In case you haven't seen CNN.....

So basically I'm in the middle of a war here, which is no new news.  However, since Friday the 13th here the Palestinians have been doing 1.)explosions...I just tell myself they are doing fireworks. 2.)tear gas and rock throwing.  aka the 17 year old boy who was killed, that happened like a 1/2 mile away from us. 3.)LOTS of yelling in Arabic.  This is all due to the "Catastrophe"-which to them is the creation of the Israel state.

Old Israelite man looking at the Western Wall

I was laying in bed last night listening to all this, but I was so tired I had no problem falling asleep.  The center is on lock down for us.  We can't go outside (even on our balcony) and going to the city is totally off-limits.  So we have been confined inside for the past 2 days...be jealous:)

What is interesting though, is that I was at the Israeli Celebration, where the Jews were celebrating the creation of the state of Israel earlier this week.  It was so funny, because I think the BYU students brought the party there. There were tons of outside concerts, but nobody was dancing.  So we pulled out our best dance moves and went crazy.  It was so funny because a crowd started forming around us just watching us dance.  All these tourists were taking pictures/filming of us dancing (fyi.  we are not amazing dancers by any means!).

PARTY!

The Crowd behind us:)....okay so they were probably listening to the concert also.

Sorry pic is sideways....but a hotel shot off fireworks

Silly stringed Bro. Chadwick

But no fear!  We are leaving Jerusalem tomorrow morning.  Our entire group is headed..........drum roll..........TURKEY!!!

Start singing:  "Istanbul was once Constantinople"

I'm so excited.  Some things that we will be doing are:  Hagia Sophia, Grand Bazaar, tons of ruins, etc.




So no internet during the week, so I will update in a week!


Here are a couple random pics:

 A shop keeper put all of us in authentic clothing

Another historical place according to Wikipedia:
The main north-south thoroughfare, the Cardo Maximus, was originally a paved avenue approximately 22.5 meters wide (roughly the width of a six lane highway) which ran southward from the site of the Damascus gate, terminating at an unknown point. The southern addition to the Cardo, constructed under Justinian in the 6th century CE, extended the road further south to connect the Church of the Holy Sepulchre with the newly-built Zion Gate.^[3] Along its length, the roadway was divided into three parts: two colonnaded covered walks flanking a 12 meter wide road.^[4] The shaded porticoes provided separation of pedestrian traffic from wheeled carts, shelter from the elements, space for small-scale commerce, as well as opportunities for residents and visitors to gather and interact.^[5] The central open pavement provided commercial access as well as ritual space. The Cardo’s most striking visual feature was its colonnade, clearly depicted on the Madaba Map.




So basically this was a main road from ancient Jerusalem:

This structure was from one of the temple periods (don't remember haha)

Ancient main street aka "Cardo"