with seth in bethlehem...

seth and i went to bethlehem.
here we are in the church of the nativity...
built on the traditional site of Christ's birth

outside the church there was a demonstration going
on protesting the israeli zionist movement...

the sign reads
"the land of the Orthodox Church must serve
the interests of the Arab Orthodox community
and not the Zionist movement..."

bethlehem is governed by the
Palestinian Authority.


here palestinian police direct traffic

in the bethlehem street market...
which has VERY good, cheap prices!

a woman's clothing store...

more women's clothing for sale...

some beautiful scarves ~

israeli license plates are yellow,
in contrast to palestinian ones which are green.


here, a palestinian soldier stops a yellow plated
car to check i.d.

israeli's are not allowed into areas governed by the
palestinian authority, so any yellow license plates
are subject to investigation...


seth and i standing by part of the wall
(also called 'the fence')
built a few years ago by the israeli government
to make it more difficult for suicide bombers and other
terrorist activity to access nearby jerusalem...

a watch tower...

here you can see different parts of the wall
as it curves around, separating bethlehem
from jerusalem...

behind seth and i is the drive-through check-point
through the wall, between bethlehem and jerusalem...

this is as close as we could get since we were walking.
there is another check-point that you can walk through,
but this was the drive-through one...




the road leading to the check-point was named
for Yasser Arafat...

signs at the check-point....

"Passengers must dismount for inspection"
"to transit check point, please prepare documents"
"welcome to Jerusalem"

all signs are in hebrew, arabic and english...

a guard checks a citizen's documents...

notice the machine gun in the guard's hand

bethlehem bill boards...

the top bill board is advertising a raman noodle type food,
the second is for the bank of Jordan,
the third is an energy drink,
and the fourth, i can't tell...

behind me is bethlehem and other palestinian
authority areas...

a shepherd and his sheep standing on the side of the road...

a fountain outside of a restaurant that was actually
a big, bedoin tent that i didn't get a good picture of  :(

seth is here...!!! :)

seth arrived in israel on october 5th...

i was sooooo happy to see him!  :)  :)

seth and i went to tel aviv the day he got here

and enjoyed a walk on the beach...

tel aviv beach...

seth and i went to jerusalem and enjoyed

the sights and sounds of the famous

ben yehuda pedestrian street...

here an artist pencil sketches a girl's face...

street musicians...

these street musicians have a very interesting

combination of a saxaphone and 

drums made out of pvc plumbing pipe!!  lol!!

seth took a picture of me standing in front of the gate

to the president's house....

after we took the picture, the guards by the gate

came over and asked to see what we had taken pictures of...

when they saw the picture, they were ok with it!  :)

the weekend seth and i spent in jerusalem there was

two jewish holidays back to back -

shavuot  - the feast of weeks/booths

and simhat torah - the celebration of the torah.

orthodox men headed home for shabbat meal

with their families on friday night...

an orthodox father and sons...

we spent time with daniel kirchhevel and his family...

here we were singing together...

the boys went to play basketball...

first they watched...

then they played...

friday night we walked jerusalem's old city

with donnovan and elena and their friend, daniel

the plaza around the western wall was very full

as it was friday night, the beginning of shabbat,

as well as being a holiday....

celebrating the torah....

men dance and sing holding torah scrolls

i got a few pictures before i was noticed by

people standing nearby who asked me to stop.

taking pictures is breaking the sabbath

for the ultra orthodox, so it is prohibited

near the wall during shabbat.

then we walked on top of the old city walls

and enjoyed a night time view of the whole city...

seth climbed a fence he found
(lol...leave it to seth to be entertaining... :)

playing some music for friends...

on shabbat, seth and i attended church in jerusalem

and then enjoyed a picnic in the park after the service.

israeli life...

on the eve of Rosh HaShanah, the Jewish New Year,

i enjoyed a wonderful meal and evening with

Ilana's family...

(Ilana is the midwife that i am living and working with

while here in israel...)

me with ilana's daughters...

imbal, mayaan and lital...

the big, happy family at the holiday meal...

walking to the bus station one day,

i observed how israeli's move into upper-story apartments...

a truck with a platform on a conveyor belt

takes the furniture and boxes up to the balcony!

one of the moving guys saw me taking pictures

and decided to pose!  :)

andalus ranch...

i have enjoyed volunteering at a

therapeutic riding stables...

with nicole, one of the main horses i work

with at the ranch...

eden helping a student shower and brush a horse...

avital, one of the instructors

adjusting the stirrups for a student...

karen, another instructor, helps

a student with their helmet...

the awesome view from the stables...

shenee...one of the other volunteers...

serg working with one of the beautiful stallions...

me with apache, one of the stallions...

giving a ride...

abir, the owner of the ranch

abir giving riding lessons in the arena...

eden and i  :)

eating a wonderful meal with one of the

student's family...

with karen ~

with avital ~