The Other Side of the Jordan

Okay, as was the case with my Galilee recap, this is going to be brief.  I've got 13 days left in this place and I don't necessarily want to spend it at my computer.  However, since it was only four days I think that this can be done reasonably...so, here goes.

Macherus

Day 1.  We leave Israel, cross over to the other side of the River Jordan into the Hashemite Kingdom of Jordan.  First thing we do there is 1) pee 2) by a six pack (of snickers, you weirdos) 3) wait forever to get visas figured out.  Then we head to Mount Nebo, the place where Moses was taken up into Heaven and where he saw the promised land, but was told his job was finished and that he would not be going any farther.  Then we headed to Madaba where a famous mosaic floor is located that has a huge map of the Holy Land including names like Bethlehem, a fullon map of ancient Jerusalem etc...  Then we went to Macherus, the location of the beheading of John the Baptist.  This was a twin fortress of the Herodian, a lot of other interesting historical things were associated with this place, but since you're probably not the Old and New Testament/ Ancient Near Eastern Studies nerd that I feel like I am right now I won't go into detail.  After that we had a long bus ride to Petra where we were welcomed with drums, pictures, drinks, and gladiator type people.  We ate, and hit the sack.

Day 2.  We packed our bags, loaded onto the bus drove for approximately 1 and a half minutes to the Petra visitors center where we began our tour of the coolest place, it was seriously awesome.  Unfortunately, we were told that it would be super hot by the time we left, so jackets were optional.  I'll just say that a rain jacket would have been really nice.  The hike up the canyon of the crescent moon was a bit chilly.  We then went to the Shobak castle which was always great, I love me some castles and jumping pictures.  Then we finished the day with another long bus ride to Amman where Nathaniel and I went up to our room on the 11th floor, where we were greeted by a big sign saying Royal Suites.  We then opened our room door and a suite it was.  Kitchen, Dining table, Living room, two bathrooms, and a beautiful bedroom not to mention the sweet deck with a view that was directly underneath the hotel sign.  I fell asleep easily tonight.  Pics of the sweet suite will come later.

It was raining...good thing these girls were too sick to even notice they were miserable.

Somewhat awkward, but I like showing them who's in charge every once in a while.

Jumping Pictures are a necessity.

The crew at the "great temple" which is probably a palace and not a temple.

More jumping pictures, this one is on a castle though, so it's different.

This jumping pic is from underneath and has an arch over it,, so its different.

Inside the mosque, the lines on the
floor are so that the lines of praying
people can be orderly as they do so.

Day 3 started at a mosque, King Hussein mosque.  We were so excited to finally go in one, we were supposed to in Cairo, but we all know how that went down.  It was really pretty, and we learned a lot.  Love my muslim friends.  After that we went and stopped at the Jabbok river.  There we read the account of Jacob wrestling with a man, receiving his new name of Israel.  It was a really neat story at a neat place.  After that we drove on to Jerash, or Jershon.  The ancient decapolis city.  There was a ton to see and learn here, and there were tons of Arab girls wanting pics with Americans.  Following Jerash we went to another castle so that we could look out and see the other decapolis city that we went to when we were on the Galilee trip called Bet Shean.  Unfortunately it was cloudy,  so instead we just explored another castle.  We then went back to the palace, or hotel, and explored around Rainbow street a bit.  Then we headed back for dinner, afterwhich I spent a good amount of alone time in my suite taking a bath, eating my American Reeses Peanut Butter Cups, drinking a coke and reading my Bible.  Can life get any better?

Engagements on the Jabbok River...classic

The Hippodrome (where they raced chariots) at Jerash

The randomly awesome dance party with a bunch of Arab girls in the ancient theater.
There were bag pipers playing Amazing Grace, Yankee Doodle, and (they didn't know it but...) Praise to the Man

AwkwardFamilyPhotos with Madi...a requirement in order for a field trip to be awesome.

Me and Bethany.  She's studying archaeology, she loves this stuff.

 Day 4.  Final day.  We left our amazing suite, ate breakfast and headed to downtown Amman where the citadel is located.  It was cool.  Then we went to the largest theater in the middle east, following that we had a very brisk walk through downtown, I guess no BYU group has been able to do this, so it was rushed and kinda weird.  After that we headed for the Jordan River where we stopped and ate the most random meal ever.  KFC in the middle of nowhere just next to the Jordan River Baptismal site, kinda strange.  Then we crossed back over the border and were thrilled to be back at the JC.  And that my friends is how you see Jordan in 4 days.

The temple of Hercules, at the Amman Citadel.

The Jordan River.  See Ketchup to see what the water looks like when it first gets going.  This is miles downstream and has collected a lot of dirt.

Fooled.

So this post is to mainly let people know that I'm back from the Hashemite Kingdom of Jordan and had an awesome experience.  It was a whirlwind tour and way too many hours on a bus, but we saw a lot of cool stuff that I will post about later when I have time to upload pics.  I only have 13 more days in the Holy Land which is sad and exciting to think about.  I'm hoping to make the most out of the last two weeks I have here and then move on, and hopefully my friends will be there to help me with post-JRu depression.  

Many will not understand the subtleties associated with this picture, but I'm going to post it anyways.

(One of the) Last Crusades!

Well friends, my final major field trip is upon me.  Tomorrow morning we will board the busses and attempt to cross the Jordan into Jordan.  Four days in Indy's territory is more than I could ask for.  Petra here we come!  So stoked!

Ketchup.

Despite what the title may suggest this post has nothing to do at all with a delicious Tomato based condiment.  It is merely the way that some people would say the words "catch up" if they were to say it too quickly and squash them together accidentally.  What this post is really going to entail is a bunch of pictures with little to no description... as it would take a full novel in order to inform you as to all of the amazing things that I have done or seen in the past week and a half.  Most of these are from Galilee and I will try to offer as much information as I have time to describe.  So in the words of Mario..."Here we gooooo!"

On our journey up north we made a few stops, the first one was at a place called Bet-Shean, its one of the ancient Decapolis cities where Christ would have come.  Its a bunch of ancient Roman ruins now, but those are always great to take pics of us using ancient latrines.

Everyone loves a good dance on an ancient roman stage.

This is taken from Mt. Arbel on the west side of the Kinneret.  From here you can see the shores of Magdala (where a certain Mary was from).  Tiberius is behind that rock.

Tiberius at sunset from Ein Gev.

Cam, Cory and Me on the Sea of Galilee

Just a cool shot I took.  That cliff is Mt. Arbel, its so beautiful.

Me at the Synagogue in Capernaum, Christ surely taught here.  

Me and BJ at the Mt. of Beatitudes.

Gamla.  Quite possibly the coolest place on earth.  We hike out to that mountain tip, this is one of the few mountain top cities that is visible from the area that Christ gave His "a city set on a hill" talk.  Since He usually spoke of things within eyesight, this is possibly the mountain He was looking at.

Me and Sabrina on our hikes.

This was on a random hike to this waterfall, it was optional, as was clothing.   JK.

I had to throw these random shots in to prove to my family that I submerged my head underwater.

Denise, me and Jeni after our waterfall hike.

Me and Kaitlyn from the balcony at the Tiberius branch.

The Jordan River.

Walking on the Sea of Galilee.

Caesarea Philippi 

Cool waterfalls, the water gushing from the rock, heading to the Jordan River.

Nimrods Castle

We got into a valiant fighting mood.  

The fights became more and more epic til eventually 'magical' was the only description worthy.

Acco

Even Bro. Muhlestein got into the fighting mood.

My bladder broke in Acco.
(I bought a Israeli Parks Authority Camelbak, and it was leaking...Cory and Jen fixed me all up though.)

At the Mediterranean Sea at Acco with Kels.

Mark and I jumping of a Roman aqueduct.

In summary:  I think I've found a new love.... I love Galilee (and Britt too).


Oh Galilee, Sweet Galilee, Where Jesus loved so much to be.

f-r-i-e-n-d-s

There are times in everyone's lives when you must part ways with precious things within your life.  Things that have been with you for years.  Things that make you laugh, cry and put you to bed at night.  Things that will always be there for you.  When the rain starts to pour.  Well, when I left for Jerusalem, I was sure that I was going to be giving up my friends for what seemed like forever.  I saved a couple episodes to my computer so that I could have them with me in dire situations, but it still wasn't going to be the same.  I remember going to bed to the sound of silence, instead of laugh tracks and Jennifer Aniston.  Weird.  But then along came a real friend who had thought ahead (spirit prompting?) and brought all 10 seasons.  Can you say knight-ess in shining armour?  This is a public thank you to Stacey, who lets me borrow her friends so that I can keep my friends with me like they've been there before.

Yeah, you're seeing this right.  A legit friends kippa.  Its like the Jews knew I was coming.

Learning Israeli Folk Dancing

This was from a while back when we had a teacher come

in and teach us Israeli folk dancing.  I'll teach you when I get home if you want.

BYU v. SDSU

This is a day and moment you should all remember.  

This is when we were able to catch the BYU SDSU game LIVE.

Oh and we won.

Wood that came from an olive tree...

It is almost a known fact that everyone that comes to Jerusalem has to buy some type of olive wood statue. Especially mormons, and especially BYU Jerusalem students.  So I would like to introduce you to Omar.  One of two 'carvers' who cater specifically to Mormons and BYU students.  This guy is like a legend, he's met more General Authorities than I have.  The carvings he has are beautiful, and the guy is pretty fun.  But having said that, the guy is a merchant and does like to make money, I feel like he generally gives good deals, but you know...he has to make a profit some how.  Oh and he has a University of Utah flag, ugh.