Sunday, November 9, 2008

Favorite Mideast memories, stream-of-consciousness
(aka, How I spent my stimulus check and tax refund)

  • The warm, gooey perfect falafel we bought just outside the Western Wall
  • Making a human pyramid at the pyramids
  • Referring to any food we didn't recognize as "wikipedia"
  • Singing hymns in the matchless acoustics of Saint Anne's church
  • Laughing, talking, sipping lemon tea and eating wikipedia crackers and white pomegranate at the hostel in Petra, afternoon sunlight streaming in through the perfect window
  • Matt's spirited rendition of the Lion King in the Petra monastery
  • Floating down the Nile talking with dear friends and watching a slow sunset
  • Wandering through the tunneled streets of Acco at night
  • Dumping piles of dust out of my shoes after a day in Petra
  • Falling asleep on a horse and buggy ride around Luxor from sheer exhaustion
  • Sinking in up to my knees in mud at the Dead Sea
  • Paging Andrea over the airport intercom in Amman
  • Praying in the church on the Mount of Beatitudes
  • Getting lost driving in the West Bank … I'm not sure where we are but there’s a sign to Ramallah … yikes ...
  • Rusty and Dave pelting each other with olives all along the Jerusalem city wall
  • Jewish men and boys singing and dancing their way to the Western Wall at sunset
  • Wading through knee-deep water in Hezekiah’s tunnel
  • Camels everywhere! I heart camels
  • Getting proposed to by my camel driver (he offered 1 million camels for me!)
  • Being told by my donkey driver that my donkey was slower because I was too fat
  • All the homos – I mean hummus – I could eat. I heart hummus
  • Being nearly accosted by Egyptians for money
  • Melt-in-your-mouth Egyptian pizza
  • Randomly meeting someone from the Cairo ministry of culture who got us reserved seating at the whirling dervish show
  • Matt reading us select verses at Biblical sites in and around Jerusalem
  • Walking smack into a wall in the Masada museum
  • Shekels!
  • Dinars!
  • Hearing the call to prayer virtually everywhere
  • Sprinting through the old city with a djembe and a backpack full of dishes and scarves
  • Losing half my body weight in sweat at the Valley of the Kings
  • Gaining it all back eating pita bread and every kind of salad imaginable

3 comments:

matt b said...

Total Eclipse of the Heart at the ice cream shop. By far.

Margaret said...

I

MUST

GO

BACK

TO

THE

MIDDLE

EAST.

Now, please.

Thompson Family said...

Oh my goodness. What great memories. Reading your last few posts have totally taken me back to the Jerusalem center fall of 1996. I am so glad you had the opportunity to go there. You look great!