Jerusalem

Wednesday January 30 - Jerusalem

The fact that I slept in Jerusalem last night meant that I didn't have to be on a bus at 7am and for that I am grateful.  When the bus came to get me (shortly after 9) all of the other passengers had been on it for 2 hours already, having come from Tel Aviv.  The guide for the day is Scottish, Sylvia, and she was disappointed that I am not Scottish and that I wasn't wearing a kilt.  She assumed a lot from looking at my name and you know what assume means...

Our first stop was the Mount of Olives where we could get an overview and panorama of the Old City of Jerusalem.  I usually like to get the big picture before diving in, so I appreciated that we started there even though it was cold and a bit rainy.  Encouraged by Sylvia, I bought the labeled panorama view for 5 sk, or just over 1$.  It rolls up tight and will help me identify what I was looking at.  The one below is my picture.

The view of Jerusalem's old city from the Mount of Olives. 

Unfortunately, right after this pleasant experience we spent way too long at and over priced souvenir shop called the Mount of Olives Bazaar.  If the prices had been in shekels instead of dollars it might have been reasonable, but it wasn't and I wasn't going to buy anything and resented having to wait for others that did.  (Maybe resent is too strong of a word.)  We finally got back on the bus and headed towards the old city.  There were several sites that Sylvia pointed out to us as we zoomed past.  "Look to your left, through this doorway, you'll be able to see olive trees that are 1600 years old" zoom.  "Look to your right, between these two buildings, you'll be able to see the top of this church" zoom.  "Look straight ahead, above the rooftops to this one particular roof, that belongs to this church" zoom.  It was quite unsatisfying.  (At this point I have been saving up all the unpleasant things I have to say about the tours I have been on in general, and my tour agent in particular.  I might get around to writing about them in detail as some point, but perhaps I wont and my grouchiness will just fade away unremembered...)

This was in look while we zoom past category, but I just happened to get most of it in my picture.  It is the fascade to the Basilica of the Agony in the Garden of Gethsemane, also known as the Church of all Nations.  The present church was built in 1924.

We entered the Old City by the Jaffa gate between the Christian and Armenian quarters.  We walked down David street to the Cardo, "an excavated and partially restored section of the main street of Byzantine era Jerusalem" Eye Witness guide book, p 78 where I took a gratuitous cat picture.

What has been excavated of the cardo.  Note it is several meters below current Jerusalem, reminding me to ask, did no one sweep for the last 1500 years that so much dust would accumulate to bury everything 2 meters down?

This mosaic (copy) shows Jerusalem during the Byzantium period ~1500 years ago it was much smaller.  The cardo is the in the middle.  

Here is an artists rendition of what the Cardo might have looked like.  The guy on the left looks so lifelike, I would almost believe he was real.  

Our next stop was the Western wall, all that is left of the second Temple.  Sylvia said that the first 7 blocks are original, but above that it is reconstruction done in the Ottoman time.  The wall was split into the woman's section (smaller but with many more people) on the right and the men's section on the left.  I went in, but it was too crowded for me to get very close to the wall.

Many women praying at the western wall. 

The men's side was much less crowded, but I am sure the prayers were just as heartfelt. 

From the wall we went to the Muslim quarter to the 3rd station of the cross on the via Dolorosa where Jesus falls under the weight of the cross for the first time.  We followed the stations all the way to the Church of the Holy Sepulchre in the Christian quarter.

This cross was at the 5th station, one controlled by Franciscans.  Sylvia told us what the arms meant, but both the guy I was standing near and I missed it.  I have since learned that the bare arm is Jesus's and the sleaved arm is St. Francis, although how he got a nail mark in the middle of his palm, I do not know.

Outside the 5th station was a rock where Jesus supposedly rested his hand and now you can put your hand there too.

The church of the Holy Sepulchure doesn't look all that impressive from the outside, but inside it is huge and all sorts of different in different places. 

Apparently there are six different denominations represented in the church: Armenians, Greeks, Copts, Roman Catholics, Ethiopians and Syrians, and they couldn't agree to who should hold the key, so they gave it to the Muslims who open the door every morning at 4am and lock it again every evening at 8pm.  Inside there are lots of chapels and niches and places that different things 'happened.' I know Jerusalem isn't that big of a place, but I have a hard time believing that Golgotha was really 20 steps from Joseph of Aramathea's tomb.  

This is a Greek Orthodox chapel, on the second level of the church.  Under the alter is the actual rock where the cross was placed and Christ was crucified.  You can stand in line to crawl under and pray there, but I chose not to.

This mosaic greets you when you first enter and it shows, from right to left, Christ being taken down from the cross, being prepared for burial and being placed in the tomb.  The whole mosaic is probably 30 feet across and takes up about a third of the distance between these three events if their locations with in the church are to be believed.

This was in an underground chapel and it is supposedly where the true cross was kept for years before it was stolen.

This is the line to get into Christ's Tomb.  The line is only as much as you can see, which Sylvia says is very short.  She still wouldn't let us stand in it as we would get off her schedule.

Instead she took us to the tomb where Joseph was eventually buried since he had given his tomb to Jesus.  I don't understand why he couldn't use his own since Jesus didn't use it for very long, it should have been empty in plenty of time.  

This is the marble slab that Jesus was laid out on to be prepared for burial.  It was placed here in 1820 and is therefore completely authentic.

That pretty much finished the Old City for us, which was a real disappointment for me.  I would really have liked to go to the dome of the Rock.  I understand that non-Muslims haven't been able to go in since 2000, but I would still have liked a closer view.  (I am not sure that Sylvia knew that it wasn't open because when I asked she seemed to think I could visit, but two other independent people have said that it isn't.)  I would also have liked more time to walk around.  It is possible that we had seen the highlights and that the law of diminishing returns would kick in, but there were lots of other museums and churches to visit at the very least.   My original itinerary had a whole day in the Old City and a half day in the new city GRRR.

As we left the Old City, I took this picture of David's gate.  Later in the evening I came back to see the sound and light show here, but didn't get to explore the museum at all. 

After lunch at a kubutz, we split into three different afternoon tours.  A group was going on to the dead sea, a group was going to Bethlehem to see the church of the nativity and my group was going to Yad Vashem, the memorial to the holocaust.  We dropped of the Bethlehem folks just outside the wall.  They walked in and were met by a different guide who showed them the church and then gave them the opportunity to shop before they were picked up by our driver and brought to the museum to pick us up.  I was glad that I got to see the wall and I am looking forward to going through it on Saturday when I visit Bethlehem, which is governed by the Palestinian Authority.

The wall around Bethlehem

My small group went on to Yad Vashem, where we visited three separate places.  First the Children's museum, then the hall of remembrance and finally the holocaust museum.  The children's museum was dark inside and you were first greeted with images of children who were killed flashing on screens as you entered. Then, following a hand rail because it got quite dark, you walked into a room where names, ages and countries of origin were being read.  The whole room was lit with just 5 candles that were reflected over and over again by the walls which were covered in mirrors.  The effect was like looking into the night sky.  It was well done and very powerful.

These unfinished columns represented the unfinished lives of the 1.5 million children  killed in the holocaust.

 The remembrance hall was a simple open air building that you walked around on a raised platform.  The names of the major concentration camps were listed and there was an eternal flame.

Remembrance Hall - the concentration camps names and the mixed ashes of the victims as well as the eternal flame and if there is a head of state visiting, they leave a wreath.

Finally, for the main event, we went into the museum itself (no pictures allowed).  We wound our way back and forth across the toblerone shaped building learning the history and seeing many artifacts, movie clips and photographs of the victims.  The museum was very well done, very modern and well organized.  It was full of people, mostly Israelis - school groups and young military recruits by the look of them.  At first I was disapointed that we would only have an hour to go through it, but more would probably have been overwhelming, so I didn't feel too badly that I had to leave to meet the group.

The exit end of the Yad Vashem Holocaust museum.

There were just three of us who were staying in Jerusalem, so the tour company called a taxi for us and we were sent back to my hotel.  The ladies who came with me were actually staying in Tel Aviv, but they had dinner plans with a friend later on so had some time to kill.  We sat in a cafe across from the Jerusalem Tower Hotel while they tried to contact thier friend and I ate a brownie.  The afternoon was still relatively fresh and I was thinking about what to do with the rest of my day.  Sylvia had suggested the Elevator of Time, which I guess is like star tours in that it is a movie with shaking seats, but I had seen a sign for a light and sound show at David's tower, which sounded more interesting.  Looking at their website, it showed a 6pm tour of the museum in English followed by a 7pm show for Wednesday January 30.  Google maps showed that it was a 13 minute walk from the hotel and the ladies were willing to wait for me as I put another layer of clothing on before we walked that way together.  The hotel guy suggested that I didn't need to make a reservation given that it was the low season, but that I should take a blanket if I didn't have another jacket because it was outside and it would be cold.  I got as dressed as I could and took a blanket and we walked down to the Old City.

When I asked for the tour and the show, I was told that the museum was closed and all there was was shows, but there was a 6pm show if I wanted to see that.  Sure, that would be fine.  The ladies were cold and even though they had the time they didn't have the warmth to stay for the show and they headed off to find either more clothes or shelter.  I chatted with some Methodists who were in a big group touring around for a week.  There might have been a few drops of rain while we were standing waiting to be let in, there might have been a few more as we walked to our seats, but the rain didn't start in earnest until the show did, almost as if it was part of the special effects.  We had been warned at the ticket booth that the show would go on even if it rained and that there would be no refunds.  Tamam.  They passed out plastic ponchos and I had my blanket.  I do wish I had spent a little more time arranging myself before the show started.  The blanket was covering parts of me, the poncho was covering parts, so some parts were warm and other parts were dry, but only a few parts were warm and dry.  The show was good.  It was on the history of Jerusalem, but it wasn't narrated, so if you didn't already know the basic outline it would have been hard to follow.  I am sure there were lots of details I missed because all I know is the basic outline.  Technically it was very impressive, projecting onto the walls and using the contours of the walls to give dimensions to the movies flat parts and using the corners of the walls to make corners in the movie.  I wonder what the movie would have looked like projected on a flat surface.  I would guess that it wouldn't make much sense.  It pretty much rained for the exact 45 minutes of the show, but there were only 5 minutes or so when it was really pouring and I am thankfully covered with a hydrophobic and insoluble layer of skin, so I survived the experience.  I even made it back to the hotel, although not as seamlessly as I found the venue in the first place.  When I got there I was tired and wet and didn't get very far on this blog which is why I am publishing it now, two days late.

If I had this trip to do again, I would definately put an extra day in Jerusalem and it could probably take a total of 3 to see the highlights to my satisfaction.  At least I had the two nights there and didn't have to get the bus back to Tel Aviv.