"I Sea Dead People"

After the mental scarring from seeing Brian’s naked body vigorously worked over by a hairy Turkish man in the Hamam, I knew it was time to move on. And what better place to purify the soul than the Holy Land?

Our trip to Israel brought with it the excitement of seeing Jerusalem, Tel Aviv, the Dead Sea, and the ruins of Caesarea. While in Israel we were the guests of family friends Anne and Daniel Cohen who welcomed us into their home and ensured we got a true Israel experience during our short time there. Anne and Daniel, thank you so much for having us.

When we arrived in Israel, Daniel picked us up at the airport and drove us to his home in Caesarea – a beach community that was developed by the Rothschild banking family. As soon as we arrived Anne welcomed us with a hearty meal, and while we were full of stories in the car, we ravenously ate in silence when the food was put in front of us. We had not had a home cooked meal in 6 weeks and we have each lost about 15 pounds, so Anne’s excellent cooking was the perfect remedy. After finishing we fell into a food-coma for a few hours before Anne took us to see the ancient ruins of Caesarea.

Caesarea was a port city built by Herod the Great to honor his Roman patrons. A vibrant city developed from this endeavor of which the ruins are evidence. Anne walked us along the water where we observed a Circus (where chariot races and gladiator competitions were held), an amphitheatre, and numerous temples and palaces. 

After going through the ruins we returned home where we had an excellent dinner. It was a full house at the Cohen’s as they also had friends visiting from France who were on a goodbye tour before moving to New York. We came to find out that the family was moving to NYC because Thierry, the father, was a chocolatier and ran an NYC chocolate shop called Sugar and Plum. Brian and I were amazed as we had both heard of it due to its reputation for making almost anything out of chocolate from candy bars to hand bags to Easter eggs. We spent dinner poring over pictures of different chocolate creations by Thierry and resolved to go there the next time we were in New York. 

The next day we made our big trip to Jerusalem with Anne and family friend Julie. Anne and Daniel arranged for us to have a guide although I'm not sure we needed it because Anne was so knowledgeable already. Jerusalem is a convoluted, beautiful mess of ruins, holy sites, and worshippers from Islam, Judaism and Christianity. It was hot and crowded but we managed to see it all: the Wailing Wall, the Dome of the Rock, and the Holy Sepulcher

Brian and I even felt so holy as to write down a prayer and put it into the Wailing Wall. Neither of us are Jewish but we were wearing kippahs so I hope it worked. Next we made the big push to get in to see the Dome of the Rock. There was nothing spiritual or holy about this as it required some force. The line was hours long but our guide was determined to get us in so she kept trying to get another guide towards the front of the line to take us with their group. When that didn’t work, she tried to cut everyone numerous times and repeatedly got into heated arguments, blatantly lying  that she had been there the whole time. One argument got so hated that a man told her, “If you get in line here I will body slam you.” He obviously had a background in wrestling but still she persisted. After that argument fizzled out she nudged me and said, “Go in front of the woman with the baby.” I looked over and saw a poor mother holding her baby in the sweltering heat. She was moving slowly forward, pouring water on her baby’s head. Like a jungle animal our guide had picked out the weakest prey. My conscience said no but the guide dragged Brian and I over and asserted her position. Although I felt bad, had we not cut we would have never seen the golden domed mosque where Muslims say that Mohammed ascended to heaven. We've come to find that wearing shorts is offensive to pretty much every faith so we had to wear these cloths to cover them:

After this we made our way to the Holy Sepulcher, the church that was built where Jesus was crucified and buried before the Resurrection. The church was packed with Christians wall to wall all trying to touch where the cross had been placed (shown to the right), where His body was cleaned before he was buried, and the tomb itself. 

Christians who have permanent fixtures in the church are the Catholics, Armenians, and Greek Orthodox; but, none of these sects of Christianity have the key to the church. Our guide directed us to an underwhelming looking man sitting by the door. She told us that his family had had the key for centuries because they were related to general in Saladin’s army. After Saladin defeated the Crusader and took back Jerusalem he gave the land the church was on and the key to this general as a reward. So, the key to the most holy Christian site belongs to a Muslim. Pretty crazy.

The next day we sent by the pool and on the beach of Caesarea. After another amazing lunch we relaxed before going into Tel Aviv for dinner and a taste of the nightlife. It just so happened that a fraternity brother of ours, Michael Laser, was also in Tel Aviv that night; so after a great dinner at an Italian restaurant with the Cohen’s, we went to meet up with him. Michael happened to be in town to play a tournament on the pro-tennis circuit. Brian and I were in awe as he described his year of travelling and playing professional tennis all around the world. Life really is just better for professional athletes.

Michael had been to Tel Aviv before and wanted to show us one of his favorite places. After a little waiting outside we got in with a stroke of luck. The stroke of luck being that they had let in all of the attractive women and rich men and we were the only normal looking people left in a lengthy line of pasty looking point-dexters.

Now lets talk about the women. While Brian fended off a few unwanted “courtships,” (like this girl posing in our picture), I was naturally fascinated by every dark haired Israeli woman I saw.  

After talking with this group for a while I fell in love with Israeli women. All of them go to the army after high school and then they travel for 6 months before college; so, this means that they are not only interesting to talk to but they could also kick my ass – what more could you want?

After a great night in Tel Aviv we awoke the next day to drive to the Dead Sea. The Dead Sea is “dead” because nothing lives in it due to the high salt concentration. The salt is bad for marine life but excellent for floating. Brian and I spent the day floating around effortlessly. You literally don’t have to move at all to float as we demonstrated in the pictures by keeping our hands and feet out of the water. While hands and feet can go in the water, definitely don’t dunk your head. If the salt gets in your eyes or mouth a searing pain follows.

After floating around we decided to coat ourselves in the famous Dead Sea mud. The black mud is supposed to have a nourishing effect on the skin so we covered every inch of our bodies. Upon looking at ourselves in the nearby mirror we were shocked by how different we looked. After applying the mud we practically ran into the water to cool off as the black mud trapped the Israeli sun, baking our skin. This was when I made the mistake of dunking my head.

We rinsed off the remaining mud and salt and made for Caesarea to get some rest before our trip to Scandinavia. The next day we even got to the airport three hours early (or so we thought) because of how tough Israeli security is. After making it to the check out counter, the Turkish Airline representative took a look at our itinerary and said, “You are very early. Your flight isn’t until June 5.” Shocked, we walked over to the ticketing counter to get it changed to a flight for May 5.

We are now in Scandinavia with just over a week to go in our trip!