Winter Break

Shalom everyone and مرحبا for all of our Arabic speaking readers out there! We hope that this entry finds you all well and enjoying the beginning of 2010. Things are going well for us. Our two month hiatus from school is just about over - we only have a week left until classes get going again. We are looking forward to getting back to the grind, though. Having the time off has been really good and has afforded us the chance to enjoy the holidays, make some new friends, see some new sights, and get some work done on our thesis papers.  (Make sure to check out our photo album "Christmas Break" for our latest photos!)

Christmastime was really nice, though a little challenging for us emotionally. Obviously we missed being at home among family and friends and our familiar, Christmasy things. We did a little Christmas shopping for each other in the Old City. I bought Mandy a skirt that she wanted and she got me two espresso, or in this case, Arabic Coffee cups. We then worked on a puzzle that Mandy's grandpa got us and, after a leisurely morning we made an amazing Christmas dinner. We cooked a lemon-rosemary chicken in our toaster-oven and we had stuffing, cranberry sauce, mashed potatoes, and apple cobbler for desert! It was an excellent dinner. We then got to have Christmas dinner again at JUC the following day (we actually got turkey at this one...it was also amazing). While there were some New Years celebrations going on among some of the JUC students who were still here, we stayed in and enjoyed a quiet evening at home and celebrated by making tacos and having Coke. Believe me, this may not sound like much of a celebration, but when you live in a place with NO tacos (at least we have yet to see any), homemade tacos were an amazing treat and Coke is always special here when we splurge a bit and buy some.

We have been working in the kitchen at JUC as we noted that we would in our previous entry. Our new "bosses," JUC's new cooks, Nat and Shirley Wofford, are a wonderful couple from Texas (if you're so inclined, you can check out their blog at www.woffordmission.blogspot.com) who have volunteered to be JUC's breakfast and lunch chefs for the next seven months. This month JUC hosted three short-term study groups, which amounted to something like 130 students on campus. The schedule of the classes and field studies varied per group and so not every meal that Nat and Shirley have had to prepare these past three weeks has been for the full amount of students, but a handful of them have been - that's where we come in. We have been helping in the kitchen mostly with breakfast clean-up and lunch preparation and in addition to this we have done the dishes for Sunday nights and on two of the three weeks, for breakfast and lunch on Fridays. I guess we are now professional dishwashers.

So we have prepared some commercial-size meals of late. We have made gallons of soup and spaghetti sauce, hundreds of hot-dogs, tons (and tons) of salad, and 40 pounds of meatloaf. The beauty of all this is we got paid for it and we got to eat at each meal we helped with - things couldn't get much better than that! In addition, we have been able to enjoy working with Nat and Shirley and spending some time "behind the scenes" at school. We have also really enjoyed getting to know Nat and Shirley better, and since they are from Texas and are so much like Mandy’s parents, it feels like we have surrogate parents here now, too. Our time in the kitchen ends this weekend and then we have one more week off before classes begin.

In addition to working in the kitchen and putting some time in on our research we have attempted to get out and do some of the things that visitors to Jerusalem normally do. We have lived here for almost 6 months now (can you believe it has already been that long?!) and have still not done any touristy things except for our field work, but our class sessions in the field limited our time and focus (and are, really, not very touristy). We finally have been able to get out a little bit and to take in some of the sites Jerusalem has to offer. Two days ago we spent the day in the neighborhood known locally as mizrach Yerushalayim, "east Jerusalem." This part of town is located outside of Damascus Gate, which is one of three of the Old City's northern gates. Even though we reach this area by heading north, it is in located east of the "New City," which is west of the Old City and denotes some of the original areas that were inhabited in Jerusalem prior to the expansion of the city westward in recent years. Once you head out Damascus Gate, you are immediately impressed by the fact that suddenly it appears that you moved to the Middle East! The neighborhood is older (and understandably a little more run-down) and is inhabited by many of Jerusalem's Arab population. It is in stark contrast to our neighborhood of Talpiot, which is a newer Israeli settlement (established about 80 years ago and maintained ever since). Talpiot feels very western and a lot more like home than "east Jerusalem." East Jerusalem is in no way unwelcoming, however.

East Jerusalem is a wonderful reminder of where we are, with all of its smells of coffee with cardamon, eastern spices, and frying food. The area is crowded with lots of pedestrians, which make up an interesting blend of people. Mostly the residents walking around are Arabs. But interestingly, amid this very eastern bustle of activity, a little section of east Jerusalem is devoted to some very western sites and subsequently draws some very western crowds mostly from England and the States. There is a walled compound just a little way from Damascus Gate on Nablus Road in which there is situated the (now) famous Protestant shrine to the last events of the Gospel stories, the Garden Tomb. This was one of our stops of the day.

The Garden Tomb has a long story associated with it that I will refrain from going into details about here, except to say that it is one of the two main sites in Jerusalem that are revered as being the location of Jesus' interment and resurrection. The other site is the Church of the Holy Sepulcher in the Old City's Christian Quarter. The Garden tomb was discovered in the 1800s by a local who was trying to dig a cistern and within 20 years it was decided that the tomb was the actual tomb of Joseph of Arimathea in which Jesus was placed after his execution. The rock face in which the tomb is carved is part of a large limestone hill, which extends to the northeast. With a little imagination, many have seen in this northeastern portion of the rock face, the face of a skull, which is reminiscent of the biblical designation Golgotha (in Latin Calvary) of the place of Jesus' execution, a term which means "skull." This hill has been known, therefore, for the past 200 or so years as "Skull Hill," and it has been the subject of many quasi-archaeological excavations as has the Garden tomb.

Many people visit the area and come away with feelings of awe. Despite the feelings associated with the place, it is most likely not the location of Jesus' burial because it is not a first century tomb. It is an Iron Age II (1000-586 B.C.E.) tomb from the time of King David and the rest of Israel's monarchy, a period that scholars refer to as the "First Temple Period." In fact the whole area has many of these tombs. The characteristics of tombs, like any other cultural aspect of a time period, change as time goes by and thus Iron Age tombs have certain distinguishing characteristics as do first century tombs. There are other details that could be discussed, but we will save that for another entry. The Garden Tomb compound, nevertheless, is really a beautiful little place with sprawling gardens and a quiet atmosphere. It has been maintained quite well by the Garden Tomb Association situated in England. The staff are very friendly and they help make for a pleasurable experience. There is also no entry fee, which makes the visit even better! Also within this same compound is the Ecolé Biblique et Archeologique (The French School of Archaeology) and the French Monastery of St. Etienne (or St. Stephen). The Ecolé Biblique is a long established archaeological research center in Jerusalem with a nice library, which we hope to check out sometime!

Just a short walk from the Garden Tomb is the Rockefeller Museum, Jerusalem's oldest museum devoted to archaeological discoveries in Palestine. In 1968 the Israel Museum was opened in the New City and the Rockefeller became a branch of the Israel Museum. What's really great is that right now the Rockefeller is free of charge while the Israel Museum is doing some renovations in their archaeological wing. We finally took advantage of this opportunity, and we spent the bulk of our day at the museum looking around. We were a bit dismayed to find that we weren't allowed to take pictures of any of the artifacts, though we did see other people taking pictures (and we managed to sneak a couple). The most impressive exhibits in the museum were by far the Paleolithic - Late Bronze Age (500,000 - 1200 B.C.E.) housed in the South Octagon and South Gallery of the building. The South Octagon houses the Egyptian artifacts discovered at Beth-Shean and other places from Palestine that reflect the Egyptian domination of Palestine in the Late Bronze Age (1550-1200 B.C.E.), just before the period of the Judges, according to biblical history. Just to name a few, there is a massive basalt stele that was erected at an Egyptian military outpost by Pharaoh Seti I as well as a later statue of Ramesses III. A signet ring from Tel el-Ajjul, bearing the throne name of Pharaoh Tut-Ankh-Amun, called more colloquially, King Tut, is on display. Needless to say, we had a lot of fun.

Another amazing discovery that we made just yesterday on our grocery store run is that there is a store here that is basically a Walmart kind of store. People from the States are always curious to know if there is a Walmart in Israel. No there is not, but we now know that there is a Megahbul, which means something like "Mega-Savings." This place has excellent prices and has a little bit of everything (including food), just like a Super Walmart. We even got one of their shopper discount cards, called a "YOU Card." We stood at the checkout stand filling out the little form for the card while the clerk rattled off the instructions to us in Hebrew. I (Justin) would fill in one part without really knowing what I was doing and then ask her in Hebrew, "Is this ok?" Then, seeing that I had not filled it in correctly or was missing parts would rattle some more directions in Hebrew. Fortunately the guy behind us in the line intervened and asked me, a bit to my chagrin, "Do you understand what she is asking you?" To which I could only respond, "I'm trying to," in an effort to preserve a little of my dignity. He then helped me through the rest of the form and we made it out of there. Ah well, it all worked out - the guy in line was really helpful and patient, as was the clerk. Anyway, we are now equipped with our YOU Card and are ready to look like locals the next time we go in! The funniest thing about this situation is that we have walked by this store every time we have gone to our other grocery store for almost six months now and have never gone in. We finally went inside and we are so glad we did!

So, now we look toward the beginning of the next semester. We got our new class schedule yesterday and have found that we have 5 days of field studies throughout the semester (we were expecting 2), and during our only overnight field study, we will be staying once again in Galilee, at En Gev!

As we head into the next semester, we wanted to update everyone with our prayer requests:

Praise! Spring Tuition Covered! Over the break, we were able to obtain our necessary funding to pay for our spring tuition through the sell of Justin’s truck! We have been amazed to see God’s provision through all of this! We went into this journey with enough funds to cover our being here for one semester, and he has made our funds stretch so far. We are so thankful, and we know he will continue to help us through the journey.

Job for Mandy. As many of you know, I have been able to maintain a 10-hour per week position through Azusa Pacific University during our stay. I have been blessed to work with APU’s Study Abroad office through this time and have been thankful for their graciousness in allowing me to continue to work for them long-distance. As of February 23rd, this position will be ending, a bit unexpectedly for Study Abroad and for me. Please pray for this time of transition, and please pray that I can find another job. Because we are here on student visas, we can’t work for an Israeli-based company, but we can work for a US company, which means I can work via the internet. With the advance of technology and security, I can still work in many different venues, including financial, secretarial, graphics, or web design. I’m looking for about 10 hours per week. If you know or hear of anything I might be able to do from here, please let me know!! My income through APU made up ¾ of our monthly income, so you can imagine what a hit this is going to be to our already incredibly tight budget.
Finance Update. We have the finances currently to get us through the spring semester, tuition and living expenses combined. We are currently trying to find scholarships that will help us pay for our summer practicum. Please pray that we can get some funding to help with this. If we can get funding, we will have enough finances to last us through the summer. As always, if you feel led to give towards our time in Israel, I would encourage you to do so. Even if it is just a few dollars, it would help so much. You may not think it would be worth the stamp to forego a couple cups of coffee and send $5 to us, but if you consider that that is equal to almost 20 shekels, that’s quite a bit! If you would like to give, please email me at his_clay1@yahoo.com, and I would be happy to send you mailing instructions!!
Thesis Topics. Once our semester starts, we will be meeting with our advisor to try to finalize our thesis topics. Normally, this process begins in our second year, but since we know we don’t currently have the finances to last us our full length of time, we are trying to get started on them now. Our meetings with him last semester proved to be a bit of a challenge (especially for Mandy’s topic), and we are hoping that, with our research done over the break, it will be easier this time around. We need to have our thesis topics approved so we can have a sure direction to head to start working on them. Please pray that our advisor will work with us.

Thank you everyone for your continued prayers and support of us! It is absolutely incredible to live out each day seeing God’s provision. Especially since I (Mandy) am a practical, numbers person, it has been amazing to do our budget, know that we are short, see how much we have at the end and how it doesn’t add up, and just say, “God did it.” Doesn’t make sense, but He did it. And, seeing the surplus at the end of each period gives us faith that He will continue to do it to the end of our journey. It is a lesson in trust I hope we never forget. God provides for us every day; we can trust we won’t run out.

Blessings to each one of you! We love and miss you all tons and tons!

Justin and Mandy