Jerusalem

November 11, 2019 – I came to Jordan with 1 trip in mind: traveling to Jerusalem. I finally got the chance to go there this past weekend with my friends. We crossed the King Hussein Bridge border crossing from Jordan into the West Bank on Friday afternoon, and, after going through immigration on the other side, we arrived at our AirBnb in Jerusalem by Friday evening. The next day we started our day by taking the light rail to the Damascus gate (a 5 minute ride from our neighborhood).

The Old City of Jerusalem is just as exciting and vibrant as I remembered it. People of every faith and every background going about their daily lives while tourists swarm their city. We made our way to the Western Wall, the remnants of the Second Temple. We returned to the Wall on Shabbat, and it was much more full than it was on Friday morning.

Following the Temple, we went to see the Holy Sepulchre and just explored the small, narrow streets of the Old City.

After a long day of exploring the Old City, we attempted to get the light rail home only to realize that the tram stops operation 90 minutes before Shabbat and doesn’t resume service until 90 minutes after Shabbat ends. So we ended up paying 50 shekels to a taxi driver to take us home.
The next day, we explored the new city of Jerusalem. Again, because it was Shabbat, most businesses were closed. However, we still found a lot to see. First, we walked from the Old City to the new city just to explore by foot. We ended up seeing a lot of empty streets, but found our way to a park where we were so excited to see grass! There’s almost no green spaces in Amman, so my friends and I spent time just lying in the grass under the trees in the park while watching some locals play a game of cricket.

After sitting for awhile, we headed up to the Israeli Museum, which houses a model of Jerusalem from the Second Temple Period, some of the original Dead Sea Scrolls, and rotating art exhibitions. The temporary exhibit this season, “Veiled Women of the Holy Land”, displayed the various conservative clothing choices of Jewish, Christian, and Muslim women in Israel-Palestine. It was insightful to see how similar the forms of dress were to each other. Often, in the West, we tend to believe that only Muslim women choose to veil themselves, but many Jewish and Christian women also choose to dress conservatively in public.

Following the end of Shabbat, we went to a market in the New City to meet some friends who were also visiting Jerusalem for dinner.

On our last day in Jerusalem, we got up very early to go to the Temple Mount to see the Dome of the Rock and the Al-Aqsa Mosque. We arrived at the Damascus gate around 7:00 AM, and the streets were virtually empty. We made sure that we got to the Temple Mount early, knowing that it wouldn’t be very crowded. The Dome of the Rock is probably one of the most beautiful buildings I have ever seen. Being a hexagon, it looks good from every possible side. The Dome of the Rock was built not too terribly long after the life of the Prophet, making it one of the oldest buildings in Islam’s history. The story goes that the Umayyads built the structure as a testament to the greatness of Islam and it’s distinctness as a religion separate from Judaism and Christianity. The Golden Dome and the exterior are part of the original structure, only undergoing occasional renovations. The beautiful tile-work is an addition by the Ottomans, who restored the site after their conquest of Jerusalem.

Following the Temple Mount, we embarked on our journey back across the King Hussein Bridge and back to Amman. The trip to Jerusalem marks my last trip outside of Jordan for the semester, but don’t worry, I still have a couple more adventure in the Hashemite Kingdom before December 14th. Thanks for reading!!

-Matt