Eve of the Birth of the BVM

Autumn fruit on sale

The weather has cooled a lot and I'm wearing a hoodie in the evenings when I come home from work. The temp. ranges from 30 degrees in the day to 20 degrees in the nights. And the wind in the evenings are quite chilly. All these seem to go right as soon it will be mid-autumn ... for the chinese; and on the same day, it'll be the feast of Tabernacles for the jews. The harvest has started and the markets are full of autumn fruit. And the full moon is out ... absolutely lovely and bright ... lighting up the City. It's a nice background to the Feast of the birth of the Bl. Virgin Mary that we'll celebrate tomorrow. The place is just down our street at St. Anne's Church ... also called the Bethesda Pool where Christ healed the paralytic by the pool.

I haven't reported about my health in the recent blogs. Thankfully y asthma is under control and had a minor attack only when I ate some biscuit with a little pistachio. But everything's alright. However I've been having fainting spells the past 3 days ... and lots of dizziness. I guess it's exhaustion. Yesterday I managed to grab an hour's sleep and it felt so good. The old body is slowing down and rest is a constant need. And thankfully the roadworks have progressed down to Ecce Homo convent. We can't hear the racket in the nights anymore. And I made a couple of friends among the workers.

Full moon over Damascus Gate

School has started in Israel and Palestine today. This morning I had to give the Induction Talk to the 1st Year students. It's the 3rd year running that I've been asked to do this. This year we have americans and ethiopians, indians, italians and a few I'm not sure where they come from. I didn't have the time to chat and get to know them. Everything was rushed.

Back to the topic of implosion ... the rightwing agenda is now gathering so much steam, school teachers are being ruined out of school because parents consider them leftwing. More division in the country. When education no longer is objective and impartial, but leans toward one ideology and narrative, you can only expect a future generation of extremists.  http://www.haaretz.com/israel-news/.premium-1.810778

Disturbingly, an arab family was evicted from their home in the early morning so a jewish family could reclaim ownership over the house even though the arabs have lived their since the 1967 war. Jews have a right to reclaim property owned before the war but arabs don;t have this right. It is a form of injustice which unfortunately is quite common here.   http://www.haaretz.com/israel-news/.premium-1.810671