Yesterday I walked from Jerusalem to Bethlehem.  Part of the route that I walked was even on the patriarchal highway!  It’s so surreal to be living in Jerusalem and walking between these ancient sites.  It is an experience that I am so grateful to have.  I also felt an oddly satisfying awareness of being disconnected from the cellular tether of the iPhone.  There was a sense of freedom and adventure that I haven’t felt in quite a while.  It reminded me of younger days when my brother and I would walk to Blockbuster to browse the video games.  Whenever we would walk Mike would carry his pocket knife for security when we crossed through the forest (it wasn’t really a forest, but when I was young I thought of this grassy area with a couple of trees as a forest…now it’s a Walgreens).  You know, just in case we came upon some bandits or thieves.  Yeah, maybe we had an overactive imagination, but for a six year old it was quite the adventure.  Yesterday, I got that same feeling.  There were hills filled with ancient olive trees and mountains/giant hills all around.  It was like Lord of the Rings, but only if there were modern cities and roads running through Middle Earth.  I could see Herodian far in the distance and every once in a while we would come across a shepherd and some sheep grazing just a few feet from us.

                When we got to Bethlehem, we passed through the checkpoint and had to walk past the multitude of taxi drivers waiting for work to walk through the gates.  They are probably the most persistent people I have ever met in my life.  After getting through and being questioned and interrupted and all of that jazz, I was able to talk with one of the drivers who finally recognized that we weren’t really in need of a ride.  I asked him how business was, but he didn’t respond right away.  He took another drag on his cigarette and told me that life in the West Bank behind the wall was like prison.  He said he went to college and became a teacher, but there isn’t any work so he drives a taxi and makes enough money for gas and a little bit of food to bring home.  He told me that the people there don’t dream of saving up their money and building a nice house or opening a shop; if they don’t get enough business then they can’t afford to bring enough food home for the day.  He said they are just trying to survive.  The situation here in Israel is so complex I couldn’t begin to try and explain what I have learned.  It certainly isn’t black and white.  At times it is easy to see the plight of the Palestinians and at other times it is easy to see the plight of the Israelis.  I’ve had many very good and very honest conversations with other students here, as well as with some locals and I am, again, grateful for the experience.  Things look quite different on location as opposed to what is filtered through the news.  It’s just complex.

                Davis, my roommate, and I stood around for another 20 minutes waiting for the driver from Paidia to take us out to the main complex.  Paidia is an organization that is interested in education in the West Bank.  I volunteer once a week, helping kids learn English in an afterschool program.  Our driver is named Osama (I guess a pretty common name?) and he is a pretty nice guy.  He finally showed up and it was a little bit funny because the situation seemed so sketchy at the moment.  I don’t think I have seen him in the same car twice since I met him a couple of weeks ago.  He drove up with a friend and stopped on the corner and asked if I was Jonathan and then we got in the car.  Osama was having a little bit of a bad day.  His car kept dying and, apparently, a tour group that he had taken around wanted to go out and explore the desert on their own.  He warned them that they would probably get lost and that he should take them out, but they wanted to go.  They were lost for around 12 hours in the desert.  When we were leaving some of them were still lost in the desert, but Osama said he could find them easily once he talked to the local Bedouin. 

The kids there are learning some basic English phrases, but some of the older kids are so smart!  We try and play games with them so that they can learn in an interactive fashion.  They were really good at hangman!  It’s really great to see the volunteers who show up and help out for several weeks at a time at Paidia.  So far I have met volunteers from the U.S., Germany, Norway, and Australia. 

Afterwards, Davis and I took the bus home from the checkpoint instead of walking.  It was getting dark and what was a nice day turned pretty cold.  We made it back to JUC just in time for dinner.