June 28, 2007

Travis' blog

We got a relatively late start around 8:30 or 9. Wanting to go to the Russian Orthodox Church of Mary Magdeline, which is only open Tues and Thurs mornings, we made that our first goal. Having a bit of time beforehand, we decided to swing by Jimmy or Omar's to buy mom's stuff that she has requested. Upon reaching Aladdin's, we ran into Bro. Huntington and a group of students that were on their "Getting oriented to Jerusalem" tour. It was a fun little reunion where Bro. H introduced me and Travis to his little group of students. Omar, being off the beaten path, stood at Aladdin's, passing out his card to the students. Recognizing me, he asked if we were coming over. How could I say no? So I said yes, once again, picking Omar's over Jimmy's. I felt a tinge of guilt, since Jimmy had been the one to invite me over to dinner and I have yet to step foot inside Jimmy's shop. But at the same time, I knew that Omar had everything I wanted, and I wasn't so sure about Jimmy. So oh well. That's the way it went. I'll be sure to mention to the new students to check out Jimmy's as well. Omar was waiting for one more group of students, so we waited with him. This group was accompanied by Victor Ludlow. (You know, it really is slightly strange to meet so casually names that I hear all the time. Like when I met Don Parry, Stephen Ricks, Dana Pike, etc. Or, when I know a person from one class, then am assigned an article they wrote in another class. They're mini-celebrities in their own right. Then it turns out that they're normal, down-to-earth people that I rather like. Crazy how that works.) He also introduced Travis and myself to his little group. One boy, seeing Travis' new sandals, asked if he bought them here, so we told him where to find them and how much to pay for them. Hopefully he'll spread the good word.

When that group left, we followed Omar to his shop. I told Travis that if he found a nativity he liked, mom would subsidize it as his Christmas, so he started looking around while Omar took down my order. Apparently, there are no Bethlehem blankets to be found, so he didn't charge me for them, but promised to try to find some, and if they show up in the box, we can send him a check. He really is a nice guy. Once he was done with my portion of the order, he turned his attention to Travis. Upon mixing and matching nativities and the figurines inside, Travis finally put together his ideal nativity. I have to admit, it's quite gorgeous. I'm a little jealous. I wasn't nearly so picky. But, then again, Travis has a much better eye for detail than I do. I'm happy with much less. So it all worked out.

Later, while Travis was looking for a little box to hold his newly purchased coins, Omar asked if Travis was married. When Travis said no, Omar said that it was my fault!!! Now, how did that happen? Travis loved this approach and jumped on it. [rolls eyes] Upon expressing my disbelief at this idea, Omar explained—I have many friends, I should introduce them to Travis. When I explained that Travis didn't like being set up, Travis explained that was because we don't set him up with girls he liked. Omar then turned on Travis. "If you're going to be that picky, you'll never get married! You still have time, but there comes a point when it's too late, and then it's simply too late for you." Hehehe. I think Mom would like this guy.

Leaving Omar's, we headed up to the church of Mary Magdeline, happy to find it open. To get to the actual church, you hike up through gardens. It's rather gorgeous, actually. The only other two spots I can think of to rival it is Bethany and Dan. The church itself is also remarkably beautiful. The outside has the golden domes that I'm sure you'd all recognize from pictures. (Again, forgive me for my lack of pictures. But it's much harder to do a) when I can't open Travis' pics on my computer b) when I've stopped taking as many pictures because Travis takes much better pictures and c) I don't have unlimited Internet access anymore.) The inside is painted with detail and filled with artwork. It's rather beautiful. Everyone come over to look at pictures when we're home and you can see for yourself.

After leaving Mary Magdeline, we headed up to Dominus Flevit. Now, I would tell you what exactly Dominus Flevit is, but, to be honest, I have no idea. By the time we finally got there (it was a rather steep and long climb that we didn't expect), Travis realized that he had filled up all 9 GB of his cards. Oops? So, instead of continuing onto the church, we went over and picked up my computer. "Which Tianna swore was just a short walk away and was using the tower of the church of the annunciation as her landmark, unfortunately it was not a short walk nor was it the tower of the church of the annunciation that we were heading towards. I don't recommend getting lost in 100+ temperatures while hiking. Bringing it back to the hostel, we immediately set out to transfer over all of his pictures and deleting the old pictures off the cards. While waiting for them to download, we ate our lunch of pita bread and peanut butter, which Travis has dubbed pita butter. [rolls eyes and chuckles] We also listened to a chapter of Harry Potter 6.

After the last download, we headed over to the Ophel (the excavations on the southern end of temple mount). While in there, we set up his big camera on the temple stairs that they have uncovered that actually look quite nice and new still, surprisingly. Then, when one of the tour groups finished their explanation, we invited one lady to be a hand model for the widow's mite. (We had already done one shoot of this back at the hostel with one of the sisters, but after completion, Travis started doubting his composition and wanted to do it again on the stairs to the temple.) She agreed and we had our first photo shoot of the day. Leaving the Ophel, we went back to City of David, hoping that we really could get down to Abraham's shop w/o paying. It took a wee bit of adventure, but we did it. There we shot the coin Travis bought of Caesar and also the silver dinar that Abraham is still pushing on Travis, and Travis, being the pushover, is considering. Here I am supposed to be the Ancient Near Eastern person, and he's the one collecting coins. Perhaps because he has more money than I do... But either way, this city is turning him into a coin collector. He's going to have to make something to display them all. After we finished the shoot, I started cleaning up, but soon realized that Travis hadn't moved. Rather, he was just standing there stewing over something. So I stopped and asked him what was wrong. He didn't say anything. I finally figured out that he wanted to redo it, but wasn't sure if he should. I asked if he'd regret it, and at that, he started setting everything back up. Bringing Abraham back, as well as his son... (something like Mohammad, but a little different) he reset up the pose and we shot it all again. Upon finishing it, we hiked back up the massively steep hill, wishing we had just hired a car back, and lamenting the 100+ weather.

Despite the heat, we headed over to the Cardo to take another picture or two. We were debating between Potipher's Wife and the Woman with the Issue of Blood. When we ended up by ourselves for a long time, we decided upon Potipher's wife, since that one only needed me as a model. But, of course, as soon as I got the blue cloth wrapped around my waist and holding the white cloth so that I looked like a complete idiot, 2 or 3 tours made their way through. [rolls eyes] Though, oddly enough, for being the person who always cares what others think of me, I really wasn't embarrassed to be seen like that. I just chuckled and went on as if it were normal. Perhaps I'm just used to people staring and pointing at us because of Travis' camera and tripod. Not wanting to shoot two very different pictures at the same place, we decided to go home and do the other shot later.

Once again, we returned home as everything was closing. So, to be safe, the first restaurant we found, we popped in. There we found chicken kabobs (or screws as he called them), salads and french fries. 5 shekels less per person if we took it to go. Wanting to get back to take a picture while the light was still good, we jumped on the offer. We got back in barely enough time, but there was a car parked exactly where the camera needed to be. I told him to just stand on the car, but he didn't seem to like that idea much. So instead, we just came upstairs, ate our dinner in our room, then went to bed. Not thinking, we threw away the remains of our dinner in our room, which then stunk up the entire room. Bother.