Finally in Jerusalem

It has been interesting trying to get to this place. I was supposed to leave Cairo on a bus the night of Saturday, June 16, arrive at the Egyptian/Israeli border the morning of Sunday, June 17, take a bus to Jerusalem, and arrive in the Old City around 1pm. Of course, you can never count on things working out as you planned when traveling in the Middle East:) Which is always a good lesson for me to revisit: I can't always control life around me.

Now for the story:

Cairo's information line gave my friend Mohamad wrong times for the bus and we missed it by an hour. The man at the bus ticket counter told us there was another bus headed towards the border at 7:15am (saba w roba). So, we decided to stay up all night...caught an Egyptian movie at the cinema, ate chicken panne sandwiches at Mo'men (one of Egypt's fast food chains), and met up with one of his friends who doesn't sleep much and smoked shisha. I caught a couple hours of shut eye while in Mohamad's car, but I was pretty exhausted by the time we got back to the bus station at 6:50am. At the bus station, the same man told us that we had missed the bus to the border by 5 minutes. Mohamad started to fight with him...the man had said 7:15am, it was written on the schedule that the bus was leaving at 7:15am, but he insisted he had told us 6:45am (saba illa roba). I finally left Cairo at 10:15am.

Thankfully, I got a good night's sleep last night at a hostel and am feeling pretty alert right now. My teammates in At Tuwani say they don't really need me until tomorrow. So, I think I may walk around for a bit and then go to the Church of the Holy Sepluchre and sit in silence and pray for a while. It will be good to slow down before I reach the village tomorrow.