Israel IV

On July 14, I took a day tour to Jerusalem. The picture shows Old Jerusalem in Jerusalem. Inside the walls is Old Jerusalem.

The wall.

The views inside of Old Jerusalem. There were many orthodox Jews there.

At the corner of the balcony, a man is praying to the dome.

Close to the dome, there is a part of remaining West Wall. Some of the Jews pray by putting their heads on the wall. The praying spaces are separated for men and women. Somehow, the men’s space is larger. When entering this space, there is a security point to go through. Because this is a holy place, people, especially, women are forced to borrow a stole to hide their shoulders. I was one of them and because I had my sweater with me, I ended up wearing it in a very hot weather!

After the prayer, some people leave this place by walking backwards. I suppose it is rude to face their butts to the wall (the dome?).

Once entering to another street, everything is Arabic. Muslims live in this area.

	The church is a size of football field, and buildings are built on top of it. It’s like a town built on top of buildings. This is the view on top of the church. You can see that they are very old.

The spot where Jesus was put on the cross. There is a hole in front of the frame of Jesus, and this is the hole where the cross stood. I am not religious and I do not believe all the stories in the Bible, but when I see something like this in real life, it makes me think. There was a person whose name was Jesus, and he was actually executed on a cross. I have never imagined of such a place existed, and I never thought that I would be standing in front of that place. Other than this, there was a stone bed where Jesus’ body was washed after the execution. Something like this really happened 2000 years ago…

In souvenir shops, the most of the things are religious. The picture is statues made out of olive trees. These are really heavy. One of the Americans from my tourist group purchased a 1,000 dollar nativity statue set! It was pretty impressive, but it seems she spent about 2,000 dollars the last time when she was here. After purchasing this statue set, this sales guy was trying to sell her a Persian rug for another 1,000 dollars. Okay, she was really thinking about it but had guts to say no in the end. I’m very impressed by how some people shop for souvenirs!

This tour to Jerusalem turned out to be one of my most important trips in my life. Not that I will become religious from now on, but more like something opened up my eyes to something that I didn’t think was real. I certainly would like to recommend this trip to everyone!