Tuesday, February 11 - Amman to Nazareth

We started out the day in Amman, then went to Madaba. We looked at St. George's Orthodox church and checked out all the mosaics there. From Madaba, we went up to Mt. Nebo, passing by the place where Moses is said to have split the waters. We went up Mt. Nebo and, just as Moses did, looked out over the Promised Land.

We looked out, and then went on down into the Jericho Valley. Jericho is the world's oldest continuously inhabited city -- people have been living there for 10,000 years. On the way down, we saw camels and sheep and goats and donkeys. We watched the terrain change from dry and sterile to the green, lush valleys.

To get to Jericho, we had to go acroos the King Hussein bridge (the Allenby bridge if you're Israeli). We entered the West Bank, crossing through Jordanian border patrols, then Israeli border patrols and finally through Israeli customs. Not sure what the big deal was with getting off the bus, getting our luggage and getting back on a different bus, since customs didn't look at our bags. They did have us do biometrics, though -- much like the Clear Card, with the left and right index fingers.

In Jericho, we saw the sycamore tree Zaccheus climbed up. We revisited the Scriptures, since the original Greek does not specify who was short of stature; some English translations imply that it was Jesus who was short of stature, though most of us have lived with the idea that it was Zacchaeus who was short. The point was to be careful -- very careful with one's biblical interpretation. While neither that point nor the thought that archaeology may not confirm the existence of the Jericho walls was a dealbreaker for me, it seemed that there was a little discomfort on the bus.

While we entered Jericho from the south, we intended to go through the city and depart from the north entrance. But the northern checkpoint was closed, so we had to turn around and come back through the southern checkpoint. Most tourists don't go through these checkpoints -- they are just for the Palestinians.

After Jericho, we stopped at a falafel shop. I ordered a falafel salad, and got four falafel balls, some Turkish eggplant, some hot stuff, and some babaganoush. I think Amir's Falafel has better falafel. We saw lots of street urchins and peddlers; Peter explained how incredibly hard times are for Palestinians -- some may have lived in Israel all their lives, but unless they join the Israeli army they're not able to work or have access to normal Israeli society.

Then we came up to St. Margaret's seminary. It's nestled in the hills above Nazareth. I can't wait til tomorrow morning, to see the sunrise and to see clear views from the hill. The Basilica of the Annunciation is on the hillside, so we'll see that tomorrow.

I hate that Google in Israel is right-formatted. It's all in Hebrew and I can't find the setting to switch the captions and formatting to English. At least in Jordan, I could switch it to an English page....