Almost winter

Light show on the City Wall

The time is coming for daylight saving to end .... on Sunday morning to be exact. Sunrise is now almost 5.40am and the sun sets by 6pm. Late autumn with 16 degree evenings  and 26 degree daytime. Cool and cloudy everyday ... and what everyone is watching for these weeks ... the falling leaves of trees. I've noticed some trees have already gone bare while others are still withstanding the change in climate. Winter we all hope will be full of rain and even snow. We need the rains so badly.

Last night, after a day of headache and pain, I decided to go for a walk. The cool breeze could ease my pain in the operated area and fever. I was surprised to find a light show at the western City wall along Jaffa Gate. Lots of tourists come to take photos and go away. It was quite crowded and lively. Restaurants and shops opened to quite late, to milk every shekel they can.

Coptic leaders and police

This morning began early as I had a meeting with a group at the Holy Sepulchre. Then by 9am it was the daily routine of meetings with lawyers and heads of departments. It may sound strange to you that we need lawyers to deposit or withdraw money from the bank, or receive parcels from the Post Office .... but here we must do that because we're being penalised by the govt. at every turn in life. The govt. wants to raise the economy by claiming taxes (and back taxes from 1948) from our institutions and properties. Not from the muslims though. They want church money to boost the economy. So every month I receive a letter from the bank "Order of seizure by the govt. of Israel" and a large amount of money is removed from our library account. Then the Post Office restricts each parcel to no more than 2kg. Each parcel that arrives, we have to pay 250 shekels of handling charge plus 17%  of VAT. Concretely it means for a book costing US$10 we have to pay US$100 in charges and taxes.

Anyway at the Holy Sepulchre this morning there was a crowd of police with the Coptic hierarchy... bishop, monks and nuns. There was quite an animated exchange but I was not near enough to find out what it was all about. Later I eland from our sacristans that the Copts are protesting that the Ethiopics are renovating their chapels, hence closing the door which allows  the Copts to go to the Holy Sepulchre. I don't think it was resolved ... but it's part of the life in the Christian Quarter.