I made it!!!!!!

Well, I made it!!!!!!!!!!!! After the longest trip I have ever had, I am FINALLY in Jerusalem! I don’t even know where to begin… It is gorgeous! The BYU Jerusalem Center sits up on the Mount of Olives (or Mount Scopus depending on who you ask!) and it overlooks all of the city of Jerusalem, including the Dome of the Rock and the Church of the Holy Sepulcher. The view from the gardens here is breathtaking!!! The first day we got here, pretty much all we wanted to do was sleep. You should have seen all the students during orientation- we were all nodding off to sleep! Somehow I made it through and quite frankly, I don’t even remember changing my clothes or crawling into bed. I was that tired. And I slept, like a ROCK, the whole night. The next morning, we were up early for breakfast at 6:15, another orientation meeting, and a walking tour of the city of Jerusalem. The walking tour was SO SO SO cool! I felt like I saw a million things- it was hard to take it all in. We literally walked miles and miles and saw so many cool things. I can’t wait to see all the sights that were pointed out to me. And let me tell you- I can’t wait to go SHOPPING!!! I saw a million things that I thought looked so cool! Anyways, yesterday was our first day that we could go into the city by ourselves. A bunch of us walked to the Old City- the hills here are killer! My calves were definitely a little sore after walking the whole day :D It was interesting to walk through the city and see how things in Israel are for the average person on an average day. And I am sure all the Mormon kids are quite the sight for the Israeli’s here- I have never gotten so many cat-calls in my life! It seemed like everywhere we turned Israeli boys were trying to get us to come with them, or telling us we were beautiful, or just making strange noises toward us. Yikes!!! But on the overall, it was such a cool experience to just walk through the city and really begin to explore all the things Jerusalem has to offer. Today was the Sabbath- it was kind of strange having the Sabbath be on Saturday, but as the day progressed I forgot that it wasn’t Sunday and it wasn’t so strange anymore. It was amazing to be singing the hymns about Jesus while staring out at the beautiful overlook of Jerusalem. Honestly, it gave new meaning to the hymns- everything religious has a new meaning. It is just amazing to be here!!!!!!! I can’t wait to see what this amazing place has in store for me!!!