Well, today has been my last day on break before diving back into the remainder of the semester! I had 2 glorious weeks off for the Jewish high holiday of Sukkot, but I guess I had to get back to work eventually. It was a pretty mellow break. I spent most of the time resting, reading, hanging out with people, and going to worship and help out at Living Bread Int'l Church. I also went to the Dead Sea and Masada with one of my roommates and one of my friends, which was super fun!!

The Dead Sea (also called the Salt Sea) is such a kick, let me tell you. The salt concentration is so ridiculously high that you bob like a cork on the surface, it doesn't feel normal at all! The water is a beautiful greenish blue shade and has a layer of magnesium or something in it, so it feels slightly more slippery than regular water (some people say it feels slimy, but I didn't think so). You can seriously sit straight upright, not moving your legs or arms at all, and just float there with your head and shoulders above the surface. It's vaguely like swimming in Jell-o or something, at least as far as how supportive the water is, but the odd thing is that it's not that the water is thick or anything, it's just… I don't know, super buoyant! If you're ever in Israel, this place is seriously worth the visit. My friend Ali and I stayed in there for hours, which most people don't really do (at least without taking a break) because any wounds or exposed sensitive skin really feel the burn from the salt, but somehow I didn't really have a problem. Though I will say that if you go there, goggles would not be a bad idea. I mean, nobody puts their head under the surface anyway, but if it happens to splash into your eyes at all, even a tiny droplet burns like mad.

The sea is bigger than I expected, and surrounded by beautiful jagged mountains on all sides. The far side of the sea actually belongs to Jordan. We were so absurdly salty that by the time we got out, my hair had dried into one crunchy sheet, there was a layer of dried salt that I had to brush off in flakes all over my shoulders and neck, and I found salt falling out of my hair for the rest of the day, despite doing my level best to desalinate myself in the outdoor showers at the beach. Fun times!

Then we caught a bus to Masada. For those who don't know what Masada is, you should take a quick look here: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Masada Anyway, since I had never heard of Masada till we read a story about it in ulpan over summer, I didn't have enough of an attachment to it to make it worth the high admission price, especially since we only had an hour and a half before we had to catch the last bus back. Many people spend a whole day hiking up and admiring Masada, sometimes even camping out at the mountaintop overnight. We did no such thing. I stayed at the visitor's center at the foot of the mountain to do some journaling while Ali and Jacq took the cable car up the mountain for a quick look. Masada closes at 5 and the last bus back to Jerusalem was scheduled to come by at 5:05 (well actually, there was another one at 7:30, but then we would have to sit around in the parking lot for 2 and a half hours, all salty and hungry and bored; no one wants that). So I walk down to the bus stop in the parking lot, where I was supposed to meet my comrades, and to my disappointment the bus pulls up a few minutes early, and Jacq and Ali aren't there yet. So, bummed about the imminent long wait, I wave the bus past. It has to do a U-turn in the parking lot to get out, and while it's doing that, I hear someone yell my name. I look up to see Jacq and Ali sprinting down the steep, rocky trail toward me, flailing and trying desperately not to fall and die. One of them yelled indistinctly, which I correctly interpreted as them saying I should try to stall the bus, but they were still maybe 600 feet up the mountain and the bus was already past the bus stop!

However, with nothing to lose, I jump up and run toward the bus, waving my arms. The bus driver sees me and stops just a few feet short of the exit from the parking lot. I go to the door and say (in Hebrew), "Sleechah… zeh holech l'Yerushalayim?" [Sorry… This goes to Jerusalem?] He says yes, and then (before getting all the way on the bus, so he can't close the doors and drive off) I say, "Yesh stei oad" [There are 2 more coming…]. "Eyfo hen?" [Where are they?] When he asks that, I look out the window behind him, desperately hoping they're within view so he doesn't get mad and blow me off (Israeli bus drivers are not notoriously friendly), and to my relief they dart into view, running around the back side of the bus at that very moment. I point and say, "Poh!" [Here!] and then decisively step onto the bus and pull out my money to stall him while they get to the door. I'm happy to report that we all made it on, had our tickets handy, and got home to Jerusalem without having to wait 2 and a half hours in a parking lot! Yay! I will say, though, that getting to the Dead Sea by bus from Jerusalem while avoiding the West Bank takes some creativity, but Jacq is good with planning things like that. We also ran into a friend of ours from church on the bus and only noticed him as we were getting off, which was a funny story in and of itself.

Sukkot is an interesting holiday. It's commonly called the "Feast of Tabernacles" in English, and the commandment is that each family builds a little shack called a sookah outside and stays in it for a week. In a modern city, this gets a bit tricky; people get plywood and build little shacks on their balconies and on the sidewalks and stuff. It's quite a sight! Unfortunately, I wasn't very diligent about staying on top of my homework during the 2 weeks off. I don't have class on Sundays, so even though today was the first day of classes after the break, I'm still off till tomorrow morning (bright and early for Hebrew at 8:30), so I've been catching up a bit. Anyway, that's it for now. Stay tuned!