Day 7 - 5 Apr 08

Today is Satuday. Saturdays to the Jews are like Sundays for the rest of us. It is the day of their Sabbath (or Shabat in Hebrew), where they do not work. In fact, even in the hotels, (at least) one of the lifts would be designated as the Shabat lift, and would therefore not function throughout the day. Shabat starts at sun down on Friday and ends at sun down on Saturdays. It follows that Sundays therefore become the first day of their work week, like Mondays are for us.
So, no classes today. We got an entire day of guided tour. :)

Our first stop brought us to the town of Bet Sha'erim. I can't recall what the Ah-Lao tour guide babbled about, except that this valley here is known as the Valley of Armageddon, where at the end of days, the battle between Christ and the Anti-Christ will take place. Not a place I'd want to be in when that happens.



Next, we visited the Church of the Annunciation in Nazereth, where it is said that the angel Gabriel came to announce (predict, actually) to Mary that she'd be pregnant with the son of God. The thing about this church that fascinated me the most were these mosiac pictures depicting Mary and Jesus, gifts to the church from countries all over the world. Here are some of the more interesting ones.

Oh, this church is also built over the location of the remains of the house of Joseph and Mary.






Lunch was at an Arab restaurant. After the obligatory humus, falafel, pita and salad entre, we were treated to great-tasting chicken shislik and this other sausage-like thing on a skewer that I suspect is beef but never gotten to confirm. Dessert included dates, "sweets" (which were really middle-eastern kueh-kueh that are called that because they are really very sweet!), turkish coffee and mint tea.




Post-lunch, we proceeded to the Sea of Galilee and then to the nearby Capharnaum, where Jesus gave the first preaching to Peter.




As the sun was setting, we visited the Golan Heights, near the Syrian border. This is at the northen-most part of Israel. The weather was great and we could see the snow-peaked mountains, which I didn't get to see during my previous trip here.





I bought another Dora gift for Jae. One of my course mates jokingly said that if I was to have another daughter, I ought to name her Dora Ng.