Helllloooooo from Jeruuuuusalem! (Day 1)

Hey friends and family, Carrie here.

After 24 hours, we are finallly in Jerusalem! I know my parents/family would like to know that we had two in-flight meals. One at midnight (pasta or chicken w/ rice), which made really no sense to either the time zone we left or were headed into. We then had breakfast before landing (again, timing made no sense) of french toast sticks or omellete. Woot.

Alright. We landed about 4:45ish pm our time (meaning Israel's...yep I'm claiming that to be 'our time' now.) After doing the usual airport stuff of getting our passports stamped, luggage collected, etc., we got on a bus to take us from Tel Aviv to Jerusalem. I never knew how much I liked reading billboards until they were all in Arabic, and I couldn't understand them.

The drive lasted probably 30-45 minutes? I'm honestly not really sure. Dr. Bouzard quoted a Pslam that said something about looking to the hills, which was fitting because...there were hills. Very steep and rocky hills.

We then found our hotel and had dinner by 8:00. It was strange to think that you all were probably scrounging up some lunch. Dinner consisted of a salad course (lots of greens, cucumbers, humus, and things we had no idea of what they were), a main course (lots of hotdish-looking-things...they were good...noodles, beef/mushrooms over rice, chicken/pineapple), and a dessert course (cake/pastry type things).

After dinner, we headed out to see a bit of the city. We planned on heading to the top of the hotel to check out the sites, but there was a meeting happening. So, we wandered around the Christian Quarter and saw some of the shops. We met one shop owner, Shaaban, who has known Dr. Bouzard for a while now and seems like a really good guy. He explained to us his fair prices and money changing. I guess he has few other brothers who also own shops. He was also sure to include how safe the streets are and even showed us some security cameras so, "if someone tries to steal from you, the cops would be on them like that." (Feel even better, Mom?) ;)

We're all heading to bed now (it's our 9:18pm...your 1:18pm) and will join Dr. Strickert tomorrow morning for church. (He's a Wartburg professor who lives now in Jerusalem, and I believe is the pastor at this church.) As for the rest of the day, I'm not sure too many plans have been made.

All in all, everyone is having a splendid time. :)

Okay, some personal shout-outs from me:
Mom: There's gorgeous flowers here and an amazing garden at our hotel. I'll try to get pictures.
Dedee: I have seen like five cats here. They're all awesome. I might bring one home. ;)
Dad: My luggage weighed exactly 37 pounds. I win.