Easter in the Garden

Well we made it to Jerusalem on Sunday morning!  It was a super early start, but well worth it.  It was a classic case of making sure we left early enough to not be late,  but then catching every bus perfectly and being super early!  Oh well - we got to see the sun rising as the bus drove over the hills into Jerusalem (except that I slept most of the way there...)  We managed to find our way there, taking the light rail for the first time.  We also had time to stop for coffee downtown and then walk along the old city walls to the Garden Tomb.  The service was in English and a local church's band was playing.  It was kind of funny to see the garden all decked out with a sound system and speakers but it was necessary since there were at least 200 people there.  Kind of a weird feeling to be singing about Easter and realizing that everything went down in this general area.
The benches were set up all throughout the garden - we were sort of in the front middle: benefit to arriving an hour early :)

He is not here, for He is risen: (door to the tomb)

As we were waiting outside I found this funny sign - note the 3rd Sunday Service.  I wonder what "Scandinavian" sounds like?  Also - "son-rise"?  groan. (maybe I always thought it was sunrise growing up but it's actually been this 'punny' the whole time?)

After the service we stayed in Jerusalem for lunch.  One thing I love about Israel is the cafe culture - everything is so nice and laid back. It was a gorgeous sunny day and pretty hot too.  Yay for spring!

One thing about Passover is that all of the coffee chains have hiked their prices.  One of them explained that they have to buy all this special food, and replace all of the cutlery so that it is "kosher for Passover".  Also we went to the grocery store, and I had this idea that only the yeast and bread items would be covered.  Alas - apparently there are millions of products that aren't considered kosher for Passover and so the grocery store has aisles and aisles of sheet plastic taped over them -taunting you with their cereals and pastas just out of reach!  We wondered what would happen if you grabbed a product from behind the plastic and try to buy it...but I'm too chicken.  I don't want to get humiliated in Hebrew in my local store.

To finish the day, Zach made this...because we stocked up on yeast and flour the week before :)

HaYarkon Park

This Good Friday we went exploring HaYarkon park which is Tel Aviv's version of Central Park, centered around the Yarkon River.  It's huge! It's sort of misleading near us because we are right on the part of the park where the river flows out to the sea, so it gets small.  But if you walk in the other direction it just keeps going and going.  It turns out there is a 5 acre tropical garden, 10 acre rock garden (which is literally just rocks plopped on the grass...although apparently they are significant rocks to the geology in the area), a pond you can go paddle boating in, many bbq pits (one of the favourite activities of people here), a sport center, petting zoo (with a fancy looking peacock), water-park and aviary.  We only walked around for a few hours but we'll have to go back and explore more when the gardens are open! (It is Passover, day 1, so everything is closed).  Unfortunately we only got one picture - but it's pretty cool :)  Zach took it of this tree that grew over the fence (the new fence is where the camera is).  It's an HDR image, which is Zach's new photography hobby...basically it makes awesome looking pictures using a few exposure settings of the same shot so you can adjust more colour levels....or something like that. I'm gonna be honest - I just look at the pretty end result :)

Today we walked in the little park beside our home and saw this pretty tree!  So if we end up missing the cherry blossom festival in Japan next week - I will have still seen a pretty pink tree :)

Here is another HDR shot of our little park in the sunshine (25C today!) you can see this pink tree in the distance.

And then, when we got back, I got to talk to one of my best friends (via skype) who is brand newly engaged!! Yay! Congratulations Lindi :D  So all in all, despite my having the plague feeling slightly under the weather for the past week or so*, a great Easter weekend thus far.  Tomorrow morning we are attempting to attend an Easter service in the Garden Tomb in Jerusalem...but it means catching a bus at 6am, and quite possibly fending off hordes of Passover and Easter tourists (yes I realize we will be Easter tourists too)... so we'll see :)

*side note:  Zach made the most amazing chicken soup - from scratch.  Like, after we ate a roasted chicken (which he also made!), he put the remains in a pot with water and spices and something called mirepoix (right?) and it turned into delicious chicken broth which then turned into delicious chicken noodle soup.  He's totally amazing.  I didn't even know you could make chicken soup without chicken broth cubes, or what mirepoix was until we got married, haha. Cooking isn't exactly my forte.  I can feel my throat healing already :)