22/8/11 – 23/8/11
Jerusalem, Israel
1747 local time
(Firstly, HAPPY BIRTHDAY MUM) – Alrighty!
Phew, what a massive day! I have just returned back from 7 hours of walking around Jerusalem. It was an awesome day! My mind has been totally changed, we all see from the news as Israel being this country that wants to take take, take, and all they are doing are firing rockets into West Bank and Gaza (Palestine territory) but when you start speaking to the locals they are always on alert about what is happening, and of course very worried.
The best way I can explain it to all the people from Melbourne that read this is: Remember the day when that bloke shot 2 people in central Melbourne all regarding drugs. That day, a fair majority of Melbourne were watching their backs and worried about if he was going to be caught or worse if he were going to attack again.
Now imagine that feeling every day, this is what the old and the young are feeling every day, and no, they don’t get desensitized to it at all. How can you, when everyday you are reading in the paper, seeing on the news new attacks to different parts of Israel, or rockets that have been intercepted that were heading to Jerusalem.
OK, so hopefully you have a better understanding about how the Israelis feel, I will now tell you about how I feel and how beautiful I think their country is.
So today I left Sandra’s lovely apartment at 9.30am after a delicious breakfast, only armed with a Banana and 3 litres of water I set off. I was fortunate enough to arrive at the right time to go on a 3 hour tour that took us to all 4 quarters of the Old City Jerusalem. It was fantastic and also very interesting. I took some amazing photos. For me, the most amazing sights were of the Western Wall in the Jewish area, looking at the front of the Church of the Holy Sepulchre which was located in the Christian section, the Muslim section was interesting but you couldn’t see all that much, but just wait for tomorrow, and then there was the Armenian section which wasn’t all that nice to look at, but had some amazing stories.
After the tour finished, we had to do the awkward obligatory tip to our tour guide and then I quickly set off again. I walked to the end of Old City and caught bus 73 to the top of the Mt. Olives where I proceeded to walk down.
I was fortunate enough to sneakily tag along to a Nigerian tour group, luckily enough they spoke English by an outspoken American tour guide! The Nigerians were super cool though and I took a ton of photos for them.
By this time the day was getting on, it was around 4pm and like I said earlier I left at 9.30am! I had drunk all my 3 litres of water, my feet were killing me and my body was aching all over!
By the time I got back to Sandra’s I was a wreck, I dumped my stuff and went straight downstairs to the swimming pool and had a swim and a spa and then felt refreshed enough to head back up for a beautifully cooked spaghetti Bolognese from Sandra!
After I slammed this down, I headed off down town again as there was a festival on, I paid my 45NIS ($15 AUD) and then sat down and listen to a awesome Reggae band from Israel that sounded very similar to Blue King Brown, they were called Odelyah and the Soulmates. Honestly check them out on Facebook, add Odelyah (tell her I sent ya) and you will be able to download her music! Its fantastic.
She played for over an hour, after that I wandered around the festival and had a look at all the stalls from all over the world.
From there I heard some more music, (not in English) as I walked around the corner the guy was playing in front of a crowd that was 10,000 or more! It was fantastic! I stayed and listened for over an hour not understanding anything he was saying but it was fantastic just to be in the atmosphere of it all. Eventually I found out that his name was Mosh Ben Ari. Check him out!
By this time it was getting on 11pm, I was a tired wreck, I stumbled my way back to Sandra’s tried to watch Ben Hur but passed out instead!
What an amazing day… Tomorrow I’m off to Bethlehem and Hebron… West Bank!
Much Love and Shalom!
Steve xx
