Last day in the middle east!

Tonight marks the last day of my time in the middle east. To make travelling easier tomorrow me and Stephen have come back to Jerusalem. It was fairly easy to get to Jerusalem from Nablus. We took various services and taxis and then crossed the border by foot. That was a new experience for me but it was pain free :D Once the other side of the checkpoint we got on a bus to Damascus Gate.

Damascus gate at about 1pm

After photographing the gate we walked to the hostel as the tram was not free anymore :(. It was a lovely walk very hot though! I did have to stop a few times as I was carrying everything in my hiking bag which was not easy in the heat!
After checking into the hostel we went for a walk around the Old City. Due to it being the Sabbath after sundown today we did the Western Wall/Wailing Wall first. I walked to the women's side of the wall and wrote out a prayer and stuck it in the wall.

Women's side of the wall

We walked through the different quarters, the Jewish Quarter, the Armenian Quarter, the Christian Quarter and the Muslim Quarter. We walked around the Church of the Holy Sepulchre.

The tower of the Church of the Holy Sepulchre

I got to see the stone where Jesus' body was annointed before burial, where Jesus was crucified and where he was buried. As we walked around, we got to see the different chapels of the different denominations, including Catholic, Ethiopian Orthodox and Greek.

I also saw Helen's Cistern, a large well next to the church. I had to duck and crawl through arches and corridors to get there.

A blurry picture of Helen's Cistern

Afterwards, we carried on walking through the Old City, and left it through Damascus Gate just as dusk was falling and the call to prayer started.

Jerusalem at night

We then went to dinner and came back to update my blog. A very exciting week was had!

Palestine Day 4!

Last night I had an invite to Stephen's Boss' house for dinner. All the internationals at the University who work in the LRC (language resource centre). It was really lovely food, all traditional and there was plenty of it. There was so much food left over that all the internationals took home goody bags. The walk back to Stephen's apartment was fun with a stomach full of food whilst walking up and down hills!

Today, Stephen got called into work so I decided that I will spend the morning exploring the old city and doing my Mother's shopping for her! The things I do for her. I managed to find the old town by walking there (all downhill!). I found the shop I was looking for, although I walked past it 3 times but that happens when you can't read Arabic. I asked another shop keeper he didn't understand the English but Stephen wrote it out for me in Arabic before I left. Turns out the shop was diagonally opposite the shop I was at asking! I had a tour then did my shopping. I carried on looking around the old city and took photos.

One of the streets in the Old City

A ruin building in the Old City

Once I finished in the Old City I walked around the Modern part of Nablus, including the Mall for a drink. It was weird being in a Shopping Mall that didn't have any Christmas decorations up, but there again this is an Islamic State so they wont be celebrating Christmas here.

After I finished looking around Nablus, I walked back to the Old campus of the university and stopped briefly outside the cemetery. Afterwards I found Stephen at the New Campus of the University after I managed to work out the Services on my own....yay go me!!! I spent some time in the LRC and then one of the students who kidnapped me Tuesday, took me on another tour of the campus this time to the medical school and then to the mosque. I got to go into the Mosque and they didn't require me to cover my head. I got shown the prayer books and then the student convinced the female worker there to give me a copy of the quran, so somehow I have now have a copy of the quran which I have to get back through the airport in Israel!!!

As this is my last night in Palestine, I can say I have thoroughly enjoyed myself and will come back here again. The country is lovely and the people are really friendly. There are still places to see and visit which I haven't done yet so I will be back some day!