Lost Luggage

After about 28 hours of flying and lay overs, we finally landed in Israel. Our flight to DC was late and my group and I had to sprint to get to Austrian Air. We barely made it. We flew to Vienna and then to Tel Aviv. When we got to Tel Aviv me and my group’s bags weren’t there. So we had to fill out a form and hopefully they can find our bags and deliver them soon. All of my toiletries are in my suitcase but luckily my whites were in my carry-on bag. Tel Aviv is a pretty modern looking city. But the Center is located in the Old City of Jerusalem and it has a good biblical feel to it.

Yesterday we went on a short tour of parts of the Old City. The big highlight was going to the Church of the Holy Sepulcher. This is where the Catholics believe where Christ was crucified, laid, and resurrected.  

Orientation

     So today I went to orientation and had a riveting presentation by one of the directors from the BYU Jerusalem Center. He emphasized how our dress standards are very different than that of Arab or Israeli people. It is most extreme for the girls in our group because they can't wear things that are too tight or to low cut or show a lot of their arms. But when you're in Rome you do as the Romans do.
     In our group there are 81 students with 26 male and 55 female. I like that ratio.
     I will be taking 6 classes from professors who are Muslim, Jewish and LDS. My classes on the Ancient Near East, Old Testament and New Testament are taught by BYU professors, my Modern Near East class from the Jewish/Israeli prospective is taught by a Jewish professor, naturally, and my Modern Near East from the Muslim/Arab prospective is taught by, you guessed it, a Muslim professor. I'm also taking beginning Hebrew from Jewish lady.
     In addition to studying and touring in Jerusalem and the surrounding areas, we are going to be spending two weeks in Galilee, one week in Turkey, and four days in Jordan.
     Jerusalem is considered holy to the three great monotheistic religions: Judaism, Christianity and Islam and I am excited to study about all three. I am very anxious to start my journey tomorrow and I really have no idea what exactly to expect. Itineraries can only do so much.
     Hopefully I can keep up on this blog. My journal writing is pretty similar to my workout schedule: 2 days in a row hardcore and then about 3 weeks off, then 2 days on, 3 weeks off, etc.