After a week of manipulating and arranging and rearranaging photos, blurring my aging eyes with pixels and colors and every shade of light and darkness, I have finally completed our Israel 07 album on Flickr.
At the same time, maybe I am finished with adjusting again to our local time. The two goals seemed to go hand in hand. Perhaps I was living in multiple worlds while I worked on the album - the past and the present, Mid-East time and Pacific Standard time - and neither would reconcile until I finished the album. Until the album was completed, I would have no normal sleep.
During the trip, my memory captured some quotables by Anise (I'm not sure exactly how to spell his name) - our very knowledgeable and eloquent tour guide from NAWA, and Pastor Matthew - our host from Gloria Dei Lutheran Church in Escondido. Pastor Matthew said something that keeps resounding in my memories:
When I'm here in Capernaum, I long to be in Jerusalem; and when I'm in Jerusalem, I long to be in Capernaum.
Church of St Peter's Primacy
Originally uploaded by Suzie Rozie.
Such it seemed with me as I completed the album. When my spirit was in the present in Israel, I longed to be in its past; and when my spirit was in Israel's past, I longed to be in its present. It is the wonder of such a place. The experience is transforming on levels that can't be understood.
Church of St Peter in Gallicantu
Originally uploaded by Suzie Rozie.
One of the strongest impressions that will remain with me, as I think of this place that has such a presence in our lives, is that Israel is a place of light and color. On many occasion, after snapping a picture and checking it to see if my lighting was sufficient or overdone, I found myself sighing with wonder and contentment at the brilliant display of colors and light! Had there not been another picture I wanted to capture quickly, I would have found myself lost in the image on my disc, being satisfied as I explored the display I saw there.
I had the fear, before we took this journey, that Israel would be some sort of Christian Disneyland, overbuilt with human (and therefore artificial) monuments to stories in the Bible. That fear was unfounded. I found myself weeping at the Wailing Wall, as I did at Fatima, with the people there, both men and women. Our needs are great no matter where we are, and we seek God's closeness throughout our lives.
Israel is a living, breathing place. The monuments (chapels, churches, sanctuaries, basilicas) are so respectful and so tastefully exhibit the remains of the historical sites they protect. They have been built with the greatest of care and sense of beauty. Rarely are they duplicates of one another; rarely do they show a sense of a group of humans grabbing a spot and saying "This is Mine!" I feel a great sense of gratitude for those who participated in creating these works. They were creating no Disneyland.
Here's how I recommend viewing the album, if you are so inclined:
-Open the collection by clicking the Israel 07 box that should be on the right of your screen.
-Choose a set to look at, such as 10 Dec 07 - Capernaum. I believe you will see the main picture for the set, on the left, with a description of the set's contents, with thumbnails of all of the pictures on the right.
- Here, choose one of two choices:-Beneath the 10 Dec 07 - Capernaum label just to the right of my picture, click the Details link and view the pictures with their descriptions -- or
- Click the Slideshow link at the right corner just above the pictures. If you view the pictures as a slideshow, move your mouse over the picture. You'll see an "i" when you do that. Click the "i," and the captions will appear below the picture as the slideshow progresses.
You can leave comments if you have something to say about the picture - a clarification of the image, your thoughts, or whatever.
I hope you enjoy. The album isn't perfect, of course - if perfection were attainable, it would take much longer than I have spent on this endeavor - but I hope you enjoy it as it is and get a taste of what we saw and felt during this brief journey!
It was a marvelous trip, one that I would recommend to anyone who is inclined to travel. Our touring company, NAWA, specializes in Christian tours, but the trip was as much about present-day Israel and Palestine as it was about its historical Christian past and present. That, to me, gave this trip a distinct advantage. Whatever we longed for, from the vantage point we were enjoying at any moment, was not far away.
Please feel free to forward our Flickr or my blog link to anyone you believe might be interested. We love to travel and our thirst to know our world and our co-habitants on this earth is endless. We love viewing albums of others on the Internet, and we try to present our albums in a way that means you can travel with us, too.
Sue and Lauren
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