midterms suck in the jerusalem center too.

we all wish we were back here:

this is from the border of egypt.

i'm pretty sure i could be on a fieldtrip indefinitely. or atleast the rest of my life.

everyone told us we would get sick from eating the food...so we bough snickers and sprite and cheerios. and we heard we'd run out of money, so we got a ton of one dollar bills. then i got too confident, ate the food one morning...and the next night on the way back to jerusalem...without giving too many details...mmmmmmmmmmmm

me: (so tentative to professor...) um...i have pharaoh's revenge...how much longer to jerusalem...?

professor: (turns to other professor in front) did you hear that?

other professor: yes i did. (to me) are you okay pulling off to the side of the road?

me: yes, yes. i really don't care.

the bus pulls over. i run out. success. i come back, look at both professors, who snort, silently laughing while i sit down in my spot with unimaginable relief.

aren't you glad i disclosed that to the entire blogging world?

ukuleles taking the world by storm...

elissa (the girl on the far right) and i have single-handedly convinced a bunch of people at the center that they should play uke! what?? some of the them are the type of people that are always like, "i always wanted to learn to play guitar," and now they're like, "well, maybe i'll just play uke..." and then other people see elissa, and of course that makes them want to play because they realize it's awesome...

also, i played my sis cami's song "black sheep" that she wrote last year before she went on her mission to finland in the formal talent show. it's one of my favorite songs on the album she made before she left, and i basically wanted to bring her ukulele here to jerusalem so that i could learn that song...mmm anyway, so, after a lot of wishing i hadn't signed up at all, and after sound checks where it was like one of those dreams where you open your mouth and try so hard to force something, anything to come out, and nothing does...it was bad. not to mention i'm pretty sure i looked like a freaking deer in headlights that were an inch in front of my face. but that was during the soundcheck. but then prayers were answered, i cracked a few jokes, and i enjoyed myself up there. anyway...pretty fun! i wish i could figure out how to put her song up here! does anyone know?? if you want the song, please email me and i will send it to you.

for now, i will tempt you with pleasant lyrics:

there are sheep in line,
one is darker than the rest
she hopes they won't confine
her from the herd.

she says i spend much time
thinking about what they say to me
i can't get it out of mind

over again, why can't you think of me as your own
think of me as your own
can't you think of me as your own
think of me as your own

when a man with stick walked over
told her she's not alone.
i choose who is in this fold
and you are in it too.

think of me as your own
think of me as your own
think of me as your own
.
.
.

sort of famous bodies of water:

felucca rides on the nile in luxor. this is when we were sailing up stream. i love this picture:



this was taken while i was on a camel: this kid steered our boat and every girl on the boat wanted to take a picture with him. so, of course i was too embarrassed to get one.



the red sea: greg, me, andrew, jeff, elissa, gretchen, ron. three people decided to jump into the water and got grounded on a free day when we got back to the center. it was so warm...i sort of wish i would have. but, yeah, i was still a bit sick......

(thanks for this last pic gretch!)

Sinai!

So...everyone who's been to sinai at 2:30 in the morning freaking freaked me out that i was going to be freezing. SO.

I wore:

1 pair of cotton socks
2 pairs of wool socks
1 pair of smart wool pants
1 pair of jeans
1 pair of wind pants
1 t-shirt
1 non-cotton longsleeved shirt
1 fleece
1 sweatshirt
1 leather jacket
1 camel's wool poncho
1 camel's wool scarf
1 really warm hat
and a windbreaker just in case in my back pack.

friends...i was not cold sitting there waiting for the sun to rise. but i really don't think i needed to use so much space in my luggage for that...woops! look at my elephant feet in the first pic.

but i took a camel up part way, which i wouldn't take back no matter how many times people told me it was a cop-out. i loved leaning back and staring at the sky. i may or may not have started crying until i realized brittney's camel in front of me kept farting and the bedouins kept using gross slurping noises to control the camels. but besides that, nothing beats seeing the silhouettes of camels on the ridge, moving slowly and steadily forward, and looking at the silent, clear night with my head craned back. Thinking of God, and that at least a few times, He had been here.

after climbing down sinai at st catherine's monastery: me, lindsay, gretchen

on top of mt sinai while the sun was rising. (thanks for the pic ron!)

not at sinai. but i love this picture (thanks to ron again...he's kind of a good photographer.). my roommate lindsay. who i rely on too much socially, physically (as in i almost slip and fall ALL the time), and she takes my candy away when i buy it so i don't eat it all at once.

temple at karnak

something you HAVE to do if you ever go to egypt.

deal?

so, i know this is kind of an old song, but oh my oh my. this is what i listened to while i was at the temple at karnak. mmm. listen while you look at pictures.



sorry michael!!! credit to him for this song too :)

(thanks to elissa for this pic!)

this place really is amazing. and i always try really hard not to use that word if i can help it.

guess it can't be helped.

you know pretend swearing?

where you say the first part of the word and you don't finish so it's like it doesn't count? and for some reason it's really funny. today i tried to do it and failed.


lindsay piling huge amount of salad on to her plate in the cafeteria at the center.

me: lindsay, that's a big a-- salad. short pause. wooooooooopppsss

it seems like everywhere i go the sky is falling, and the concierges all meet ya with a frown

what i didn't stop listening to the entire time in egypt:

thanks michael b!





pyramids! i read lauren's post about seeing the pyramids for the first time and i didn't even realize how excited i would be to see them! a few people saw them way in the distance on our bus, and the professor just kept saying, "there straight ahead! 12:00!" which doesn't help at all when you're on the seventeenth row and 12:00 means the back of someone's head. so we were all craning around trying to see, and finally, seriously after a long while, glorious pyramids were beheld by all.

we went into the great pyramid the next day, and when we were taking pictures there, i got three different headpieces put on to my head to take pictures. woops

natalie, gretchen, me, lindsay. thanks for the pic gretch!


making a pyramid at the pyramids. so fun


peace in the middle east! thanks to lindsay for the inspiration

gretchen doesn't like this picture. but i do