Merry Christmas from Germany

Christmas Eve in Germany

Our trip started off pretty rough, starting with delayed flights, damaged luggage, not having the car we reserved, and stolen jewelry (my brand new Shaffalie jewelry I just wrote about last week!). Just when my mother proclaimed, “Well, it can’t get any worse.” my dad runs over my husband with the car! Thank God he’s ok and nothing is broken, just rolled over his toe.

We drove to Rothenburg, enjoying the beautiful scenery of snow covered fields and forests. We quickly rushed to the Rothenburg’s Christmas Market in the old city square. We warmed our hands and our tummies with hot spiced mulled wine (Gluhwien ) and enjoyed meter long bratwurst. I even found a yarn shop!

Our bed and breakfast was a really cute and quaint old German Guesthouse inside the old city wall built in 1521. It had a lot of character and was very cozy. There was even a house cat to wake us up in the morning.

Today we drove to Nuremberg and got to the old city center (Hauptmarkt) just in time to see the Frauenkirche strike noon with all its’ bells and moveable pieces spring to life. Then we spent several hours wondering around the famous Chriskindlesmarkt and also spun the gold ring at the Schoner Brunnen for good luck. After another meter long bratwurst and some Lebkuchen (gingerbread) we guided ourselves on a walking tour of old Nuremberg.

We’re warming up in the hotel now and just skyped our family back home to wish them a Merry Christmas. We’ll head down soon to enjoy our Christmas Eve meal at the hotel restaurant.

Christmas Travels

Tonight we are heading to Germany for Christmas. We will be meeting Kristal's parents there. We are really looking forward to seeing some snow for Christmas and enjoying the Christmas Markets, decorations and holiday cheer!

We miss all of our family and friends back home and wish you all a Merry Christmas and Happy Holidays.

We love you all so much!

Chance of a Lifetime Experience

I (Kristal) had a chance of a Lifetime opportunity today. I got to join the sixth grade class on their field trip to Taposiris Magna.

It's about an hour west of Alexandria in a town called Abu Sir and has an ancient temple and a one tenth size replica of the Great Pharos Lighthouse of Alexandria. The "chance of a lifetime experience" was the fact that this sight is NOT open to the public because monumental archeology studies are currently underway here in hope of finding the lost tombs of lovers Marc Anthony and Cleopatra. So why you ask did we get to go to a closed site excavation? Well, because the head archeologist Kathleen Martinez from the Dominican Republic has her daughter in Schutz while she is here working on the research.

It was so exciting to be at a place that few people have been allowed to go. There has hardly even been any articles or even photos published yet. Discovery Channel is making a documentary so keep on the look out maybe next year. It would be so exciting if they do discover the lost tombs; for me to say that I was their while they were doing the excavation, and saw it years before any tourist were allowed on site.

Unfortunately, Kathleen was very sick today and was not able to be here today to give us the tour herself, but another great archeologist showed us around. He took us inside the temple and showed us many sites that they have excavated and took us down into many tunnels that they had found. He also took us inside the pylons, showed us some artifacts that they had found and were storing there, then we were able to climb up and stand on top of the temple walls. Unfortunately, we were limited on what we were allowed to take pictures of since this is still a closed site and not open to the public, they don't want certain finds to be broadcast before they publish them. However, I was still allowed to take many pictures of many wonderful things...just not any of the "really good stuff". But I'll have those memories for myself for the rest of my life.

Then we went over to the cemetery which was just discovered this year! We watched as workers and archeologist worked together to excavate some tombs that they had just discovered within the past month. We went down into almost all of the tombs that have been fully excavated. At one tomb, we had to one by one be lowered into a hole and then crouch down, when you crouch down you are literally face to face with two mummies just inches away from you! In many of the other tombs there are full skeletons laying open. It was amazing. Unfortunately I wasn't able to take any pictures of these, but if you watch the videos below, you can see some of what I saw.

We walked over to the little lighthouse and were able to climb up onto it and got a great view of the sea and the temple grounds.


I feel really bad, because Seth almost was able to go on this trip too, but with school closing for H1N1 he unfortunately had to be a good teacher and devote his time to his students. I was truly blessed to be granted this opportunity today and I will remember it for the rest of my life.

Below are several youtube videos about the project site, some are by Zahi Hawass, the Supreme Council of Antiquities in Egypt (you'll recognize him from so many National Geographic documentaries) and also Kathleen Martinez herself.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gJ4ugRiL8WM


http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KTaHkrhzN9g

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7Y3MVEMJa6E

Here are a few articles:
http://egyptsites.wordpress.com/2009/03/03/abu-sir-taposiris-magna/

http://heritage-key.com/blogs/sean-williams/digging-cleopatras-tomb-taposiris-magna

http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/middle_east/8000978.stm

Interview

I got interviewed by some of the third graders for their country reports. They interviewed me on the U.S.A.

Jewelry and Christmas Party

Several of my girlfriends and I went to a Jewelry show today. The designer, Shafalie, is a friend of one of our staff members and we went to one of her Open Houses last year. She custom made both our mom’s necklaces for Mother’s Day last year. They have their name, their husbands name and both of their children’s names written in Arabic with the word for protection in the middle.

She also custom made a necklace for me, so I could wear Seth’s name (in Arabic)
close to my heart. (picture coming)

This year I bought a few more pieces for myself. (Pictures coming)

That night we went to the Christmas Party at the American Cultural Center. The Cultural Center is a old Mansion and it was decorated beautifully with a Christmas tree and poinsettias everywhere. There were tons of good cookies and Christmas treats and they had real nice activities for kids like making Gingerbread houses and Christmas movies. There was even a small Christmas bazaar with crafts from local businesses. The highlight of the night was a special visit from Santa!

Christmas Decorating and Bazaar

It’s a tradition here at Schutz for the residents to get together and decorate the dinning room and put up a Christmas tree together. We enjoyed some yummy hot coco, decorated some sugar cookies and sang along with some Holiday music. I giggle every time I get “Let it Snow, Let it Snow, Let it Snow” stuck in my head. “Let it sand storm, Let it sand storm, Let it sand storm,” just doesn’t flow as well.
On Friday several of us went down to Cairo for a large Christmas Bazaar put on by the Cairo American College. There were over fifty vendors there, most selling handmade crafts a few selling Christmas crafts. Some of the crafts were made by the nuns of the Coptic Church, some were NGO’s who teach the Bedouin women a craft to earn a living, and some were crafts made out of the recycled materials from the Zabbalin village in Coptic Cairo. (see previous post for explanation). The cards they made out of recycled paper was probably the most purchased item at the bazaar, I was very impressed with their quality, and to make them even better, each was embroidered with an Egyptian or Christmas scene. I really enjoyed my shopping trip and when crazy buying local crafts. I got some exquisite glass blown figurines, a clay figuring of two women greeting each other from a nun of the Coptic Church, and embroidered purse, and my pride and joy of the trip is a huge wall hanging completely hand embroidered with Egyptian scenes. They also had some great food, including bagels which are a huge treat for us here. We all bought some to take home to our husbands since none of us bought anything for them.

We stopped at a nice restaurant before the drive back to Alex and had a lovely dinner. While we were there, some of the men that came along with us decided they wanted to place a Drinkies order. Drinkies is the alcohol store in Egypt. And yes, you call and place an order and they deliver to you in a matter of minutes. In Cairo they carry a brand of beer called Luxor that they don’t carry in Alexandria. We really confused the Drinkies store as well as our waiter of why guest in the restaurant were calling to place an order. But after a few laughs and an explanation that we can’t get Luxor in Alex we had three cases of beer delivered right to our table.

Coptic Cairo

One of our local teacher friends organized a nice day trip for us a few weekends ago. We spent the day in Cairo and visited two important places, the first one the Monastery of St. Simon in the Zabbalin village and the second the area of Coptic Cairo.

In 1969 the Governor of Cairo decided to move all the “trash collectors” to the hills of Mt. Mokattam. They build themselves little houses of tin and other scrap metal and today this village of Zabbalin has a population around 30,000 and is mostly Coptic Christians. Since the Egyptian government does not have a government run waste removal system, for over a hundred years this community has made their living by cleaning the city. Each morning the village men go out on their donkey carts to their district in Cairo and gather the trash.

Picture taken from:

http://blog.foreignpolicy.com/posts/2008/10/24/cairos_trash_collectors_lose_an_advocate

Picture taken from:

http://www.travelpod.com/travel-blog-entries/inoursuitcase/freedom_07-08/1223650500/tpod.html

They have contracts with companies and residents to gather their waste for them. They bring it back to their home and the women and children sort though the pile. They feed the refuse to the pigs that they raise. This is the only population of pigs in the country. You might have heard that when H1N1 (Swine Flu) came to Egypt; the Present ordered that ALL of these pigs be slaughtered. This greatly

hurt this community by not have any pigs to eat or sell, but also hurt all of Cairo, since the refuse waste that was taken to be fed to the pigs, now just sits in the streets and rots! Driving through Zabbalin stirs up lots of emotions. It pains my heart to see bare foot children sitting waste deep in a pile of trash in front of their shack of a house, but at the same time, it’s impressive to see their effectiveness with sorting through so much. They are able to recycle 60% of Cairo’s trash. (Most first world countries recycle about 70%).

Picture taken from:

http://www.travelpod.com/travel-blog-entries/inoursuitcase/freedom_07-08/1223650500/tpod.html

As with most sights in Egypt, there are no signs and clear directions marked, but it didn’t matter to get to the Mokattam Church, driving through Zabbalin, everyone just points the way without us having to stop and ask.  It was amazing, diving through Zabbalin, where you felt like the piles of trash were caving in on you and little sunlight reached the streets, to all of a sudden you take one more turn and under a walkway, and all of a sudden the surroundings open up, a huge mountain appears, and the warmth of the sun is shining down on you and you see a huge Coptic Church in front of you with biblical carvings in the mountain all around.   This is the Monastery of St. Simon which the Cathedral of Virgin Marry and six other churches hidden in an underground network of caves in the Mokattam hills.  In the tenth century when Egypt was ruled by Caliph Al Muizz, he got into a debate with the Coptic Pope Abram where the Caliph challenged the Coptic’s to prove the bible verse stating that if you have faith strong enough you can move a mountain.  The Caliph saw this as an opportunity to move the Mountain that was spoiling his view, and if the Coptic’s were unable to, it he would be finally able to prove that the Christians were wrong and do away with them in his country.  Simon was chosen to be the one to move the mountain so after three days of fasting and prayers the mountain moved.

Next we headed to the area called Coptic Cairo. This is the oldest area of Cairo and was settled around the 6 century B.C.  Later the Romans build a fort around it called Babylon.  Within the fort walls there were twenty Coptic Christian churches, several mosques including the earliest one built in Egypt, and the Ben Ezra synagogue all living in peaceful religious harmony for thousands of years.  We visited the Mar Girgis Church, Keniset Mar Girgis, El-Mu’ Allaqa (the Hanging Church), Ben Ezra synagogue, and Abu Serga.  At the Nunnery of St. George, the sisters take care of the original chain and shackle that St. George was tortured in.  Here we watched man women come pay homage by the custom of taking the chains and wrapping them around your body and neck, saying a prayer, and kissing the chains.  Since the city is so old, the modern street level has risen several meters above the original, which means, to get to the original floors, we always had to walk down stairs to what felt like the basement.

 

 

 

 

Jordan Picture Video

Jordan

Day 1 Thursday Nov. 27, 2009

For the Eid el Adha/Thanksgiving break, we went to Jordan with our friends Mike and Nada and their baby Malcolm.   For our first day (Thanksgiving Day), we had a driver take us to Wadi Musa, the town outside ancient Petra.  Mike, Seth and Kristal went walking around town while Malcolm took a nap.  That evening, Kristal got reservations at Petra’s Kitchen to take a Jordanian cooking class.  Nada and I cooked while the boys watched Malcolm.  Our menu:

Soup:

            Lentil Soup (different than Egyptian Lentil soup)

Cold Mezza:

            Arabic Salad

            Baba Ganuj (very different than Egyptian)

            Bagdonesiah

            Cucumber with yoghurt

Hot Mezza:

            Galaya Bandura

            Araies Lahmah

Main Course:

            Magloubah

After all the dishes were prepared we sat down and enjoyed this huge feast.  There were a few other Americans there, including a guy from Hutchinson, Kansas, that sat with us so we had our own little Thanksgiving Day celebration.  Even though there was no turkey, potatoes, pumpkin pie, or cranberries it was still a very nice Thanksgiving and it made it easier to be away from family. 

Day 2 Friday Nov. 28, 2009

We were awoken quite early by the mosque outside our hotel.  Today was the first day of the Feast of Sacrifices and the mosque kept on chanting the same phrase over and over again for over an hour.  We headed off to Petra, the ancient Nabitean city carved into the cliffs.  To get to Petra you must hike about 30 minutes through a high gorge, called a Siq, that was ripped through the mountain by an earthquake thousands of years ago.  If this was all there was of Petra we would have been impressed enough.  We really enjoyed this walk though the high Siq.  The colored limestone was gorgeous and shown in all shades of reds and oranges that dazzled in the morning sun.  Along the way were remains of tombs, statues, and most impressive:  a water channel carved into the entire length of the wall that brought water to the city of Petra.  In some areas you could still see the terracotta pipes.  

 

 

When I didn’t think that anything could compare to the wonder and beauty of this Siq, I caught a sliver of a glimpse through the narrow gorge of a large building, a few more steps and the world opened up to a huge court yard in front of the miraculous Treasury of Petra. 

 

First Glimpse

We spent some time resting here and admiring the grandeur of the Treasury and then set off again, exploring other tombs and sanctuaries.  After every turn we were rewarded with more awe inspiring views of ancient royal tombs, domestic dwellings, and religious alters.  Looking at the map and book, we realized that we weren’t even at the city center yet and couldn’t believe how big Petra really is and decided we needed to quicken our pace in hope of seeing even a small fraction of this magnificent city. 

 

 We decided to take the trail up to The High Place of Sacrifice.  We should have read the book a bit more carefully in order to realize just how “high” this place was.  Let’s just say we have a lot of respect for Mike now after he carried Malcolm up the mountain in his backpack carrier and it was a good thing that Nada had fallen behind us, because by the time she caught up with us at the top, she was quite freaked out that her husband had carried their baby up that so-called path.  The view from the top was well worth the climb though.  We were amazed by how large the city of Petra was.  We could see tombs and dwellings pocketing the surrounding mountains for miles.  Unfortunately, we weren’t able to enjoy our view in peace.   A local Bedouin lady was up there and kept bugging us for baksheesh (tip) by showing us pictures of her kids, gifting us pretty rocks she had found, or pointing out which way we should look.  At one point, Kristal left the camera bag with her jacket on top with Mike so we could climb out to the edge and get a better view.   When we returned my jacket was missing.  After several minutes of searching, the lady conveniently “found” my jacket and we had to reward her with some baksheesh.  Although we weren’t rested from our hike up and we didn’t get to enjoy our picnic lunch at the altar, we decided to start our way back down to get away from the annoying lady. 

 

After seeing how huge Petra was from atop the mountain we decided we need to head straight for the Monastery, which of course was clear on the other side from us but it was recommended as a must see by several friends.   On our way we only got side tracked by the Amphitheater and a few temples.   As we started up the mountain hike to the Monastery it started to rain.  We climbed up to one of the ancient cave dwellings to wait out the worst of the rain.  Nada was already worried about bringing Malcolm up this mountain after climbing the last one, with the rain she was worried about the rocks being slippery, then we saw a Red Crescent ambulance come and eight men carrying someone on a stretcher down the mountain; that was the straw that broke the camel’s back so she and Malcolm were not going up to the Monastery.   They went back to the museum while the rest of us set off up the mountain at a quickened pace so that we wouldn’t be caught in the dark coming back down.  By the way, in case you’re wondering, donkeys don’t care if they push you out of the way on narrow mountain paths.  This climb was well rewarded; you are so busy watching your footing on the path that you don’t realize that all of a sudden you are at the top and you look up onto a huge open plateau and just around the boulder on your right you can see the Monastery looming out of the mountain.  By this time, the rain had stopped and the setting sun was shining all of its orange rays onto the grand building and we pretty much had the place to ourselves.  With the setting sun, we knew we needed to get off the mountain fast, which we did.  Unfortunately, we still had about an hour and half hike back through the Petra city center, back to the Treasury, and through the Siq with only the light of the moon to guide us.  It was a spectacular night walk back, but we were exhausted by this time.  We stopped in town to eat at a shwarma place that our friends recommended.  

Day 3 Nov. 29, 2009

We drove up to the Dead Sea today and got a day pass at the Dead Sea Resort and Spa.  We had lunch by the pools and then headed down to the beach for a dip on the sea.  The weather was perfect, just warm enough not to be cold in the water.  We could see the West Bank of Israel on the other side of the sea.  The feeling of floating in the Dead Sea is indescribable.  I know because several friends tried to tell us about it before we went, but we just couldn’t comprehend it until we felt it for ourselves.  Floating out of the water without any effort at all was incredible.  The most fun was standing and letting one leg completely relax and laugh as it floated up to the top.  If you get out further than mid-chest level, you cannot even force yourself to get your feet down to the bottom no matter how much you tried; trust me we tried.  The deeper you went in the water, the high out of the water you floated!  What I wasn’t expecting was to see the salt crystals built up along the shore and to find huge chucks of crystals on the ground like rocks.  Also, the salt water did not dry out your skin as I would have expected, but instead our skins felt like it had oil on it.  Then we went over to the mud hole and got some good Dead Sea mud and rubbed it all over ourselves and each other.  We had soooo much fun this day!  After our fun in the Sea we went back up to pools (there were five of them) because Nada and Kristal just had to have some fun on the water slides. 

 

 

Day 4 Nov. 30, 2009

Today we drove north of Amman to the ancient Roman ruins of Jerash.  These are one of the most intact Roman cities in the world.  We had the treat of hearing a Jordanian bagpipe in the South Theater which is a rare, unscheduled event.  The construction of the theater and the acoustics were amazing.  After lunch we headed back to Amman and visited the Citadel and had a great view of the Amman Forum.