Holiday

Thick fog at the highway

So it's the 3rd successive  day that I woke up at 3am to do something .. this time it wa to travel to Tel Aviv for my doc appointment. I had to leave at 5am otherwise the traffic would be impossible. Then again today is a national holiday ... being Election Day. The highway was a lot quieter with families waking up late. By 8am I saw crowds lining up at polling stations to cast their vote. Then it was beach time ... thousands took advantage of the sunshine and especially school kids ... the beaches were packed. Other families were shopping in the major thoroughfares of Tel Aviv ... the sidewalks were so crowded, people spilled onto the roads and blocked traffic. Quite annoying ... except that it is after all a holiday ... so after a few curses by drivers, things moved on. Public transport between cities today are free of charge ... so people can go to vote and also enjoy the holiday. I rather liked that.

However the early morning ride to the city was dangerous because of a very thick fog that enveloped the highway 20 kms away from Tel Aviv. Visibility was down to 3 metres ahead. I have never seen anything like this before.

Holiday crowd at Allenby Road

The checkup was good and the doc was pleased ... she said it's no problem. Then she corrected herself and said it's a problem but it's a solvable problem. Just need to make more tests to figure what treatment is applicable. I was quite pleased. After that I took a walk along the beach and bought some chinese food at the fantastic Peking Duck restaurant. It was still early and no clients arrived yet s I was the first. The 2 shanghainese cooks came to speak with me. Anyway I remembered I have to keep a vegetarian diet ... and the doc said this morning that I must also cut down on sugar and carbohydrates. Looks like I can only eat air ... and even that is polluted.

Police were everywhere ... not just in Jerusalem but also Tel Aviv ... which is very rare. They were at the beaches and roads with restaurants and shopping malls. The borders with Palestine were all closed for 24 hours. All the tensions will die down by this evening ... but tensions will rise within the Israeli side of the border when the votes are counted tonight.

Last week of Lent

Procession around
the Empty Tomb

I did go to the Lenten Vigil on Sunday at midnight and prayed for you all. The psalms were shorter this week but the readings from St. Augustine of Hippo and the Letter to the Hebrews were much longer. I decided to go up to the gallery and watch the procession around the Empty Tomb instead of joining in. It's a spectacular view and the pipes of the organ and up there so it's thunderous. I managed to take several nice photos of the procession.

It was a tiring day in all because I walked up to the Holy Sepulcher on Saturday at 11.45pm and the Vigil and Mass ended only at 2.30am. By the time I reached home it was 3am and I had to prepare my homily for the Armenian Mass at 9am. I had to go early to the Armenian Catholic church because I had no one to help me that day. My armenian seminarians and organists could not make it and the PDDM sisters had left their service ... so I had to prepare the altar, lights, microphones, books ... everything by myself. After the Mass I cleaned my room and then went out for a walk. It was such a lovely sunny day to waste it staying in the room. I walked to the Mamilla Muslim cemetery where the wild flowers were blooming profusely. There were especially numerous the wild barley and oats. I harvested quite alot of the barley to decorate our altars. The Feast of Unleavened Bread which falls on the same day as the feast of Passover, uses barley to make the unleavened bread. We usually harvest the wild barley to offer on our altars and they look spectacular.

Vase of barley on
Mary's altar

Then I had a short meeting with a student and then a dinner meeting with a professor before returning home to sleep early. That's mainly because I have class at 5am (4am real time) and it was work all through the day. Tomorrow morning I must wake up at 3am again because I must go to the Tel Aviv hospital at 5am for another checkup. That's 3 days in a row I wake up at 3am. It's exhausting. No wonder I lose my memory and get horribly confused. I think I'll move to Jaffa for Holy Week away from the chaos of tourists in our streets and the police blockades that disrupt our daily lives. So yes ... its the last week of Lent and another Holy Week is upon us. The Resurrection is waiting .....

Lenten Vigil

The Empty Tomb at mid-
night for Lenten Vigil

It's the 4th Saturday of Lent and tonight will be the last Vigil at the Holy Sepulchre. The weather is holding up ... cold but cloudy ... no rain ... so I hope to go and pray for all of you from midnight to 3am. I do tire easily so last week the seminarians brought me a chair to sit during the service. And it rained very hard as well so I was caught in the rain and was sick. Tonight should be a lot better.

The past few days I've been feeling drained and tired easily. It's been getting more and more pronounced. And the memory is gone ... I was trying to connect with Toronto at 2.45pm for class but couldn't get through. Late I realised that class was at 3.45pm. Utter confusion. Hope it doesn't get worse or I'll book myself into the infirmary. We did have a good laugh about losing the memory ... the cook and sisters in the kitchen ... the funny things that happen when people lose their memory.

Since I'll be up all night I'm thinking of going to the muslim cemetery tonight (actually morning at 3am) to harvest some barley for decoration of our refectory altar. It's best to harvest it while its cold so it doesn't wither too quickly.

Election fever is hitting the country ... and it's anybody's guess who'll win. Election day is on Tuesday and its a national holiday. However I have an appointment with the doc ... so now I'm not sure if the doc is working or not. I'll need to check it out. Anyway regarding the elections, one thing is clear: the left is in total disarray and this election is all about the right wingers.

News just in ... 10,000 protesters had gathered at the Gaza border. But it didn't affect us in the cities north of Gaza.    https://www.jpost.com/Arab-Israeli-Conflict/Over-10000-Palestinians-protest-on-Gaza-border-585932

Quiet Friday

Wild mustard in the muslim cemetery 

Friday passed without major incidents here in the City though security helicopters flew overhead for several hours at noon. I didn't want to stay in the Muslim Quarter because of the crowds of tourists and muslims coming into the City to pray ... so I stayed in my office 1km away till the noonday prayer was underway ... the streets are quieter because most will be in the mosques and tourists will be eating lunch.

Damascus Gate vendors

The weather continues to be cold but sunny. No drizzle at all. The wild flowers are particularly profuse this year because of the rains. Streets, walls ... everywhere is blooming in colourful flowers. The Music Festival ended and right now I can smell someone barbecuing somewhere nearby. The smell of summer. But I feel fatigued and sick. No appetite for food or anything. High fever every night. Yesterday I had a talk with out house doctor. Talked about death and he described his duties when I die. Morbid I guess ... on my birthday ... but I thought it's important to discuss these things while I'm still alive.

Thanks to everyone for their well wishes and prayers and gifts. With the relative peace we're having in the City, I'm taking advantage of it and going to sleep early. Tomorrow is the last Lenten Vigil at the Holy Sepulchre and I'll go again and pray for you all.

Festival of Music

Music and light show along the
City Wall

Last night I decided to go see the Music Festival. The weather was cold and there was a blackout along the main road but the crowd was still quite large. However the festival was reduced to one third of its normal size. No concerts inside the Old City. 7 concert locales all along the City Walls .... outside. The massive exhibition was the western wall ... the entire stretch had very loud music blaring and light show synchronised to the music. Jewish performers had their concerts along the south-western to western part of the City walls while the northern section had a couple of concerts ... one which for the first time is totally dedicated to arab performers. It was good to see the arab population included in this festival. It was very crowded and among the crowd were sephardi jews ... those who grew up in arab countries, speak arabic and share arabic culture. It was good to see music uniting the 2 races.

Arab concert at Damascus Gate

This morning I had Mass on Mt. Calvary ... with a few friends in attendance. Some baked brownies for me. Then I bumped into an old classmate from 26 yrs back. We chatted before I rushed home to start work. The 3rd Station sisters gave me a gift which was rally nice of them. Then at my other place of work, the Curia staff had a surprise birthday cake for me. In the afternoon I had english class with my students in a cafe ... they had to learn how to order and pay for food in english. Then it was adoration and confessions at Ml Teresa's convent till 7pm. They gave me a box of chocolate doughnuts. How nice everyone was! At dinner our cook prepared 2 cake to celebrate my birthday and my community was very festive about it. There was even a bottle of champagne.

Well I'm exhausted with work and social obligations for today. Age has caught up. Time to rest.

Wednesday

Xinjiang muslim pilgrims

Though the bad weather has ended and forecast was sunny for today ... it was everything but. The sky remains cloudy and gloomy and slight drizzle fell in the morning. And the wind is still very cold. People are complaining that winter is not going away ... but those who can remember winter 30 yrs back will remember it was a lot colder and lasted a lot longer ... all the way to Holy Week. Anyway the rain is good as the Sea of Galilee has risen in volume.

Tourists are flocking into the Old City in unbelievable numbers ... not just christians but muslims as well. Today there were countless Xinjiang muslims at Damascus Gate ... speaking turkish and mandarin. Holy Week is starting in 10 days and the Jewish Passover falls exactly on our Good Friday. The crowds of christians and jews will be enormous.

Village vendors at Damascus Gate

There was another stabbing attack in Hawara, the town just outside Nablus in Samaria this morning. I think it's the 2nd terrorist attack. That means entry into Nablus will be very difficult as road blocks will be set up all along the way. And jewish settlers will be waiting along the highway stoning arab cars that pass by the way. It's dangerous.

Meantime in Gaza the Hamas govt and terrorist group Jihad have ordered Gaza's to stop violent attacks at the border with Israel. Israel had last week granted concessions by widening the fishing boundaries (many Gazans are fishermen). The checkpoints and borders have reopened and I think some food and medical supplies are permitted to re-enter. That's good news.

It's 4th Wednesday of Lent ... so right now the Lenten pilgrimage celebrates Mass at our Condemnation chapel. There's a small crowd here in attendance with many friars singing solemnly the Passion. I have a high fever since this morning so I'm not going down. Just stay in bed and hope the fever goes away.

Lenten Vigil

Via Dolorosa at
2.30am in rain

What an incredible weekend weather. Violent thunderstorms after midnight, hailstones during the afternoon, gale-force freezing winds all day and night. People are ravaged by a contagious flu and no one wants to go out if they could possibly do. The weather was so bad, the annual Sounds of the Old City music festival had its opening cancelled last night. Tonight is the opening instead ... I hope to go see it, But having been so busy in the past 60 hours ... having slept only 6 hours in all ... I am today brain-dead. In fact I fell asleep while writing a report.

Sunday midnight I went to the Lenten Vigil. It was raining very heavily. From 12.30am to 2pm we sang Matins with canticles and read passages form the Church Fathers. Then there was the procession around the Empty Tomb in candlelight. It was very crowded despite the late hour and bad weather. There was Mass after the Vigil but I went home instead. Drenched when I arrived home at 2.30am. I had a hot cup of coffee and a piece of bread, then I had to prepare the chapel because a group was coming at 5am for Way of the Cross. They were wet and made the pews and church all wet. When they left I spent one hour mopping and wiping the entire chapel because our Sunday Mass was at 7am and the chapel needed to be orderly. After Mass, I had to rsh off to the Armenian Catholic church because the 3 PDDM sisters were leaving the premises, having finished their contract with the Armenian Catholic Church.

Robotic mini-tank

The weather is not the only thing going extreme. The political environment is quite heated up as elections will take place next week. And the war with Gaza, though quiet now, has spilled into the City. Police have stepped up their presence and the other day I actually saw - the first time in my life - a mini robotic tank. Soldiers were guiding it into its carrier. It was really frightening to see it. It had 4 gun guns attached ... meaning one mini-tank does the job of 4 soldiers. Truck-drivers next to it stopped their machines and scattered as far as possible.