Jerusalem 

Basilica of the agony

Rockefeller Museum 

Mount of Olives, from afar

Liz at Masada watchtower 

Rockefeller Museum 

Rockefeller Museum 

Garden of Gethsemane

Rockefeller Museum 

Jerusalem from Mount of Olives, cemetery below

Masada

Jerusalem 

Rockefeller Museum 

Masada and the Dead Sea

Mount of Olives and cemetery from afar 

Dovecote, Masada 

Jerusalem

Stone, song and soldiers: those are my three strongest impressions of Old Jerusalem. 

Stone. The entire old city is built of a pale limestone that shines golden in the sun. The walls of the city, the towers, archways, buildings old and new. Huge blocks of it everywhere, some smooth, some rough, stacked upon one another. A few streets wide enough for modern traffic, an open square or two, the Western Wall, crooked cobblestone streets with buildings leaning in - you’re always surrounded by stone. 

Song. Singing near or far, in the day, at night, in the streets, from the yeshivas, the father and son of our home stay; calls to prayer from mosques; Christian church bells tolling; each day was filled with song.  

Soldiers. They were visible everywhere, men and women, small and tall, carrying rifles, manning checkpoints, mixing with crowds. It’s impossible to forget that Israel is a disputed territory, its very right to existence denied by its neighbours. On entering Israel, you get a loose leaf stamp, not a passport stamp, because you cannot enter the Muslim countries with an Israeli stamp in your passport. Even though you can, for example, fly into Jordan from Israel or make a land crossing into Jordan from Israel, you cannot have the Israeli stamp in your passport. 

My friend, Liz, has joined me for this part of the trip and it’s such a pleasure to relax with a good friend and experience the delights of travel with her. We spent most of our time in the old city, where we stayed in the tiny attic room of a teensy, old stone home. It was an apartment really, but the stairs led only to one other home. Out the windows were rooftop terraces of other attached homes. It’s like all the buildings have been stuck together and you enter each from a different address, even a different street. And it was so wonderful to be in the old city! We spent hours wandering the timeless, narrow streets with their synagogues, mosques, churches, souks, restaurants, steps, homes, donated public buildings (the Dan Family of Canada Building sticks in my memory) and the Western Wall. 

We left the old city walls to shop in the Mahane Yehuda Market for veggies (a pure delight for someone who has not eaten fresh vegetables since the end of October!), olives (I love olives with every meal, and in between too), hummus and freshly baked, warm laffa (a large flat pita-type bread). We also walked to the Mount of Olives, from where you can see the old city to advantage. From a distance it looks like there are large limestone blocks in a tumble on the side of the Mount, but as you approach you realize they are actually tombs, of rectangular golden stone in the most ancient graveyard in Jerusalem. On the only cold, rainy day of my winter thus far, we visited the Rockefeller Museum with its exhibits ranging from prehistoric times to nearly the present day. We both loved the displays, including the venerable skeleton laughing at death, but the entire museum is unheated. The excavated site of the City of Jerusalem is outside the walls as well but when we went we discovered the tour we were interested in is a “wet” tour and it would be best experienced in the heat of summer. One day we bussed out to Masada, with bus stops at two kibbutzes located in the dry mountains facing the Dead Sea; one old, established, and green, the other newer and more bleak. The site of Masada itself is stupendous. For a prairie girl who loves wide open spaces, I certainly have enjoyed all the time I’ve spent in the mountains. Well, mostly the time I’ve spent on top of the mountains, looking at wide open spaces from a height, I guess.

Masada was originally Herod’s palace fortress, with the Northern Palace complex having a large balcony looking out over mountains in one direction, and at the turquoise Dead 

Sea in another. Many walls are clearly visible, the site is still under excavation, and the same golden stone lies

everywhere. You can imagine daily life up there, with hundreds of poor people toiling to maintain the luxurious lifestyle of a king. Huge storerooms for food, and freshwater wells, equipped it to withstand a long siege. And that’s where the Jews of Masada made their last fatal stand against the Romans. It’s a story of terrible sadness. And among these weathered stones a group of boys, yeshiva students wearing tallits  and sporting broad brimmed black hats, played guitar and sang song after song. On our return by bus, two soldiers with their deadly weapons nonchalantly slung over their shoulders boarded for the ride home. Stone, song and soldiers once again. 

Ethiopia pictures

Timkat. He was in charge of the 4 horses.

Gelada monkeys

St George’s

 cross

Bet Merkorios 

View 

Ethiopia 3

I am sad to leave Ethiopia. India was wildly exciting, Sri Lanka was beautiful, but Ethiopia has kind of stolen my heart. 

It is poor - in some areas rural people live in “daub and wattle” homes, where thin eucalyptus trunks form the shape - round, square or rectangular - and then a mixture of dung, black mud and hay is packed between the sticks and smoothed to make richly dark and textured walls. Sometimes bright paints cover the surface. In others areas, stones are stacked to form beautifully textured homes. Roofs are of expertly fashioned thatch with saucy looking “tassels” at the peak, or of corrugated steel. Corrugated steel sometimes forms the walls of the house too. 

Its highways are mostly miserable, like India’s but with fewer completed miles. Two lanes at most. Tarmac suddenly peters out into dirt road studded with big rocks. Negotiating the mountains means roads are on the brink of the world with blind switchbacks - you literally have no idea what is around the corner. There is a memorial on one highway to the workers who lost their lives building it. On one stretch of road, farmers have dug frequent irrigation trenches across the dirt road, meaning you have to slow to a snail’s pace to cross them. But the cross country roads and highways are largely empty. Ethiopia may be on the verge of a development boom but up to now relatively few people own cars. (Although in the cities the traffic is chaotic and it may seem that everyone owns a car!) 

But the landscape gives you room to breathe, even when it’s mountainous. It is breathtaking. Looking down from the many heights we ascended, I often wished I were a geologist because the folds of earth, dips of valleys, cuts of rivers, and miles of exposed rock look like a book of nature waiting to be read. Everywhere, a bewildering variety of 

birds soar wild and free, and birdsong when they are roosting at night is of deafening beauty. They say Ethiopia has 10 months of sunshine - and that when it’s rainy season the sun still shines most of the day. 

There is a kind of still and spiritual centre to the country, (even with the broadcast  of prayer services), because so many people are drawn to the churches, for a visit and quick prayer. The many churches carved into the very mountains are in high and inaccessible places - but they are still active religious communities, and have been so continuously since nearly the advent of Christianity. Yesterday in Lalibela we rode mules, walked, mounted the mules again, walked some more (a total of about 10 kilometres) up the narrow, rocky path on the edge of a mountain to see Asheton Maryam Monastery. The mules sometimes lost their hind footing. When we descended, the loose stone and dirt made for many slips and falls. But when you are at the top, breathing in the beauty of the world lying all around and far below you; when you enter the rock with its carved, curved “antechamber”, and the silent centre chamber which houses the holy of holies, the replica of the ark of the covenant; when you see the carved crosses; when you view the ancient manuscripts with their now-familiar depictions of the saints and angels, you know you’ve reached a special place where human beings devote themselves to a higher vision. 

There is a mix of old and new ways here. The roads, even in the city, are shared with pedestrians, cows, camels, donkeys, goats and sheep - and sometimes chickens. Sparkling new high rises stand beside corrugated steel storefront-booths, on sidewalks where you can get your shoes shined or your runners washed. Restaurants serve traditional food alongside pizza. Friends and family still hand feed one another, in a  gesture of respect and affection. Men wear gabis (locally woven cotton shawls) over their suit jackets. Traditional and modern music of Ethiopia share a tonal structure dating back to St Yared, who wrote the first Ethiopian church music, which is still sung at services. Traditional shoulder dancing accompanies modern music. 

The people have really been the icing on the cake. You can see already how foreign tourism is a mixed blessing, with children asking for pens or money.  The gap between rich and poor is growing. But the good heart of the country is the strongest memory I will take with me. Strangers frequently made eye contact, waggled their eyebrows, smiled. People said hello, asked how I found their country, made recommendations for what I should not miss. They practiced their English with me, joked with me, offered to help me, ate with me, danced and sang with me, treated me as an honoured guest, and invited me to learn more about their world. I have loved being a part of it, even if only on the fringes, and even if only for a short while. 

Timkat

The feast of the Epiphany is a joyous time to be in Ethiopia. We spent both the Eve and the Day in Mekele -  not the usual tourist destinations of Gondar and Lalibela for this holiday, but a smaller town where we were among the few visible foreigners. Enough of a rarity that we were asked to be interviewed on TV.  That we were invited inside the  cordoned off area by the baptismal water, along with participants, priests and bishops. That people noticed us in the crowd and included us in the fun. 

I ventured into the crowds on my own and was greeted and welcomed countless times. People smiled, made small talk, encouraged me to take their pictures, drew me into dancing circles, got me to ululate, laughed with me at my efforts, shared mint stalks with me, instructed me on appropriate behaviour, asked to take selfies with me, walked beside me with their hands on my shoulder. I decided not to follow the tail of the procession today to its very end and sat on the curb, thinking other members of the tour would show up, and many said hello. One man stopped to be sure I was okay and invite me to coffee. I ended up walking back to the hotel on my own - well, not exactly. I pretty much had an escort the entire way. People walked with me a while, pointed me in the right direction, stopped me to say hello, and to appreciate my Ethiopian head covering. (I’d bought it in Addis.) Did I mention how warm Ethiopians are? As an outsider, I could not have asked for a better, more happily inclusive experience. 

Timkat, Mekele

Forgot this church and the camels

Simien Mountains