A Little About Israel

I've been doing a little touring of Jerusalem over the past few days. I've seen a bunch of really interesting things along the way.

Let's start at the walk through Damascus Gate in the old city on Jerusalem day. As a Jew, it is somewhat nerve-wracking to walk through the Arab market on a day when there is so much hate in the air. Still I went with a bunch of friends through the Arab part of the old city without much trouble. A couple of Jews ran through the market singing Jewish songs in the joy of commemorating the day that marked the return of the land on which the old temple was regained by the Jews.

I thought that that could have been interpreted as provocative, but perhaps it is merely my Jewish ancestry and its bias that tells me they were genuinely happy to have the city of Jerusalem again and were therefore singing in praise and thanks to God.

A couple of days later I went to tour the southern excavations at the edge of the temple mount. It was amazing to see the history that is contained especially for the Jewish people but also for the Byzantines there. The tour guide was an archaeologist and really helped bring the history of the place to life.

Then my final encounter of worthy importance was a walk down the Haredi part of Jerusalem on Bar Ilan. It's really a dirty part of town and I found it to be a rather loathsome experience on the whole. I needed to be there though to catch my bus. Problem was that when I got there there was a whole riot with overturned metal disposal bins in the street and a whole load of fire and burning and other such destructive activities.

Yep, they're meant to be representing the Jewish religion and are found disrupting the lives of people. Anyway, it turned out that I had to walk through Jerusalem for an hour until 12:30 pm to catch the next bus at a different location due to the diversion of the public bus system.

It was rather aggravating experience.

That's it for now!