Grand Priory of the Hospitaler Knights . . .

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A cat enjoys the shadow of a flagpole in the Old City of Jerusalem, providing fodder for both Camera-Critters and Shadow Shot Sunday.

Please enlarge the photo to read the history!

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The complex in back of this stone is called the Muristan (bimaristan meaning "hospital" in Persian).

After the Hospitaler knights left their headquarters on the Temple Mount, they took up residence in the Muristan.

The order was founded during the First Crusade and is also known as the Order of St. John.

These knights, entrusted with caring for the health of Crusaders and pilgrims, built a hospital here.

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As you can learn from the inscription, "the Grand Priory in the British Realm" followed their example in more recent times.

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A bridge over ancient history

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For Sunday Bridges over at San Francisco Bay Daily Photo, here is a bridge, of sorts, in Jerusalem.
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The 16th century Damascus Gate is the main entry into the Muslim Quarter.
From the street and sidewalk and plaza outside the portal you must walk over a bridge to enter the Old City.

The modern bridge rests on the remains of earlier structures, most of them from the Crusader period. The Crusaders built their own gate here after they captured Jerusalem in 1099.

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Even farther down is what the tour sign calls the Roman Square.

The Roman Legion destroyed the Temple in 70 C.E. In the 2nd century emperor Hadrian changed Jerusalem's name to Aelia Capitolina and it became a pagan Roman city.

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The arch you see in the photo is the only survivor of a magnificent Roman triumphal arch which was comprised of three vaulted gates.

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Jerusalem's September 11 memorial

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I like this Mother and Child Center at Hadassah Medical Center mostly because of the flags.
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We in Israel are especially united in memory with the people of the United States today.
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I urge you to watch a 4-minute video of the dedication of the September 11 memorial sculpture and plaza in the Jerusalem Hills.
Its plaque reads

"A REMINDER OF SHARED LOSS AND A CALL FOR PEACE AMONG NATIONS."
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The names of the 9/11 victims are written there, in the Jerusalem Forest, that we may remember.
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Imagining the binding of Isaac

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Today is the second day of Rosh Hashana, the Jewish new year.
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The Torah portion that is read on this day is Genesis 22, God's testing of Abraham by asking him to sacrifice his son on Mount Moriah.
In Hebrew we call it the Akedah, the binding of Isaac.
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Below is a wide variation of artistic portrayals of the story, on display at the Jewish museum in Jerusalem's Hechal Shlomo.
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"Abraham's sacrifice," designed by W. Breathe, England, 1870, porcelain, manufactured by Wedgewood.
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On the other extreme is this simple brass tub drilled with holes, made in Israel in the 20th century.

The inscription is "Lay not thy hand upon the lad," the welcome words of God's messenger-angel.

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This is an illustration on a 1743 map of Eretz-Israel, painted in France.

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A painting by Moshe Castel, 1925.

We can see the ram, tangled in the branches by its horns, which will be offered instead of Isaac.

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"The way to the mountain," wool thread on cushion cover, embroidered in Ethiopia in the 1980s.

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The servant boys stay behind with the donkey, Isaac carries the wood for the fire, Abraham carries the knife. Vultures circling above?

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You have to admit, religion has a lot of drama at its core.

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More about Rosh Hashana in previous posts:

A stone sculpture of the Akeda

Fish heads

New calendar for a new year

Tashlich bread to the fish

Shofar, tashlich

The world's birthday

Pomegranate symbol

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Home and away

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Look who's standing on my desk (with a little help from her mom), and she's only four months old!
I have been spending many of the past nine days with these two.

We celebrated the eve of Rosh Hashana with relatives on the roof of their Tel Aviv apartment building.

I took a chance and took a picture of Naomi and Libby with only the light from the window and a little candlelight from the table.

Last night was our difficult parting, and today my beloved daughter and granddaughter are winging their way back to Australia (24 long hours of flying).

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As a way of getting close to them again, today I experimented with photographing their photo on my computer screen, adding Grandma Dina's reflection looking at the kids with love and longing.

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Sigh . . .

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I hope it will be good for James' Weekend Reflections.
Happy new year 5771 to you all.

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KinderKot

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The KinderKot is so practical for travel.
Daughter Naomi bought it in Australia last week and here it is, in the Jerusalem Hills today!
And sleeping peacefully inside it, our little bundle of joy, Libby.
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The KinderKot is like a pop-up tent for little ones, complete with self-inflating mattress.
It folds down and slips into a carrying case about the size of a steering wheel. Very light.
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The windows can be either clear or curtained or with a bug screen.
The KinderKot website says this is one of Dutch designer Roy van Aalst's revolutionary designs.
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Reflections in a laptop

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Three generations together at one computer!
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Daughter Naomi, back in Israel for a short visit, had just signed off from a Skype video call with her husband and two sons back home in Australia. (Hence the big smile.)
For a second she and my granddaughter Libby were reflected on the blank screen.

I snapped a picture of them for James' Weekend Reflections.
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First shy rain

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Finally! Clouds on the horizon last night!
And at noon yesterday a whole minute of sprinkles, the first rain we've seen since last spring.

For the first time in a month, the day temperature dipped a few degrees below the 30s C.

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For SkyWatch Friday, things are looking up.

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Sunrise breakfast with baby in the Jerusalem Hills

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Meet Libby, my sweet 4-month-old grandbaby.
She and my daughter flew up from Australia yesterday for a short visit in the homeland.
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As the photo proves, I am the typical doting grandmother; but hey, it was my very first time to hold the little girl!
In Hebrew libi means "my heart," and Libby has truly captured my heart.
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After flying across seven time zones, Naomi and Libby felt the jet lag, so we were all up for a very early breakfast as the sun rose on the Jerusalem Hills.
We stay at the old house of friends who are conveniently away.
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A baby goes to market

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My favorite picture from Jerusalem's huge outdoor market, Shuk Mahane Yehuda.
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City Daily Photo bloggers have our monthly Theme Day today and the subject is open air markets.

Click here to view thumbnails for all participants.
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Life in the gutter

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A gutter on the go in a back alley of Jerusalem -- for ABC Wednesday G-day.
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Seeing it made me start singing the kid song:
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"The itsy bitsy spider went up the water spout.
Down came the rain and washed the spider out.
Up came the sun and dried up all the rain,
and the itsy bitsy spider went up the spout again. "

The good old tinsmith does wonders with his mallet.
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(Yes, it's a photo from winter. We are still in the 30s C every day this August. I can hardly wait for winter!)

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An enclosed garden in the middle of new Jerusalem

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Come, step through the (almost always locked) little door in the big gate, enter a hidden garden.

The monastery wall separates you from busy Agron Street, the big hotels, and modern Jerusalem.

The church was built from the 1880s until 1927.

The convent, school, guest hostel, and church belong to the Catholic Arab women's order called the Congregation of the Rosary Sisters.

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More about them in my earlier post.

Sit in the shade of an old olive tree

and enjoy the lovingly-tended gardens.

A scarecrow in a keffiyeh guards the sisters' vegetable garden!

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Hope you enjoyed today's visit in the secret garden for That's My World Tuesday.

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Bench for catnaps

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The neighborhood stray cats have taken over the young neighbors' little sitting corner.

It is too hot for the kitties to do much else than snooze in the shade.
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A peaceful picture for Camera-Critter Sunday.
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Action above and below-ground

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A battle in the skies of Jerusalem?!
Who will win, the mast of Calatrava's Bridge of Strings or the giant cranes?
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The cranes are working in a deep pit that we saw in a previous post.
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The crane's shadow, for Shadow Shot Sunday, suddenly curves as it hits the side wall of the 80-meter-deep pit.
There is a big machine near the air hose. I think they are starting to bore a tunnel for the future high speed Tel Aviv-Jerusalem train.
This hole will someday be the train station, and it will double as a bomb shelter.
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The bridge, or at least the top part of it, is for Louis la Vache's Sunday Bridges.

The sabra passes hands

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I love this photo.
The Muslim opens a sabra for a nun while the Jew takes their picture.

During sabra season, this Arab woman sits on the ground at Denmark Square in Jerusalem

and sells the sabras she has brought from home.

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At prayer time she spreads a little rug among the bushes and prays.

She is the only Muslim woman I have ever seen praying in public.

I like her. Someday I will find a way to open a conversation.

So far it has only been, "Please, may I take a picture of you and the sister and the sabra, no faces?"

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In yesterday's post, readers and I talked about sabras and Sabras.

But you know, tsabar is originally an Arabic word; it was adopted by modern Hebrew.

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Sabra cactus can grow to five meters tall and is also very wide.

Arab farmers used to plant them in rows as living fences against intruders.

Whenever I am out hiking and come across a straightish line of sabras "in the middle of nowhere," I can guess that there might have been a village there around the middle of the previous century.

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Sabras--the taste of summer

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It's sabra season!

I tried to get a picture of a big sabra cactus through the bus window and ended up with a bonus--a reflection for James' Weekend Reflections.
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My neighbor was outside on his steps peeling the prickly pears, so I went over to watch and to sample some sabras.
He himself is a Sabra (a native-born Israeli), so since childhood he has known how to pick and peel this fruit of the cactus.

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I asked to learn his secrets of painless preparation of the fruit:

1. Pick them at 5:oo in the morning when the thorns are still soft from the dew.

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2. Put them on the ground, turn on the garden hose, and brush them with a stiff broom.

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3. You can then also soak them in water for a further softening of the remaining stickers.

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4. Hold the sabra in one protected hand, as illustrated.

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5. Cut off the top and bottom of the fruit.

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6. Make a cut from top to bottom.

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7. Reach in and pull out the slippery bare fruit with your bare hand.

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8. Bless and eat (and pray that no barb gets stuck in your finger, or worse yet, your tongue).

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Trees in a row, happy for dusk

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Enlarge and see the silhouettes all in a row.

The sun had just gone down behind the farthest ridge, across the valley from my hill, giving each individual tree a nice silhouette.

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Sunset is a blessed moment, a waited-for and welcome turning point after long hot days of relentless summer sunshine. For people and animals for sure; maybe even for trees?

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More skies of the world over at Sky Watch Friday.

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A bike lane, in Jerusalem?!

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Jerusalem is going to have a dedicated bicycle lane??
Hard to believe!
The pictures of bikes along the new sidewalk is a good sign though.

As we saw in yesterday's post, Jaffa Street is getting ready to have its first-ever tram, in April inshallah.
The new sidewalk has been made, trees have been planted, and little shelters for future tram riders have been built.
In the photo above, the light rail tracks are to the left of the station.

Here's how that part of Jaffa Street looked in December 2008 when the rails were still above ground.
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This is the way I often walk from the Central Bus Station to the Mahaneh Yehuda market.
It is faster to walk than to sit in a bus that is trapped by the congestion of having only one or two lanes open for traffic.
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Living in Jerusalem takes a lot of patience.
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You know, I'm thinking now . . . they probably are making a bike path in order to keep bike riders off the tram lane.
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Dressing the poles

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The tram/light rail is making progress toward its predicted April completion date.
All up and down Jaffa Street I saw cosmetic touches being made, before my very eyes!

The poles that will supply the overhead electricity for the trams got beautified!
First the two workmen wrapped a skirt around the base.
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Then, with drill in hand, they wrapped her--I mean IT--with the top part of the crenelated skirt that slid down and got tucked into the base
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Ta-da!

Complete with beautiful decoration--the lion of Judah, symbol of the Jerusalem Municipality.

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Fuel for faith's flame

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When next you see a flame of faith lighting the darkness,

give a thought to my friends who freed up time to fill flasks of fuel for the vigil lamps.

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Fondly posted for F-day at ABC Wednesday.

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