Last few days.

We did a brief tour of Jerusalem. The city blew my mind and gave me a lot to think about in terms of the arbitrary construction of boundaries & borders, the taking of cities, the beauty of old spaces, and wanting to learn Arabic badly. I don't feel like talking about what it meant politically to me, so I will avoid that...

Walking around the old parts (i.e. pre-19th century) made me giggle when considering the idea of historicity between different places (i.e. what is "new"...19th century onward in Jerusalem versus what is "old" in the states, i.e. anything over 50 years old). Here are the walls of the old city, these ones built sometime in the 16th century, with me for scale:


Aside from the market and the general aesthetic pleasure of the city,the funniest part of our wanderings was how we would consistently stumble upon Christian holy sites inadvertently. This has more to do with the Christian worship of holy objects than any plan on our part. The best moment was when we came across the Holy Sepulcher, i.e. where Jesus is said to have been crucified and buried. So yes, "I found Jesus." We didn't know where we were, except it seemed important because there were lots of tourists. Noam asked one of the security guards, and they laughed and explained what it was. Here's what it looks like from the outside:


A few highlights of the short trip were the many vista points we went to with amazing views of different parts of the city where I could consider how random the boundaries of Israeli annexation were (like squid tentacles...). The best was the last day when we accidentally found the Virgin Mary's grave (underground) and then hiked up the Mt. Olive to look out west toward the Old City and West Jerusalem at sunset. Below is part of the view:


Now I'm back and getting ready to start packing. I have one more evening here, and then I head off back to Providence via Zurich (where I will find some way to entertain myself for 24 hours). Apparently there is indeed a "timekeeper" museum, i.e. a watch museum, and the Lindt factory tour (!!!) with free chocolate, but it is unfortunately closed the day I am there.

What a weird end to this weird trip it shall be.

Dusty change

We left Ezuz (I miss the goats muchly), and we're back in the kibbutz now, where a lot has been going on. Noam's parents' kitchen is getting a much-needed overhaul, so Noam and I helped pack things up prior to the beginning of construction. Now construction is underway and half the house is covered with toxic concrete dust.

Our plan was to go to Jerusalem today and stay there until Friday, but everything is up in the air because Noam's grandfather is in the hospital and may not come out. So, we'll see. The dust in the air does not help the mood around here.

As for me, I am coming back to the states early - I will be landing next Tuesday evening and heading back to Providence. The plan was that Noam would come about two weeks later, but now we don't know. So a lot of change in the works...

Hot hot hot.

Well, it's the desert. And it's certainly desert-like weather. It's been in the 90's the past few days, with very little breeze, and the goats have been drinking up water like it's their job. By the time the day is finished I'm usually covered in a delightful mixture of corn-bran feed, various animal excrement (shoes only...usually), sweat, and lots of goats milk from feeding baby goats and sheep. Today I even got the extra treat of having a bird shit on my head! It's certainly been fun working here, and I have officially confirmed that I love goats (and think sheep are incredibly dumb), but I don't plan on being a goat herder or keeper-of-animals-for-a-living any time soon; it's too much work!

Highlights of the past, goaty month in Ezuz have included:

• Baby Lindsey goat was born!
• Helping a momma goat give birth (with my own two hands!) to her beautiful baby boy in the middle of the desert while we were out grazing one day
• Learning how to successfully bottle feed and nurse very young and sick baby sheep & goats
• Finally understanding (more or less) how cheese is made, and feeling optimistic about making it on my own
• Getting rid of my yeast bread fears...and successfully making yeast bread on my own
  
• Knowing that although my socio-political values are very passionately different from a lot of Israelis, it's sometimes better to just avoid politics...
• Being surprised by a random Purim party (Jewish holiday that is especially exciting for kids involving ~3 days of costumes, parties, pastries, revelry, intentional drunkenness, and randomness) in the middle of our podunk village on Saturday morning, that involved lots of live music and a rather offensive theme of "AFRICA!" which was every terrible stereotype you an conjure up equating black people as = 'weird' tribal, primitive, jungle-swinging Africans. To end the the day of revelry, there was a Ghanaian drum and dance group "featuring real live Africans!"...enough said. (Have I mentioned that ethnic/political awareness is somewhat absent here?)
  
• The desert has been in full bloom (lots of wild flowers)
  

I'm still in love with all the baby goats here in Ezuz, but it's about time to head off and start working on some other new venture of...life. If all goes well and I don't feel too guilty about leaving the farm, Noam and I will probably head out on Friday morning. But, we'll see! In the meantime, as many baby goats as I can handle!