The Old City

Last night I had the opportunity to go on a night tour of the Old City of Jerusalem. Now, I’d like to note that the Old City is a lot of the reason that I decided to study abroad in Israel. This place is the site of so much of what I’ve studied for the last two years: the Dome of the Rock, the Kotel, the Church of the Holy Sepulchre. I had been looking forward to this for so long – and it absolutely surpassed my expectations. (Emilie, Miriam, Sarah, Hannah, and Michael all being there with me would have been the only thing that could have improved the experience!)

This began with me dressing in what I have dubbed my “Old City outfit.” As I prepared for this trip, my mother and I went shopping for a modest outfit that would be appropriate for the ultra-conservative, ultra-orthodox areas of the city. In the most basic sense, this requires having one’s knees and elbows covered, but ankle-length skirts and full sleeves are not uncommon. Here’s what Mom and I put together:

When ready, we took a charter bus with Yos, one of the madrichim, to the Old City. I sadly had to spend this time studying; two quizzes awaited me the next day. When we arrived we met Yossi, our fabulous tour guide. Hi, Yossi!

He's originally from Manchester, England and has an adorable accent. He's been living in Israel for five or six years now. Following Yossi, we entered the Christian quarter through the Jaffa Gate, one of the six gates into the Old City:

Yossi explained to us that Jerusalem is a city that has been built upon and built upon, with many different layers. He demonstrated this by putting several hats atop the head of a girl named Charlotte, each hat representing the settlement of the group that had conquered the city. Then we saw a more real representation: the Tower of David.

As you can see, there are several different types of stone in different layers; some from ancient times, some from the crusaders, and, as Yossi pointed out, the inside is a modern Israeli museum! They’re also pretty sure this isn’t the actual site of the Tower of David. Oh well.

We then walked to the Mosque of Omar and the Church of the Holy Sepulchre, which are adjacent to one another. This is because Omar, the third most-important prophet to Isalm, refused to enter the church because he believed that would cause it to become a mosque. So, he built a mosque right next to it:

Then we had the opportunity to go into the Church of the Holy Sepulchre, which commemorates the place where it is believed Jesus died, was embalmed, was buried, and rose again. Yossi would not enter for religious reasons, so we did not have a formal tour of the space, although he gave us some background before we went in. These are the lamps over the spot where he was embalmed, and after that is the tomb that he was laid in:

There was also some truly beautiful artwork. It was a really incredible experience for me...I loved being there.

Then we hung out in the Armenian quarter for a very long time while Yos and our guard, Eliahu, went to find someone who’d gotten lost and Yossi spend five minutes on the phone with him trying to explain where we were. So Rachel, Robert, Esther, and I got kinda silly.

This is Esther Benatar. AKA Benatar the Transformer. Benatar knows krav maga (a form of self-defense that derives from the Israeli army). The image above is a simulation of what we thought would happen if Benatar tried to protect us in Eliahu’s absence: put on her sunglasses, then crash into a wall. We felt safe.

Then the lost person returned, and Yossi gave us a bit of background on the Armenian quarter. Interesting to note: this is the one quarter that is not a religion. The other three are dedicated to each of the Abrahamic religions. Armenia is believed to be the first nation that made Christianity its official religion. It was also the first nation in the modern day to have been the victim of genocide.

After that, we went up onto the roof. It’s said that you can spend an entire day exploring the roof of the Old City! An interesting tidbit: the transliteration of the Hebrew word for Jerusalem, Yerushalaim, has the plural ending “–im.” Yossi explained that Jerusalem is two cities: the heavenly city (the Old City) and the earthly city (the new city). There we had a really interesting discussion of what “holy” means to each of us and what we consider holy places. The word for “holy” in Hebrew actually means separate rather than sacred, so that brought an interesting dynamic to our conversation.

Finally, we walked to the Kotel, otherwise known as the Western Wall or the Wailing Wall. We began at what Yossi says is the second-best view, and the best view you can access at night. From there we could see into the Islamic Quarter, and saw the Dome of the Rock and the Temple Mount...you can barely see the latter, but I'll hopefully be touring it soon:

We discussed the significance of these sites and where they were built: on the site of the Second Temple of Jerusalem, which was destroyed in 70c.e. (This is the beginning of what we studied in the Michael class I took last semester.) The Western Wall is the last standing wall of the temple, and is a common site of prayer for Jews. But there’s a very controversial point...can you spot it?

There’s a partition about two-thirds of the way down the wall, which divides where men can pray (in the larger portion) and where women can pray (in the smaller portion). (Miriam, I know you’ll have SO much to say about this! Your voice was in my head the whole time I was there.) Despite the controversy, it was absolutely fascinating to be there.

Finally we boarded the buses and returned to K’far HaStudentim, the student village. I wrapped up my night studying for Hebrew...par-tay. Alison and I are planning on visiting the shuk on Friday morning (apparently it’s a good day to go...we’ll see why that’s so special) and then spend the afternoon in the Old City on our own. Something to give me a push through the last day of ulpan week 2!

I had hoped to write more tonight, but it’s bedtime. More soon!