Desert day-off

Our sisters in the desert

The weather has cooled alot. It feels like autumn now. It's very cool in the nights, and the mornings are very foggy. The humidity is high. But daytime is still in the 30s.

Violence continues to rip through the country: gangland killings, military raids and terror attacks. Several people have died these past few days. Things will get more tense in a month's time when the jewish feast of New Year, Yom Kippur and Sukkot. I guess the checkpoints and border with Palestine will be closed during that period. It will not be convenient to travel about. Even right now, police have stepped up stop-and-search checks in the streets.

I may be tired. I'm forgetting things again .... names, places, why I go where. It's the confusion of names that's worrying me. One whole morning I was struggling to get a name right and kept saying "popcorn" when the sisters kept correcting me "cornflakes." Now that I'm practically alone at home - everyone else has gone for summer vacation - I try to take my daily walks along my usual routes so I do not get lost in the streets. Hands and feet continue to be swollen ... but I'm making mulberry tea which people tell me helps heal the kidneys. I might also have a cataract on the left eye as it is very blur and I cannot rub it out.

Talking about summer vacation, our 2 sisters working in the kitchen and sacristy have not had a day's break this year. So our superior told them to have Sundays off. Last Sunday they spent the morning in the desert, visiting the famous monasteries of Mar Saba and Mar Theodosius. I'm glad they enjoyed themselves and got away from work. They have been overworked. Our vice-superior drove them there in our monastery car so the sisters travelled in comfort and safety. In this heat the desert is not a good place to go alone.