The Holy Land

I'm here!! I'm finally in the Holy Land!!

There are 82 of us, 26 being boys.  The flight to NYC was good. We flew in at sunset and it was gorgeous. I saw the city and the statue of liberty from the plane. Once we landed a group of 10 of us ate at Chile's in the airport. We then got onto the plane for Tel Aviv. It was already culture shock for me. We talked to a bunch of Israelis who were in New York for vacation. It was so amazing seeing the different cultures already. On the plane they served kosher food that was mostly normal except for gross pickled cabbage-ish stuff. Men with different religious clothing stood up during the flight to pray. The flight attendants translated everything into Hebrew. It was a looong 9 hour flight. I got maybe 3 hours of restless sleep. The the sun came out at some point and we flew over Italy and I saw little cities and boats and I died. Greece was pretty gorgeous too--it has lots of mountains! Finally we got to Israel and it is BEAUTIFUL. Everything is extremely green (like neon green) and there are so many different kinds of trees. It is a little humid and pretty cold. The air is so fresh and everything is incredible. Our bus drive to the center was rediculous. We were all in shock. This is not the desert I was expecting!! We had to drive through the West Bank and we went through a checkpoint to get in. An armed guard with a huge automatic gun walked onto the bus and looked at all of us and my Old Testament teacher convinced her we were harmless. She left the bus and we drove on. The west bank has a huge black wall at least 20 ft high with barbed wire and watch towers. It's crazy because this place is gorgeous and so peaceful and not like the intense stories they tell in the news. Minus the scary checkpoints, it is a calm place! We drove up to Jerusalem 2,400 feet from Tel Aviv. The song "Far Far Away on Judea's Plain" is wrong, Judea is not flat, it has huge terraced rolling hills with olive vinyards and lots of trees from pine trees to palm trees. We even saw wings from planes on the side of the road that were from past wars. This place is like a dream. The signs are in Hebrew and all the buildings look so old, but are gorgeous and sit on the incredible hills. An hour later we turned a corner and my   Old Testament teacher, Brother Judd, dramatically counted down from 5 until Jerusalem appeared and said, "Kids, welcome home." Everyone was basically crying because the city is so incredible!! Pictures don't do it justice. We got to the center and were welcomed by amazing staff. Most of them are either Israeli or Palistinian. There are also our teachers and 3 sets of missionary couples. They are so kind and gave us hugs and welcomed us "home" and already know our names. We went into a huge room with the big windows and an organ and were welcomed. The man in charge, Aaron Hyett spoke and the curtains opened and the city was right there! It was snowing hard but so gorgeous. The prayers started in the city and we could hear the distant sounds of it. The rest has been so crazy. We got a tour, ate dinner (there were so many options and everything was so good), met with 2 of our classes, unpacked, and found wifi to email our families. This building is the most gorgeous thing! Seriously this whole place is incredible and the spirit is amazing. I can't even describe it. Basically, if anyone is planning on traveling anywhere, come here. I'm convinced this is the most gorgeous place on earth. Between the landscape, the spirit, the people, and the small cities and openness, I don't think there is anywhere this amazing. The weather has thrown our schedule off, so we will be in orientation meetings and things for most of the week. On Saturday we go into Jerusalem for the first time to see the Garden Tomb. It's hard to believe I will be living here for 4 months. It doesn't feel real!