So instead of boring you with all of the intricacies of getting through the plain-clothed security at the Israel-Jordan border, I will just tell you the cools things that happened afterwards. We finally arrived at our hostel, which is clean and filled with young, progressive Europeans (did I mention some are mind-blowingly hot women?)
We stowed our bags and walked out to find something to eat and lo and behold we found ourselves in a clean neighborhood with shops and restaurants all around that could have been in Germany or Holland or something like that. After an expensive lunch we returned to the Hostel to grab a free tour of the old city of Jerusalem just to get our bearings. On the tour with us was just one other women, a very short Indian women from New Delhi. She spoke amazing English and here is a sample of our conversation:
Me: "So what do you do?"
Her: "I work for Wikipedia."
Me: "Ha Ha seriously, what do you do?"
Her: "I work for Wikipedia, I am one of the only 70 employees."
Me: "AWESOME."
Any who... we saw just about all of the old city, but didn't get to go into the major sites because at that time the lines were too long or they were closed, so we spent most of our time in front of the Wailing Wall, the last remaining part of the original temple built by Herod. Yesterday we arrived on an amazingly lucky day to be in Jerusalem, as it was the anniversary of the first temple being destroyed and the second temple being destroyed. They were destroyed on the same day separated by a few hundred years and yesterday was that day. So on this holiday all of the stores and restaurants close and thousands of people visit the wall and pray over it while mourning the loss of the previous temples. You know all of those pictures you see of thousands at the wall crying? Yeah I was there, right in the middle of it.
So that was pretty much my first day, first impressions?
- Israel is overwhelmingly aggressive on all fronts, religiously, militarily, socially.
- There is a lot of contradiction between there traditions and the modern Israel (as far as I can tell)
- Arabs are nicer to Americans than Israelis
- Even though no one spoke English in Jordan, and everyone speaks it here, I could get around and communicate better in Jordan
- Israel's Old City is freaking sweet
- Israel's Old City is extremely photogenic
- Israel's Old City is awesome, one of the coolest places I have ever been
- I will return here to find a wife, the women here are on the same level as the Grove at game time, no lie
So I am going to the Holocaust museum today and the Israel national museum (Dead Sea Scrolls) so I will update again when I take some good pictures (like this one):
We stowed our bags and walked out to find something to eat and lo and behold we found ourselves in a clean neighborhood with shops and restaurants all around that could have been in Germany or Holland or something like that. After an expensive lunch we returned to the Hostel to grab a free tour of the old city of Jerusalem just to get our bearings. On the tour with us was just one other women, a very short Indian women from New Delhi. She spoke amazing English and here is a sample of our conversation:
Me: "So what do you do?"
Her: "I work for Wikipedia."
Me: "Ha Ha seriously, what do you do?"
Her: "I work for Wikipedia, I am one of the only 70 employees."
Me: "AWESOME."
Any who... we saw just about all of the old city, but didn't get to go into the major sites because at that time the lines were too long or they were closed, so we spent most of our time in front of the Wailing Wall, the last remaining part of the original temple built by Herod. Yesterday we arrived on an amazingly lucky day to be in Jerusalem, as it was the anniversary of the first temple being destroyed and the second temple being destroyed. They were destroyed on the same day separated by a few hundred years and yesterday was that day. So on this holiday all of the stores and restaurants close and thousands of people visit the wall and pray over it while mourning the loss of the previous temples. You know all of those pictures you see of thousands at the wall crying? Yeah I was there, right in the middle of it.
So that was pretty much my first day, first impressions?
- Israel is overwhelmingly aggressive on all fronts, religiously, militarily, socially.
- There is a lot of contradiction between there traditions and the modern Israel (as far as I can tell)
- Arabs are nicer to Americans than Israelis
- Even though no one spoke English in Jordan, and everyone speaks it here, I could get around and communicate better in Jordan
- Israel's Old City is freaking sweet
- Israel's Old City is extremely photogenic
- Israel's Old City is awesome, one of the coolest places I have ever been
- I will return here to find a wife, the women here are on the same level as the Grove at game time, no lie
So I am going to the Holocaust museum today and the Israel national museum (Dead Sea Scrolls) so I will update again when I take some good pictures (like this one):
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