YOJO: You Only Jeru Once!

Another trip out into the city!! Seriously if I could just spend every day in the city I would!! First thing we did was exchange money!! We go to Aladdin’s to exchange money every time and every time I find a new note on the wall that I haven’t read before! I can’t wait to leave a note there for futures JCers!!

We decided to go into the city through Herod’s gate to see if there were any kids who wanted to play soccer! Turns out, there was!! It was soo much fun! They are really good! They were just little kids and they were waaayyy better then I was! It is always so much fun to play with them!

After we decided to go into the Jewish Quarter because we hadn’t been there yet! So we were walking through the Muslim quarter to get there and this guy stopped us and asked us where we thought he should go. he said that he was only going to be in the city for one day and what we would recommend he see. We told him what we thought and then got talking to him about why he was here for only a day and he told us he was here for a pilgrimage. You would assume that it he would have been Christian, or Jewish but it turns out he was Baha’i.  I had never heard about the religion before but here is a little info about what it is.

“The Bahá'í Faith is the youngest of the world's independent religions. Its founder, Bahá'u'lláh (1817-1892), is regarded by Bahá'ís as the most recent in the line of Messengers of God that stretches back beyond recorded time and that includes Abraham, Moses, Buddha, Krishna, Zoroaster, Christ and Muhammad.

The central theme of Bahá'u'lláh's message is that humanity is one single race and that the day has come for its unification in one global society. God, Bahá'u'lláh said, has set in motion historical forces that are breaking down traditional barriers of race, class, creed, and nation and that will, in time, give birth to a universal civilization. The principal challenge facing the peoples of the earth is to accept the fact of their oneness and to assist the processes of unification.”

It is quite interesting I thought but he was really nice and he spoke English so that was kinda nice ahaha. Anyway so we continued on through the Muslim quarter to get to the Jewish quarter and I made everyone stop so that I could take a picture. One of the little, I guess you could call them restaurants, had a sign that said “pomegranate juice is chuck Norris approved!” hahahaha I could not stop laughing I thought it was great so I had to stop and take a pic.

When we thought we had gotten to the Jewish quarter it turns out we had walked right into the western wall. We decided that we should go in since most of us hadn’t been back since that Friday and we couldn’t take any pictures then. I also really wanted to write my prayer on a piece of paper and stick it in the wall. The Jewish believe that prayers go directly to go from the wall to heaven because it is the closest thing to the temple there is. I know that I don’t believe this to be completely true but I thought that I should do it at least once while I am here! I decided that I need to experience as much as I can and continue learning and taking part in other cultures while I am here! So far it has been amazing and eye opening.

There is my note!! :) It is the biggest one there in the middle of the picture.

The men's side. Women aren't allowed in but we can look in

After the western wall it finally on to the Jewish quarter. By the time that we finally got there we had to split because part of our group was going to do the carillon bells. So we split up and it ended up being just me, Sarah Write, Spencer A, and Hannah. It was really cool. We started off on this street that was part of the original city. It was really neat to see. After that we decided to head over the four synagogues. Once we got there, we found out that you had to pay to go in and we weren’t quite sure whether or not it was actually worth it, so we didn’t go much farther than just inside the door.

 It was really neat though because the Jewish quarter is so much calmer, quieter and 10 million times cleaner. It is interesting to me how much different it looked. It was like coming back into modern times but we were still in the old city! It was crazy!

While we were exploring we saw this jewelry store and it was really neat because a lot of the jewelry had pieces of rock that were from the original city (or temple wall I can’t remember). Either was we decided to stop and look. The pieces where gorgeous but extremely expensive! There were a couple amazing pieces that were made that were not for sale. They were extremely intricate and beautiful! A picture definitely wouldn’t do any of the pieces justice that is for sure!

After that we were walking down the street and we saw a synagogue. We decided we wanted to stop in and see it. Well when we walked in we kinda got in trouble and told that we had to leave. I am pretty sure that we walked in on the men’s side and there were three girls in the group! Haha it was kind of funny to be honest!

Then we decided to just walk around and explore. We were trying to look for the archaeological gardens but we are either blind or we honestly just couldn’t find it. We ended up just walking through the neighborhoods and exploring and it was really neat! The streets where beautiful! Then we decided it was time to go to the Tower of David Citadel.

The Tower Of David is a Museum is a restored citadel that is King David Castle. This would have been where he would have seen Bathsheba. It was really neat! We walked in and walked up to the highest point of the museum. When we got to the top you could see all around the city! It was amazing!! You could see the old city, West J, and pretty much everything! It was absolutely beautiful!! We stood up there for almost an hour just talking and looking out over the city. By the time we were done up there, Sarah and I were super hungry so we decided to head out. We kinda walked through the rest of the stuff but we didn’t really look although I wish that we had. Anyway it was really pretty and neat!

Hannah and Spencer

On the Shabban’s again! I feel like I can’t go out without going to Shabban’s haha! So we went by Shabban’s and I ordered some things and we just kinda looked around. Then we were getting ready to head out of the old city when we saw some of our fellow JCers. We stopped and talked to them for a little and it was right outside this little falafel place so we stopped to get something to eat. It was ABSOLUTELY AMAZING!! I loved it sooo much!! The guy was super duper nice!

While we were there eating, there was a group of about three ladies sitting there and we got talking to them. One of them was attending Hebrew University (which is right up here on the hill next to the Jerusalem Center). She asked where were where staying and we told her the Mormon University (because that is what everyone knows the JC as haha). When we said that, she got all excited. She said that a couple years ago she had a guy in one of her classes that went there for church and she thought it was really cool. I kind of wish that we could have talked to her about it more but we agreed not to so we just said how cool it was and changed the subject back to why she was here. She was studying Israeli politics (which are suuupppppeeeerrrr confusing) and she was from the US. It was kinda neat to see that even in a place like this you can run into people who know about the church.

After Falafel we decided to stop at Jimmy and Omar’s shops (the olive wood shops). Spencer and Hannah needed to stop by and I always like looking so I didn’t complain one bit! Off we went to Omar’s first then Jimmy’s then home for the night! All in all it was definitely a good trip into the city and super fun!