bomb shelter where the nursery toys live, or the laundry room (one has to be quick or one might find one's laundry folded by someone else!). I tidied up the apartment (actually two adjoining apartments) with two kitchens, a dining area and living room area, three bedrooms, and three bathrooms. With its nice cozy size, it's surprising how many hiding places there are for chess pawns, socks, and Scrabble pieces. Emily got a few minutes to play Friv.com, the kids' new "fave." It's "presh." Or in the student vernacular, it's "sick." (Or was it "phat"?) What is it with negative words mutating into positive ones? English slang is totally wicked.

While Frank fed Emily and studied Lehi's dream, I had an appointment with 7 students at the nearby Princess Basma School for the Disabled to begin another mural in their cafeteria. This project was supposed to begin on Monday, but there was a tiny bit of unrest which turned us back that day. Today everything was smooth. We loaded two ladders and three students in an old diesel van (yes, they all wore seatbelts) and Marilyn Bentley, our Humanitarian coordinator, drove the others a kilometer and a half to the school.   School is out for the elementary classes, but the physical therapy inpatients still use the cafeteria, so we work around their lunch time. From 12:30 to 2 pm the students spackled some nail holes and slapped on a base coat of Maple Pecan on an area roughly 12 ft by 12 feet. The final plan, headed by student Megan Nuttall, is a mosaic-style portrait of the cartoon Sinbad. (click for a picture). Mural painting is at the top of my list of activities for which even a mediocre end product requires an extraordinary amount of effort. It's always more time and effort than you think, and the ideal in your mind seems farther away the longer you work at it. But fun. And this one's for the kids.

After washing up and reloading the ladders, I dropped off students and went shopping at Wadi al-Joz (we call it 'Wadi Joes') for produce and milk. The parking is a little crazy, but free, and the Palestinian shopkeepers are always polite.  At the produce store the clerk rounded down the total price and his helper carried the melons and apples to the car for me. Across the street I bought necessities like milk, Gilboa cheese, a flat of eggs (unrefrigerated), sesame seed rolls, and tuna.

Frank and I hauled the groceries down two stories (thankful for elevators and rolling carts) as the kids trooped down the stairs from school. Julianne Muhlestein had bought us fresh pita from the "pita factory," and everyone munched while I put away groceries. Did I mention how grateful I am to have two refrigerators? The two ovens come in handy when I bake cookies for Frank's class--this may or may not coincide with teacher evaluations.

Meanwhile, Lisa told me her frustration at not getting a second turn to bat in rounders, which is like baseball, or maybe like cricket. Amanda was done with her weekly homework already, so she read me a book and then played with Emily and the Muhlesteins in the gym. Carrie worked on her Robin Hood paper, and Megan refined her Design Tech schematic drawing of a wooden helicopter toy.

At five o'clock, I took Megan, Carrie, and Tashara Muhlestein to the Anglican school to watch the Merchant of Venice (30 shekels for me, 15 shekels each for the younger girls, Megan got in free because she made the programs and helped paint a backdrop and the three 'caskets'.) In the small lawn of the fenced campus, director Vicki Bonaccurso prefaced the play with an overview of the religious tensions of contemporary England, and explained that what seems like a cruel, stereotypical portrayal of Shylock was actually somewhat more sympathetic and progressive than was common in Shakespeare's day. Nonetheless, the play deals with sensitive issues of religion and revenge in ways that are intentionally uncomfortable. The international cast of 9th through 11th grade students mastered the antiquated English text. Nachum Barucohen played Shylock, ponytailed Yazan Barghauti was Bassanio, and Megan's friend Shambhavi Tiwari was a dignified judge.  Alex Olang and a 5 piece rock band sent strains of "Money for Nothing" and other thematic music across the busy streets not far from the Jewish Shuk shopping area in Mahane Yehuda.  A powerful moment came when Noemy Ramirez as Portia delivered the immortal lines:

The quality of mercy is not strained.
It droppeth as the gentle rain from heaven
Upon the place beneath. It is twice blest:
It blesseth him that gives and him that takes.
Tis mightiest in the mightiest; it becomes
The throned monarch better than his crown.
His scepter shows the force of temporal power,
The attribute to awe and majesty,
Wherein doth sit the dread and fear of kings.
But mercy is above this sceptered sway;
It is enthroned in the hearts of kings;
It is an attribute of God himself;
And earthly power doth then show like God's
When mercy seasons justice.

The play was poignant in the middle of this special city with so much need for peace, so much tension between mercy and the scepter of temporal power.

We drove home to the Jerusalem Center and found the little kids watching the end of Bolt. Frank kept saying, "I thought you said it was almost over."  We heard fireworks during family prayer, a very common sound on Thursday nights. We used to tense up at the first bang and relax only when we actually saw the flash of light. Now we're more used to the popcorn sound and the loud Arabic music that accompanies weddings and other celebrations.    The day ended with Carrie printing her Robin Hood paper (The color printer is upstairs, only 40 agorot per page--that's .40 shekel, about 13 cents).

Well, I better end before the clock strikes 0:00!

Saturday, May 28, 2011

Galilee

Thanks, Carrie for your help with this blog! --Mom

ur welcome --Carrie

Mom stayed in Galilee with Dad and Emily...

Beautiful Mosaics (We visited a school/shop in Madaba where locals, some of whom are disabled, received training to make, replicate, or restore mosaics. Click here to read more about Madaba mosaics.)