travel – Page 9 – Another Adventure

Another Important Announcement–Please Read!!

Hello my dear friends and family!!

I would like to share some joy with you. It may have taken me six months on the other side of the world to figure this out, but I know this now and shall never forget it: I am loved. I love that feeling. I am blessed with so many dear, brilliant friends and a (huge) family that is both multifarious and unique and I wouldn’t have it any other way.

I have begun classes again in Ewing, New Jersey and couldn’t really come up with anything profound or exciting to blog about spending most of my time in Ewing, as beautiful as the campus is and as interesting as my classes are (Soviet Russia, anyone?!). BUT I HAVE SOMETHING VERY EXCITING TO TELL YOU, because I need your help!!!!!!!

Shortly after returning from Israel, I realized that the wanderlust was not going away. I also realized that I wanted to give back (or, I guess, give forward) to a community who could use a helping hand (or ten) and give thanks to God for all the gifts he’s given me. Enter, Real Break.

Real Break is this fantastic program, sponsored by the OCF, that gathers college-age kids (I say kids because, let’s face it, that’s what we are) in small teams and sends them to different places around this world to work with a community in need. This year trips include Constantinople (I was tempted, but I think my stomach would have killed me if I attempted another twelve hour flight this soon!), Honduras, Guatemala, Mexico, New Orleans, LA, and Toronto. Click on the words “Real Break” to go to their website and see testimonies about their past projects. Click on “OCF” to learn more about what OCF–Orthodox Christian Fellowship–is. I’ve always wanted to do this, because everything I’ve heard has been fantastic, but I’ve always been too scared to.

But I’m not anymore! It’s incredible what throwing yourself into seemingly crazy circumstances can do for your self esteem. God is good, and we–Christian, Jew, atheist, Budhist–are all called to do good for our fellow man, because we are all brothers. In the words of my BGU counselor Sarah, “you don’t want someone who means well, you want someone who does well.”

This Spring Break, I will attempt to “do well.” But here’s the caviot: these trips are sponsored by the OCF, but it is up to the students to raise the funds to travel to these places, eat, sleep, and work. This is why I am asking for your help! I am raising money to fly to Toronto, Canada from March 9 through March 16. I will be sleeping, eating, praying and working with St. John the Compassionate Mission. Click the link to learn more about everything this home does to serve its community. It’s so incredible!!

In order for me to participate, I must raise $800 by the end of March. The minimum amount for me to raise is $785, and there is no maximum amount, because however much I raise past the minimum amount will go directly to OCF and to St. John Mission to help sustain their community.

This is really a fantastic cause!! And it’s really not about me at all. I am merely a vehicle through which your generosity and care will go to loving people in Toronto, in a public housing project, who really need our help. Isn’t that what this is all about???

I ask you to please consider donating to my trip. Donations are tax-deductible and God-approved. 🙂 (Sorry for the bad joke, but hey, you know my father…)

Because this trip is through OCF, I can’t do a GoFundMe page, but that doesn’t mean that you shouldn’t contribute! The easiest way to donate is to send donations (preferably in check form) directly to me, and from there I tally them and send it all to the OCF offices, where they do all the important stuff. Please leave a comment on this blog with your email address and I will email you my mailing address! And if you’d like I have a formal letter and donation form that I’d be happy to send 🙂

I urge to contribute. I’m not a money-oriented person at all, but I know when it’s important, and it’s important now. I hope you agree! I’m so blessed to have you all in my life and I know your love and support will follow me wherever I go.

God bless,

Mel

Christmas in Bethlehem

My laundry is still in the washing machine, so I can’t take a shower, and even if I did, I would have no clean, dry clothes with which to dress so that I could leave the house and go work on a paper…

SO, I will blog! It’s been a while since I’ve done this. I just moved out of the dorms yesterday (woooohoooo! They were not nice.) and am staying at a friend’s apartment in a different neighborhood close to campus (she’s away in Turkey. Cool, huh?!) For the FIRST time since I’ve been in Israel, I woke up this morning with the very real sensation that I am living in another country. I look out of the bedroom window and I see uniform concrete buildings in the background; smaller, flat roofed concrete houses are in the foreground along with some blue construction tarps, a few small cars, garbage dumps in the parking lot, a few palm trees and one giant tree, whose variety escapes me. There’s also a few electrical towers, TONS of sand, and a big, big, blue sky enveloping everything. This, my friends, is Be’er Sheva in a nutshell. And it’s been my home for almost half a year now.

There’s no way I can write a blog post about “my time in Israel”; it’s way too dense for that. Instead, I want to share my Christmas experience, which I believe was the best Christmas I’ve had. And it’s strange, because this is the first Christmas I spent away from my family. You would think it would be extremely difficult. But being in the Holy Land helped, as did sharing my Christmas with my friends. I’ll recap:

I decided to go to Jerusalem. This wasn’t as hyped up as it sounds. I think Jerusalem gets really crowded on Easter (obviously) but it was pretty empty on Monday afternoon, December 24, when I arrived via bus. First thing I did was go to the Old City with my friend Kurt, to see if we could get tickets to a Christmas service that night at the Lutheran Church of the Redeemer. Did I mention that the service was in German?

This was the first interesting thing I did. I had originally planned to attend a “unitarian” service of sorts at some big church somewhere near the Old City, because it had the subtitle “multilingual,” which to me equaled English! No Orthodox services were held on the 25th, because every Orthodox church in Israel is Old Calendar, so there would be no “Thy Nativity, Oh Christ our God…” for me. BUT wait until I tell you the rest.

Kurt and I weren’t sure if we would be let into Church of the Redeemer. They had stopped giving tickets and we were told that if we came back in a few hours we might be able to find some standing room in the back. Okay, no harm done. We both wanted to be at service. Kurt told me that in Germany he sometimes goes to four services on Christmas day, just to hear the carols. Cool, huh?

So, we had a few hours to spare in Jerusalem. What does one do in the Old City for a few hours? Pray and shop and go up on the roofs of old buildings. Seriously. We went to the Church of the Holy Sepulchre (erected by Sts. Constantine and Helen in the 300s) and–it was so quiet! The last time I had been to the Church, it was Saturday, in the middle of the day, and it was miserably crowded. But because it was the evening, and on a Monday, there was scarcely anyone inside. So what did I do? I walked quickly toward the tomb to go inside and venerate the stone. I made it, but not before an angry monk started shouting at me to keep moving. Needless to say it was not the spiritual experience one expects when venerating such sacred objects, but I knew that, because last time at the Church I felt similarly…like a stuffed sardine waiting to be healed! But then when I feel like this I always think of Zachaeus and how he climbed a tree just to see Jesus above the crowds. Where’s a good, sturdy tree when you need one?

Anyway, after a bit of shopping (that’s another perk of not being home for Christmas–you have so much more time to buy presents!) we ended up at a bar with some friends, toasting on Christmas Eve. This was also strange for me. I’m used to fasting and (trying to) nap on Christmas Eve…but we gathered at a table around an outdoor heater, I drank hot mulled wine (!!!) and somehow, it felt good.

After this, Kurt and I went back to the Church to see about getting into the service. Did I mention that Kurt is German? He totally played the “we’re both from the same country” card and got us inside, but there were plenty of open pews even after the service started.

Creche Scene in the Lutheran Church of The Redeemer, Jerusalem

About the service: the program was in German, English, Hebrew, and Arabic. This was singularly incredible. From the entrance to the building, we descended a set of stairs, passed an open courtyard, and crossed through a doorway into a massive white chapel with high vaulted ceilings, dimly lit and incredibly beautiful. Candles lined the rows of pews, a Christmas tree was set up on stage, and a beautiful creche scene was off to the side, pictured at left (it’s blurry, I apologize..)

Then the service began with an angelic choir singing very familiar Christmas carols! The choir and congregation sang in German, but I happily joined in in English. At one point during one carol, we ALL sang the same thing: Glooooooooooooria! In Excelcius Deo.
See, not only did I learn Hebrew, but I speak German now too 🙂

It was a beautiful service; the shortest Christmas service I had ever been to, and there was a lot of sitting, but it was lovely and restful. In retrospect, I’m glad we sat for so long, because here’s what we did next:

Stopping to sing a (German) Christmas carol en route to Bethlehem

Ever wondered how long it takes one to walk from Jerusalem to Bethlehem? No? That’s okay, I’ll tell you anyway: two and a half hours, plus stops for singing.

Yep! Me, Kurt, Krystoff, and Paul joined a group of about 100 from the service on a midnight walk to the place of His birth…I really can’t believe this. I will try to describe the experience without sounding like a Hallmark card or the 700 club, but please forgive me if I cheese out a bit….

It was cold and the walk was long. I felt neither of these sensations. I was warm and giddy. Really giddy. It was CHRISTMAS! I had never felt so excited in my whole life. Everything about this day felt special, unlike all the rest of the days, which it is.

Stuck in the security pass crossing Jerusalem into Bethlehem.

The walk itself is not a beautiful one, and we were honked at several times by onlookers thinking all sorts of crazy things (I was surprised how used to this I felt…I remembered the Boston days of traipsing through the street at 2 am with giant candles…thanks Mama and Papa for raising me crazy, it came in handy.)

Our walk continued into Manger Square, where everything was warm and fuzzy.

Manger Square, Bethlehem.

Manger Square, Bethlehem

Venerating the place where Christ was born.

The best is till yet to come, though I apologize that this post is turning out to be so long. We went into the Church of the Nativity, mostly to get warm, but ended up staying there for quiet some time (it was about 3 am at this point…). I walked down into the Grotto where the star is placed over the spot of his birth. It looks like this, pictured at left.

When I climbed down into the grotto, I was astonished (though thinking back on it, it makes sense) to see SO many people down there, even at 3 am! There was a Catholic service being conducted, and people were gathered around this humble little star, kneeling and praying. I was in awe. I couldn’t really move and just stared at this star, picturing a tiny little baby curled up and sleeping inside. What Kings and Shepherds felt that day, here I was standing in their footprints.

It was surreal. Remembering it now, I feel very funny inside…that’s all I can say. I probably shouldn’t try and describe it because I can’t.

But needless to say, this was the best Christmas of my life. No family, no presents, no warm Christmas morning, but WHAT a day I had!

Wishing you all a peaceful and blessed 2013.

With love,
Melanie 🙂

Picture Highlights So Far, Again!!

A trip to the Communist Museum (Prague, Czech Republic)

Hungarian Sweeties 🙂 (Budapest, Hungary)

The Parliament Building overlooking the Danube (Budapest, Hungary)

Full Moon #3 of my time abroad. It rose over Budapest as I waited outside St. Mathius Church to hear Requiem (I did, and it was beautiful. Budapest, Hungary)

Carthusians conquer the Golan (Israel)

Ein Gedi mountains (Israel)

A feast of pork goulash!!!! (Czech Republic)

15th Century Castle, the significance of which slipped my mind because it’s so darn BEAUTIFUL. (Czech Republic)

Prague!!!! I’m in Love. (Czech Republic)

Traditional Hungarian flat bread, cooked in a warm oven (Hungary)

Tour boat on the Danube (Czech Republic)

View from St. Charles’ Bridge (Czech Republic.)

As I sipped red wine, my future husband serenaded me with a beautiful rendition of Zhivago. I’m in love. (Budapest, Hungary)

PRAGUE! Can you smell it? (Czech Republic)

Budapest (Hungary)

Long, LONG overdue pictures 🙂 Europe and such!!!!

It’s Time To Check In

Check: still here. Check: still breathing! Check: still a beginner. Still struggling, but who isn’t? I’m okay with that. And I want to share this passage, which, save for the last sentence, I have never really heard before. I may have heard it in passing, but never really listened to it.

“I have learned in whatever state I am, to be content. I know how to be abased, and how to abound. Everywhere and in all things I have learned both to be full and to be hungry, both to abound and to suffer need. I can do all things through Christ who strengthens me.” Phillipians 4:10-13

I can’t believe that my answer is here, in the Epistles. Of course, it always is, I’m just too stubborn to look all the time. It seems to me there comes a point when we let go of our parents’ lifelines and then all of a sudden are in too deep or not deep enough. Many, many times since I’ve been in Israel (and truth be told before Israel, I guess) I’ve felt like I’m either “too full or too hungry”: not getting enough or getting too, too much. Why can’t I be content somewhere in the middle? Well you can; that’s life.

It seems to me that there are two ways to do things: either to read adventures in books, or to go on adventures with your own two feet. Both ways have their benefits. I sat last weekend in the Golan Heights (and hiked, of course) in a Moshav (a small community). The quiet became my quiet and I felt very much at peace. But I just came back from a trek over volcanic rock, up and down hills and jumping into cool, clean water pools. I don’t know why, but sometimes I think I have to have everything figured out. (Okay, a lot of the time I think this.) I don’t. I can’t. I get so afraid of putting myself outside of my comfort zone. I think of myself as a stuffed shirt, an office box, a pale-bellied fish: an unwarented slave to something, some demonic force at work against me (of course) that wants to keep me in a box. But life begins outside this box of vanishing complacency. It used to be a world I only read about in books. And still, sometimes my imagination gets the better of me and alters my perception.

Sometimes I think I see illusions–or maybe I’m dehydrated. I always used to dream as a kid, outloud in broad daylight. Really. My life was spent in pretend lands, and sometimes I still think parts of Israel, my time in Israel, is one of those pretend lands in my head that I will write down in between classes in the sixth grade in my black and white composition notebook. Will someone pinch me, please?

The funny thing is, I did just come back from a pretend land. I swam in waterfalls. I walked along the edge of a mountain while overlooking towers of trees that slope and ascend in curvatures unheard of by the artist. I several times had to stop myself and stand and stare and the vast, misty foreground opening itself to me like a warm embrace. How lucky I am. How incredibly, incredibly blessed!! Is life seriously THIS beautiful???!

I used to be a total cynic. I used to read about magical lands and dream myself away from reality instead of opening my bedroom door and extending my toes over the line of complacency. Now I know that that door is the doorway–the portal, to a bigger, better, more beautiful world that I get to live and play in!! It’s like my backyard suddenly became the world. (And hiking is my “kick the can” :))

I still love books. Nikolos Rostov is still my dream guy and I still think I”m part hobbit. But my alter-egoes have to rest on the shelf for a little bit, along with my old diaries and Harry Potter books, I guess, while I go and try and figure out this life. I never believed I’d be here. I never believed I’d be living here, reading and dreaming and inhaling and exhaling sweet Middle-Eastern air. I can’t believe I just wrote that down. (I don’t care if it’s been three months; I’m still in shock.)

It exists! And the cool thing is, somehow, I am existing with it. And I think if I can do that here, assuage my life into the messy, crazy, “balagan” of a culture (really, cultures) that operate here, and somehow take care of myself and prosper a tiny bit in the middle of the desert, in a place completely foreign to me, then I think I can do this pretty much anywhere. That’s a tall order, but who knows?