Day 63

Sarah and I at Herodian

Melia Ludlow and I at the Herodian

Katie and I at the Herodian

Herodian with Caleb and Whitney

Bethlehem University with AnnaLeah, Leslie, and Dana

Star Street. Lauren, Leslie and I. Plus a few photo bombers.

Little entrance into the Church

Inside the Church

Lauren, Katelyn, and Wendy

The Church

Bethlehem Square

Shepherd's field

Shepherd's field with Lauren

Bethlehem

The sheep!

Tuesday. The 1st of November.

Today we had our Bethlehem field trip, it was supposed to be next weed but it happened to be during a Muslim holiday so it was pushed up a week. So for this field trip we switched to our new testament teachers. So now my class is with Huntsman for the rest of the semester. He is nearly the opposite of Harper, so it should be interesting. Sarah sat by me on the bus, we were only on the bus for a little while but it was curvy. Sarah was on the brink of throwing up right before we got to the Herodian. So I stuck by her until she was feeling better. Since we spent the day in the West Bank, we had four of our security guards with us the entire time. Herod's tomb was found here in 2007, but we couldn't see it because it is still being excavated. It is basically just a massive fortress on top of a hill. We walked through the cisterns to get to the top. Then we drove to Bethlehem University where we learned about their school, it's a Catholic school but more than 70% of the students are Muslim. After we watched a video we had a Q&A with a few of the students. Then we broke into small groups and were led around campus by the students. A few of us went around with the only boy that came to the Q&A, he just toured us around. He seemed to be a bit of a party-er. Leslie, Elyse, AnnaLeah and I ended up siting with this girl Dana and talked with her for a while. She was really interesting to talk with, she was only seventeen but she was so smart. I was impressed with how interested she was in education. We got her email address before we were ushered back onto the bus. Two student's were six minutes late getting back on the bus and Brother Huntsman blew up on them. He was soo angry. I'm so glad that it wasn't me. We went to the Tent restaurant after that where we had the usual pita bread with lot's of spreads. Then we got meat and fries. So I had pita and fries for lunch. We then drove to the traditional site of Jesus birth. We had to walk through Star Street and Bethlehem Square to get to the church which was built on top of the site. We had the option to wait in a huge line to so the star which marked the supposed spot of his birth or to tour the rest of the church. I went with the group that toured the rest of the church. We went down into a cave right next to the star and actually got to look through a little hole in a door at it, that was good enough for me. We sand some Christmas songs while we were down there. We were then allowed a few minutes to shop, but there was only like five stores and they all had the exact same stuff. Everyone was buying these Bethlehem baby blankets, I felt like I needed to get one just because so many people were. But I don't know any babies, so I resisted the urge to buy one. We then drove to our last stop at a shepherd's field. The sun was starting to go down so we all had our jacket's and flashlights. We sat on some rocks and had a little lesson by both of the religion teachers from Luke 1 and 2. A couple little hurd's of sheep passed behind us while we sang our Christmas songs. One little sheep came way behind all of his little friends and couldn't find them, so one of our security guards guided him to his little friends. It was perfect timing. The shepard's field was a cool experience, in both ways. Lauren had forgotten her jacket so we were huddled together the entire time. We got back to the center and had dinner. Then I studied for the rest of the night. I'm really excited for the next six weeks, I think the New Testament is going to be great.