Fast Saturday

"Oh yea, tomorrow is fast Sunday."
"No, it's fast Saturday."

Here at the Jerusalem center, we follow the Jewish tradition of the Sabbath being on Saturday, and Sunday being a free day. Not going to lie, it feels really weird. But I like it. Instead of partying all day Saturday and then not wanting to do homework the next day because it's Sunday, we do Sunday all day Saturday then can do whatever we want on Sunday. As in, homework. Because yes, I still do have homework, and a lot of studying. In one of our classes, Anchient Near Eastern Studies, there are only 10 A's and 12 A-'s given out to 79 students. So yea, some studying is going to happen.

Today after church, being forced to fast until 4 when the cafeteria opens, the majoirty of the students decided to go out into the city. I joined a group that was headed for the Garden of Gethsemane. I say headed, because we couldn't find it. And we ended up getting turned around and a little lost on the Mount of Olives...but we made it back! And in time for dinner!

We knew that the Garden of Gethsemane was located somewhere south of the Jerusalem Center, and so we just started walking. There was this one road that we knew would lead us directly there, but some of our tour guides from Thursday had told us to avoid the road at all costs, so we took the long way around, and ended up exploring the Mount of Olives.

As was explained to me by a guy in our group, it's Jewish tradition that when Christ comes again, the first people to be resurrected will be those buried on the Mount of Olives. So everyone wants to be buried there. And the hill is just covered with tombs. They are everywhere, squeezed into every available space. It's kinda sad, the Mount of Olives is in East Jerusalem, the Palestinian part of the city where the Jews don't go, so the cemeteries aren't as kept up as they could be.

As we were exploring, we stumbled on Dominus Flevit, which is the church that marks the place where Christ wept over Jerusalem. From the church you have a perfect view of the Dome of the Rock, which is located in the place where the temple used to be. You could almost see Christ sitting up there, looking down at the city, and the temple, knowing exactly what was going to happen to it, and just being so sad.

After that, we just kinda took streets in the general direction of the Jerusalem center until we found it. We could keep our bearings because of the Hebrew University tower, which is on the hill behind the center. And we were in a pretty big group. Remember how in my last post I mentioned how we always needed to have a guy with us? The guys in the group I was with were very good about keeping an eye on the girls. Making sure that we were all there, not letting us get seperated in the crowds. They know that our safety is partially on them, and they're taking that seriously. Another reason why you all shouldn't worry about me. :)