Journey's End

It was a long journey, I know.  Lol.

Today was our last day in Jordan.  Honestly, I wish we had stayed longer.  It was over way too quickly.  I wanted to spend more time just about everywhere we went, and I feel like we could have seen more.  But it was definitely still amazing.  Guess I'll just have to come back here someday too.  :)

This morning we went to... a mosque.  I wish I remembered the name.  It must not be that important, tho, because it's on our schedule just as "the mosque"...  Sorry.  It was pretty cool, tho.  The outside was all blue and pretty.  All the women had to wear these choir robe-like things with hoods, lol.  I'm not gonna lie, I felt a little KKK at first, but we all just looked like Muslim women, really.  Except white.  Lol.  Actually, it was super weird seeing the guys in just their normal clothes when 80% of the group was in these burka things (they weren't really burkas).  I had my coat on underneath mine (because I didn't want to be pulling my hoodie on and off over my pretty hair all day-- Richelle curled it for me and I pretty much look like a model) and with the hood it made me look like a hunchback.  It was great.  Good times, lol.  

The mosque itself was cool, too.  Out guide showed us how they do the prayers and stuff.  Neat to watch.  It always fascinates me when I get to see somebody bust out the prayer rug like, at work, totally right in the middle of wherever and do the prayers.  It's cool.   I definitely got my sock all wet when I walked from the men's hall over to the women's-- you have to have your shoes off inside and I had to walk outside between them.  That was a little uncomfortable.

Then we went to the Amman citadel, where there are some more cool ruins of the temple of Hercules.  I am seriously still so impressed with the ruins in this place.  Seriously, they are way cool.  We had fun taking some pix amid the toppled columns (though most of them were still intact).  Also, there was an overlook of Amman, where we could see the Old City that we weren't allowed to go to  And an Archaeological Museum that was kind of cool.  They had the copper scroll from the Dead Sea scrolls, and most of a human child's skeleton, and some old coins that Mike thought were pretty cool.  And a bunch of other stuff.

Then we drove out to the Israeli border (which happens to be the Jordan River) to see the place where Jesus was baptized.  Ya, it doesn't look much like the painting, to be honest.  The painting is all green and lush looking, and the water is blue.  It's actually in the middle of the desert, super dry, not much plant life, and the water is super murky.  Remember when Elisha sent Naaman to wash in the Jordan seven times to be healed of leprosy and he was saying how there were a lot of better rivers for the job?  Ya, one girl put her hand in, and you couldn't see it, an inch below the water.  And there was this random building on the Israeli side, across the river, which made it look even more barren, lol.  But there are palm trees.  And on either side of the random building there are reeds, more like you would expect to see.  And they are green, just not as luscious looking as the painter made them out to be, lol.  Our guide actually said we were there at the best time of year, coz he showed us this "John the Baptist Spring" (a little ways away from the river) that he said is completely dry most of the year.  So that was kinda neat.  Lol, the observation deck at the river was flooded.  It was actually pretty cool.

That is also the place where Elijah was taken into heaven in a chariot of fire.  They have a nice little church commemorating it that was a gift from the Russian government.  It's really nice and quaint, actually, I liked it.  Dude, Elijah is a freakin stud.  I've been reading 1 Kings (we're about to get there in OT) and he rocks, man.  Like, forget Moses, they should make a movie about Elijah.  He's freakin awesome, plus Jezebel is a straight up bad a, perfect villain.  Seriously, I would watch that movie.

And then we had to cross the border.  Bro. Wilson got a little ticked at me, coz apparently my pink passport cover caused some extra hassle when they were checking the stack before they let us go through, lol.  Actually, we had a lot more hassle overall getting back into Israel.  They made me go through this machine that like, squirts air at you, starting at your head and then it goes all the way down.  Reminded me of like a combination between that horrible test they give you at the eye doctor and a spray tan...  It was way weird, tho, I couldn't figure out what it was for as I was going through.  And then like, two people after me they stopped making people do it (though everyone I could see ahead of me went).  It apparently checks for like, concealed weapons.  But like, I couldn't decide if it was like a contamination chamber or what.  That's what it made me think of.  And hardly anyone got through without some kind of extra check.  I heard some other people got fingerprinted or something, and I got behind one guy in the line who was being questioned and then didn't notice that everyone else was getting through except us in back of him.  Mike had nothing, though.  He apparently is less suspicious-looking than I am...  But the point is, we all made it, one way or another.  And now we're home again!