Electrolytes, Istanbul, and the first glimpse the Holy Land

The past couple days have not been quite as exciting as the others. I got a severe case of food poisoning on Friday. Actually over the course of the weekend, every person in our group was affected by it, including the Turkish tour guide, so it was definitely something that we ate together. Some of us were hit worse than others and, unfortunately, I was one of the worst. To make a long story short and spare the gross details, I had to stay in the hotel for 3 days and miss the sites. We called a doctor, who had to see me twice to give me iv fluids to re-hydrate me and prescribe lots of medicine. The humorous part was that to hang the iv bag in the hotel room, he took the painting off of the wall and hung it on the nail! But for those of you who know how much I hate needles, the actual iv was really not humorous. After fluids, medicine and lots and lots of electrolytes, I finally started feeling stronger. The grace in the situation was the love and care the people in the program showed for each other. They nursed us, checked in on us, kept our spirits up, bought us little gifts from the sites we missed. I was really overwhelmed with how giving everyone was. Anyway, I felt better to go out for our last day in Istanbul.

Istanbul is a really neat city, with so much history. But it is very touristy, very expensive and very busy. I had been really wanting to see Hagia Sophia, but it was closed for the national holiday on Monday. At least the outside is still impressive! We did get to go in the Blue Mosque across from it though, which was really impressive. We went to a different church though, in which most of the mosaics have been preserved. It was beautiful. I felt like I was stepping into my art history books. After our tours, Lori, Rick and I went to every market and bazaar possible because we needed to spend all of our Turkish Lira since it was our last day in Turkey. I think we did our part to stimulate the Turkish economy. The best souvenir EVER is pictured below: sparkly pink pom pom shoes…. it totally made my day, and the day of the man selling them to me.

One of the mosaic domes in the Chora church

Hagia Sophia

The Blue Mosque

Buying my Turkish slippers...I felt like Cinderella!!

This morning we left at 5 am for the airport for Israel. I had some trouble with my ticket and checking in, and four of us were running for the airplane at the last minute, but we made it on! Then upon arriving in Israel, we had some trouble with the border patrol who didn’t quite understand what we were going to be doing in the country for 6 weeks. But eventually it all worked out, and we were greeted at the convent by happy loving sisters, and personal bedrooms with several hours for a nice long nap :) The drive from the airport to the convent was beautiful. The land here is amazing, just like what you imagine Jesus walking through. We got to catch a glimpse of the old city and the Dome of the Rock, which was so exciting. Our professor here, Laurie, said that view will soon become old news to us. I hope not. We are staying on the Mount of Olives, in the area where Mary and Martha would have lived, and near Lazarus’ tomb. It is beautiful. Tomorrow we take our first walk to the city to learn our way around. I was so blown away by being in the places where Paul walked and preached, I cant even imagine walking in Jesus’ footsteps now… Laurie read us this psalm as we made our way through the country:

"I rejoiced when they said to me, 'Let us go to the house of the Lord.' And now our feet are standing within your gates, Jerusalem. Jerusalem, built as a city, walled round about. Here the tribes have come, the tribes of the Lord. As it was decreed for Israel, to give thanks to the name of the Lord. Here are the thrones of justice, the thrones of the house of David. For the peace of Jerusalem pray: 'May those who love you prosper! May peace be within your ramparts, prosperity within your towers.' For family and friends I say, 'May peace be yours.' For the house of the Lord, our God, I pray, 'May blessings be yours.'"

The first view of the wall of the old city and the Dome of the Rock

Goodbye Greece, Hello Turkey!!

Our last two days in Greece were simply fabulous. Sunday we got up at 4 am to fly to the island of Samos. Once we got there, I didn’t mind the fact that I was dead tired because the island is beautiful!! Just like the Greek islands you see in the movies. Little colorful houses dotting the hillsides with steep winding roads. Before going to our hotel we checked out one of the archeological sites where there was a small town and temple, as well as a big tunnel built in the 6th century BC that was built into a mountain to carry water from one side of the island to the other. Apparently the island’s main product used to be water because it was the only island in the area that had fresh water. Therefore it was a major port town, and even invented the dock by building up large stones in the sea. (We had to do something educational here since nothing biblical happened here…really they just wanted to take us to a beautiful island. No complaints by me!) After the tours a group of us walked a bit down the road to the nearest beach. All of the beaches are small and stony but lovely! We spent the afternoon swimming in the Agean sea and looking for sea glass in the rocks.

The column of the Temple in Samos

Me swimming in the Agean Sea.

Me in front of the Samos port.

The next day we took a ferry to Patmos. The ferry was rough! The sea was very choppy with huge magnificent blue waves which made the boat pitch back and forth and up and down. On the way home several in my group got seasick. Patmos is the island on which John wrote the book of Revelation. The cave in which he received the visions recorded in Revelation is there, and has been turned into a beautiful chapel. The holes in the cave in which John (according to legend) rested his head and used as a support to get up are enshrined as well as the natural ledge that was used as a writing surface. It was really neat to see and the people of the island are so proud of this fact that they call themselves the “second Jerusalem.” We also visited the monastery dedicated to John, which was beautiful. Then we had lunch at a small restaurant where they treated us to a performance of Greek dancing! It was fabulous, as well as the food and complimentary wine!

Patmos

The entrance to the cave of John

Our dancing waiters.

It was sad leaving Greece because I had grown accustomed to it, but once we got to Turkey, all thoughts of Greece disappeared. The thing that I cant get over is how close Turkey and Greece are, but how distinctly different they are. The architecture is completely different, the food is different, the people and general atmosphere are different! Both beautiful though! It is interesting that there are Turkish flags everywhere. They are very patriotic apparently. Lots of tapestries and hookahs for sale!
We got off the boat, got on a bus and went straight to Ephesus. I had heard that Ephesus is so in tact that you can really see Paul walking down the street. It is so true! The ruins are incredible. The carvings in the buildings and temples are exquisite. The site is huge, which gives an idea of how big the city would have been in its prime. We walked a mile from one end to the other, and spent over 3 hours. The theater was one of the most exciting because it is huge, and one of the main passages in Acts about Ephesus takes place there. We were singing and dancing on the stage, and some climbed to the top and said they could hear us perfectly. There is also a huge façade of the library at the end of the main street, which was beautiful.
We also visited the ruins of a basilica dedicated to John the Apostle, since it is believed he buried there. The altar would have been over what is now marked as his Tomb. Legend states that John took Mary to Ephesus and that they lived out their days there. We did not have a chance to visit their “house” though. While we were looking around the basilica, a minaret of a nearby mosque sounded its call to prayer. It was absolutely beautiful, and lasted about 3 minutes. I guess we will be hearing that often in Turkey because the country is 98% Muslim. A friend of mine who had visited Turkey in the past said that the Muslim call to prayer was a reminder for themselves to pray, and they took the opportunity to pray for peace in the Middle East. I think I will do the same.

Part of the basilica dedicated to John

Me "performing" in the theater.

The view from our hotel window... its a rough life.

Wednesday we were in Antioch. We visited a cave church that the early Christians used. Since Antioch was the first place followers of Christ were called “Christians,” and was Paul’s home base while he went on his missionary journeys, it was very moving. Then we went to a museum that had a really impressive mosaic collection and artifacts from the Hittites.

The most amazing adventure happened in the afternoon though. Sheila, Kathy, Lori and I went for a walk to find some shopping. We found a perfume store which we wanted to look into because we feel smelly after being in the sun all day. The man in the store was so nice and hospitable, he gave us free cokes. Then we asked where we could find some spices, he said he couldn’t tell us, but he could show us. He left his store and walked with us about 3 blocks, across the river to take us to the local market. It was amazing and huge with winding streets filled with vendors and their goods. We found spices easily, in huge sacks, overflowing with colorful, rich smelling spices. Lori, Sheila and Kathy bought saffron because the price was a fraction of what we pay in the US. (We all know that I can’t cook, so no spices for me). Then we bought a bag a pistachios to take on the bus rides, only after several minutes of pantomime and several translators to get the size and price correct. Everyone was so helpful, and when a shop owner couldn’t speak English, he went a couple stores down to get his buddy who did. They would leave their shops to walk us to another shop that sold what we were looking for. And even though we were clearly tourists, no one yelled at us to buy things, or pushed items at us. It was just a nice really inexpensive local market, and so much fun! I even bought some cute leather shoes for 5 euro!

The Church of St. Peter.

The local market in Antioch

Today we visited Paul’s hometown of Tarsus, and a well that is traditionally held to be a well that Paul used. We got to drink water from the well! Then when we got to our hotel in Adana, Lori, Kim, Eddie, Frances and I walked around and found a huge mosque. We asked if we could go in, and they said no problem, if we take off our shoes and cover our heads. It was absolutely beautiful. I looked it up online. It is called Sabancı Merkez Camii and is one of the largest mosques in the Middle East. A man there said it was the largest in Turkey.

Drinking water from Paul's well

The mosque... amazing.

Next we go through Cappadocia on our way to Istanbul!
I'll keep you all posted!

Meteora, Athens and Corinth

Hi Everyone!

On Thursday we traveled up to the monasteries of Meteora. It was absolutely breathtaking. These rocks are over a thousand feet high and are rounded so that they almost look alien. The monasteries are perched at the top like they are just clinging to the rock. The monks who built them in the 14th century had to scale the rocks with the building materials on their backs and it took 25 years just to carry the building materials up. Once the monasteries were built, the only way to access them was by being lifted up in a basket or net. Now, thankfully, there are winding roads to the top. After taking several fun pictures on the rocks with the marvelous landscape of the valley behind us, we visited one of the convents. It holds about 30 sisters now. Women were required to wear skirts that covered the knee and have their arms covered to the elbow. Men had to have pants or shorts that covered the knee. We weren’t allowed to take pictures inside, but I have some good shots of the outside. The chapel had beautiful artwork on the walls of Byzantine icons and biblical scenes.

Lori and I doing some rock climbing in our long skirts.

The convent we visited.

Part of the group on a rock overlooking the valley.

Following our tour of the convent, we went to a nearby town and visited a workshop where they make icons. They showed us the wood that they use, how they make the parchment, and how they paint or technically “write” the icons. We got to see some iconographers at work, which was really neat. I purchased a beautiful icon of the Holy Family. When I was on the bus, I wanted to take a picture of it to post on the blog, and may camera was set to the close-up setting. But the face-recognition feature picked out Jesus’ face and automatically changed the setting to portrait! Jesus’ presence is more real than we let ourselves believe!

My icon of the Holy Family

The iconographers in the workshop.

We arrived in Athens on Thursday evening without enough time to really see the city, but with plenty of time to take advantage of the roof-top pool! It was lovely swimming on a balmy evening in the Mediterranean under the Athenian moon, with a view that overlooked the Acropolis. We joked that Biblical Studies are rough this semester…

The view from the pool. The "classical" sign is on the next hotel over... just in case you forget that it is a classical monument!

Natalie, Maria, Me, Lori and Rick in front of the Parthenon

Friday we went to the Acropolis. It was absolutely incredible. These ancient temples are magnificent and so perfectly constructed, that you wonder how they could have done this without the advanced technology of today. It makes us look pretty silly having to depend on our calculators and computers! We also stopped at the Areapogus which is where St. Paul addressed the Athenians. His speech there is absolutely beautiful, and once again we got to hear it read right in the place where Paul originally gave it. So surreal.

Me in front of a temple to Athena

We didn’t have any group plans for the afternoon, so Lori and I joined Sheila and Kathy (two lovely Mercy sisters from Ireland and New Zealand) on an adventure on the metro to a small museum. The metro was actually surprising clean and bright (Athens is not a pretty city), but the neat part is that every time someone tries to build something in Greece, a full-scale excavation must be done because there are so many treasures in the ground. So some of the walls in the subway stations had glass showing ancient walls behind them, and even small exhibits of pottery found while constructing the subway. We got off the metro at the Parliament building just in time for the changing of the guards! The wear traditional kilts with pom pom shoes and do a great routine with their legs kicking in the air! The museum was beautiful with art through the centuries of Greek history ancient pottery and jewelry, through medieval icons, up to today’s modern art.

The changing of the guards.

Today we visited Corinth, which was one of the biggest and most important cities in biblical times. Seeing the ruins and artifacts really gave a great glimpse into the social life at the time which helps explain the difficulties the Christians were having and why Paul was so frustrated with them in his letters. We are beginning to understand the layout and design of ancient cities and the shapes of different ruins, so even after our tour ended Lori, Rick and I were able to pick out different features and figure out what they were. Yes, we are nerds, but we fully embrace that! We also stopped by the Corinth canal, which was neat. And the city of Cenchrea which is now mostly underwater, but you can see the outline of a basilica peeking out. Paul stopped here and made a vow and cut his hair lol. I’m really getting very familiar with Paul. He is like a friend to us on this trip.

Me, Efi and Lori in front of a temple dedicated to Apollo in Corinth

The Corinth Canal

The underwater basilica of Cenchrea

This afternoon Lori and I took advantage of the rooftop pool again because we have to get to sleep early tonight. We leave for Samos bright and early!

The first 3 days....

Hello everyone!


So much has happened over the last two days that I don’t even know where to start. I guess at the beginning….

On the airplane I was sitting next to an 11 year old girl who was flying home by herself from a month long vacation with family in USA. She was silent for the majority of the trip, but during the last two hours, took out a scrapbook. I asked if it was from her trip and she smiled and started to tell me in broken English about her family in Chicago. Then I noticed a picture and brochure form the Carnegie Museum of Natural History. “Pittsburgh?” I asked. She said yes, and was very excited when I told her that I was form Pittsburgh. The next page had pictures of Heinz Field, Mount Washington, etc. But then she had a picture of her family reunion in Pittsburgh….and I recognized three faces! Bob, Celine and Michael Mitchell. I went to school with Michael and Celine was my CCD teacher for several years! We were so shocked that we knew the same people, and talked nonstop for the last leg of the flight. She was so sweet and smart, and I really enjoyed hearing about her “holiday” in Pittsburgh and Chicago!

The group I am traveling with is awesome. Typical CTU folk: all ages, from all over the world, and super friendly and eager to get to know everyone. Our tour guide who is with us for all of Greece is named Effie and is just like a beautiful Greek woman you would imagine from a movie: long curly hair, short and round, very generous and very talkative. She is so knowledgeable about Greek history and culture, and talks non-stop on our bus, but is so funny and interesting. We have several priests on our trip, several sisters, and several young lay women. There are 24 of us total. One woman is 73 and outdoing all of us with her energy and enthusiasm!

We stayed in Thessoloniki the last two nights. It is a neat city right by the sea. There are a ton of shops and thousands and thousands of apartments stacked on top of each other. It is weird to see the Greek characters written everywhere and to not be able to even sound out the names of things. I can only imagine what it will be like when we get to Arabic characters. Lori and I explored a little the first day to push through our jet lag and found a beautiful monastery. 97% of Greece is Greek Orthodox and their churches are just beautiful with vibrant paintings, lots of gold ornamentation and icons everywhere. There are little chapels with icons and candles, some just in little boxes dotting the roads everywhere. Effie says most of them are in memory of accidents that happened, or in thanksgiving that individuals survived accidents, or just because people like the icons and want to venerate them.

The coast of Thessaloniki

The main square in the city

Lori and I overlooking Thessaloniki

Tuesday we took our tour bus to Philippi. The ruins are magnificent. There are traces of two basilicas, an octagonal church, a city square, markets, even public restrooms, and a prison where it is said Paul was held for expelling a demon from a girl. The ruins are so complete that parts of the marble floor are still there. You really get the sense that you are walking right where the early Christians walked. At one point we sat on a shaded hillside overlooking the city and our professor Van Than read to us from Acts and the Letter to the Philippians. I couldn’t help but wonder if the people of Philippi once sat there and listened to Paul preach, or to his letters being read.

Ruins of one of the basilicas

One of the pictures I know you've all been waiting for...ancient public toilets...

After touring the ruins, we went to Lydia’s baptistery, which was built at a stream outside of the city where scholars think may be the place where Paul met Lydia and the women praying by the river in Acts. There is seating built into the hillside and bridges crossing the stream to an altar and an icon chapel. We had mass here, with some students sitting with their feet in the water. It was a beautiful mass during which we reflected about Lydia and the contribution of women to the early church. One of the priests, Eddie, who is with us said Mass and Van Than gave the sermon. Effie provided us with a pita-like bread for communion and wine. Speaking of Communion, the one Greek word I have learned is “thank you” because it is where our term “Eucharist” comes from. In Greek they pronounce “u” as “f” so it sounds something like “ef-carito.”

The whole group at Lydia's baptistry.

Today we traveled to Beroea where Paul fled once he was kicked out of Thessoloniki. they have the steps on which Paul stood when he preached to the people. We could stand on the same steps! We also visited Vergina where the tombs of the ancient Kings of Macedonia are. The museum was amazing, built right in with the tombs so that you walk into the mound of earth and can walk right up to the tombs. They also have on display many of the things found in the tombs like the gold crowns, and the gold boxes in which the bones of the king and prince were kept. It was really neat.

The steps of St. Paul in the middle.

Tomorrow we will visit the monasteries of Meteora, built way high up on huge rocks in the mountains.

Everyone here is so friendly, and thank goodness most people speak English. I am having a fabulous time so far. The food is amazing. Everything has olive oil and feta cheese on it. Please continue to pray for us and we are praying for all of our friends and family back home!

Love you all!

Darcy

beautiful Greek countryside by the sea