Turkey actually tastes just as good in Cyprus as in the US, or at least when you have the right connections and can get one from America through the US embassy! We had Thanksgiving dinner with the Checketts, the Johnsons, the Larsens, and about 16 missionaries serving in the Greece mission. The mashed potatoes were made by a missionary from Sweden and they were so yummy. I'm not sure what the Swedes know that we don't. No, they were good, but I personally just love mashed potatoes whether they're made by Mom or Grandma Lindsay (or Grandpa when he was the official masher) or my old roommate Christy Warnick. Remember, Jacq??? Mmm. And for the first time in my life, I actually ate sweet potatoes and liked them. I'm experiencing so many new things in Cyprus.
It's actually 3:15 a.m., but we're leaving in the morning for Jerusalem so I thought I'd let you know what's happening. We've been up planning where we're going to go and talking to my kind and crazy friend Catherine who studied for 4 months in Jerusalem at the beginning of this year. Her advice: Go to the Shuk, the open air market. Go through Hezekiah's Tunnel without a flashlight. You get wet and it's creepy. (The tunnel ends at the pool of Siloam, which is where Jesus restored sight to a blind man by telling him to go wash in the pool. We're also going to the pool of Bethesda where Jesus told a man to go wash to be healed. The man had been sick for 38 years, but when Jesus told him "Arise, take up your bed, and walk," he did.) Get the best falafals at the Damascus Gate. Tell everyone we're Mormon because they'll give us a cheaper price. They LOVE the BYU students, which is great for us. Try the cow chocolate with poprocks in it. It's called popchoc! Isn't that so cool?
Friday (tomorrow) we land in the Telaviv Airport around 2 p.m., so we're going to go to our hostel first to drop off our stuff and then go straight to the Western Wall. And then to Dome of the Rock and St. Peter in Gallicantu. Saturday morning we're going to the Garden of Gethsemane, then to church at the Jerusalem Center(Saturday is the Sabbath here), then the Garden Tomb, the pool of Bethseda, Herods Gate, Demascus Gate, Golgotha, and some other places. At night we'll go to Hezekiah's Tunnel. Sunday we'll go to the Shuk and Omar's, and do whatever other shopping we want, and then we'll head to Bethlehem. Then we'll catch a bus to the Sea of Galilee for the rest of the week! This is all so unbelievable. We're going to the City of David! We're going to the place where Christ was crucified and where He rose again. It was real before, but now it will be even more personal to me.
Thursday, November 27, 2008
Tuesday, November 25, 2008
Sunday: The Best of the Best (our last day in Egypt)
1. Mandy didn't lose one single arm-wrestling match against the street boys we played with today.
2. Lori has new friends who call her Rambo, all because of her headband (and her guns).
3. We were all proposed to today and had rings put on our fingers. Lori and Katie accepted, but Mandy's holding out for an Israeli.
4. We met four amazing Egyptians who are so willing to give of their time and talents to help street kids. El-Hammi is the main director of the program and is known all over the country for his art TV show. He taught us how to make clothespin animals. I made a shark, Mandy made snowflakes, and Lori thought about making a camel.
5. Even though it cost us 70 pounds to pay our taxi driver Tarik to get us to the wrong terminal in the airport, it only cost 15 pounds, 15 minutes, and 50/50 English and Arabic to fix the problem and get to the right terminal! And the right terminal was way less crowded, so we didn't miss our flight! It all worked out.
6. Aunt Marlene made us a yummy home-cooked meal of angel hair pasta in a sweet honey mustard sesame sauce with chicken and carrots. SO delicious!!
7. Our last 45 minutes or so at home in Egypt we relaxed and watched our favorite parts of Enchanted while eating ice cream! (Egypt sells Snickers ice cream bars here!)
8. We're headed to the second leg of our journey--blue skies and blue water! I'm hoping for more white, fluffy clouds like we saw in Alexandria, and for some white walls like in The Sisterhood of the Traveling Pants. I can't wait! We arrive at 12:55 a.m. in Cyprus, and the Checketts are picking us up from the airport.
9. It's only Sunday even though it logically seems like Tuesday (because the Sabbath is on Friday) and feels like Saturday because we played all day with the little boys.
10. We had Greek candy for the first time--joker chocolates handed out on the airplane.
2. Lori has new friends who call her Rambo, all because of her headband (and her guns).
3. We were all proposed to today and had rings put on our fingers. Lori and Katie accepted, but Mandy's holding out for an Israeli.
4. We met four amazing Egyptians who are so willing to give of their time and talents to help street kids. El-Hammi is the main director of the program and is known all over the country for his art TV show. He taught us how to make clothespin animals. I made a shark, Mandy made snowflakes, and Lori thought about making a camel.
5. Even though it cost us 70 pounds to pay our taxi driver Tarik to get us to the wrong terminal in the airport, it only cost 15 pounds, 15 minutes, and 50/50 English and Arabic to fix the problem and get to the right terminal! And the right terminal was way less crowded, so we didn't miss our flight! It all worked out.
6. Aunt Marlene made us a yummy home-cooked meal of angel hair pasta in a sweet honey mustard sesame sauce with chicken and carrots. SO delicious!!
7. Our last 45 minutes or so at home in Egypt we relaxed and watched our favorite parts of Enchanted while eating ice cream! (Egypt sells Snickers ice cream bars here!)
8. We're headed to the second leg of our journey--blue skies and blue water! I'm hoping for more white, fluffy clouds like we saw in Alexandria, and for some white walls like in The Sisterhood of the Traveling Pants. I can't wait! We arrive at 12:55 a.m. in Cyprus, and the Checketts are picking us up from the airport.
9. It's only Sunday even though it logically seems like Tuesday (because the Sabbath is on Friday) and feels like Saturday because we played all day with the little boys.
10. We had Greek candy for the first time--joker chocolates handed out on the airplane.
Sunday, November 23, 2008
On the way to Alexandria
The countryside is beautiful! It's alive. The people, the sky, the clouds, the breeze. It makes me more alive! Everyone is at work. Donkeys pulling carts. People with their sickles working out in the fields. Women crossing the river fully clothed. Laundry. Sunshine. Rough stones and rickety bridges. Green palms along the long paved path walked by gray-haired women with baskets on their heads, old men wearing long dusty robes, and dirty, rowdy boys on their wobbly bicycles. Carts and cows and heavy loads. Lime green walls. Hasan. Waiting, working, fishing. Chewing and chewing and lazily watching. Babies in the back of pick-up trucks. Life and death. I see it all from the train. All beautiful because there's purpose and steadiness. A common, fluid rhythm.
Friday, November 21, 2008
Alex
We're headed to Alexandria tomorrow morning at 6 a.m. by train! The city's right on the Mediterranean Sea and is supposed to be beautiful. We miss you. . . and all I have to say is GO BYU!!! We'd be watching the game if we could, but I think it starts at 1 a.m. our time and we don't get that channel here in Maadi. :)
Carvings in the Rock
Once you get through the trash you come to these amazing carvings in the mountain, amphitheater, and cave church. The artist is Mario Debeesh from Poland. (He's the guy on the ladder in the picture.) He started his work in Garbage City (Maqaadi) in 1995, and we have no idea who, if anyone, has commissioned him to do this. He must be getting paid somehow. I honestly had no idea what we'd find in Garbage City, we'd just heard there were carvings near the church, so we really were amazed at the massive murals carved into the rock. I imagined some little scratchings on the side of a church.
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