Christmas in Bethlehem!

Is… different.

On one hand, it’s pretty incredible looking out on the hill that Bethlehem is built on as I read the Christmas story.  It’s crazy to think we’re looking at the same sky as the shepherds…  That is cool.

But otherwise… it was not what I expected.  I don’t know what I expected, but I don’t think I got what I thought I’d get.

 

 

Painted on “The Wall” just inside the checkpoint in Bethlehem.  Interesting wording too, considering my recent trip to the Holocaust Museum…

 

We headed up to Manger Square (the market square right outside Nativity church) on the morning of Christams Eve to watch the scouts in their parade.  That was pretty cool.  All the local families came out for the festivtes and the news stations… Char got interviewed several times by different ones!!  They scouts came through in their fancy uniforms and drumlines and bagpipes bands!!  I don’t know how or why bagpipes caught on here, but they are huge.  Check out some of the scouts:

See that girl behind the girl in front?  The girl looking the other way?  That’s on of the kids I’ve been working with!  I saw several of them marching by!  I felt so proud!

The parade was pretty cool.  I dug it.

Afterwards we headed back to our house and had a feast of a lunch: homemade pita chips, hummus, and mixed veggies… super good.

Later that night we headed back up to manger square to check out the festivities.  This is what we saw:

They had shows going on all night, up until midnight.  Christmas eve here is like new years in the states.  It’s a big party and everyone hangs out until midnight and then cheers.  It’s kind of weird.  We didn’t stay the whole time because there were tons of people and we were definitely touristy looking enough for people to constantly try to sell us things. 

In the morning all the families came out and it was fun, in the night time, all the creepers come out.  There were a lot of the 20 something year old guys who were kind of gross d-bags… no offense, but that’s really how it is. 

So we cruised back to our place.

This morning we had a great family breakfast.  Then played a four hour game of risk, had some presents and now we’re relaxing… it was a good day.