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5/18/09
Today was a day of history and politics, we started off a little later than normal and headed out to Yad Vashem, the national Holocaust museum. It was a different experience than any other museum I have ever been in. It progressed linearly through time starting at the beginning of the Jewish oppression and then leading to the death camps and then the end of the war. It was designed to be distressful. It did its job well. At the very end of the main museum we went into a room called the hall of names. Above us were pictures of some of the Jews killed in the Holocaust. The room was circular and on the walls it was filled with shelves that had names and sometimes journals or descriptions about some of the people who died. However, there were quite a few empty shelves that where meant to hold the names of those people who had no identification or no family to claim them.
After leaving the main museum we went to the children's memorial. It was quite a different experience. 1 in 4 of all the Jews killed in the Holocaust were children. In the memorial it was really dark and filled with mirrors. There were 5 candles lit in there but it reflected hundreds of times. It was very moving. Pictures were forbidden inside of both the memorial and the museum so I only have pictures of the outside.
After that we spent a few minutes in the gift shop and headed toward the Israel Museum. I was so excited to go there I was afraid I might faint! When we first got our itinerary we weren't supposed to stop by there but Mike made an amendment to the agenda so we would go! We first saw a model of the second temple after Jesus but right before the fall to the Romans. It was huge and so cool! (I picked up a book about it for future teaching resources and because it has really good pictures!) Mike pointed out all of the places we had seen while in Jerusalem to us. So cool!
Then we went to the Shrine of the Book. That is where they have on display some fragments from the Dead Sea scrolls! In my last semester at Morningside I did a 2 credit independent study on the Dad Sea Scrolls so I was quite excited to see fragments of the same scrolls I had read from! I spent so much time just looking and drooling (not literally but you know what I mean). It was probably my favorite place in all of Jerusalem. I spent some money in the gift shop (more cool things to help me when I teach… and a nerdy Dead Sea Scrolls mouse-pad for kicks and giggles).
After that we headed across the street to the Knesset building to get a short tour and meet a representative who is a Jew from Ethiopia. He was quite interesting to listen to in comparison to Ezra who we had heard last night. I have to admit I was somewhat tired and missed some of the conversation because of that but I will admit he had a very good story. I also was interested in hearing his solution to the "Issue" of Palestine. He believes in a 2-State solution. It was almost fascinating in comparison. I don't believe that either of the solutions will be appealing to one of the groups but it is a lofty goal for the Knesset member to believe in.
After listening to the Knesset member we went to a place called Neve Shalom just outside of Jerusalem. This community is where Jews and Arabs have decided to live peacefully in the same community. It was an awesome experience. We listened to a representative from the community who explained that he had been there from almost the beginning of the community and has not seen any problems. They are similar to a Kibbutz but that people don't eat communally or work communally. It is a great idea, but after seeing so many prejudices I am almost sure it would never work for the entire state.
That night the students and I went back to Ben Yehuda street and sat outside and just talked. We shared some of our favorite moments from the trip, the regret of having to leave, and many other random things. It was a great way to finish our last night in Israel.
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