ISRAEL'S TOP 10 THINGS--well, 11 minus 1

In no particular order…

1. Israel is a diverse place in every way: even its natural beauty can shift from dry desert to lush greenery.

2. The food! The food here is absolutely incredible… So rich and so fresh. I can see why meals here have brought people together since the beginning of time! Hmmm, maybe all of the world leaders just need to get together and eat.

3. Olive trees. They are so old and so beautiful. If the trees could talk… The Garden of Gethsemane is just a small garden of olive trees… I ate one fresh off the tree… not the same!

4. Wandering away from the tourists to remind oneself of what it’s really about. Although, this got me into trouble from time to time… mainly just with my guide—a descendent of the shepherds in Bethlehem, who threatened me with the Biblical story of the shepherd breaking the lamb’s legs in order to keep it close… I had to be reminded often.

5. The peaceful countryside and old ruins… I enjoyed this much better than the gaudy shrines that people have made out of significant places—At the same time, if they wouldn’t have done this, then we might not have known where things took place.

6. Experiencing the sorrow. Without the group noticing, I stayed behind… down in the dungeon where Jesus was chained to the walls and held as he awaited his execution. I just sat there in the silence, with my wrists and ankles pressed against the cold damp stone… thinking how strong those chains must have been… to hold up the weight of the world.

7. Freshly squeezed pomegranite juice!

8. Tons of beautiful artifacts everywhere… even being made into jewelry, like my widow’s mite and Roman glass cross necklaces…. {which I’m not sure if I actually agree with, but was apparently happy to enable}.

9. The intensity in the air—especially in Jerusalem. For better or worse, it is always there and always tangible… definitely unique to this place.

10. The water: Sea of Galilee, River Jordan, Dead Sea… there is something mystical (or maybe just miraculous) about them.

11. Experiencing several different religious ‘holidays’ at the same time (Rosh Hashanah, Yom Kippur, and Ramadan)… and hearing varying calls of prayer—which was also a little freaky, they were so overwhelmingly powerful/ forceful. I had a love/ hate relationship with the eeriness of it.

-1. The worst part about Israel, for me… was learning the truth. And realizing that there is no black and white—just gray. The only clear line… is a giant wall with barbed wire on top. [Enlightening fact: There are Christians living inside this “West Bank” wall… and only 5% of them are allowed to pass through it.]