First Week "Off"

Wow, it’s only been a few days, but I had to come on and read my last post to remember when I’d last written. So, the rest of this week I ran errands, and took a wrong bus here and there (just to see where they go :-)), back to the beach a few times, actually worked on my data a little bit, and had a great outing yesterday with a friend! And looking over my pictures, I remember a friend and I went out for sushi, and I ordered something I've never heard of before: a sushi sandwich! (cucumber, sweet potatoes, and I forgot what the third thing was, but since I stopped eating fish last winter going out for sushi has been a bit new for me, haha) I couldn't picture what in the world a sushi sandwich would look like so I ordered it--it looks like a sandwich! Tastes like sushi rolls. :-)

Anyway, about the outing, my friend asked me Wednesday morning if I wanted to go to the Dead Sea on Thursday and I originally agreed, although I don’t really want to go until the temperature drops a bit, but after we researched the bus times, etc. we decided to forego the desert and check out some sites around Haifa. Yay :-)

She wanted to see the Stella Maris monastery, and we both wanted to go to Elijah’s Cave. So, she found out which bus we needed, and we dutifully boarded, and then halfway there we realized amidst our Hebrew con-ver-sa-tion (it takes me that long to speak in Hebrew, but she’s not so fond of English--my first language, and my Japanese--her first language, is quite wanting), that neither of us knew where to de-board the bus. Thankfully her Hebrew is great, so she talked to the driver and he let us know when we arrived at our stop. Between our two maps we decided we had to walk back up the hill and eventually found the church. Success!

Another small adventure to follow as I sought out an iced coffee. It’s always a mini-adventure ordering coffee-type drinks here; I never know what I’m going to get even though I typically order one of two things (iced coffee or cappuccino). I always get new concoction. :-)

We sat on a low wall outside the church as we drank our iced lattes and discussed the differences in Israeli, American, Japanese, and Italian cultures regarding coffee, food, and eating practices (and the relative ease of vegetarian eating in each country). Next stop was Elijah’s Cave. On both our maps it looked fairly nearby, but as most of Haifa is up and down, it is hard to tell from a map which direction one wants to head. We first looked for a bus, but as we couldn’t discern the best to board, and I spotted a “trail line” on my map, we decided to hoof it.

As we looked for the trailhead, I thought I’d found it, but she pointed out that the stairs I’d seen were to the entrance to the chair lift. OOOooooo, but it is 50 shekels, so we still decided to walk. But I shot some pics for you:

She found the trail and it was easy going halfway down and then we had to decide to go down the north side of the hill or south side. As we looked around and tried to figure out where the cave was relative to us, I decided it was a good time to make my first “ASL narrative” video, which I’d promised to some of my friends back home. Short and sweet I just described where we were and our dilemma in finding the cave, mentioned the port and the sea, and welcomed my viewers to Haifa.

We made a choice of direction (which turned out to be accurate, yay), walked past some buildings that seemed like old abandoned shelters, but made for great views:

and found the cave with little backtracking. As we stood one moment considering our next direction a woman on trail pointed to a sign that said "Bathrooms that way" and "The Cave that way". Oh. Helpful. :-)

Elijah's Cave is regarded as a cave that the prophet Elijah stayed in before going up the mountain and cleansing Israel of hundreds of false prophets (It's a cool story, but I'll save it for another time. It's one of my favorites. :-)) The cave is a place of pilgrimage to Jews, Muslims, Druze, and some Christians, and so outside it there is a place to wash, and a few different places to light candles, pray, etc.

Inside, the cave is separated into the men's side and the women's side, with a sign delegating each in Hebrew, Arabic, and English (although I saw visitors of both genders on both sides a few times and no one seemed overly concerned).

At the entrance I saw a box of head coverings and realized this is a holy site (thankful I was wearing long shorts that covered my knees, and a shirt that covered my shoulders). I pointed them out to my friend and we were discussing if we needed to use them when a nice orthodox Jewish man smiled at us and gestured that yes, we needed to cover. So we selected one each and fumbled with them for the next five minutes as we walked around until we finally figured out a way to keep them on (not so traditional-looking, but functional).

The room divider portrayed many historical events in the land. Above the boards the letters spelled out "Shema Israel", which references a prayer so important in the Jewish faith that little kids learn from childhood, and it is recited regularly in an observant Jewish life. It comes from Deuteronomy 6:4 and says:

"Hear, O Israel, the LORD our God the LORD is one."

Deuteronomy goes on saying to love the Lord with all heart, soul, and might, and follows up with many promises to God's people. The twelve tribes of Israel are represented the boards along the top, either one or two per board.

Along with each tribe represented were various pictures and stories about the history of Israel (most of it was all in Hebrew, so while we spent quite a bit of time in there, I could only decode so much. ;-)) But I did spend a lot of time looking at an old map of the middle east--it seems like North is to the left of the map, with Egypt on the right and the Mediterranean along the bottom.

All around the caves written prayers were hidden away in crevices, behind the frames on the boards, in corners, in baskets attached to the boards...

There were two little side cave-ettes. One was covered in hanging scarves and the other was covered with a curtain and used as a little prayer room. We tried to read the sign next to the scarf room, but we don't know why they were all tied up there. (I've always appreciated tour guides, but it just reemphasized how much I like them!)

When we were up on the mountain, and as we hiked down, we had seen the Maritime Museum below, so we decided to go there after the cave.

The top floor was all about excavation in water around the middle east. It was very neat to learn more about the process, and I was interested to see that on many of the plaques it mentioned who had found the item, how, and when. It reminded me of the sentiment I've heard over and over that in Israel everyone knows everyone--so names are important.

The other thing that struck me was that on many of the plaques it explained how the item had been dated (carbon dating, carvings, pottery and coins found nearby, etc.). It makes sense because so many people in this region are very interested in archeology, and practice it professionally or as amateurs.

The middle floor had exhibits about ships all over the world from the last several centuries including the Titanic, and the bottom floor was a new exhibit all about piracy...only when I had made it to the bottom floor did I finally ask if we could take pictures! I had looked around and not seen any signs saying we couldn't, but I'd just assumed. But when I saw how decked out the pirate floor was, I thought it begged for cameras, and that was confirmed, so we went at it. :-)

We learned about pirate lifestyles and famous pirates throughout the ages.

We learned about their knot making and other arts and crafts.

We saw a cool sarcophagus with images of Greek gods.

And then we head over to the Navy and Clandestine Immigration museum next door, since our tickets allowed us entry into there as well. To enter the maritime museum all we did was buy a ticket, but to enter the second we had to show our passports (I had a copy of mine, though not the original) and answer all the questions I usually am asked when I go through customs. Then after asking if we had any weapons, the guard let us enter.

To be continued. . . :-)